Repositioning a landmark: The Hutchins commission and freedom of the press

Abstract

The ideal of “accountability,” a major normative concept in media ethics for the past forty years, was articulated during the mid‐1940s by the Commission on Freedom of the Press, a distinguished group of intellectuals and scholars who met intermittently during World War II to consider the problem of freedom of expression in modern society. Drawing on a variety of archival materials for evidence of the commission's thinking, this essay argues that the concept of accountability was originally intended as a guide to policy making and that, to appreciate the continuing relevance of the commission's work as a landmark in media studies, it is essential to understand the policy orientation that underlay most of its ideas and recommendations.