Abstract
Rapport was established in 1970 as a mass-market Sunday newspaper that inherited many of the partly populist characteristics of its predecessors, Die Landstem, Dagbreek and Die Beeld. These included the prominent display of sexually oriented stories, photographs of scantily clad women, extensive sports coverage and other forms of light entertainment.
This media-historical study examines one defining dimension of Rapport and its predecessors that may be characterised as populist journalism. Drawing on relevant scholarship, interviews and a qualitative content analysis based on a convenience sample, it traces the evolution of this journalistic style over time. The article does not seek to provide a comprehensive content analysis of Rapport or the other newspapers under discussion, as such an undertaking would require a substantially larger study.
The sample comprises available issues from the author’s private collection, supplemented by a small number of copies held in the Stellenbosch University Library. The analysis focuses primarily on headlines and is therefore necessarily limited in scope, leaving ample opportunity for further research.
Although ethical concerns underpinned much of the criticism directed at these newspapers, this article offers a media-historical analysis rather than a normative ethical evaluation. Its purpose is to examine the nature and development of this editorial style, with contemporary criticism considered in so far as it formed part of the historical context within which editors and journalists operated.
The study proceeds from the premise that one form of populist journalism is characterised by a strong emphasis on sex, scandal, melodrama, trivia, extreme social deviance and sport. Serious public affairs receive comparatively less prominence, while relatively insignificant events and celebrity figures are elevated to headline status through striking headlines and prominent photographic treatment. This article conceptualises this journalistic style as sensational populism.
Not all aspects of populism, however, are necessarily ethically problematic. Some may be regarded as democratically valuable because they make journalism more accessible to wider audiences. In this sense, populism can broaden the public sphere and should not automatically be dismissed as inferior journalism (Örnebring & Jönsson, 2004). As Rapport’s first business editor recalled, the newspaper sought “to bring business affairs within the understanding of every reader ... We also had to engage the housewife, the farmer and the school pupil” (Meades 1995; translations in this abstract are my own, unless stated otherwise).
The empirical analysis begins with Die Landstem and its editor, Piet Beukes. Ton Vosloo, later chair of Naspers, described Beukes as “the man who opened the windows of Afrikaans journalism to the wider world beyond – in the sense of human-interest stories” (Vosloo 2020), while recalling that the newspaper’s headlines could be “highly cheeky” (Vosloo 2018:265). In response to Die Landstem’s commercial success, Naspers managing director Phil Weber lamented that readers appeared to prefer “the sensational and the inferior” (Steyn 2002:87). Yet only a few years later, Naspers itself launched Die Beeld, successfully adopting a remarkably similar editorial formula.
Die Landstem’s populist orientation manifested itself most clearly in its sexually provocative headlines, stories and photographs, which, by the standards of the time, were highly controversial. This editorial approach paved the way for Dagbreek, Die Beeld and later Rapport, where comparable material occupied a prominent place.
Rapport inherited important elements of the populist style of the merged newspapers, including Die Landstem, while simultaneously developing into an unprecedented commercial success with a circulation of approximately 500 000 copies. Its back page became the principal location for stories and photographs with a sexual theme and remained a distinctive editorial feature under most successive editors, although it was periodically discontinued or published under different titles. The evidence also suggests that Rapport’s editors were not always united in their views of the newspaper’s populist orientation. As its most recognisable symbol of sensational populism, Die Agterblad disappeared during Johan de Wet’s editorship, later returned, and was eventually discontinued again.
The content analysis demonstrates that the newspapers under review regularly featured sensational stories and images on both their front and inside pages. Over time, however, this material became concentrated on the back page of Rapport’s main news section, where it evolved into a distinctive editorial trademark. As with Die Landstem, Dagbreek and Die Beeld, Rapport’s yellow-press component was not confined to its back page. Sensational front-page stories continued to attract readers, and this style of reporting, together with its accompanying images, remained evident until the newspaper’s final print edition in December 2024.
At the same time, Rapport consistently published serious news reporting, political coverage and commentary. It is, therefore, more accurately understood as a hybrid or broad-spectrum newspaper that combined elements of both popular and serious journalism. The controversial examples discussed here should not be taken as exhaustive representations of its editorial identity. Rather, Rapport deliberately sought to appeal to a broad readership by accommodating diverse tastes. As former editor Willem de Klerk (1995) remarked, “We wore both a suit and tie, and a pair of shorts with veldskoene.” The metaphor encapsulated the newspaper’s enduring ambition to combine authoritative journalism with lighter, more populist content.
The study further demonstrates that this editorial style attracted sustained criticism from church leaders during earlier decades and that considerable internal opposition existed within Naspers. Significantly, much of this criticism focused less on the newspapers’ political reporting than on their emphasis on sex and sensationalism.
Although criticism from both internal and external quarters may have moderated aspects of their editorial content, Rapport and its predecessors retained a distinctive form of sensational populism over several decades. In doing so, they left a lasting imprint on Afrikaans journalism and influenced later newspapers such as Die Son and Sondag. Public criticism gradually subsided, while Rapport achieved widespread reader acceptance and considerable commercial success as a hybrid, broad-spectrum newspaper.
Until the cessation of its print edition in 2024, Rapport continued to exhibit many of the defining characteristics traditionally associated with the yellow press, although these constituted only one component of its broader hybrid editorial identity.
Keywords: Dagbreek; Die Beeld; Die Landstem; hybrid newspaper; media history; populism; Rapport; sensationalism; Sunday newspapers; yellow press
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Aspekte van Rapport as hibriede massakoerant – historiese aanloop, sukses en tydgenootlike kritiek