Day and Golan 2005

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Source and Content Diversity in Op-Ed Pages:

assessing editorial strategies in The New York

Times and the Washington Post

ANITA G. DAY and GUY GOLAN Louisiana State University, USA

ABSTRACT A content analysis of opinion editorial (Op-Ed) articles published in the Washington Post andThe New

York Times between 1999 and 2003 was used to assess source and issue stand diversity on three salient issues.

The study revealed that editors in both newspapers allowed only limited diversity in its source selection and issue

stand on the discussion of gay marriages, affirmative action and the death penalty. The authors identify the lack of

diversity as inconsistent with the original stated purpose of the Op-Ed as a forum for the articulation of diverse

viewpoints on salient issues and call upon future studies to further examine diversity of sources and issue stands in

Op-Ed pages.

KEY WORDS: Content Analysis, Editorial, Journalists, Opinion Op-Eds, Public Debate

Introduction

The importance of the opinion editorial (Op-Ed),

a recent forum in the marketplace of ideas forfostering the exchange of diverse issue stands,

has received limited attention from mass com-

munication scholars (Ciofalo and Traverso,

1994). Further, the role of the press in fostering

public debate has been ignored in research on

the international press. Instead, research has

concentrated largely on the role of the press

as emerging media systems in countries such

as Romania (Gross, 1996) and South Africa

(Tomaselli, 1989). These studies examinethe press as it is transformed from a state-

sanctioned political arm to one that reflects a

traditional Western commercial composition.

Other studies of the international press in

Germany (Humphreys, 1990) and Japan (Kasza,

1993) concentrate on defining the role between

the state, public policy and the mass media.

Even studies that address the role of the press in

the United States have largely concentrated only

on the ability of the press to foster political

participation rather than debate (Ansolabeherre

et al., 1994; Cook, 1998; Gilliam and Iyengar,

2002; Wattenberg and Brians, 1999). This study

hopes to expand previous research and examine

the role of the press in political debate in the

United States by examining several public

affairs issues in the Op-Ed pages of two major

national US papers.

The particular question here is the relative

success of the Op-Ed as a forum for public

officials, academics, experts, advocates and other

forms of public intellectuals to articulate diverse

opinions on salient issues. Do newspaper gate-

keepers select Op-Ed contributions that reinforce

the papers worldview as typically expressed by

the papers columnists or do guest contributors

provide opposing views of an issue?

The current study examined Op-Eds that

appeared in The New York Times and the

Washington Post between January 1999 to De-

cember 2003 concentrating on the issues of the

death penalty, gay marriage and affirmative

action.

Coverage of these issues may influence the

public agenda of issue (McCombs and Shaw,

1972) and/or attribute saliency (Golan and

Wanta, 2001; Kiousis, 2003) as predicted by the

Journalism Studies, Volume 6, Number 1, 2005, pp. 61 71


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If Op-Ed editors employ a strategy of source

and content diversity, they are likely to provide

readers with a balanced exposure of competing

issue stands. This is important as the original

purpose of the Op-Ed was to provide a vehicle

for divergent opinions from that normally ex-pressed by the news and editorial comments of

the newspaper (Salisbury, 1988). The current

study aims to contribute to Op-Ed research by

analyzing the source and content diversity

strategies of Op-Ed editors from The New York

Times and the Washington Post in order to

determine if the Op-Ed page of the newspaper

provides an open forum for debate on salient

issues.

A Forum for Diverse Issue Stands: a review of

literature

The Opinion Editorial

Within a year of The New York Times s launch of

its Op-Ed page in September 1970, several major

newspapers such as the Washington Post, the

Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times

(Stonecipher, 1979) had established their own

Op-Ed page within the same location of thenewspaper (Salisbury, 1988). The function of the

Op-Ed was designed as a forum for the articu-

lation of multiple ideas in an attempt to promote

public debate on salient issues. The page

would offer a window in the world, particularly

that scene which for one reason or another . . .

was not present on its news and editorial

comment (Salisbury, 1988, p. 317).

