Savoir et démocratie : le fondement normatif des univers sociologique et journalistique

There are journalists who say they are sociologists, as there are sociologists who call themselves journalists, specifically improved journalists. They mention a common object and identity and a question of methods that would differ only in degree. In the opposite, some authors describe the specificity and the professional autonomy of these two activities in terms of object and methods. The two ways of thinking journalistic and sociological activities may be designated as continuism and discontinuism. For the continuist approach, these two activities are the same, the only difference lies in a different degree methods. For the discontinuist approach, this article defend, the two activities are based on two bearing and heterogeneous points as « knowledge» and « democracy ». If they are ideals in terms of what is actually observed concerning the practices of sociologists and journalists, this paper argues that these goals describe values and common knowledge. These professions have to be considered as distinct « universes » which recognize themselves shared rules