INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS
IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
PRODUCCIÓN INFORMATIVA DE LA PRENSA ESCRITA
EN ECUADOR DESDE LA PERSPECTIVA DE DERECHOS
HUMANOS
DOI:
Artículo de Investigación
https://doi.org/10.37135/chk.002.17.01
Received: (18/10/2021)
Accepted: (11/02/2022)
Universidad Técnica de Cotopaxi, Faculty of Human
Sciences and Education, Communication Career,
Latacunga, Ecuador.
lourdes.cabrera@utc.edu.ec
Lourdes Yessenia Cabrera-Martínez
Universidad Técnica de Cotopaxi, Faculty of Human
Sciences and Education, Communication Career,
Latacunga, Ecuador.
pablo.lomas@utc.edu.ec
Pablo Esteban Lomas Chacón
Universidad Técnica de Cotopaxi, Faculty of Human
Sciences and Education, Communication Career,
Latacunga, Ecuador.
ricardo.urena@utc.edu.ec
Ricardo Francisco Ureña-López
Universidad Técnica de Cotopaxi, Faculty of Human
Sciences and Education, Communication Career,
Latacunga, Ecuador.
franklin.falconi@utc.edu.ec
Franklin Eduardo Falconí Suárez
Número 17 / AGOSTO, 2022 (23-39)
INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
Número 17 / AGOSTO, 2022 (23-39) 24
INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS
IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
PRODUCCIÓN INFORMATIVA DE LA PRENSA ESCRITA
EN ECUADOR DESDE LA PERSPECTIVA DE DERECHOS
HUMANOS
This article presents the analysis of the news production of El Extra, La Hora and La
Gaceta, three written media in Ecuador with the highest national, regional and local
circulation respectively. The objective was to determine to what extent their contents
are generated from a human rights perspective. Thus, two aspects were addressed: 1)
informative production based on the index of violation of rights in the media, and 2)
evaluations of journalistic discourse in relation to themes, sources, images and headlines.
A mixed approach was used through content analysis and a focus group (FG) in which
journalists participated. Among the most relevant results, the predominance of content
that violates rights in two of the three media stands out in the indicators overrepresentation
of reality and manipulation, although in the indicators ridicule and misuse of language
there is no prevalence, there is a signicant frequency of content who use language
inappropriately and discriminate against individuals or groups. In addition, the dierences
in the organizational dynamics of the media aect journalistic routines and need to promote
permanent training mechanisms on human rights.
KEYWORDS: Human rights, journalism, written press, perception
Este artículo expone el análisis de la producción informativa de El Extra, La Hora y La
Gaceta, tres medios escritos de Ecuador con mayor circulación en lo nacional, regional
y local, respectivamente. El objetivo fue determinar en qué medida sus contenidos se
generan bajo una perspectiva de derechos humanos y para ello se abordaron dos aspectos:
1) producción informativa en función del índice de vulneración de derechos en los medios,
y, 2) valoraciones del discurso periodístico en relación a temáticas, fuentes, imágenes y
titulares. Se trabajó con un enfoque mixto mediante el análisis de contenido y un grupo
focal en el que participaron periodistas. Entre los resultados más relevantes se destaca
el predominio de contenidos que vulneran derechos, en dos de los tres medios, en los
indicadores sobrerrepresentación de la realidad y manipulación, aunque en los indicadores
ridiculización y mal empleo del lenguaje no hay prevalencia, hay una frecuencia importante
de contenidos que usan de manera inadecuada el lenguaje y discriminan a personas
o colectivos. Además, las diferencias en las dinámicas organizativas de los medios de
comunicación, inciden en las rutinas periodísticas y necesitan promover mecanismos de
formación permanente sobre derechos humanos.
PALABRAS CLAVE: Derechos humanos, periodismo, prensa escrita, percepción
ABSTRACT
RESUMEN
Lourdes Cabrera-Martínez / Ricardo Ureña-López / Pablo Lomas Chacón / Franklin Falconí Suárez
CHAKIÑAN. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades / ISSN 2550 - 6722 25
INTRODUCTION
The media, as the fundamental actors in
public’s opinion conguration, contribute on
the constitution of political, social, economic
and cultural scenarios of the peoples. Precisely
because of this, it’s essential to ponder about the
relationship between the media and the human
rights. This means to think in diverse areas, one
of them is related with the challenges that appear
in the context of the economic globalization
(Tuvilla 1997). Many authors (Barrera 2017;
Torres 2005) point out that the human rights’
recognition is going through a serious setback in
face of the economic policies characterized by
cuts in socials investments, opening to external
markets and privatization of state companies.
Therefore, to analyze media and human rights
implies to think the conditions on how they
are generated, in a landscape drawn by severe
processes of inequality and poverty. Reguillo
(1998) and Torres (2005) agree that setting the
structural issues aside will be a reductionism
which would prevent realizing the media’s
complex role in dissemination processes and
human rights defense. From the perspective
of Reguillo, taking in consideration these
conditions, to review the link between human
rights and communication is problematic due to
the media: “are but the most visible expression
or no more element of a structure of inequality”
(Reguillo 1998:19).