The Op-Eds purpose in these national news-

papers then was to provide experts, the public

and policy makers a space to present and argue

different sides of the public agenda (Stone-

cipher, 1979). Specifically the objective of the

Op-Ed for The New York Times was to afford a

greater opportunity for exploration of issues

and presentation of new insights and new ideas

by writers and thinkers who have no institu-

tional connection [with the paper] (The New

York Times , 1970, p. 42).

Rosenfeld (2000) contends that The New York

Times hoped to attract new readership through

increased content diversity. According to Rosen-

liberal counterpoints of the papers editors by

hiring conservative non-journalist, William Sa-

fire as a regular Op-Ed columnist (2000).

Rosenfeld said, good Op-Ed pages now pro-

vide an entry into the debate for experts,

dissenters, and survivors of earlier battles

(2000, p. 7).

Despite the importance of the Op-Ed page as

a journalistic forum for diverse opinions from

expert and private citizen alike and its subse-

quent criticisms, mass communication scholar-

ship has largely ignored the Op-Ed page. As

Ciofalo and Traverso (1994) state: the issue of

the public forum in the Op-Ed page has been

largely unexplored except by the practitioners

themselves and media critics (p. 54). Little else

has changed in the past decade. A limited focus

in major journalism and communication aca-

demic journals on the Op-Ed has produced a

dearth of research on the role of the Op-Ed to

further a diversity of ideas.

Rather, research on Op-Eds has centered on

advertisements in Op-Ed pages (Brown et al.,

2001), public relation strategies on Op-Ed pages

(Smith and Heath, 1990), and political prefer-

ences between publishers and editorial page

editors (Kapoor and Kang, 1993).

Media Gatekeeping

As noted by Shoemaker et al. (2001), the gate-

keeping concept is one of the oldest in the field

of mass communication. As described by the

authors, gatekeeping refers to the process by

which potential news is narrowed and shaped

into the actual news that is transmitted by the

news media (p. 233). David White (1950) ap-plied psychologist Kurt Lewins (1947) concepts

of item selection around the dinner table to the

field of mass communication. Whites study

revealed that news content had to pass through

the gates of the editor before it could be news.

He found that the news editors (Mr. Gates)

personal beliefs and his knowledge of news

routines were influential on the news selection

process. Shoemaker and Reese (1996) explain

further that several key variables shape the

gatekeeping process: the personal views and

roles of media workers, media routines, media

62 ANITA G. DAY AND GUY GOLAN


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The news selection process is also derived

from the socialization of reporters to the norma-

tive behavior of the organizations structure

(Tuchman, 1978). This allows for the right

news to be reported and the right manner of

its interpretation to be presented. This helps

equalize, or balance, the meaning of reality and

maintain the status quo. As such, Stephen Reese

(1994) observed that in US television news,

gatekeepers implicitly define the limits of dis-

course on an issue and help maintain the status

quo by their selection of expert and commenta-

tor sources. Based on the identified purpose of

the Op-Ed section as a forum for the expression

of diverse viewpoints on salient issues, it is

likely that opinion gatekeepers would aim to

provide their readers with a diversity of both

source and issue stands.

Diversity in the Op-Ed

A study by Kapoor and Kang (1993) looked at

the political preferences of editorial page editors

and publishers to find that publishers did not

exercise monolithic control on editorial content.

Editorial page editors were free to provide

divergent political views on the editorial pagesof the paper in contrast to the views held by the

paper. A study by Golan and Wanta (2004)

found such diversity in the strategy employed

by Op-Ed editors of The New York Times con-

cerning the Israel Palestine conflict. The results

indicated diverse content and source issue

stands between newspaper columnist and guest

contributors on this single issue.

Yet, a Song (2003) study questioned whether

ideological orientations of news media ratherthan content and source strategies of editors

serve to guide the selection of Op-Ed pieces.

