Introduction

The rise of alternative and cooperative media and their organic relationship with social transformation projects (^{Downing, 2002, p. 55}) has led us to examine in our article how these media build their own agendas, what topics they tackle and what type of sources they use to elaborate their news stories. Likewise, we analyze if they engage in collaborative journalism, since this practice is considered to be an agent of transformation and for remediating the errors and excesses of conventional media (^{Graves & Konieczna, 2015}; ^{Martínez Mendoza & Ramos Rojas, 2020}).

Interest in the agenda building of alternative and cooperative media is warranted because, as pointed out by ^{Fleischman et al. (2009)}, these media “have become a door to publish information that is excluded from traditional media’s agenda” (p. 257). Furthermore, these media are characterized by a variety of points of view and the diversity of topics dealt with, but with a common focus that is always present to a greater or lesser extent: distribution of wealth in a fairer and/or more equitable way and a desire for transformation.

We must keep in mind that construction of the agenda and use of sources are essential in alternative and cooperative media as they are perceived more as a public service and not so much as a factory manufacturing content (^{Jarvis, 2015}). We must likewise take into account that they are opposed to mainstream, conventional and dominant media, and hence are very suitable for building local communities and facilitating communication between social movements, while being fundamentally critical (^{Sandoval & Fuchs, 2010}).

An issue of concern that has been highlighted in research on the use of sources has been the media’s loss of control over contents, and therefore of agenda building, in favor of interested sources. The media require news on a daily basis but they generally work with limited financial and human resources. This is more evident in the media sector that concerns us since, as ^{Fleischman et al. (2009)} point out, they are non-profit initiatives, which are usually based on voluntary collaboration from their participants. For this reason, they sometimes reject advertising or financial support from foundations or governments in order to maintain their autonomy.

Authors such as ^{Vázquez Bermúdez (2006)} have warned about the inordinate dependence of conventional media on the agenda established by certain news sources, especially those occupying the most relevant positions in the political, economic, social and cultural hierarchy. Research studies by ^{Casero Ripollés and López Rabadán (2016)}, ^{Mayoral (2018)}, and ^{Pérez Curiel et al. (2015)} have also cautioned about this dependence, pointing out that “journalistic work has been oriented towards the predominance of official and government sources in the news” (p. 103). ^{Ortega and Humanes (2000)} consider that the excessive presence of institutional sources causes both a disaffection from reality by journalists (facts are replaced by statements from sources), and a biased vision, shaped exclusively by a few focal points. In a similar vein, ^{Alonso González (2016)} observes that in the mainstream media, institutional sources continue to be clearly overrepresented compared to other types of sources (civil society, alternative ones, etc.) and ^{Mayoral (2018)} asserts that traditional media “are increasingly dependent on these huge machines that produce press releases, calls, announcements, press conferences, etc.” (p. 47).

Likewise, conventional media have shown an excessive dependence on news agency information, “which would explain how a great homogeneity of topics can be hidden under an apparent model of pluralism with a multitude of different media outlets” (^{Gelado Marcos, 2009, p. 245}). It is a practice that ^{Noelle-Neumann (1973)} already warned about when referring to “consonance” as one of the causes of journalistic information uniformity and which other authors such as ^{Lewis et al. (2007)} have called “pre-packaged information”.

In recent years, the digital environment has opened the door to interaction between the media and citizens, making it easier, in the case of alternative and cooperative media, to introduce their issues on the public agenda. This has given rise to initiatives ranging from information from a citizen source to the coverage of a specific event or to collective dissemination of specific campaigns (^{López-Fernández, 2018}).

Theoretical framework

Media agenda building and sources

The study of the media agenda has been fundamentally based on its effects on the audience, applying the agenda setting theory (^{McCombs & Shaw, 1972}). However, in order to calibrate that influence, it is of interest to know how the former is constructed, and delve into the process known as agenda building (^{Sádaba & Rodríguez, 2007}). This term, created in 1971 by Cobb and Elder, is known as the fourth phase of agenda setting and refers to the process of building the news that makes up the media agenda and to the elements that try to influence and ultimately do influence it (^{McCombs, 2006}). The traditional analysis of who sets the public agenda shifts to who determines the media agenda (^{Kroon & Van der Meer, 2021}). It is likewise useful for studying the type of interaction that occurs between the political and media agenda (^{Aruguete, 2017}).

