Kjersti Thorbjørnsrud

• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2018). Mediated Agency, Blame Avoidance and Institutional Responsibility: Government Communication in a Personalised Media Landscape. Scandinavian Political Studies.  41(2), s 210- 232 . doi: 10.1111/1467-9477.12117
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Figenschou, Tine Ustad (2018). Consensus and dissent after terror: Editorial policies in times of crisis. Journalism - Theory, Practice & Criticism.  19(3), s 333- 348 . doi: 10.1177/1464884916657519 Vis sammendrag

  This article analyses the role of central editors in constructing a national debate in the Norwegian media after the 2011 Oslo terror attacks. A broad literature has documented that after crisis, mainstream media move away from their everyday critical function to a ritual type of journalism that fosters adherence to shared values and support for national authorities. Based on in-depth interviews with debate editors, this article analyses how this type of national crisis discourse is substantiated and guarded through editorial decisions and policies. Second, it gives insights into how changes in the perceived climate of opinion and increasingly vocal critical voices gradually affect editorial practices and challenge consensus. Theoretically, the article combines perspectives from a critical approach (the media as channels for political authorities during crisis) and a cultural approach (the media as constitutive for resilience and recovery) to contribute to the understanding of crisis journalism in a multi-platform, multi-directional media landscape.

• Figenschou, Tine Ustad; Karlsen, Rune; Kolltveit, Kristoffer & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Serving the Media Ministers: A Mixed Methods Study on the Personalization of Ministerial Communication. The International Journal of Press/Politics.  22(4), s 411- 430 . doi: 10.1177/1940161217720772 Fulltekst i vitenarkiv. Vis sammendrag

  The personalization of politics has received much attention in both the political science and political communication literature, but the focus has almost entirely been on party leaders and prime ministers. This study investigates the personalization of ministerial communication in Norway, a type of decentralized personalization. It combines a survey of communication workers; in-depth interviews with politicians, communication workers, political reporters, and top-level civil servants; and ethnographic observation inside a ministry. The article goes beyond media-centered perspectives and identifies several potential drivers and barriers to personalization processes. Based on our mixed methods approach, we find that ministerial communication in Norway is strongly centered on the minister in both reactive media management and the proactive promotion of the minister and new policies. This decentralized personalization is driven by both demands from the media and the strategic adaptation by political and administrative actors within ministries. Based on the rich empirically grounded insights, the article discusses how the interplay between the logic of the contemporary commercial news media, political ambitions, internal administrative ambitions, and changes in executive government shapes the personalization of ministerial communication, and illuminates how these multiple drivers of personalization are mutually reinforcing.

• Midtbøen, Arnfinn Haagensen; Steen-Johnsen, Kari & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Boundary-making in the public sphere: Contestations of free speech, In Arnfinn Haagensen Midtbøen; Kari Steen-Johnsen & Kjersti Thorbjørnsrud (ed.),  Boundary Struggles : Contestations of Free Speech in the Norwegian Public Sphere.  Cappelen Damm Akademisk.  ISBN 978-82-02-53503-2.  Ch. 1.  s 13 - 43 Fulltekst i vitenarkiv. Vis sammendrag

  Freedom of speech is a fundamental human right and considered a core value in liberal democracies. However, it is also one of our time’s most contested issues, constantly claimed either to be too wide-ranging, allowing continuous repression of minority groups, or too limited – restricting dissent and democratic deliberation. In this book we depart from conventional approaches of free speech, which tend to focus on whether specific types of public talk should be considered legally allowed or not. Instead, we study how boundaries of free speech are contested and negotiated through social processes which silence certain groups and opinions while amplifying others. Theoretically, we build on the concepts of boundaries and boundary-work. The study of symbolic and social boundaries has a long tradition in sociological and anthropological research, but is less used in current scholarship on free speech. We believe that this field of research can benefit from employing this perspective because it allows us to study the social processes through which boundaries of free speech are drawn, maintained and changed. How are boundaries of free speech defined – explicitly or implicitly – by institutional elites? And how are these boundaries perceived by the mainstream public and from the margins of the public sphere? These questions direct our attention to fundamental dynamics of the public sphere: Public debates are shaped by social mechanisms which silence certain groups and opinions, while amplifying the voice of others. These mechanisms create boundaries that are not (primarily) defined through judicial paragraphs, but rather barriers made of different types of perceived pressure, self-censorship, exclusion and stigma. Sometimes boundaries of free speech appear bright and clear-cut, based on a strong consensus regarding what opinions and groups are considered legitimate or illegitimate in the public sphere. However, they are more often blurred and ambiguous, leaving room both for explicit conflict over where the boundaries are or should be drawn, and for individual maneuvering in the public sphere based on assumptions about the subtle rules defining ‘the game’ of public participation. In a sociological perspective, we argue, the public sphere can be seen as a locus of ‘boundary struggles’: Constant debates over the boundaries of free speech shape the dynamics of public debates and gradually change what actors and opinions are granted a legitimate space in the public sphere.

