This is the next digital newsroom looking to unionize

Claire Zillman

<p>There&#8217;s no doubt about it: Digital newsrooms are the new hotbeds of union organizing.</p><div class="paywall-selector"></div><div class="paywall">
<p>The digital journalists at Al Jazeera America announced that a majority of their newsroom had petitioned to join the NewsGuild of New York that&#8217;s part of the Communication Workers of America union, according to statement they released Thursday.</p>
<p>&#8220;An overwhelming majority of the digital newsroom has signed on to the effort [to join The NewsGuild of New York, CWA Local 31003], and the group has called on AJAM’s management to voluntarily recognize their union. They are still awaiting a formal response from the company,&#8221; the statement said. &#8220;Should Al Jazeera refuse to do so, it would be the first journalism outlet in recent months to be forced into a federally supervised election at the National Labor Relations Board.&#8221;</p>
<p>Al Jazeera America—a television channel with an accompanying website that&#8217;s owned by Al Jazeera Media Network, which is partially funded by the ruling family of Qatar— launched in August 2013. The effort to unionize the channel&#8217;s digital journalists was motivated by &#8220;a troubling lack of transparency, inconsistent management and lack of clear redress have persisted at AJAM Digital,&#8221; the statement said. &#8220;Discrepancies in salaries, responsibilities and the way job performance is evaluated undermine our work and the harmony of our workplace.&#8221;</p>
<p>The union push comes <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/al-jazeera-america-replaces-ceo-1430955479" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">amid turmoil at Al Jazeera America</a> as several high-profile journalists and executives have left the network recently and it has been sued for discrimination.</p>
<p>The news channel told Fortune in a statement it is &#8220;currently considering the request to voluntarily recognize the NewsGuild as the exclusive bargaining representative of the digital department employees.”</p>
<p>Al Jazeera America is the latest digital newsroom to undergo a unionization effort. <a href="https://fortune.com/2015/08/07/vice-media-union/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">In August, writers at Vice Media voted to join the Writers&#8217; Guild of America</a> following the lead of journalists at <a href="http://gawker.com/gawker-media-votes-to-unionize-1708892974" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Gawker</a> and <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/07/salon-votes-to-unionize-209898" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Salon</a>, who also voted to unionize in June and July, respectively. That trend—that&#8217;s motivated in part by digital journalists&#8217; pursuit of the relatively stable environments and pay scale associated with more traditional media outlets—comes during a decline in overall union membership. <a href="http://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">It&#8217;s at its lowest point—11.1%—since 1983, the first year with comparable date, when the rate was 20.1%</a>.</p></div>

Digital news organizations are the new hotbeds of unionization.

Like Vice and Gawker, Al Jazeera America digital wants to unionize

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Al Jazeera America

Leadership

This is the Next Digital Newsroom Looking to Unionize

Like Vice and Gawker, Al Jazeera America digital wants to unionize | Fortune

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