This construction of the media agenda or agenda building refers to the “process by which news organizations and journalists feature, emphasize, and/or select certain events, issues, or sources to cover over others” (^{Nisbet, 2008, p. 1}). Despite its relation to agenda setting, it remains a much less explored field of study, whose framework has been applied sporadically and inconsistently (^{Denham, 2010}).

The emergence of the media agenda as an object of research is explained by the confluence of a “complex network of structural and contextual factors, endogenous and exogenous, that shape news content” (^{Brandenburg, 2002, p. 39}). As ^{Aruguete (2017)} points out, it is influenced by institutional limitations, news values, professional habits, values associated with the journalist’s social role and work routines. Decades ago, ^{McCombs (1992)} used the popular metaphor of the layers of an onion, in whose outer layer were the external sources. The media themselves that influence one another are the second layer, while the third one is the technical resources that constrain news production. The restrictions imposed by the organization’s own culture constitute the fourth layer, whereas the fifth one is the journalists’ individual preferences. Finally, the last layer is the journalistic styles or genres.

Along these lines, ^{Weaver and Choi (2017)} take up the onion metaphor and reduce the possible “layers” or spheres of influences in the media agenda to five. First, there are the most influential sources, especially the institutional and political ones. Second are the media themselves, which influence one another, especially the so-called media of reference. This layer is known as the intermedia agenda setting. In the third layer, we find social norms and journalistic traditions, which also affect the construction of the media agenda. Unscheduled or “authentic” events, such as a natural disaster, unexpectedly appearing on the agenda are the fourth layer. Finally, the last layer refers to the audience itself, which also participates in this process. The latter has been more influential since the appearance of the Internet and social media (^{Gillmor, 2006}), as user-generated content (UGC) has found new channels with the development of the Internet (^{García de Torres, 2010}) and less alternative media. Social media have also played a role in this battle for the agenda, and for setting the media agenda, as well as the political and public ones (^{Candón Mena, 2012}).

^{McCombs (1992)} and ^{Weaver and Choi (2017)} concur in placing those external sources that most influence its setting in the outer layer of this onion that represents the media agenda. This relationship between the media agenda and the sources is an issue that has been debated and examined in depth for half a century. As ^{Atton and Wickenden (2005)} observe, the credibility of the media is also influenced by the hierarchy of sources, a concept that has to do with notions of power, legitimacy and authority. On the other hand, ^{Pérez Curiel et al. (2015)} point out that “the management of sources is a factor of journalistic quality, based on ethical principles such as truthfulness, cross-checking sources, coherence and equity, which come up against political, economic, ideological and labor-professional constraints” (p. 104).

Thus, sources constitute an essential part of journalistic activity, and they have been a recurring object of study up to the present day (^{Franklin & Carlson, 2011}; ^{Lewis et al., 2008}; ^{Splendore, 2017}). At the same time, they are a key element in analyzing the construction of the media agenda (^{Weaver & Choi, 2017}). The study of sources has led to the establishment of different categories, such as those of ^{Ruiz and Albertini (2008)}. These authors differentiate between primary sources (those that are informed by their own participation in the newsworthy event, either as participants or as witnesses to what happened) and secondary (those that are informed through oral or written reports sought out or received from primary sources).

Along these lines, ^{López (1995)} distinguishes four categories of sources: own, institutional, spontaneous (from groups of citizens that normally come into conflict with the large corporations that constitute power, counterbalance the strategy of the powerful and whose opinions reflect the interests and concerns of the majority of citizens), and confidential and anonymous.

^{Armentia Vizuete and Caminos Marcet (2003)} differentiate between: public (sources interested in making their public work known and who use press offices, press releases, press conferences, etc. to communicate with journalists); private (not available to all journalists and their access is restricted to a certain number of reporters); confidential (they usually work with the off-the-record system); and experts (individuals specialized in certain topics to whom the journalist goes to obtain unique information or to interpret available data accurately).

Finally, ^{Mayoral (2005)} establishes three types of sources: intermediaries or news agencies; official (central government, regional governments, city councils, unions, political parties, employers, other institutions, and others); and unofficial (associations, non-governmental organizations, experts, members of institutions or organizations, and others).

