Concurrently fading away and strengthening: A cross-country comparison of foreign and local news beats

One of the structuring logics behind the creation of news beats is the geographical one: that is, national, foreign and local news desks. Foreign and local beats, in particular, have a lot in common: the coverage of different geographical contexts increases the diversity and plurality of views; reporting from geographical peripheries is always the costliest in terms of production; the audience is more dispersed; and geographical news beats can create a sense of belonging to the place and the associated community of people. The national news desk is traditionally considered the most important and it receives adequate research attention; the coverage of foreign and local news desks is scarcer. Our aim is to make a cross-country comparison of key national media in 13 countries, both quantitatively and qualitatively, with focus on geographical news beats. We aim to answer the following questions: How do selected national news organisations cover geographical news beats, specifically foreign and local news beats? How are these news desks organised in terms of production and staffing? How does this practice vary across selected national news organisations? The findings are based on a combination of executive semi-structured in-depth interviews and a byline analysis of news stories. The findings illustrate that economic pressures have a significant impact on the maintenance of geographical news beats, although concurrent international crises may reinforce their importance. We have developed a conceptual model based on four different groups of media with their similar editorial strategies as related to foreign and local news beats.