The Rise and Fall of the Media as an Elite Institution

The election of Donald Trump as President has brought much attention to the partisan media coverage of his administration. Concern about the one-sided nature of reporting and the alteration of longtime standards has caused trust in media to decline sharply. To better understand the current situation, this paper looks at the history of American media, from the initial partisan stage to the development of broad standards. It then examines the recent drift back toward partisanship as an explanation for why trust in this longstanding institution has diminished