The trade journal’s great advantage over major daily newspapers or business magazines is that it can focus exclusively on one industry. That results in more detailed and comprehensive coverage.
However, this can lead to a big disadvantage. A trade journal can place too much emphasis on what is called “access journalism.” Reporters and editors may get so close to industry leaders that its coverage can often veer more toward public relations puffery than “accountability journalism.”
If an industry suffers from groupthink, the trade journal may amplify it rather than act as a journalistic counterbalance. In other words, a trade journal that places too much emphasis on maintaining access can do active harm to a troubled industry.
Did Automotive News contribute to Detroit’s collapse?
This raises an interesting question about Automotive News, which bills itself as “the nation’s pre-eminent newspaper covering the automotive industry” (2019). U.S. automakers have experienced a dramatic decline over the last half century. What role did Automotive News play in that process? Has the robustness of this media outlet’s reporting and editorial content helped Detroit adapt more quickly to heightened competition from foreign automakers? Or did Automotive News perpetuate groupthink?
My perception is that Automotive News mostly perpetuated rather than challenged Detroit groupthink. Perhaps the biggest reason why is that news coverage has tended to focus on the minutiae of the moment — particularly product launches — rather than taking a step back to analyze long-term trends.
Keith Crain set a low bar for quality of analysis
In addition, the analysis that has been published has not always been top drawer. For many decades Editor-in-Chief Keith Crain set the tone with a weekly column which was not in the same league as punditry by the likes of John McElroy or Paul Eisenstein. Both have displayed superior analytical sophistication and a somewhat greater willingness to challenge groupthink. The weakness of Crain’s analysis was problematic given that his column took up prime real estate in Automotive News and has been described by the Automotive Hall of Fame (2018) as “essential reading.” (Go here for my critique of a Crain column.)
Crain’s retrograde views on topics such as electric vehicles, governmental regulation and climate change illustrate the dangers of someone holding too much agenda-setting power for too long. Crain became publisher of Automotive News way back in 1971. All of his auto industry contemporaries from that time have long since passed from the scene — and for good reason. Their worldview was formed in a very different time. A headline for a Crain (2019) column applies to a broader range of topics than he may wish to admit: “EV fever: I just don’t get it.”
Reporting and editorial stances don’t take many risks
In general, Automotive News has had a “go along to get along” quality. You’ve got to be an industry outlier along the lines of a Malcolm Bricklin to elicit much reportorial skepticism (e.g., Truett, 2017). Nor have editorial stances taken many risks. They tend to either reflect a dominant view within the industry, such as concern about President Trump’s trade policies (2018a), or take shots at relatively small targets. As a case in point, Automotive News quite rightly raised questions about how Hyundai treated dealers during the launch of the Genesis brand (2018b).
Also see ‘Automotive News enables denialism and conspiracies about COVID-19’
Another way that Automotive News has magnified industry myopia has been by paying relatively little attention to the automobile’s social and environmental impacts. Once in a while the publication has done interesting enterprise reporting, such as assessing community-wide impacts of plant closures (e.g., Wayland, 2019; Bunkley, 2018) and shedding light on sexism in the industry. However, coverage of climate change policy has been infrequent and overly focused on industry opposition to regulation. This has been the attitude toward transportation policy in general.
In recent years Automotive News has made an admirable effort to update its products and services in response to advances in electronic media technologies. However, one area could use further improvement. The “search” function is clunky enough that I sometimes switch over to Google to track down an old article. In addition, the electronic archive does not go back very far. These are odd deficiencies given that Automotive News has long functioned as the newspaper of record for the American auto industry.
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RE:SOURCES
- Automotive News; 2018a. “Trump can’t be trusted on trade.” (Subscription required.) Posted March 12; accessed June 11.
- ——; 2018b. “Can Hyundai dealers believe in Genesis?” (Subscription required.) Posted May 7; accessed June 11.
- ——; 2019. “About Us.” Accessed August 5.
- Automotive Hall of Fame; 2018. “Keith E. Crain.” Accessed July 22.
- Bunkley, Nick; 2018. “A decade later, Janesville confronts life after GM.” Automotive News (subscription required.) Posted December 17; accessed January 38, 2019.
- Crain, Keith; 2019. “EV fever: I just don’t get it.” Automotive News (subscription required.) Posted March 11; accessed April 5.
- Truitt, Richard; 2017. “Malcolm Bricklin’s next bright idea.” Automotive News (subscription required.) Posted May 15; accessed June 11, 2018.
- Wayland, Michael; 2019. “GM plants’ 2nd chances would save few jobs.” Automotive News (subscription required.) Posted May 12; accessed July 15.
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