In the past, industry observers and researchers have linked community newspaper closure to diminished civic trust and political participation, among other negative effects. New research from Brad Greenwood, the Maximus Corporate Partner Professor of Business at the Costello College of Business at George Mason University, builds on this discourse, finding evidence that when local papers topple, political corruption springs up in their wake.

All told, these findings suggest that community newspapers should not be regarded as just another business model ill-adapted to digital disruption that should be allowed to fail. Their demise comes at significant public cost, financial and otherwise. “In an age of misinformation, the solution is not rejecting the professional press, it is embracing it, and ensuring that well-trained and hard-working men and women have both the ability and venue to hold those in power to account,” Greenwood says.