In order to overcome this situation, the author
proposes that a previous work, oriented toward
the disassembly of discourse, mechanisms and
devices which favor the naturalization of the
exclusion is primordial. Thus, Reguillo (1998)
proposes the analysis from three dierent
frames: 1) the media role in a context of poverty
caused by neoliberal policy, 2) binary media
narratives that hinder the debate about social
inequalities, y 3) the way on how women, youth
and indigenous identity are built.
Along this same line, Torres (2005) explains
that quoting communication and human rights
involves promoting the analysis about how in
a capitalist context the signs of domination and
exclusion get worse as they prevent the otherness’
recognition, while the notion of wellbeing is
associated to consume and productivity which
bypasses the possibilities of dialogue and citizen
encounter. In fact, entailing a space that enables
the formation of critic and reexive citizens
about their environment is one of the subjects
in which many research converge (Torres 2005;
Unicef 2006; Barrera 2017) and it’s considered a
remarkable factor when it’s about linking human
rights and media.
Consequently, a debate from a structural
perspective is indispensable, this means
evidencing the urgent need to redene the
sense of communication and think the media
content in a critic manner. Thus, this orientation
will be the one helping how to understand the
democratization processes’ claims, in order to
warranty the citizen’s participation (Torres 2005;
Unicef 2006; Barrera 2017). These demands
born after questioning this condition of those
media traditionally linked to an instrumental
conception, which make dicult to shape critical
scenarios facing the inequity and poverty issues
experienced in Latin America (Unicef 2006).
Therefore, it is urgent to rethink the role played
by the audience: moving from the vision of
passive entities, which only receive information,
to leading actors in participatory processes, such
perspectives are explained by “an exhaustion of
mechanistic communicational processes” (Torres
2005:76) and that is the scenario that marks the
debate on human rights. From where and how
can the articulation between human rights,
participation and citizenship be promoted? What
role does the media play? Literature analyzes,
explains and agrees that daily experience is
the accurate place for this connection because
it is where citizenship is built. (Reguillo 1998;
Gumucio 2012).
In contrast to a space marked by the media
that promote vertical practices, there are social
groups that demand the democratization of
communication and, from the day-to-day,
promote actions aimed at humanization (Torres
2005). Such actions are driven out outside the
INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
Número 17 / AGOSTO, 2022 (23-39) 26
traditional media, which are functional actors
to an economic system and, therefore, do not
problematize the root causes of social inequality.
In these circumstances, the role of academia
becomes fundamental, in such a way that it is
possible to examine the complex relationship
between the media and human rights, which
carries on the debate on citizenship, participation
and democracy. This is exactly the main interest of
the project by Universidad Técnica de Cotopaxi,
named University Center for Media Analysis:
observation and educommunication on issues of
human rights, gender and interculturality, whose
general objective is to think about the discourse
of the media from the point of view of human
rights, gender and interculturality; in order to
identify discriminatory content in such a way
that building educommunication participatory
processes and alternative communication is
made possible between the university, the
mass media and the educational community of
Cotopaxi.
In a particular way, this article presents the
most relevant ndings regarding the reaching
of human rights. It is done by following-up of
three written media that circulate in the city
of Latacunga: La Gaceta, La Hora and El
Extra. What is interesting to underline are the
characteristics of the informative speech and
thus make visible the way on how these media
favor or prevent exclusionary or discriminatory
practices. Based on this interest, the research
question is: to what extent is the informative
production of the written media La Hora, La
Gaceta and El Extra produced from a Human
Rights perspective?
Theoretically there is a position in the Agenda
Setting, a proposal that was born at the end of the
sixties and proposes the existence of two levels:
1) the media say what subjects to review, and
2) the media express how to think about certain
aspects or attributes (McCombs & Shaw 1972;
Rodríguez 2009). Precisely, evaluating how the
media, when it is about addressing some themes,
are susceptible to violating rights; sheds light on
the challenges regarding the establishment of
their agenda and thus helps the consideration of
journalistic narratives from the perspective of
human rights. This theory was launched because
methodologically it is recommended as the most
suitable when working with quantitative content
analysis (Aruguete 2016).
This is relevant to the investigation considering
the preliminary studies, which subscribe
limited number of investigations that study
the relationship between the media and human
rights. In addition, it will make it possible to
determine the constraints and possibilities of
the informative discourse in the promotion of
human rights. Hence, there will be elements
that will contribute to the creation of spaces and
processes of educommunication targeted at the
articulation of a critical citizenship about media
content.
METHODOLOGY
The current research article was made through
a no experimental design, a cross-sectional,
descriptive and correlational kind. A mixed
approach was held in order to achieve a
quantitative dimension, a content analysis
was used considering its most remarkable
characteristics as the search for objectivity, it
is systematic, it is susceptible to quantication
and it is suitable for the analysis of journalistic
professional exercise (Fernández 2002).
