ABSTRACT. Meadows views journalism as part of the broader process of making culture: journalism practices should be seen as anything but self-justifying (they must be contingent on the social consequences they provoke in the formation of democracy). Randall claims that the distinguishing feature of investigative reporting is original research. Schudson argues that the mass media have as yet to prove that they are capable of meeting the demards of the new kind of citizen (the "monitorial" citizen).