"Who Makes the News?" Not Many Women, Study Shows

LONDON - The most extensive study to date of gender coverage in the news indicates that women remain significantly underrepresented across the globe.

"Women – 52 percent of the world's population – are barely present in the faces seen, the voices heard, the opinions represented in the news," concludes the 2005 report of the Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP).

The results of the study were released to the public at a press conference and panel discussion at the Foreign Press Association in London Wednesday. The event and the research project were sponsored by the World Association for Christian Communication, a multi-faith based organization in spite of its name.

The 2005 study was the third in a series of worldwide media monitoring days, the first two occurring in 1995 and 2000. In each round, a random day was chosen on which trained media monitors around the globe recorded and analyzed the news stories on television, radio and in newspapers. The 2005 survey covered almost 13,000 pieces of news in 76 countries.

One of the key findings of the 2005 report was that little had changed in the previous decade. In 1995, women constituted 17 percent of news subjects (people interviewed or whom the news was about). In 2005, the proportion was 21 percent— roughly one female for every four male appearances in the media.

"I was surprised to see such little progress," said Professor Dafna Lemish, Chair of the Communications Department at Tel Aviv University and coordinator of the project in Israel. "At the rate of 3 percent change every five years, it will take until about 2060 to reach 50 percent."

Speakers at the press conference also highlighted the lack of significant disparities across geographical regions. The gap between North America, the area with the highest ratio of female news subjects and Asia or Africa, the regions with the lowest proportion, was only eight percent, with Europe falling right in the middle.

The study also indicates that when women do make the news, it is not as figures of authority such as experts but rather as celebrities, royalty or the "person on the street". According to Margaret Gallagher, the report's author, this does not necessarily reflect the reality of women's roles in society, such as their proportion among decision makers and professionals.

"In Rwanda, 49 percent of politicians are women, but only 13 percent of the politicians in the media were women," she said. "If the media is a mirror of reality, then it is a very distorted mirror."

Channel 4 news anchor John Snow, who chaired the panel that followed the press conference, maintained that given the disorderly nature of newsrooms, this distortion was not always intentional and could be difficult to change.

"[Journalists] don't have the capacity to ensure that women don't get on," he said. "At ten minutes to five, you take whoever you can get."

According to Professor Lemish, who served as an expert witness during the panel discussion, the misrepresentation of women in the media is not only a matter of quantity but also quality. Women are often presented as specific stereotypes, such as the "bimbo" or the "trophy wife." They are often depicted as excessively emotional or as helpless victims. When interviewed, they are stripped of official titles and described based on family status, such as the "mother of X".

She said that for both female presenters and news subjects there is also an emphasis on appearances, with youthful looks often valued more than expertise. The GMMP study indicates that age has a crucial bearing on whether women appear in the news and that female presenters disappear from the screen as they get older.

"Up to the age of 34 women are in the majority as both news presenters and reporters," says the report. "By the age of 50, only 17 percent of reporters and 7 percent of presenters [are women]."

Despite the figures for older women, the study found that there has been a steady increase in the percentage of news items reported by female journalists, rising from 28 percent in 1995 to 37 percent in 2005. Some of those present at the event therefore found it difficult to understand why the content of articles was not more balanced in terms of gender.

According to Lemish, this is because women, like men, are socialized to see the world and gender issues through certain eyes. "It is the same for women journalists," she says. "They play by the rules of the game."

What next?

One of the questions that concerned panel participants was how to change the rules of the game. Several suggestions were raised, ranging from having more women in management positions to better training for journalists to a code of conduct concerning balanced coverage.

Regarding codes of conduct, there was some disagreement among the media professionals on the panel as to their effectiveness, with some arguing that such codes are rarely implemented.

Anchor John Snow maintained, however, that the regulatory structure of television did enable more balanced gender representation. He called for a code of conduct for the printed press, saying that the latter's self-regulatory structure is a "scandal."

The report emphasizes another strategy, one that may be more immediate, comprehensive, and ultimately more effective: incorporating women's perspectives and roles into most news stories, rather than relegating them to separate articles.

"Good, innovative journalists will see the professional advantage of thinking about gender—in terms of sources, priorities, and perspectives—to produce stories that are more rounded, balanced and stimulating," says the report. "From this point of view, paying attention to gender becomes not an extra burden but a professional imperative."

The GMMP monitors hope that the report will serve as a tool for change. As such, Wednesday marked the launch of a three-week campaign to raise awareness on the representation of men and women in the media. The campaign, titled "Who Makes the News?" will conclude on March 8, International Women's Day and is being conducted in partnership with other organizations like the United Nations and Amnesty International.

In the meantime, activists in other organizations say the study's concrete findings will assist them in their daily work.

"It's ammunition," says Amy Pratt, Communications Manager for Womankind Worldwide. "It's another bullet in my belt."