The used instrument was a structured observation
guideline, prepared under the parameters of the
Index of Violation of Rights in the Media (IVR)
(Laboratorio de Comunicación y Derechos
2014), conceptual and technical document
provided by the Communication and Rights
Laboratory (CRL), which is “is a tool to analyze
the media content whose objective is to provide
a technical and critical perspective, supported by
quantitative and qualitative data, with analysis
criteria that avoid discretion” (Laboratorio de
Comunicación y Derechos 2014:8).
The IVR is composed by 27 dimensions,
which have their respective indicators, which
means the: “concepts, expressions or media
behaviors, whose presence warns of some type
Lourdes Cabrera-Martínez / Ricardo Ureña-López / Pablo Lomas Chacón / Franklin Falconí Suárez
CHAKIÑAN. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades / ISSN 2550 - 6722 27
of discrimination on a scale of 0 to 1” (CRL
2014:2). According to this scale, zero is equal
to content with no violation of rights and one
is discriminatory content. The Table 1 details
the four dimensions and indicators that were
analyzed in the enquiry.
The monitoring was carried out on the
newspapers La Gaceta, La Hora and El Extra
in their printed version, during the months of
April, May and June 2019, the sample consisted
of 781 journalistic productions. And the units of
analysis were the complete notes of each journal.
(See Table 2).
Each journal production was registered in the
structured observation guideline by following
the dimensions and indicators underlined in
Table 1 in addition to the next elements: a)
observed space section, b) title corner, and c)
presence or absence of the indicator. The pursuit
was made in 3 phases:
1. Classication of the informative production
according to the sections of the journal and
record in the structured observation guideline
In the rst place, the productions were
identied and classied according to the
sections of the newspaper; subsequently,
from a critical reading, it was recorded in
the observation guideline.
2. Debugging the guideline’s records
The records of the guidelines were
reviewed in order to ratify or correct the
location of the journalistic productions
according to the indicators.
3. Systematization of the guideline’s results
Table 1: Dimensions and Indicators from the structured information guideline
Source: Communication and Rights Laboratory
Table 2: Sample
Source: own elaboration
INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
Número 17 / AGOSTO, 2022 (23-39) 28
With the intention on organize and
identify the extent to which the contents
of these three written media violate
rights, a descriptive statistical analysis
of the frequency distribution was used.
When it came for the qualitative look, a focus
group was carried out, in the words of Rodas-
Pacheco and Pacheco-Salazar (2020) contribute
to the collection of information about personal
experiences, experiences and feelings, with
the aim of self-explanations in order to obtain
qualitative data. The instrument was a question
guide developed in correlation to the specic
objectives, which considered three aspects:
1) issues addressed by the media,
2) management of sources, headlines and
images of the news production; and
3) challenges of news production.
An intentional non-probabilistic sampling was
applied, therefore, the research team invited
journalists following some inclusion criteria:
a) journalists who work or have worked in
these media,
b) journalists who work in print media; and
c) journalists with experience of at least three
years.
For the analysis, a constant comparative method
was applied, dened as one that “seeks to
identify the similarities and dierences from the
inductive analysis of the social incidents observed
in the context of the information collected”
(Schettini & Cortazzo 2015:36). Triangulation
was followed as a qualitative and quantitative
integration strategy, the content reviewed by
directly inquiring into the productions of the
three printed media enable to determine the
violation of rights and through the focus group the
conditions surrounding information production
were closely reviewed. Regarding the ethical
considerations, a research’s fundamental factor
was the participating journalists’ authorization
in the focus group. An informed consent was
run based on the targets, scope, and benets
exposure, as well as the probable risks of the
research. Such actions were explained at the
initial contact and during the focus group
articulation. The professionals involved verbally
expressed their agreement about the academic
use of the information. In this sense, to ensure
the anonymity and condentiality, codes were
used to identify their testimonies.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
This section includes monitoring and
perspectives of the journalistic productions by
dailies La Gaceta, La Hora and El Extra. In
the rst instance, the starting point is to map
the absolute frequency of presence or absence
of rights violations in the four indicators shown
above, according to the sections in which they
are published.
As can be seen in Table 3, in the informative
productions of daily La Hora, the absence of
content that violates rights prevails in the four
indicators analyzed; even though it does not mean
that their journalistic productions do not incur
a certain degree of violation. When reviewing
by sections, it is observed that in Country
there is an increased frequency in the indicator
overrepresentation of reality, in other worlds,
information that excessively or unjustiably
shows violent events, whether real or symbolic.
In the indicator ridicule and misuse of language,
the absence of violation is maintained in all
sections, while for the manipulation indicator
the same frequency occurs (34-34) when it’s
about information production with the presence
and absence of rights violations.
