Civilia 2025, 16(1):34-52 | DOI: 10.5507/civ.2026.004

Precarization of journalistic work: a review of the literature on the topicOriginal contributions, Original article, Research article

Martin Honc

Institut komunikačních studií a žurnalistiky (IKSŽ), Fakulta sociálních věd, Univerzita Karlova, Praha

Journalism influences the ways in which people understand the world. Workers in the media industry play an important role in the interpretation of social reality and thus play a crucial role in shaping collective memory. However, their position has been weakening over the last few years, with journalism in crisis and the precarisation of journalistic work becoming more pronounced. While studies examining this phenomenon are increasing, the literature is relatively inconsistent in this area. This article therefore aims to conduct a detailed review of a sample of scholarly papers on the precarization of journalism work in major social science journals published between 2014 and 2024 to provide a comprehensive view of the literature and different theoretical approaches in examining the precarization of work in the media industry. This article elaborates on the concept of journalistic precarization, including a detailed definition of the phenomenon and current theoretical approaches examining the work experiences of journalists. The literature review shows that precarization is a very broad concept that can be viewed through different theoretical frameworks and scholarly disciplines. The paper also aims to enrich future studies on the precarization of work in the media by providing a sufficient theoretical framework to understand what working conditions prevail in contemporary media.

Keywords: media, journalists, precarization, journalistic autonomy, precarization of work, precarization of journalists, media industry, journalistic work

Received: September 30, 2025; Revised: September 30, 2025; Accepted: February 7, 2026; Published: February 9, 2026  Show citation