They do. Finding that Op-Ed pages tend not to

provide diverse perspectives in relationship to

the ideological orientations of the newspaper,

issues of public interest were left to slant off in

one direction. The blame comes from the witting

or unwitting selection of guest contributors to

the Op-Ed pages by Op-Ed page editors.

Croteau and Hoynes (1994) found specific

instances of limited source diversity in televi-

sion on the public affairs programs Nightline

of usual suspects, expert opinion on these two

programs closely followed that of the US gov-

ernments perspective. As Croteau and Hoynes

(1994) suggests, experts who appear on public

affairs programming, by invitation only for one

reason or another, limit debate and allow it to

fall within a short range of opinions.

Like Croteau and Hoynes (1994), Benjamin

Pages (1996) criticism of the debate in the

Op-Ed section of The New York Times brings to

focus the limits of such a forum for robust

debate on public affairs issues in the nations

leading newspaper when source and content

diversity are virtually non-existent. Page refers

to the debate on the Op-Ed pages of The New

York Times in the autumn of 1990 concerning the

Gulf War as an illusionary representation of a

full and vigorous debate on the war. As a

multitude of space was devoted to the issue

with letters to the editor, editorials and columns,

little source and content diversity in the discus-

sion of this issue was to be found. Instead of a

multitude of diverse voices, most comments

were filed by Times editors, regular columnists

employed by the Times or guest columnist

holding mainstream positions in officialdom or

academia.The current study aims to expand the current

scholarship on debate in the Op-Ed pages by

moving beyond the examination of a single

issue (Golan and Wanta, 2004) to the analysis

of three issues in two leading national news-

papers.

Research Questions

The purpose of this study is to analyze thecontent and source diversity strategy ofThe New

York Times and Washington Post Op-Ed editors

on the issues of affirmative action, the death

penalty and gay marriage. As noted by Green-

berg (2004), these issues were all salient in the

most recent presidential election as the result of

half a century of increasingly heated partisan

battles between Democrats and Republicans in

Americas political debate and culture war on

faith, family values and how people should live

their lives. The period of examination in this

study is marked by a series of news events

SOURCE AND CONTENT DIVERSITY IN OP-ED PAGES 63


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war including the execution of Oklahoma City

bomber Timothy McVeigh, the Massachusetts

Supreme Court ruling upholding gay marriages

and the Supreme Court decision upholding the

Michigan Law School affirmative action admis-

sions policy. If the Op-Ed pages are truly

designed to promote public discourse on issues

of public policy, then they ought to include

opinion articles that articulate diverse issue

stands. Therefore, we are trying to answer the

following research questions:

R1: How balanced was the selection of guest

columnist to newspaper columnists in the

Op-Ed pages of The New York Times and

Washington Post ?

R2: Did the Op-Ed editors select guest contri-

butors whose views reinforced the issue

stands of its columnists or allow for diver-

gent opinions?

A Content Analysis of The New York Times

and the Washington Post

A content analysis of Op-Ed articles published

in The New York Times and the Washington Post

between January 1, 1999 and December 31, 2003was conducted in the current study. The unit of

analysis was the individual Op-Ed article. Using

the key words gay marriage, affirmative

action, death penalty and editorial on a

Lexis-Nexis search, the current study identified

150 Op-Ed articles from the selected period.

More specifically, 38 articles dealt with gay

marriages, 67 with affirmative action and

45 with the death penalty. It ought to be noted

that these articles represent a population ratherthan a sample. The number of articles analyzed

seemed sufficient when compared to other

comparable studies from recent years. For ex-

ample, Hallock and Rodgers (2003) used

142 Op-Ed articles from two newspapers in

their analysis, Golan and Wanta (2004) analyzed

the diversity of content in 42 Op-Ed articles

published in The New York Times and Song

(2003) analyzed 196 Op-Ed articles in his analy-

sis of diversity in the Washington Post and

Washington Times .