As demonstrated in Table 4, in the case of
daily La Gaceta, in three of the four indicators
the absence of rights violations predominates
in its informative productions. The indicator
where the opposite happened was manipulation,
that is to say, there was a greater presence of
contents that express unequal or inequitable
treatment of the protagonists of the informative
production, while exposing people in a situation
of superiority or inferiority or by conferring a
space dierent from the rest. In this indicator, the
section where there is a prevalence of violation
Lourdes Cabrera-Martínez / Ricardo Ureña-López / Pablo Lomas Chacón / Franklin Falconí Suárez
CHAKIÑAN. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades / ISSN 2550 - 6722 29
of rights is Latacunga. In the rest of the sections,
the content with the absence of rights violations
remains dominant.
Finally, as can be seen in Table 5, daily El Extra;
in three of the four indicators there is a notable
absence of rights violations in their informative
productions. The over-representation of reality is
the predominant indicator of content that violates
rights, which is explained by the red chronicle
content, characteristic of the newspaper. After
sections’ reviewing, it’s evident that the indicator
appears more frequently in Court and Provinces.
In the remaining sections, there was a higher
incidence of informative productions with no
violation of rights.
Table 3: Results of daily La Hora in terms of absolute frequency
Source: own elaboration from the data of the structured observation guideline
Table 4: Results of daily La Gaceta in terms of absolute frequency
Source: own elaboration from the data of the structured observation guideline
INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
Número 17 / AGOSTO, 2022 (23-39) 30
Figure one shows a comparison of the four
dimensions’ results analyzed in the three printed
media. In dimension one, overrepresentation
of reality, a discriminatory content prevailed
in daily El Extra, followed by La Hora and La
Gaceta. Dimension two ridicule, showed a lower
manifestation of postures that provoke acts of
contempt; in all events, the highest percentage
occurred in La Hora, followed by El Extra and La
Gaceta. In dimension three bad use of language,
as in the previous one, less verbal expressions
that identies someone as dierent due to their
psychological or physical characteristics were
found.
Figure one shows at last, in dimension four
manipulation, in La Gaceta the content with
violation of rights was the most visible, which
means, its informative content promoted
superiority or inferiority by assigning media
spaces to certain topics and actors. In the case of
La Hora and El Extra, no content in this sense
was evidenced and the absence of manipulation
prevailed.
What circumstances explain the prevalence of
certain indicators in the news production of the
three analyzed media? For its understanding,
the focus group inquired about the themes’
Table 5: Results of daily El Extra in terms of absolute frequency
Source: Own elaboration from the data of the structured observation guideline
Source: own elaboration from the data of the structured observation guideline
Figure 1: Summary of the four dimensions in the newspapers El Extra, La Hora and La Gaceta
Lourdes Cabrera-Martínez / Ricardo Ureña-López / Pablo Lomas Chacón / Franklin Falconí Suárez
CHAKIÑAN. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades / ISSN 2550 - 6722 31
characteristics of the media La Hora, La Gaceta
and El Extra through a Human Rights perspective.
From this standpoint, a rst element to be noticed
is that the assessment of the editorial criteria,
that guide the work of the media, is given by
a dierentiation of these newspapers’ scope of
action. La Hora, besides having an edition upon
national inquires, also has regional ones, which
gives it a particularity. El Extra has nationwide
coverage, while La Gaceta is eminently local.
That was a dening factor in its raiting; while
La Hora and El Extra are stated as media with
a clearly concrete editorial line, thus, a structure
determines the information construction
strategies; instead, La Gaceta is conceived on
the opposite side. The economic conditions of
each medium are indicated as the main cause of
this type of situation; in this regard Suenzo et
al. (2020), in an analysis of the press in Latin
America, asserts that the main cause of the
economic crisis is the change in business models
which go from a traditional format to a digital
one. Such transformations place the editorial line
of the press media in a scenario of reinvention
and redenition, and with greater emphasis on
local areas. That, moreover, is conditioned by
the quality and type of resources available or not
available to the media.
I believe that at the local media level is
something that should be worked in that
situation, then the job’s issues will be dened
in order to be developed. Sometimes, for
example, it can be externally seen how you
work at the local media level. Then the bad
critic will always be there, isn’t it? But very
few people know what is really experienced
within the complexity around the economic
issue, around various circumstances that
actually prevents you obey this necessary
structure that all large media has. (SI02,
personal communication, april 2021)
Considering these characteristics, the informative
productions of the media is produced and it is
evident how they operate when prioritizing
certain contents and to what extent they are
constructed from a human rights perspective.
The journalists emphasize that, although in
some cases there is an editorial line more clearly
dened than in others, just the conjunctural
events are favored, mainly those of the crime
report. Such a circumstance is evidenced and
explained by the lack of evaluation gastronomic
reports, cultural and tourist themes. What is
more, in the case of media like as La Gaceta, the
limited number of sta forces aim this type of
content: “that most mark the agenda and many
times we have worked on reports; but people
don’t like it” (GLO4, personal communication,
april 2021).
