- Title Page
- Introduction
- A Newspaper with a Mandate
- Past Lessons
- First Facts
- Taking Stock
- Managing the Media
- Government Agencies
- Divvying up Tasks
- Voices of Experience
- Covering All Bases
- Sunday, January 8
- The Dam Breaks
- Loud or Soft?
- Arab Media
- A Videotape
- Next Steps
- Stressed Out
- Another Deadline
- Whom to Believe?
A Life on the Line: The Christian Science Monitor and Jill Carroll
AbstractCSJ-08-0012.0 This case treats the hard choices which confront a news organization when violence strikes one of its reporters. In January 2006, Christian Science Monitor Managing Editor Marshall Ingwerson learned that one of his stringers in Iraq, Jill Carroll, had been kidnapped by unknown assailants in Baghdad. The case traces the steps which the newspaper took to try to win Carroll's release—alive. It describes how the paper's leadership managed the many constituents pulled into the drama-government agencies, Monitor staff, other news outlets, family members, NGOs, Arab go-betweens and so forth. The kidnappers' demand—release all female Iraqi prisoners—was beyond the Monitor 's control. A first deadline passed, but Carroll seemed still to be alive. As a second deadline approached, Monitor editors found themselves caught between conflicting advice from the CIA and FBI on whether to handle the case quietly, or conduct a high-profile publicity campaign to persuade her kidnappers to release Carroll.
The class will gain insight into the complexities of newsroom management during a crisis. Students will have a chance to consider how to structure a crisis response; how to manage competing interests; and how to sustain an effort past the first adrenalin-fueled moments into weeks of frustrating but crucial work. The class should also consider what security for journalists means in a war zone. How safe is safe enough, and what is the responsibility of news organizations toward both its staff reporters and freelancers it engages?
The case can be used in a course on international journalism; about crisis management; or on reporting from war zones.
Credits:
This case was written by Delia Cabe for the Knight Case Studies Initiative, Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University. The faculty sponsor was Joshua Friedman, director of the International Students Program and adjunct faculty member . The Columbia Center for New Media Teaching and Learning (CCNMTL) produced the multimedia, online product. James R. Garfield was the project coordinator, and Zarina Mustapha was the website designer. Funding was provided by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation . (1208)
For further information:E-mail: ccnmtl+casestudies@columbia.edu