All 150 Op-Ed articles were coded for the

. Newspaper. Whether the Op-Ed was published

in The New York Times or the Washington Post.

. Type . Whether the Op-Ed was written by a

newspaper columnist or by a guest contribu-

tor.

. Writer. Whether the article was written by a

journalist (columnist), politician, academic,

expert, advocate, religious leader or other.

. Issue. Whether the article dealt with gay

marriages, affirmative action or the death

penalty as the primary subject of the Op-Ed.

. Issue impact. Whether the article discussed the

social, moral, political, legal, individual or

other impact of the issue. For example, an

article that argued These judicial pronounce-

ments, therefore, constitute an appalling ab-

negation of popular sovereignty. . .

courtsthat deny morality as a rational basis for

legislation are not only undermining the

moral fabric of society, they run directly

counter to actual legislative practice in innu-

merable important areas of society (Raul,

2003) was coded as discussing the legal

impact of the issue.

. Affective. Whether the article was negative,

neutral or positive towards the issue it dis-

cussed. For example, an article that arguedIn our racially stratified society, diversity is a

necessary part of an effective college educa-

tion. To attain such diversity, in turn, the

explicit use of race in the admissions process

is necessary (Loury, 2003) was coded as

positive based on its support of affirmative

action. An article arguing affirmative action

metastasizes into a shapeless component of

the spreading racial and ethnic spoils system

. . .

such arithmetic would have suited NaziGermanys Nuremberg laws. It mocks Amer-

icas premises (Will, 2001) was coded as

negative based on its opposition to affirmative

action.

. Criticism of individual. Whether the article

criticized an individual politician, judge, re-

ligious figure, advocate, academic, individual

citizen or other. For example an article that

argued George W. Bush . . . from the very

beginning, his often maladroit maneuvering

on gay issues has looked more like triangula-

tion than principle (Rauch, 2000) was coded



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. Criticism of organization. Whether the article

criticized a political, legal, religious, advocacy,

academic or other body or organization or

society as a whole. For example an article that

argued the government had no business

policing people in their bedrooms . . . All of

our amendments have been designed to ex-

pand the sphere of freedom, with one notor-

ious exception: prohibition. We all know how

that absurd federal power grab turned out

(Simpson, 2003) was coded as critical of the

government (political organization).

. Issue outcome. Whether the article called for a

change in status quo or supported the status

quo. For example, an article that argued But

if the meaning of marriage and the right to

marital status is sufficiently defined with thereference to autonomy of the self . . . [in]

certain intimate conduct, what principled,

non arbitrary ground is there for denying

the right of marriage to, say, a threesome

whose members insist that it is necessary for

their self-fulfillment through intimacy? (Will,

2003) was coded as supportive of the status

quo since it argued for the continuation of the

current policy on gay marriages. An article

that argued . . .

[the] United States. . .

moralleadership is under challenge because of . . .

the death penalty and violence in our society

. . . [and that] there is no compelling statistical

evidence that the death penalty is a greater

deterrent to potential criminals than other

forms of punishment . . . [since] some

300 million of our closest allies think capital

punishment is cruel and unusual and it might

be worthwhile to give it some further

thought (Rohatyn, 2001) was coded as acall for a change in status quo since it argued

for a reexamination of current polices regard-

ing the death penalty.

In order to ensure inter-coder reliability of the

content analysis, a second coder independ-

ently coded 10 percent of the Op-Ed articles

(15 articles). Inter-coder reliability scores aver-

aged 0.81 based on the Holsti formula (Holsti,

1969). This mean did not include the inter-

coder reliability scores for the newspaper and

type variables that produced perfect alpha

scores of 1.0.

Source Diversity: who spoke

Table 1 displays the source distribution of Op-

Ed articles between columnist and guests for

The New York Times and the Washington Post.