As stated in previous lines, the economic
conditions among media with wide local,
regional and national circulation are conceived
as decisive elements in their editorial lines.
These conditioning factors are expressed in the
organization of their journalistic routines. The
lack of clarity and, consequently, the specicity
of these media aects the high praise and
informational treatment given to certain types of
events.
In this sense, the news agenda of the three analyzed
media is marked, mainly, by the situation and
within it, situations associated with the crime
report are privileged. Precisely, Torre (2019)
on the processes of informative construction of
the press points out that editorial decisions are
produced based on two linked perspectives: on
the one hand, its inter-institutional logic; and, on
the other, its view of the social.
Within these circumstances, the statement
should be, especially, in dailies La Hora and
La Gaceta: there is a tension between their
intra-institutional agenda and their view of the
social. They prioritize conjunctural issues, since
they are the ones who call the attention of the
audience. When it’s about El Extra, its own
intra-institutional ideology prefers the crime
scene. This situation, in terms of Barrera (2017),
occurs because there is a market logic use to
guide the information through the law of supply
and demand, which causes a loss of its essential
value. This is convergent with the approach of
Santillán-Buelna (2018) who argues that the
media attention responds to what is expected in
journalists’ routines, which mainly implies the
coverage of newsworthy events.
Along the same lines, (Mellado et al. 2017)
agree about a primacy of emotional aspects
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over information that contributes to the social
and political debate of daily events. Indeed, the
quantitative survey says that, mainly in the daily
El Extra the indicator overrepresentation of
reality predominates, which is explained by the
insistence on crime report and, specically, it is
manifested in the section on court facts.
All this adds up a contextual factor of a regional
nature: the participants in the focus group
explain how the peculiarities of the Ecuadorian
mountains and coast have marked their
journalistic routines. Among the aspects that
appear is the allusion to more open audiences,
in the case of the coast, and others more closed,
in the case of the mountains. The following two
quotes illustrate it in a better way:
As for people in Esmeraldas, so they see
me with the camera and they say to me:
miss, miss come on, we want to tell you
everything that happened! They made me
sit down, family members surrounded me,
told me when the deceased was born, why
the accident, what they were going to do,
that they are asking for justice, that they
... then, I left the place with a more than
complete note of what that I needed; but
why? Because the crime report is seen in
Esmeraldas, for example, it can tell you
that it helps with human rights because it
helps people to become visible a problem
and maybe they can receive some legal
help. (VE03, personal communication,
April 2021)
How the work develops in the dierent
areas or in the zone where we are is very
dierent, for example, I remember that
I once did a coverage in an indigenous
execution, we arrived at a place, they
received us well; but…we went to the other
community and they beat us, for example,
so that marks a lot. (GLO4, personal
communication, April 2021)
When considering that the press’s discourse is
to a certain extent a social one, the dierences
in information production are appreciated
according to the place where the events happen.
According to this, other investigations explain
(Arteaga and Arzuaga 2015; Browne et al. 2013)
the link between journalistic productions and the
context. In their approaches, the authors start
by pointing out how vital is to understand and
recognize the social and cultural codes of the
scenarios where the events occur.
Such recognition enables the construction
of narratives that attend to certain cultural
representations and, therefore, will have better
chances of connecting with their audience
Concerning this, Campuzano & Guerrero
(2019) say that the journalistic narratives need
a hermeneutic process where “the other and
reality are perceived, analyzed, interpreted and
understood through a communicative exercise
where practices, languages and diverse aspects
of reality are decoded” (Campuzano & Guerrero
2019: 10).
Along the same lines, it is proposed to analyze
the role of the media as producers of information
under a double criterion: on the one side, a
sociological order, the need to review factors
on social demands; and, on the other side, an
organizational type criterion, focused on the
motivations and the processes of construction of
the information agenda (Wolf 1987 as cited in
Browne et al. 2013).
Among the characteristics that stand out are
the way they appear constrained between
the needs of the conjuncture in the face of a
journalism that prioritizes a respectful agenda
of the Human Rights. In this context, there is a
very subtle question of journalistic productions,
considering that there are many requirements
to be met in order to reach a clear position of
the press vis-à-vis the Human Rights. For this
purpose, journalists agree on the necessary
recognition and analysis of the Communication
Law, the value of empathy, the contrasting of
sources and the role of Communication careers
in professional training processes.