Methodology

The objective of this article is to analyze the process of agenda building of four Spanish alternative and cooperative media. In order to study the selection of the events covered by these media, we examine the type of topics and issues addressed, as well as the nature or origin of the material used to produce the news pieces, and if they engage in collaborative journalism. To analyze the influence of sources, this study focuses primarily on the first -external sources- and the last -user-generated content- layers pinpointed by ^{McCombs (1992)} and ^{Weaver and Choi (2017)}.

We rely on three hypotheses:

For our study, the cases of four Spanish alternative media with more than 50 000 followers on Twitter were analyzed: La Marea (https://www.lamarea.com/) (with 229 000 followers), El Salto (https://www.elsaltodiario.com/) (168 000), Crític (https://www.elcritic.cat/) (56 000) and 5W (https://www.revista5w.com/) (53 000).

These four media were selected, because beyond their differences, they started up from microdonations (^{Martínez Polo & Martínez Sánchez, 2017}). They function in a community and solidarity economy regime, opting for the constitution of cooperatives or entities of collective and equal participation among the partners; they ensure that internal democracy prevails; they safeguard transparency about their economic situation and have ethical advertising codes that restrict revenues in this sense, avoiding advertisements from companies that contradict their editorial principles. In all four cases, their main source of financing is subscriptions.

To carry out our research, a content analysis was performed, along with a questionnaire with open-ended questions to the four studied media, addressing aspects such as the predominance of topics and issues, sources, collaborative practices with other media and the promotion of user-generated content.

The content analysis was conducted exclusively on the web front pages, following the work of other scholars such as ^{Sigal (1978)}, ^{Erbring et al. (1980)}, ^{Danielson and Lasorsa (1997)}, and ^{López Rabadán and Casero Ripollés (2012)}, as there is where the battle for the agenda is really fought. Indeed, these front pages include the news to which each medium confers greater relevance. The topics and issues dealt with and the sources used were examined in each news item published by these media in the selected period (February 2021). News pieces recovered by the media from previous days, months or even years and brought back to their front pages -a practice often observed in this research- were also included in this sample.

Monitoring the front pages of the four media throughout the month of February 2021 has meant there were 437 articles analyzed. Of these, 259 correspond to El Salto, 88 to La Marea, 70 to Crític and 20 to 5W. This unequal number of items analyzed in each medium corresponds to the frequency of publication and the volume of articles published daily by each media. El Salto publishes the most news articles, followed by La Marea, Crític and 5W.

In our analysis, we have had to take into account that these web front pages, although forming a unit, are dynamic, changing constantly throughout the day as they are updated. In addition, given the lack of records of these updates, as has been verified in our research and confirmed by the analyzed media, the content analysis has had to be conducted in real time.

In order to observe the events and issues that the media included, highlighted and/or selected, we examined the prevalence of social and environmental issues or lack thereof. Thus, each news item was catalogued under a specific topic, differentiating between social and environmental issues and those that are not, and classifying the former according to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (sdg) included in the 2030 Agenda.

Regarding the literature addressed in the theoretical framework, the following types of sources were considered for the analysis:

All the sources in each news item were counted, usually observing several sources from different categories in the same piece.

Results

Predominance of social and environmental issues

Observing the four media as a whole has revealed that social and environmental issues (related to the sdgs) represent 74% of the total. Of these, the most frequent topics are those related to Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions. In second place, we find those related to Good Health and Well-Being. Those linked to the Reduction of Inequalities; Decent Work and Economic Growth; and Gender Equality are third. Following those, we find No Poverty; Affordable and Clean Energy; Quality Education; and Climate Action (see Figure 1).

** Those SDGs with a presence of less than 1% have not been included in the figure.

Source: The authors.

Figure 1 Topics related to SDG / not related to SDG 

In the four media studied, social and environmental issues prevail, although their weight with respect to other issues differs depending on the case. Thus, in 5W (90%) and El Salto (83%) they fully dominate the agenda, while in La Marea (63.6%) and Crític (52.8%) their prevalence is lower.

Regarding the most published social topics, there is a predominance of issues related to Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions: La Marea (46.4%), Crític (43.2%), 5W (38.8%) and El Salto (28.8%).

In second position, the most addressed topics differ from one media to another. Good Health and Well-Being stand out in the cases of El Salto (17.6%) and La Marea (12.5%), while in Crític this position is held by Gender Equality (13.5%), and in 5W by Reduced Inequalities (22.2%).

In third position is Decent Work and Economic Growth in El Salto (13%), Reduced Inequalities in La Marea (10.6%), and Good Health and Well-Being in Crític (10.8%) and 5W (16.6%).