The results indicate that the two papers adopted

different strategies in their selection of sources

in the discussion of the three issues. On the issue

of gay marriage, The New York Times allowed for

a diversity of sources with 58 percent of the Op-

Ed articles written by guest contributors. The

papers diverse use of sources is also reflected in

its coverage of the death penalty issue with55 percent of Op-Ed articles written by guests

and 45 percent by columnists. On the issue of

affirmative action, The New York Times s editors

turned the discussion over to others with

79 percent of the articles written by guest

contributors, while only allowing 21 percent of

the issues discussion for their columnists. Over-

all, 65 percent of Op-Eds concerning the three

issues were written by guest columnists while

35 percent of the articles were written by thenewspapers columnists. These results indicate

Table 1. Distribution of Op-Ed articles between columnists and guest writers

Paper Writer Gay marriage Affirmative action Death penalty Total

New York Times Guest 58% (12) 79% (22) 55% (12) 65% (46)Columnist 42% (9) 21% (6) 45% (10) 35% (25)

Total 100% (21) 100% (28) 100% (22) 100% (71)

Washington Post Guest 59% (10) 23% (9) 18% (4) 29% (23)Columnist 41% (7) 77% (30) 82% (19) 71% (56)

Total 100% (17) 100% (39) 100% (23) 100% (79)



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that The New York Times adopted a strategy of

allowing for a diversity of sources.

The results in Table 1 suggest that The New

York Times adopted a more encompassing di-

verse source strategy than the Washington Post .

While Op-Ed coverage of gay marriages was

fairly balanced between guest contributors

(59 percent) and regular columnists (41 percent),

such was not the case for the other two issues.

The analysis shows that the majority of Op-Ed

articles that dealt with affirmative action were

written by Washington Post columnists (77 per-

cent). The same strategy applied for the death

penalty issue where Washington Post columnists

accounted for nearly all Op-Ed articles

(82 percent). The findings indicate that overall

the Washington Post did not allow for diversity

of sources as 71 percent of the overall Op-Ed

articles were written by the newspapers colum-

nists. This number is much higher than the

comparable 35 percent found in The New York

Times .

The study results also identify academics and

advocates as the key guest writers of Op-Ed

articles in both the Washington Post and The New

York Times . Of guest Op-Ed articles, 52 percent

were written by academics, 32 percent werewritten by advocates, 9 percent were written by

politicians, 2 percent by religious figures and

6 percent by others.

Content Diversity: what they said

Moving beyond the analysis of source diversity,

the current study found interesting results

relating to diversity in content. Analyzing the

comments made by the two columnists thatwrote more on one issue than other columnists

at each paper finds repetitive frames used to

justify each writers position.

The New York Times columnist Bob Herbert

used several of the same criticisms against the

death penalty. Herbert painted the state of Texas

in three stories as a zealous killing machine. His

stereotype of inept public defenders are found

in three stories while four stories justify abolish-

ing the death penalty because it has been

applied to the mentally ill.

Herberts criticisms of Texas include state-

Western World when it comes to executions. . .

the states awful appellate review system, a

maddeningly dysfunctional apparatus. . .

(2000) to . . .Texas, a state that all but worships

at the altar of capital punishment. . . (2002) and

Only the United States, Congo and Iran con-tinue to execute people for offenses committed

when they were juveniles. But that is not the

issue on which Mr. Richardsons case */and

life */hinges. His lawyer, Gino Battisti, is trying

to convince the courts that it is a cruel and

unusual punishment, and therefore a violation

of the Eighth Amendment, to execute someone

who is mentally retarded (Herbert, 2001).

Writing for the Washington Post , William

Raspberry defined the issue of affirmativeaction largely in black and white terms only.

Raspberry made 64 references in nine stories on

affirmative action framing the issue as one of

blacks against whites compared to four frames

of other minority designations, most notably

Hispanics and Asians. Several examples in-

clude: blacks lag behind whites, white run

institutions, black kids, black affluence,

black households, whites, blacks, black

children, white families, black achievement

gap, etc. (1999a, 1999b, 2000a, 2000b, 2001a,

2001b, 2002, 2003a, 2003b).