Under these conditions, how can a perspective
of Human Rights be shown in the written
media? how have relations been manifested in
condition of superiority or inferiority? Faced
with this question, the participants in the focus
group express, on the one hand, there are no such
dealings, what has happened is the production
of news content, conditioned by economic
interests, specically by advertising patterns,
which mark what kinds of facts and actors have
Lourdes Cabrera-Martínez / Ricardo Ureña-López / Pablo Lomas Chacón / Franklin Falconí Suárez
CHAKIÑAN. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades / ISSN 2550 - 6722 33
the greatest attention. However, this perspective
is considered by other participants as a evident
dierentiation in media management, whether for
ethnic reasons, level of popularity of individuals
and/or political and personal anities:
I remember that on one occasion a friend of
who was the editor of the daily was involved
in an alleged violation […] but the next day
I took the newspaper and I realized that I
had deleted the name of the person to whom
she was giving a dierential treatment to
the note, because he was a friend of the
editor. (MO01, personal communication,
April 2021)
For example, you are conditioned to edit
the note on the cover, since the person
mentioned is our client and it turns out
that there is another more important
note and that fair note has to do with the
indigenous sector, then, it is no longer on
the front cover just on the inside. Then
the note goes unnoticed. (GL01, personal
communication, April 2021)
Human rights visions on information agendas
show self-interpellation in journalists toward
their human status, and the role of the media
appears weak, what is to say, in evaluating the
information treatment in terms of human rights,
a brief reference is made to the incidence of the
editorial line and a greater weight is given to
the journalist and the audience, it is therefore to
be point out that, these three aspects come into
tension in the discourse of the of the journalists
participating in the focus group.
In this reection, the role of the legal frameworks
and their ability to inuence the construction of
content that is useful to the audience (Viveros
and Mellado 2018) appears the strategies of
information production. First, there is the
human dimension, reected in the value of
empathy; and second, the technical dimension,
manifested itself in the construction of facts.
These approaches are convergent with what
Del Carmen (2019) proposes, who explains
the neuralgic role of the media in the public
construction of the facts under a human rights
point of view.
He adds that information directly aects the
forms and degrees of empathy, which contributes
to the awareness of the audience. How is that
achieved? rebuilding the facts in such a way that
citizens identify themselves with this situation,
generating a mobilizing eect in the short or
medium term. In this same direction, Sánchez et
al. (2016) take care about the role of the media
in dealing with stigmatizing and discriminatory
postures through the proper use of language,
is such a way as making it possible to play an
educational role in society.
The construction of facts after a human rights
perspective nds its limitations when facing
expressions of superiority and/or inferiority.
Among the main reasons and according to the
participants in the FG, those of an economic
nature are mainly advertising patterns that cause
a conict of interests, inuencing the information
agenda itself; therefore, the journalist is
perceived as restricted in their possibilities for
action.
This is concurrent with the analysis carried
out by Prada-Torres et al. (2018) about the
information treatment of the media. He
highlights that journalistic practice takes place
in a network of relations characterized by a game
of tensions, because there is a dependency, not
only with media owners, but with the network of
relationships they build with those who are part
of their economic support. Additionally, those
restrictions that are given by aective ties, as the
case reported by one of the participants in the
current research. The author considers these as
inter-institutional limitations.
A second instance of analysis deals with the
management of headlines, sources and images of
the information production of the three mentioned
printed media. As for the the headlines the
participating journalists agree: On the one hand,
the style of daily La Hora is cataloged as formal
and direct, while daily El Extra is described as
popular, colloquial and striking, and La Gaceta
is qualied as a media that shows a lack of
clarity in the headlines’ creation. One feature
they call for reection on is the importance of
these budding lines, in the sense of nding the
exact words that are in line with a Human Rights
point of view and also guided by the need for
contextualized information. Here comes the role
INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
Número 17 / AGOSTO, 2022 (23-39) 34
of the audience and its critical look. About this,
one of the participants said the following:
In the construction of the headlines, they
focus not on human rights but rather on
consumerism, in which people impact on
the note […] So that makes us not work in
the eld of human rights, Although rights
are inherent to everyone, we all have rights
and opportunities; but sometimes they are
denigrated, they are discriminated against
through the headlines. (MA07, personal
communication, April 2021)
In the agenda building process, the role played
by the headlines, which are not exempt from
the tensions between the journalist and the
editor, is highlighted. This analysis showed the
marked dierences in the criteria that guide
the preparation of the headlines in the three
media. (Sánchez-Moya 2017) considering that
the headline is a rst line of information, and
if the responsibility for its scope is omitted;
disinformation will occur. Here is where the role
of a critical audience of journalistic content enters
and is demanded to go beyond the reference of
the headline.
Díaz & Mellado (2017) concur with this idea.
They point out that using the headlines allows
to observe the highly relevant topis and their
editorial lines; fundamental aspect to catch the
audience’s attention to certain topics. At this
point, it is vital to reect on its importance in
the construction of information. The challenge
is to think them out of a sensationalist logic and,
instead, to emphasize their management from a
human rights point of view.
The Communication Law emerges as a factor
which, in a certain way, forces the media to take
care of the way they build their headlines. The
participants note that addressing the subject in
a general level, avoids falling into a violation
of Human Rights, like in the case of daily El
Extra. Once the sources were review, two points
appeared as relevant: 1) the type of access,
according to the coverage of the environment
(national, regional or local), and 2) degree of
condence. On the rst point, the dierence
between the management of sources in national,
regional and local media became clear:
Daily El Extra has a management of
sources at all levels, excellent management
of sources and more particularly in crime
news […] what do I mean? There is, for
example, an information source from the
police ... they have from the policeman
who just entered a week ago, a month
ago to be part of the National Police,
including the general who is directing all
... all the police at the country level [...]