• Moe, Hallvard; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Fladmoe, Audun (2017). Perceptions of journalistic bias: Party preferences, media trust and attitudes towards immigration, In Arnfinn Haagensen Midtbøen; Kari Steen-Johnsen & Kjersti Thorbjørnsrud (ed.),  Boundary Struggles : Contestations of Free Speech in the Norwegian Public Sphere.  Cappelen Damm Akademisk.  ISBN 978-82-02-53503-2.  Chapter 4.  s 109 - 137
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2016). Disruptive Media Events : Managing mediated dissent in the aftermath of terror. Journalism Practice.  11(8), s 942- 959 . doi: 10.1080/17512786.2016.1220258 Vis sammendrag

  Terror attacks force democratic societies to mobilize, reinforce and rethink core values, including media freedom and freedom of speech. The present article analyzes how one traumatic event— the 2011 Oslo terror—challenged editorial practices related to editorial control and open debate in major Norwegian media organizations. Meeting the call for more research on disruptive media events in a hybrid media landscape, it illuminates how professional media balance critical debate with strategies for societal recovery in contemporary post-crisis contexts. Based on in- depth interviews with debate editors, the article documents how terror profoundly challenges edi- torial practices, routines and norms in media organizations with debates in multiple formats and platforms. In their online comment sections, the media organizations all moved towards a more interventionist policy introducing multiple new control measures. In the traditional op-ed formats, however, they selectively expanded the range of voices and included actors deemed too extreme prior to the attacks. Theoretically the article contributes to the literature on disruptive (key) events, editorial strategies during crisis, editorial control in contemporary media systems and editorial approaches to mediated deviance.

• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Figenschou, Tine Ustad (2016). Do marginalized sources matter?: A comparative analysis of irregular migrant voice in Western media. Journalism Studies.  17(3), s 337- 355 . doi: 10.1080/1461670X.2014.987549
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad; Beyer, Audun & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2015). The moral police : agenda-setting and framing effects of a new(s) concept of immigration. Nordicom Review.  36(1), s 65- 78 Vis sammendrag

  How does the general public understand media coverage of immigration issues? The present article analyses the media effects of an extensive news series focusing on the harassment of people believed to disrespect traditional Muslim norms. Through an explorative survey study, it traces how Norwegian media launched and covered what was labeled "the moral police" phenomenon, and to what extent the media framing of the issue had an agenda- setting and/or frame-setting effect on the public. It finds that, although most respondents had become aware of the issue through the media, they did not necessarily adopt the media’s framing of the phenomenon. The respondents did not primarily relate the "moral police" to immigration (the dominant media frame), they understood the new phenomenon through experiences from their own lives and framed it as a general social problem.

• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2015). Backstage media-government negotiations: The failures and success of a government pitch. International Journal of Communication.  9, s 1947- 1965
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2015). Faces of an Invisible Population: Human Interest Framing of Irregular Immigration News in the United States, France, and Norway. American Behavioral Scientist.  59(7), s 783- 801 . doi: 10.1177/0002764215573256 Vis sammendrag

  Based on a quantitative, comparative analysis of U.S., French, and Norwegian news media, this article examines the use of human interest stories in the coverage of irregular immigration. In an innovative design, it systematically analyzes how human interest framing is related to the frequency and complexity of dominant arguments and perspectives (issue-specific frames). In contrast to the extant literature, arguing that news on immigration reduces immigrants to dangerous and anonymous threats, the article finds that about half the news stories studied have a human face or example. Moreover, these human interest articles tend to frame the issue from the immigrants’ perspective, describing their personal stories and struggle. This result nuances the commonly held assumption that human interest frames signal declining news quality, as the number and range of arguments presented are not significantly reduced when human narratives are employed. The prevalence of human interest frames is highest in Norway, where we also identify a reduction in frame complexity in human interest stories, indicating the need to rethink the democratic corporatist model in media system theory.

• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2015). Myndighetspropaganda eller demokratisk arena: Irregulær migrasjon i norske nyhetsmedier, I:  Eksepsjonell velferd? Irregulære migranter i det norske velferdssamfunnet.  Gyldendal Juridisk.  ISBN 978-82-05-48425-2.  Kapittel 5.  s 110 - 127
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Larsen, Anna M. Grøndahl (2015). Mediatized Asylum Conflicts: Human-Interest Framing and Common-Sense Public Morality, In Mikkel Fugl Eskjær; Stig Hjarvard & Mette Mortensen (ed.),  The Dynamics of Mediatized Conflicts.  Peter Lang Publishing Group.  ISBN 978-1-4331-2808-0.  Chapter 6.  s 129 - 145
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2015). Byråkrati, medier og kommunikasjon, I: Øyvind Ihlen; Eli Skogerbø & Sigurd Allern (red.),  Makt, medier og politikk: Norsk politisk kommunikasjon.  Universitetsforlaget.  ISBN 9788215024585.  kapittel 11.  s 147 - 158
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2015). Mediatization of public bureaucracies: Administrative versus political loyalty. Scandinavian Political Studies.  38(2), s 179- 197 . doi: 10.1111/1467-9477.12041
• Ihlen, Øyvind; Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2014). Mediatization in new areas: The changed role of public bureaucracies, In Josef Pallas; Stefan Jonsson & Lars Strannegård (ed.),  Organizations and the media: Organizing in a mediatized world.  Routledge.  ISBN 978-0-415-81365-5.  5.  s 162 - 175
• Ihlen, Øyvind & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2014). Making news and influencing decisions: Three threshold cases concerning forced return of immigrants. European Journal of Communication.  29(2), s 139- 152 . doi: 10.1177/0267323114523149
• Ihlen, Øyvind & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2014). Tears and Framing Contests: Public Organizations Countering Critical and Emotional Stories. International Journal of Strategic Communication.  8(1), s 45- 60 . doi: 10.1080/1553118X.2013.850695
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti; Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Ihlen, Øyvind (2014). Mediatization in public bureaucracies: A typology. Communications.  39(1), s 3- 22 . doi: 10.1515/commun-2014-0002
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti; Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Ihlen, Øyvind (2014). Mediatization of public bureaucracies, In Knut Lundby (ed.),  Mediatization of communication.  Mouton de Gruyter.  ISBN 978-3-11-027193-5.  12.  s 405 - 422
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2013). The autonomy of Scandinavian public service broadcasters during election campaign periods :. Nordicom Review.  34(1), s 63- 76
• Brekken, Tove; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Aalberg, Toril (2012). News Substance: The Relative Importance of Soft and De-Contextualized News, In Toril Aalberg & James Curran (ed.),  How media inform democracy. A comparative approach.  Routledge.  ISBN 978-0-415-88908-7.  s 64 - 78
• Lundby, Knut & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2012). Mediatization of Controversy. When the Security Police Went on Facebook, In Stig Hjarvard & Mia Lövheim (ed.),  Mediatization and Religion. Nordic Perspectives.  Nordicom.  ISBN 978-91-86523-44-2.  Kapittel.  s 95 - 108
• Strabac, Zan; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Jenssen, Anders Todal (2012). News consumption and public opposition to immigration across countries, In Toril Aalberg & James Curran (ed.),  How media inform democracy. A comparative approach.  Routledge.  ISBN 978-0-415-88908-7.  Chap.11.  s 176 - 188
• van Aelst, Peter; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Aalberg, Toril (2012). The Political Information Environment during Election Campaigns, In Toril Aalberg & James Curran (ed.),  How media inform democracy. A comparative approach.  Routledge.  ISBN 978-0-415-88908-7.  Chapter 4.  s 50 - 63
• Ihlen, Øyvind; Allern, Sigurd; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Waldahl, Ragnar (2010). The world on television: Market-driven, public service news. Nordicom Review.  31(2), s 31- 45 Vis sammendrag

  How does television cover foreign news? What is covered and how? The present article reports on a comparative study of a license-financed public broadcaster and an advertisingfinanced channel in Norway - the NRK and TV2, respectively. Both channels give priority to international news. While the NRK devotes more time to foreign news (both in absolute and relative numbers) than TV2 does, other aspects of the coverage are strikingly similar: The news is event oriented, there is heavy use of eyewitness footage, and certain regions are hardly visible. At least three explanations can be used to understand these findings: the technological platform (what footage is available, etc.) and the existence of a common news culture that is based on ratings and similar views on what is considered "good television". A third factor is that both channels still have public service obligations.

• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2008). ”Inne eller ute"? Casting av politikere til valgdebatt. Tidsskrift for samfunnsforskning.
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2008). Organizing Audiovisual Election Campaign Coverage. Influence on power relations between Media and Politics in Norway, In Jesper Strömbäck; Jesper Ørsten & Toril Aalberg (ed.),  Communicating Politics- Political Communication in the Nordic Countries.  Nordicom.  ISBN 978-91-89471-63-4.  Chapter 7.
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2007). Nærkamp i Redaksjon EN, I: Anders Todal Jenssen & Toril Aalberg (red.),  Den medialiserte politikken.  Universitetsforlaget.  ISBN 978-82-15-01063-2.  kapitel 7.
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2003). Politiske nyhetsjournalister: Aktører uten intensjoner?. Norsk Medietidsskrift.

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• Midtbøen, Arnfinn Haagensen; Steen-Johnsen, Kari & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (ed.) (2017). Boundary Struggles : Contestations of Free Speech in the Norwegian Public Sphere. Cappelen Damm Akademisk.  ISBN 978-82-02-53503-2.  323 s. Vis sammendrag

  Freedom of speech is a fundamental human right and a core value in liberal democracies. It is also, however, one of our time’s most contested issues, constantly claimed to be either too wide-ranging, at the peril of vulnerable minority groups, or too limited, restricting dissent and democratic deliberation. Employing a sociological lens on the dynamics of the public sphere, this book investigates how the boundaries of free speech are contested and negotiated through social processes which silence certain groups and opinions while amplifying others. The book focuses on key topics in current free speech debates – immigration, religion and culture. Drawing on population-representative survey data, media analysis and in-depth interviews, the authors paint a broad picture of how boundaries of free speech are defined and maintained, experienced and challenged, in the rapidly changing Norwegian public sphere. The analyses in this book build on four years of work on a large-scale project called The Status of Freedom of Speech in Norway, funded and initiated by the Fritt Ord foundation. The book presents the key findings of the second round of this project.

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• Figenschou, Tine Ustad; Larsen, Anna M. Grøndahl & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2018). Lokal helse og omsorg i mediene: Mediepåvirkning på nært hold. Rapport – Institutt for samfunnsforskning. 2018:9. Fulltekst i vitenarkiv. Vis sammendrag

  Denne rapporten belyser hvordan medienes vinklinger og formater påvirker lokal helsedebatt og helsepolitikk. Den diskuterer særlig hvordan ulike kilder og strategiske aktører aktivt søker å prege mediedekningen for å endre beslutninger i enkeltsaker og overordnede prioriteringer i kommunale helse- og omsorgstjenester. Gjennom dybdeanalyser av tre caser som alle omhandler kommunale helse- og omsorgstilbud, viser vi hvordan medieoppslag med lokalt utgangspunkt setter dagsorden for lokale helsemyndigheter, men også løftes opp på den nasjonale politiske dagsorden.

• Beyer, Audun; Brekke, Jan-Paul & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Communicating borders : informing migrants and potential asylum seekers through social media. Rapport – Institutt for samfunnsforskning. 2017:04. Fulltekst i vitenarkiv. Vis sammendrag

  Informing migrants and potential asylum seekers through social media Summary How do Norwegian immigration authorities use social media in their communication with migrants with Norway as destination? In this study, we analyze the Norwegian Facebook campaign titled “Stricter asylum regulations in Norway.” The campaign was launched by the Ministry of Justice and Public Security in a period when asylum arrivals to Norway peaked in the fall of 2015. In addition to the Norwegian campaign, we examine similar internet based information campaigns in a range of other European countries. The study demonstrates that the social media campaign allowed Norwegian authorities to reach migrants that they would not have reached through conventional means of information. This was accomplished through the use of paid content on Facebook, and the targeting of specific groups who received the information from the Norwegian Government in their personal Facebook feed. The study of similar European and international campaigns confirmed that strategic government communication with migrants through social media is still in an experimental phase. The analysis of the Norwegian campaign demonstrates the need for a set of general guidelines for government communication on social media. The report also notes that we have limited knowledge about the effects of these campaigns. Further research should study how migrants perceive this information and how it influences their decision to migrate. Government communication on social media raises questions related to transparency, communication format and rhetoric, norms of dialogue and target group identification. When communicating with migrants in potentially vulnerable situations, these are questions that clearly needs focus.

