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An essential challenge for journalism studies, in a time when the phenomenon and concept of journalism is more contested than ever before, is the understanding of journalistic agency. In order to understand the making and maintenance of accountability journalism we can find inspiration in scholarly work on ‘the problematic of structuring’ (Philip Abrams 1982), and thus overcome the contra¬diction between people making history and history making people (Zygmunt Bauman 1989). There is also something to be learned from Anthony Giddens and his persistent work to formulate a structuration theory (1979). Furthermore, we can draw upon some important works by the economic historian Christopher Lloyd and his formulation of ‘methodological structurism’ (1986, 1993).

In structuration theory ‘structure’ is conceived of as rules and resources, recursively implicated in the reproduction of social systems (incl. institutions). What rules and resources can journalists nowadays draw upon to structure viable versions of accountability journalism?

This paper demonstrates the relevance of the above mentioned theoretical contributions in the understanding of journalistic efforts to conduct and maintain accountability.

It has been argued that journalism, in a time when ‘we’re all journalists’, should simply be regarded as an activity, rather as an institution (Scott Gant 2007). The present paper, however, defends an institutional perspective and stress the need to conceive journalism as an institution with a history, and a possible future …