In the case of daily La Gaceta, I had the
opportunity to spend a few months there.
There is a handling of sources, let’s say,
but for journalists, it is not a handling of
sources, let’s say of the media. The same
thing happens in daily La Hora when we
worked there, we also learned to carry out a
work on the subject of information sources
that was quite broad, in my particular case
my source was the theme of the crime
report. Having to open that source. (DT01,
personal communication, April 2021)
While the participants in the FG agree on this
assessment, they do not neglect the role of the
journalist in building trust-based relationships.
This approach to the sources is evidenced
in the type of information production, then,
the greater or lesser access to certain types
of sources is considered fundamental in the
data quality and relevance presented by the
media. One of the diculties experienced by
participating journalists, in the case of events of
national incidence, reaching sources for a better
characterization and reporting of these events is
complex.
This is in addition to the obstacles in the
management of sources, the expression of the
dierences in the organizational structures
between local, regional and national media
itself. Also, they constitute challenges for the
journalistic exercise due to the strategies for
access these sources, as well as to generate
bonds of trust. If these actions were given under
greater accompaniment, the establishment of
an informative agenda with plural voices could
be guaranteed; in relation to this Mellado et al.
(2017) argue that the actors, sources, frequency
of appearance and the focus granted are
fundamental aspects in the type of information
that the media constructs.
Lourdes Cabrera-Martínez / Ricardo Ureña-López / Pablo Lomas Chacón / Franklin Falconí Suárez
CHAKIÑAN. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades / ISSN 2550 - 6722 35
Under these conditions, it is necessary to rethink
and restate the management of sources at the
local level. It is evident that they face restrictions
in their access, which aects the type of
journalistic philosophy. And, with respect to the
particularities of the use of images in these three
media, participants in the FG believe that with
the advent of a visual digital culture, traditional
media are poised to evaluate the use of image in
their journalistic narratives.
Piñuel (2020) devotes the need of new
methodological and theorical approaches in a
digital mediation context. The author emphasis
and warns that communicative interactions do
not depend exclusively on the production and
dissemination of expressions; it’s necessary,
however, to take in consideration the enunciation
contexts. In this manner, an image diverse well
use shows up and four elements appear:
1) El Extra, the use of yellow and red as
hallmarks; in addition, they interpellate
the commodication of women’s bodies,
although one of the journalists mentioned
the need of legal framework to avoid sexist
communication, and an audience interested
in other kind of content.
2) about La Gaceta, they consider the
photography uses as unappropriated,
because they are static images that prevent
a correct communication of the message.
3) as for La Hora, they qualify an appropriate
use of the image as they resort to moving
images enabling a better visual impact.
4) both, La Hora and La Gaceta are
classied as media that use formal images
when constructing information.
The informational treatment of the media is
conditioned by image’s use therefore, it is
necessary to generate analyzes spaces in the
context of the strengthening of digital social
networks. In this connection, some studies
(Gutiérrez et al. 2018; Mancinas et al. 2019)
show how the technological changes disrupt
various elements that make up a culture. In this
case the media are exposed to transformations
characterized by their rapidity; many of them
irreversible and unpredictable. Having said
that, the local media are called upon to reinvent
themselves and build narratives that respond to
the requirements posed by the prominence of a
visual culture (Arriaga 2017; Gómez-López &
García-Soidán 2020).
The elements to be taken in consideration are of
dierent order, Minervini & Pedrazzini (2004)
argue that referring to the image in the press
entails the analysis of “very dierent graphic
elements, such as illustrations, graphics, jokes,
cartoons and photographs. Within this global
framework, it pursues a series of functions
that can be presented jointly or separately”
(Minervini & Pedrazzini 2004: 2). The study
of these aspects is key to give the image the
prominence it needs, allowing it to go from static
images to images that manage to communicate
journalistic speeches.
For his part, Sánchez (2018) reects about the
use of photography in press and catalogues it as a
symbolic system which provides the audience the
conditions for a particular reality’s comprehension
mode; and this includes “signicant experience,
semantic, communicative, expressive, aesthetic,
etc.” (Sánchez 2018:199).
On top of all this, there are the challenges that
journalists identify for news production. A rst
point pertains to the types of communication
media required to promote reection on events
from a human rights perspective. Among the
elements that stand out are the need to work under
the principle of responsibility, which implies
acting ethically, constantly seeking to contrast
information; in such a way that audiences are
allowed to approach a critical thinking in the face
of journalistic narratives. Similarly, the appeal to
the media to maintain coherence in their external
and internal discourses, which implies, if they
transmit the principles of truth and transparency
outwards, this would be reected in labor rights,
as well as freedom of expression of journalists.
