Participatory Journalism and Its Potential in AI-Assisted Local News

Using artificial intelligence (AI) in local journalism is more likely to yield civic benefits if it begins with the culture and needs of the community. AI should be used not simply to reproduce traditional journalism more efficiently but to improve residents’ lives by providing useful information and enhancing local representation. Those hoping to use technology to “save” local journalism should shift the discussion about AI in local news away from efficiency and replacement, and toward highlighting the concerns and observations of community members. Drawing on theories of service journalism, civic AI, and political accountability, I argue that adopting AI tools in local journalism should go hand in hand with implementing more equitable, civically-focused, participatory forms of journalism. This approach is exemplified by the “Documenters” program from City Bureau in Chicago, which pays regular residents to take notes at government meetings and uses those notes as the basis for local news. Using several recent examples and a chatbot trained on Documenters’ notes, I show how these participatory approaches offer several concrete civic benefits that AI and traditional journalism alone cannot provide. The AI-assisted journalism of tomorrow should not look like a propped-up version of the stories, narratives, institutions, and inequities of the past. AI should shape and accelerate journalism’s transition, which is already underway, into a force for promoting civic empowerment and political accountability.