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Press Self-Regulatory System in the UK: The Evolution from 1953 to 2014 and the Performance in the Post-Leveson Era

thesis
posted on 2025-05-15, 09:08 authored by Qishan Jiang

For over 70 years, the British press has operated under a system of self-regulation. However, the repeated failures of self-regulatory bodies have sparked a long-running debate about how print media should be regulated. At its core is a differing understanding of the relationship between the press and government in democratic countries, influenced by neoliberal and social-democratic theories. The press industry’s strong resistance to regulatory reforms has led to a cyclical pattern in the history of British self-regulation. In the post-Leveson era, debate about the effectiveness of self-regulation continues.

This thesis examines the institutional designs of historical British self-regulatory bodies, their responses to proposed regulatory reforms, and the overall evolution of press self-regulation in the UK. It employs thematic analysis to identify three key themes: regulatory framework and scope, regulatory operations and governance, and challenges and performance. This research then assesses the performance of the current self-regulators, IPSO and IMPRESS, using the Recognition Criteria from the Royal Charter of the Press to evaluate their alignment with Leveson’s principles for effective, independent regulation. It also quantitatively analyses their complaint-handling statistics. Furthermore, this project explores how IPSO and IMPRESS are portrayed in The Guardian - a major national newspaper that chose not to join these regulators. Through content analysis, it explores The Guardian’s coverage of these regulators, its editorial stance on press regulation, and its own regulatory approach.

The central contribution of this thesis is the identification of three key themes to review the evolution of self-regulation in the UK press industry and to underscore the differences and similarities among historical self-regulators. It argues that self-regulatory reform is reactive, selective, and retrogressive, and characterised by slow and delayed reform processes. By applying regulatory capture theory, this thesis reveals the persistent influence of the newspaper industry on these regulators. Moreover, it contributes to the ongoing debate on the effectiveness of current self-regulators by identifying areas for improvement. Finally, the analysis of The Guardian’s coverage raises concerns about whether current regulators effectively serve the public interest and offers insights into viable alternatives to joining a self-regulatory body.

History

Supervisor(s)

Peter Lunt; Lieve Gies; David Smith

Date of award

2025-03-19

Author affiliation

School of Arts, Media and Communication

Awarding institution

University of Leicester

Qualification level

  • Doctoral

Qualification name

  • PhD

Language

en

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