Respecting human rights also starts from
home, right? respect the freedom that my
journalists have to be able to write the article
based on the fact that they need to inform
people of something, that what happened to
Mon does not happen, where they changed
the name of a person involved, where they
INFORMATIVE PRODUCTION OF THE WRITTEN PRESS IN ECUADOR FROM A HUMAN RIGHTS PERSPECTIVE
Número 17 / AGOSTO, 2022 (23-39) 36
changed the photo, that kinds of things
cannot happen because we need to respect
the judgment […] then comes the issue that
internally we must respect the job stability
of the rest of our sta, in this last year,
even on the issue of pandemic in the media
that very little has been said at the country
level, but the media hide a destabilization
process within the journalistic eld. (DT01,
personal communication, April 2021)
Indeed, the crisis of the press is manifested in the
work environment, in this regard, Suenzo et al.
(2020) explain that the recurrence of dismissals
and media closures causes a scenario marked by
uncertainty and job dissatisfaction, which aects
the professional values of journalists. Along
with these demands, the search for journalism
independent of the advertising interests marked
by companies is considered a critical point,
because they believe it conicts with their
professional codes of ethics. Another concept that
emerged in FG was the role of the media as key
actors in contributing to social transformation,
and that represents an inescapable prioritization
of the voices with which journalistic productions
are built.
CONCLUSIONS
The guiding question of this paper was raised to
what extent the information production of the
written media La Hora, La Gaceta and El Extra is
generated through a Human Rights perspective.
In order to reach this goal, information’s content
scrutiny was done; alongside the journalists’
point of view, those who have been part of these
media was integrated. As stated above, news
that reported a higher frequency of violation
of rights in overrepresentation of reality and
manipulation; were particularly related to red-
chronicle facts and linked to places other than
the central editorial of the media.
Although there was no prevalence in indicators
such as ridicule and misuse of language, it does
not imply the absence of information speeches
that incur in rights’ violation. Interestingly,
sections where information was most frequently
reported were the same as those with the highest
preeminence of violation of rights.
From what it may be concluded that there is a
challenge for the written media, which should be
triggered by rethinking editorial lines outside of
market logic. Reecting on this deance brings
up the following question: what types of actors
should the media prioritize in managing their
news agenda? In this regard, several points of
analysis appeared:
a) the facts are those that determine which
actors should be highlighted in the media
agenda.
b) all actors require the same level of
importance. Here comes the analysis on the
contrasting of information.
c) the media need to privilege the voices
of actors historically excluded from this
type of space, specically, from sectors of
impoverished socioeconomic strata.
d) the editorial line of the medium is what
establishes which actors and events will have
priority, then, it goes beyond and outside the
individual decision of the journalist.
In the midst of these dilemmas, a common
reection results that despite the journalists’
attempts to favor some voices and / or facts,
the local media face various limitations due to
economic and human resources that prevent
specifying that diversity of sources in their
journalistic productions.
The media challenges, from a human rights
perspective, and in a scenario characterized by
the rise of digital platforms, it was demonstrated
that, despite a leading role and consolidation of
digital; there is still an important presence of
traditional media. Anyway, building accessible
media for the entire population will be possible
by considering these three: 1) transition from
traditional to digital with adequate training for
journalists, 2) quality guarantees above the
immediacy of the information, very characteristic
of a digital medium; and 3) evaluate the
possibility of legislating digital content.
Lourdes Cabrera-Martínez / Ricardo Ureña-López / Pablo Lomas Chacón / Franklin Falconí Suárez
CHAKIÑAN. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades / ISSN 2550 - 6722 37
In such conditions, the GF expressed the idea
about the important challenge implied for
the media, journalists and citizens; because
today, unlike the last century, each person has
possibilities, not always guaranteed, of being the
owner of a medium. Finally, the results entail the
indispensable analysis of the challenges faced by
the media to build an information agenda from a
human rights perspective.
The structure of the media deals with many
tensions due to the logical demands of congruence
and responsibility from the journalists. Thus,
they need to re-evaluate ethical principles,
recognition of rights, editorial line and processes
of construction of events. Another barrier to
be jump is how and which actors should be
prioritized in the journalistic discourse. The
outcomes yielded a tension between the actors
and the events, which was assumed as a binary
position. On the contrary, complementary look
will be the best option.
DECLARACIÓN DE CONFLICTOS DE
INTERESES: Los autores declaran no tener
conictos de interés.
DECLARACIÓN DE CONTRIBUCIÓN DE
LOS AUTORES: Lourdes Y. Cabrera-Martínez
25%, Ricardo Francisco Ureña-López 25%,
Pablo Esteban Lomas Chacón 25%, Franklin
Eduardo Falconí Suárez 25%.
DECLARACIÓN DE APROBACIÓN DEL
COMITÉ DE ÉTICA: Los autores declaran
que la investigación fue aprobada por el Comité
de Ética de la institución responsable, en tanto la
misma implicó a seres humanos.
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