Case Studies
(and Case Studies Seminars)

Every so often, a new case study will be posted on this site and readers are invited to submit their "adjudication" of the matter to the Council by email. The details how to send in your judgment are given with each case study.

The Case Studies

The case studies are intended for use by journalists, students and others as a method of simulating the adjudication process of the Australian Press Council.

Details of that process, as used at Case Studies Seminars, are outlined in the introduction below.

In 1994-99, the Council secretariat produced 26 fictionalised case studies. Each was based on an actual complaint dealt with by the Council by way of adjudication. However, all features which might identify parties were - as far as possible - changed. Therefore, locations, dates, names and other pertinent details were altered, where applicable. Similarly the comments from complainants and newspapers have been rewritten to simplify details or obfuscate material that may reveal the identity of parties. In the case of photographs, in those case studies where they were used (and they were deliberately omitted from some), they were deliberately "unfocussed" to render the people in them less identifiable. Case Studies 1-5 are examples of fictionalised studies.

In 2000, the Council approved the use of genuine cases for its case studies and embarked on a program of taking the case studies to universities and to other institutions. The new Case Studies, developed from 2000, will use the original material and versions of the original complaint and the newspaper's response, with only slight changes to protect the privacy of some parties.

In 2002, the Case Studies program was offered to all universities with a journalism course and 14 agreed to host seminars. The exercise is being repeated in 2003 with even more universities involved.

Examples of these case studies will be posted in the future after their use at the universities. Case study 7 - related to 'graphic' front page images - is the first of these. Additionally, a case study, based on a complaint about an opinion column has been posted as an article from the May 2002 APC News.

Neither the case studies nor material from them should be used or reproduced without the written consent of the Australian Press Council.

Introduction

The Council meets regularly with the industry and the public to discuss their interest in, and their concerns with, the ways in which the Council deals with complaints. In 1993, Steve Foley, then Assistant Editor of The Age, Melbourne, and an industry member of the Council, proposed a meeting with young journalists.It was decided to let the young journalists learn about the Council by doing what the Council does - adjudicate on complaints. So, the Council office began to put together a series of case studies.

The Council considers complaints against its principles. Some of the case studies were considered under a different (and slightly longer) set of principles under which the Council worked for its first twenty years. (The Council reviewed its principles with a view to simplifying and strengthening them and the revised principles came into effect in October 1996. In 2003 Principle 6 was further revised.) The Council's complaints procedures are simple and are directed towards mediation.

Only those complaints that cannot be mediated or otherwise disposed of (approximately 20 percent of all complaints) are dealt with through the Complaints Committee. Both the complainant and the newspaper are invited to attend the Complaints Committee's hearing of the complaint. (See the guidelines on hearings.) One member of the Complaints Committee is asked to act as a rapporteur to prepare a draft adjudication for discussion. The draft briefly summarises the complaint, and the newspaper's response. It then sets out a proposed determination on the complaint and the reasons for reaching that decision, applying the relevant parts of the Statement of Principles.

An adjudication normally begins with an indication as to whether the complaint is upheld or not. (Some complaints are upheld in part). However, when an important principle is involved, the adjudication might lead with a discussion of that principle. A draft adjudication is developed by the Complaints Committee from the rapporteur's draft.

The full Council then considers the Complaints Committee's draft. Quite often the Council's final version of the adjudication will differ from the draft, sometimes substantially.

The purpose of these case studies is to give the participants at the seminars an opportunity to simulate this process, and, by consensus or by a majority, work out a position on the facts which will indicate whether the newspaper acted responsibly. Participants thus have an opportunity to consider and apply the commonly accepted ethical principles of reporting in factual situations.

The seminar debates the issues, and votes whether to uphold or dismiss the complaint. That decision is then contrasted with the Press Council's determination on the real complaint.

The Council intends to maintain records of the web responses to the case studies, which will be a valuable resource in indicating professional and community attitudes to these essentially ethical issues.

The case studies were written by Deborah Kirkman, the Council's Office Manager, and Jack R Herman, the Executive Secretary, who edited all of them for presentation.

The Council hopes that the use of these case studies will provide an understanding of its processes, and more importantly, continue the examination by the press and the public of the ethics of one of the pillars of our democracy - the free press.

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