It can be observed that during the analyzed period there are topics and issues that interest the four media, although they are not predominant in all cases. Thus, in addition to Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, they all publish news pieces related to Health, Affordable and Clean Energy, Reduced Inequalities and Climate Action. In this sense, it is noteworthy that El Salto dedicates 17.6% of its information to Health and 5W 22.2% to Reduced Inequalities. The three media show similar results in Affordable and Clean Energy (between 2.7% and 5.5%) and Climate Action (normally between margins of 2.7% and 8.1%).

There are issues in common, at least in three of the four media: No Poverty (El Salto, La Marea and 5W), Quality Education (El Salto, La Marea and Crític), Gender Equality (El Salto, La Marea and Crític), Sustainable Cities and Communities (El Salto, Crític and 5W), and Responsible Consumption and Production (El Salto, La Marea and Crític), with margins between 1.8% and 5.5% depending on the case.

As for non-social topics, the most frequently addressed issues are fundamentally political, especially national topics such as electoral processes and the extreme right, and quite far behind, international politics and culture.

The results coincide with the questionnaire responses, in which El Salto states its social nature and the predominance of this approach in its contents. La Marea is in line with this same philosophy, and whose interest in these issues has led to the creation of the project Apuntes de Clase and the specialized media on climate crisis, Climática. In the case of Crític, they state that climate and feminism are two of their main sections, along with others such as politics, economy, world and social issues. However, they have recently revealed that they are devoting a great deal of content to the climate emergency, the energy crisis and degrowth as an option for deterring social and economic collapse. They have also produced digital dossiers on energy and mobility. As for 5W, it explains that its focus is currently more social.

Discussion and conclusions

Social and environmental issues occupy a very prominent part of the agendas of the four media analyzed, confirming the first hypothesis. This supports ^{Downing’s (2002)} affirmations that these media are related to social transformation projects, as well as observations from ^{Jarvis (2015)} when considering that they are fundamentally conceived as a public service. It is also in line with the assessments of ^{Barranquero Carretero and Candón-Mena (2021)} who noted that these media are characterized, among other aspects, by their aim to promote democracy, human rights and other ideals of social and environmental justice.

Of the four outlets, Crític has the lowest percentage of social issues on its agenda (52.8%). However, we should bear in mind that the issues addressed by this media have likely been conditioned to a great extent by the period analyzed, coinciding with the Catalan regional elections on February 14, 2021. This resulted in an increase in information about politics and elections to the detriment of other issues. In this sense, the results observed in El Salto, La Marea and 5W, have led us to conclude that social and environmental issues occupy between 63% and 90% of the agendas examined.

Within these topics, and if we look at the cataloguing according to the SDGs, not all of them are addressed equally. The most present issue is in regard to Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, which occupies first place in the four media. Information on Good Health and Well-Being, frequently related to the Covid-19 pandemic, and Reduced Inequalities, are also in a prominent position in the studied media agendas.

Regarding the sources used, the second hypothesis is confirmed upon observing that the media analyzed are based mainly on sources resulting from the journalist’s own initiative, whether expert or primary ones. Nevertheless, there are few news stories covered by the reporter as a direct witness, with the exception of 5W, where this practice is common. This is possibly due to its profile as a media outlet dedicated to investigative journalism and highly focused on international affairs, with collaborators reporting from various countries.

The study of sources also reveals a distancing from institutional sources, both governmental and political, and practically non-existent news agency information, which also differentiates them from the practices of traditional media pointed out by ^{Pérez Curiel et al. (2015)}, ^{Casero Ripollés and López Rabadán (2016)}, ^{Alonso González (2016)} and ^{Mayoral (2018)}. However, among the institutional sources, the governmental ones still predominate.

It is also observed that they consider other types of alternative sources such as citizen groups and movements, giving voice to social problems and issues, in line with observations by ^{Downing (2002)}.

As for user-generated contents, they are also present, although with less weight and unevenly so depending on each case. Among the media studied, the most noteworthy in this regard is El Salto.

Regarding collaborative practices, the third hypothesis is confirmed, being common in the cases of El Salto, La Marea and Crític for developing editorial content, publishing translated articles, promoting joint subscriptions with other related media, and forming part of the Independent Media Platform. It is precisely these media who state that they prefer to define themselves as “independent” instead of employing the term “alternative”.