Gavin Ellis

Gavin Ellis is a lecturer, media consultant and researcher. He is a former editor-in-chief of the New Zealand Herald and his association with journalism now spans more than half a century. He was chairman of the New Zealand Media Freedom Committee and the 2005 recipient of the British Commonwealth Astor Press Freedom Award. He was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2015 for services to journalism. He is the author of Word War (VDM, Saarbrucken 2009), Trust Ownership and the Future of News: Media Moguls and White Knights (Palgrave, London 2014) and Complacent Nation (BWB Texts, Wellington 2016). He holds a PhD in political studies and lectures in Media & Communications at the University of Auckland. He is a weekly media commentator on Radio New Zealand National.

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Auckland

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Auckland

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Trust Ownership and the Future of News: Media moguls and white knights

Crumbling business models mean news media structures must change. Trust Ownership and the Future of News explores the past and present use of newspaper trusts – drawing on case studies such as the Guardian, the Irish Times and the Pulitzer Prize winning Tampa Bay Times – to make the case for a form of ownership dedicated to sustaining high quality journalism. Published by Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2014.

Complacent Nation

New Zealanders are too complacent about the continuing erosion of their right to know what government is doing on their behalf. Political risk has become a primary consideration in whether official information requests will be met, and successive governments have allowed free speech rights to be overridden. Complacent Nation draws on the author's decades of experience as a journalist and newspaper editor to chronicle these patterns of erosion. It is time, he argues, for New Zealanders to reaffirm their democratic rights or risk further deterioration to freedom of speech and our civic knowledge. A BWB Text published by Bridget Williams Books, Wellington, in 2016.