RETHINKING CONSTRUCTIVE JOURNALISM BY MEANS OF SERVICE JOURNALISM

This article argues that constructive journalism scholarship should look to service journalism and its subfields, cultural journalism and lifestyle journalism, to understand the key characteristics of this newer type of journalism. Though constructive journalism is typically associated with the reporting of political and social issues, it is also seen to challenge the traditional ways of writing about such hard news topics due to its positive and solution-oriented approach. In this respect, constructive journalism seems to reuse some of the approaches known from service journalism, especially in terms of audience address and an expanded social role for journalists. However, service journalism emerged in the increasingly commercialized and globalized media landscape of the post-World War II period, whereas constructive journalism has emerged in the digital media landscape of the 2010s. These historical contexts provide particular circumstances for both types of journalism.