Description

The scope of professional ethics is much wider than the texts of legal codes. For, in attempting to achieve a just balance between freedom and responsibility, the ethical aspects of this dichotomy depend not only on conscious decisions by a journalist, but also on practices in the media and the general social environment.1 Media ethics and standards comprise principles of ethics and of good practice as applicable to the specific challenges faced by journalists. Historically and currently, this subset of media ethics is widely known to journalists as their professional "code of ethics" or the "canons of journalism".2 The basic codes and canons commonly appear in statements drafted by professional journalism associations and individual print, broadcast, and online news organizations