Table 2 provides a systematic display of the

affective dimension of the comments provided

above. This dimension measured whether the

Op-Ed article discussed gay marriages, affirma-

tive action or the death penalty in a negative,

neutral or positive manner. An article critical of

affirmative action was coded 1 indicating nega-

tive coverage. A neutral article was coded 2 and

an Op-Ed that was supportive or positive of

affirmative action was coded 3. Therefore, Op-

Eds critical of gay marriages, affirmative action

or the death penalty would have means lower

than 2 and those articles favoring the issues/

programs would rank higher than 2.

The results reflected in Table 2 suggest that

Op-Ed editors pursued a limited diversity

strategy, allowing slightly divergent opinions

on these issues. The only real exception was the

discussion of affirmative action in the Washing-

ton Post where columnist and guest greatly



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New York Times s discussion of the death penalty(0.91 differential).

The results in Table 2 suggest that The New

York Times allowed for some diversity of opinion

in Op-Ed articles that dealt with the issue of

gay marriages. While The New York Times

columnists were unanimously supportive of

gay marriages (3.0), their guest contributors

seemed more neutral (2.6). Still, it is clear that

Op-Ed articles published in The New York Times

on the issue primarily argued in favor of

gay marriages with an overall mean of 2.81

suggesting a strong liberal orientation in the

discussion of the gay marriage issue. For exam-

ple, Nichols Kristof (2003) writes: The bottom

line is that same-sex love is a mystery far

more subtle than just a matter of biblical

injunction */just as interracial love has turned

out to be . . . someday, we will regard opposition

to gay marriage as equally obtuse and old

fashioned.

An analysis of the affective scores for the

Washington Post point to similar results. While

the papers Op-Ed columnist were strongly in

favor of gay marriages (2.71), guest contributors

averaged a lower mean of 2.3. Overall, Op-Ed

articles published in the Washington Post aver-

aged a mean of a 2.47 suggesting a more neutral

discussion of the gay marriage issue than The

New York Times . For example, Jonathan Rauch

(1999) writes: It has never been clear to me why

discouraging stable gay relationships in favor of

sex in parks and porn shops is good for the

The results indicate that on the issue of gay

marriages, both papers allowed for some diver-

sity of opinion with a mean difference of 0.40

between the means of guests and columnists.

The results in Table 2 indicate different find-

ings concerning diversity of opinion in Op-Ed

articles dealing with affirmative action. The New

York Times columnist (2.54) averaged means that

were very close to those of guest contributors

(2.35), suggesting that the majority of articles

were in favor of affirmative action. This is

consistent with the overall coverage mean score

of 2.5. Clearly, Op-Ed articles on the issue were

not very diverse in their affect towards the

affirmative action issue. The opinions of guest

contributors clearly reinforce those of the co-

lumnists. For example, Orlando Patterson (2003)

writes: As pragmatic public policy, it is easy to

show that the benefits of affirmative action far

outweigh its social or individual costs.

Table 2 shows a high degree of opinion

diversity in the Washington Post regarding

affirmative action. While the papers columnists

were mostly critical of affirmative action (1.41),

their guest contributors seemed more in favor of

the issue (2.77). The 1.36 difference in means

between columnists and guests suggests a high

degree of diversity of opinion with columnists

highly critical of the program and guests highly

supportive. For example, Richard Cohen writes:

This is the pernicious aftertaste of affirmativeaction */and its champions ought to ponder itlong and hard . . . other proponents of affirmative

Table 2. Means of issue coverage (affective)a

Issue coverage (affective) Writer New York Times Washington Post

Gay marriage Guest 2.60 2.30Columnist 3.00 2.71Differential 0.40 0.41Overall 2.81 2.47

Affirmative action Guest 2.54 2.77Columnist 2.35 1.41Differential 0.19 1.36Overall 2.50 1.73

Death penalty Guest 1.91 1.10Columnist 1.00 1.75Differential 0.91 0.65Overall 1.50 1.22

a10/negative; 20/neutral; 30/positive.