• Syse, Henrik; Ezzati, Rojan; Erdal, Marta Bivand; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti; Figenschou, Tine Ustad; Kaufmann, Mareile; Lysaker, Odin & Steen, Francis Frode Østberg (2017). Negotiating Values: Norway in the wake of July 22. PRIO Report. 2017.
• Halrynjo, Sigtona; STEEN, Arild Henrik & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2009). Norsk arbeidsliv - storm eller stille.
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2009). Journalistenes valg. - Produksjon - interaksjon – iscenesettelse. Møtet mellom journalistikk og politikk i en valgkamp med fokus på NRK Fjernsynets valgformater. Acta Humaniora. 388. Vis sammendrag

  A Journalistic Choice. Interaction – Production - Dramaturgy. The meeting between journalism and politics during election campaign periods exemplified with the election formats of NRK. Through ethnographic methods this thesis explores the dominating production premises and principles behind political TV-journalism during election campaign periods in Norway. The thesis further investigates the nature of the relations between central TV-teams and politicians and their parties during this period, with a focus on the power balance between the two groups. Based on an extended case design the thesis then analyses the Norwegian case in a comparative context where different kinds of political and public control regimes with the audio visual election coverage in different democracies are explored. This design opens up for a combination of a micro level study of the interaction between journalists and politicians with meso and macro level analyses of institutional and structural factors that come into play as central premises for these relations. The theoretical perspectives that feed the empirical analysis are based on a combination of Pierre Boride’s field theory and arguments from the theories of Ervin Goffman and Arlie Hochschild concerning the significance of emotional norms for the way we interpret and behave in communicative situations. The main empirical finding of the thesis is that the Norwegian political field in particular, compared to the political elites in other countries, has adapted to the premises of a journalistic logic during an election campaign period. This is a journalistic logic based on popular or tabloid criteria, it is largely implicit rather than made explicit, and it is based on preliminary agreements with the politicians involved, open for changes according to upcoming events and alternating judgments of newsworthiness. The meeting between journalism and politics are in Norway asymmetrical in the sense that journalists control resources that politicians are highly dependent of, whereas the politicians lack the ability or will to change the premises of the journalistic logic in play.

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• Figenschou, Tine Ustad; Karlsen, Rune; Kolltveit, Kristoffer & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Media influence on bureaucratic decision-making: Evidence from Norway and the Netherlands.
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Dual Personalization: Government communication in an emotional media landscape.
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Helsebyråkratiets bevisste bruk av media.
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Social bureucracies? Government communication beyond the news logic.
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Sosialt byråkrati?.
• Midtbøen, Arnfinn Haagensen; Steen-Johnsen, Kari & Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2017). Utstøting og selvsensur truer ytringsfriheten i Norge. Aftenposten (morgenutg. : trykt utg.). Vis sammendrag

  En fungerende offentlighet er sannhetssøkende, bygger på utveksling av rasjonelle argumenter og er åpen for kritisk meningsbrytning. Men fungerer offentligheten slik i praksis, eller bidrar trusler, stigmatisering og selvsensur til en fattigere felles offentlighet, der bestemte grupper og synspunkter forsvinner? Etter over fire års empirisk arbeid i prosjektet Status for ytringsfriheten i Norge er vår konklusjon at den norske offentligheten ikke lever opp til slike idealer. Utstøting og selvsensur er to sentrale mekanismer som regulerer hvem som deltar og hva som ytres i norsk offentlighet.

• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2015). Framing Irregular Immigration in Western Media. American Behavioral Scientist.  59(7), s 771- 782 . doi: 10.1177/0002764215573255
• Figenschou, Tine Ustad; Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti & Ihlen, Øyvind (2012). Mediatized bureaucracy: Uncovering mediatization in public organizations.
• Thorbjørnsrud, Kjersti (2010). Med media som 7. sans : norsk politikk som ekstremt case. Sosiologi i dag.  40(4), s 77- 91

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