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what they are affirming is not a concept of justicebut instead a negative stereotype. (2002, p. A23)

The overall means on affirmative action once

again suggest that The New York Times (2.5)

allowed more liberal Op-Ed contributions than

the Washington Post (1.73).The results in Table 2 indicate that the highest

level of diversity in opinion was allowed in the

Op-Ed discussion of the death penalty. While

The New York Times guest contributors seemed

neutral in their discussion of the issue (1.92), the

papers columnists were clearly opposed to the

death penalty (1.0). The overall mean for The

New York Times (1.5) clearly indicates wide-scale

diversity of opinion on the death penalty issue.

As an example, Scott Turow (2003) comments:At the end of the day, perhaps the best

argument against capital punishment may be

that it is an issue beyond the limited capacity of

government to get things right.

Similar findings are seen in the Washington

Post . Here, guest contributors were highly

critical of the death penalty (1.10) while paper

columnists were more neutral (1.75). The overall

mean score (1.22) suggests a wide-scale diver-

sity of opinions on the death penalty issue. Forexample, E. J. Dionne Jr. (2002) states: We may

not be about to abolish it, but thanks to the

courage of Illinois Republican governor, George

Ryan, the burden in the death penalty debate is

shifting.

The results indicate that while the Washington

Post was more critical to the liberal programs of

affirmative action and gay marriages than The

New York Times , it was also more critical of the

traditionally conservative issue of the death

penalty than the Times.

Study results provide further indications of an

editorial strategy of content diversity in the

discussion of the three issues. The social impact

variable of the content analysis reveals the Op-

Eds focus on the overall impact of these three

issues in American society. Results indicate that

most Op-Ed articles dealt with the social impact

of the three issues (38 percent). Yet, discussion of

the issue impact proved diverse as moral impact

(19 percent), legal impact (17 percent), impact on

individuals (15 percent) and political impact

Op-Ed Focus on the Impact of Issues

Mixed results concerning content diversity was

found in the criticism raised by Op-Ed writers of

individuals and of organizations. Opinion wri-

ters in both newspapers focused the majority of

their criticism on individual politicians (19 per-cent, 14 percent), judges (4 percent, 2.5 percent)

and various individuals in general (1.5 percent,

6 percent). It ought to be noted that most criti-

cism was directed to President George W. Bush.

A larger scale of content diversity was found in

writers criticism of organizations with the ma-

jority of it placed on society as a whole (27 percent,

28 percent) and legal bodies/organizations

(21 percent, 28 percent) followed by criticism of

academic organizations (6 percent, 6 percent) andadvocacy groups (6 percent, 4 percent).

Summary and Discussion of Content and

Source Diversity Strategies

The present study aimed to analyze the diver-

sity of sources and issue stands on gay mar-

riages, affirmative action and the death penalty

in Op-Ed articles published in The New York

Times and the Washington Post . Designed as ajournalistic forum for the articulation of compet-

ing ideas on salient issues, the Op-Ed section

ought to pursue a strategy of diversity in order

to fulfill its stated purpose. A content analysis of

these two papers produced mixed findings

concerning gatekeepers strategy of source and

content diversity.

A large degree of source diversity was identi-

fied in The New York Times as guest columnists

accounted for 65 percent of overall Op-Ed

articles regarding the three issues. The news-

paper provided a seemingly balanced use of

sources to examine the issues of gay marriages

and the death penalty as its columnists ac-

counted for over 40 percent of the articles. This

balance was completely undermined in the

discussion of affirmative action where 79 per-

cent of Op-Ed articles were written by guest

contributors. It could be argued that by turning

the discussion of the issue over to guest writers

and away from its own columnists, the news-

paper was true to its original proposition of



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of issues and presentation of new insights and

new ideas by writers and thinkers who have no

institutional connection (The New York Times ,

1970, p. 42). Based on the results of the content

analysis, it could be argued that The New York

Times followed an editorial strategy of source

diversity in its discussion of the three issues.

The results of the study also suggest that

unlike The New York Times , the Washington Post

did not allow for source diversity in its Op-Ed

discussion of the three issues. While guest

contributors (59 percent) outnumbered colum-

nists (41 percent) on the issue of gay marriages,

the discussion of the other two issues was less

balanced. The study results show that over

77 percent of Op-Ed articles on affirmative

action and 82 percent of articles on the deathpenalty were written by newspaper columnists.

As Washington Post columnists are hired and

paid by the newspaper, it cannot be argued that

the papers Op-Ed section provides discussion

that is free of institutional connection. It could

be argued that by limiting the Op-Ed discussion

of the controversial issues to its paid columnists,

the editors of the Washington Posts Op-Ed

section did not allow for sufficient source

diversity.Beyond the selection of sources, the current

study was also interested in examining diversity

in issue stands by Op-Ed writers. Aimed to

provide a stage for the articulation of competing

issue stands, the Op-Ed section ought to have

provided a voice to both liberals and conserva-

tives on the three highly polarized social issues.

Like source diversity, the current analysis also

provides mixed results concerning the diversity

of issue stands in both newspapers.Our measurement of the affective coverage of

gay marriages in The New York Times indicates

that overall, coverage in the papers Op-Ed

articles was highly supportive (positive) of gay

marriages. The low differential of 0.4 suggests

that there was no real difference in worldview

between columnists and guest contributors on

the gay marriage issue.

A lack of diversity in issue stands in the Times

was also found concerning affirmative action.

Again, the majority of articles were generally

liberal and supportive of affirmative action. The

relatively no difference in issue stand between

columnists and guests, suggesting that editors

selected mostly those articles that reinforced

their own worldview on the issue.

Contradicting the lack of diversity in issue

stand for gay marriages and affirmative action,

the Times allowed for greater diversity in issue

stand in its discussion of the death penalty.

While the newspapers columnists were over-

whelmingly opposed to the death penalty, its

guest contributors appeared largely neutral.

This diversity in issue stands is reflected by

the 0.91 differential.

The analysis of issue stand diversity in

Washington Post Op-Ed articles provides consis-

tent results to those of The New York Times .

While the Washington Post did not allow for adiversity of issue stand on gay marriages

(0.41 differential) and the death penalty (0.65

differential), it did however allow for a

greater diversity of issue stand on affirmative

action. While the papers columnists were over-

whelmingly opposed to affirmative action,

the editors elected to publish guest Op-Ed

articles that were strongly supportive of the

issue (2.77).

The current study raises concerns over diver-sity of sources and issue stands in the Op-Ed

pages of two leading national daily newspapers.

The results of the content analysis indicate that

Op-Ed gatekeepers in both The New York Times

and the Washington Post allow limited diversity

in their discussion of three important and highly

controversial social issues. The discussion was

largely limited by the source of writers in each

paper, appearing to mostly to be elites, aca-

demics and pundits.With the scarcity of relevant research, the

current study aimed to enhance knowledge on

Op-Ed journalism which is an important part of

democratic discourse. Recognizing that reveal-

ing the choices of gatekeepers and the decision-

making process is limited within a strict analysis

of editorial content, an assumption of strategy is

made here based upon the voices represented in

the observed Op-Ed pages. An in-depth analysis

of editors policies, available writers and ob-

servations of actual newsroom practices would

perhaps better answer editors source and con-



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research should continue to investigate editorial

strategies of source and content diversity

with a multi-part approach, including perhaps

interviews with The Times and Washington Post s

Op-Ed editors for an enriched understanding of

how gatekeepers allow diversity and how this

diversity influences readers perceptions of is-

sues and attribute saliency.

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Documents

Day and Golan 2005