A Comparative Study of Television Coverage of the 2014 Hong Kong Protests on Global Media BBC World News and CCTV News
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
A Comparative Study of Television Coverage of the 2014 Hong Kong Protests on Global Media BBC World News and CCTV News Tianzi Wang Master Thesis Media and Communication Studies Supervisor: Prof. Alexa Robertson, Hlazo Mkandawire Department of Journalism Media and Communication (JMK) Stockholm University Submission Date: May 2015 ABSTRACT In a globalizing world, different media representations have been witnessed from various global newsrooms, particularly with reference to issues relating to politics such as war and protest. This study focuses on cross-cultural media representations of the 2014 Hong Kong Protests on two leading global media: BBC World News based in the United Kingdom and CCTV News based in China. Drawing from a comparative perspective of the traditional and new global powers, this research sheds more light on representation of protest by global media. By using a combination method of quantitative content analysis and qualitative framing analysis, two television flagship news programs broadcast on BBC World News and CCTV News in the two weeks following the 2014 Hong Kong Protests (i.e. from 26th September to 9th October 2014) have been analyzed to find out similarities and differences between their representations. The results show that there is a significant difference in the way the 2014 Hong Kong Protests were portrayed by the two global media. The BBC World News frames the protest as a democracy movement driven by students against the government for the election issue; while CCTV News claims the protest is illegal, and argues more about the negative economic consequences of the protest by quoting much from local retailers and general publics. The findings suggest that media representation is not an emerging hegemony due to media globalization. Instead, media system and political backgrounds still play a key role in framing the news between different global newsrooms. The scientific novelty and significance of the study lie in its empirical evidence with a novel comparative perspective, which contributes to bridging the research gap between traditional and new media powers in global media studies. Keywords: Global Media, Comparative Study, Framing Analysis, Hong Kong Protests, BBCW, CCTV. I List of Acronyms BBCW BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) World News CCTV CCTV (China Central Television) News HKP The 2014 Hong Kong Protests List of Figures Figure 1 Change of the prominence of the news items devoted to the ‘Hong Kong Protest’ (HKP) in two global television news programs on BBCW and CCTV, during 26 September – 06 October 2014. ...................................................................................................................... 28 List of Tables Table 1 Number of items devoted to the ‘Hong Kong Protest’ (HKP) in relation to the total number of items in two global television news programs, during 26 September – 06 October 2014. ......................................................................................................................................... 27 Table 2 Number of items devoted to the ‘Hong Kong Protest’ (HKP) in relation to the prominence of items in two global television news programs, during 26 September – 06 October 2014. ........................................................................................................................... 27 Table 3 Distribution of Frames identified in the selected news items devoted to the ‘Hong Kong Protest’ (HKP) from two global television news programs, during 26 September – 06 October 2014. ........................................................................................................................... 29 Table 4 Distribution of Sources identified in the selected news items devoted to the ‘Hong Kong Protest’ (HKP) from two global television news programs, during 26 September – 06 October 2014. ........................................................................................................................... 32 Table 5 Comparison of the distribution in Individuals sources category identified in the selected news items devoted to the ‘Hong Kong Protest’ (HKP) from two global television news programs, during 26 September – 06 October 2014. ...................................................... 33 Table 6 Distribution of Valence towards Protest identified in the news items devoted to the ‘Hong Kong Protest’ (HKP) from two global news programs, during 26 September – 06 October 2014. ........................................................................................................................... 34 ~ II ~ Table of Contents ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................ I List of Acronyms ........................................................................................................................II List of Figures ............................................................................................................................II List of Tables ..............................................................................................................................II 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Research Aim and Questions ............................................................................................ 3 1.2 Significance of the Study .................................................................................................. 3 1.3 Thesis Outline ................................................................................................................... 4 2. Theoretical Framework and Literature Review ............................................................... 5 2.1 In the Bigger Picture ......................................................................................................... 5 2.1.1 Media Globalization .................................................................................................. 5 2.1.2 Global Media ............................................................................................................. 7 2.2 Mediated Protest ............................................................................................................... 8 2.2.1 The ‘Protest’ Paradigm .............................................................................................. 8 2.2.2 Previous Research on Mediated Protest .................................................................... 9 2.3 Comparative Studies ....................................................................................................... 10 2.3.1 Media Systems ........................................................................................................ 10 2.3.2 Old and New Global Powers ................................................................................... 11 2.3.2 The case of China .................................................................................................... 12 2.4 On the Public Screen ...................................................................................................... 13 2.4.1 The Global Newsrooms ........................................................................................... 14 2.4.2 Previous Research on the Global News Channels .................................................. 15 2.4.3 Assessing the Global News Channels ..................................................................... 16 2.5 Scholarship on Framing Analysis ................................................................................... 16 ~ III ~ 3. Methodology ....................................................................................................................... 18 3.1 The Mixed Methodology ................................................................................................ 18 3.1.1 Content Analysis ..................................................................................................... 18 3.1.2 Framing Analysis .................................................................................................... 19 3.1.3 The Combination of the Methods ............................................................................ 19 3.2 Sampling ......................................................................................................................... 20 3.2.1 Rationale of the Sampling ....................................................................................... 20 3.2.2 The Empirical Materials .......................................................................................... 21 3.3 Coding ............................................................................................................................ 22 3.3.1 Conceptual and Operational Definitions of Variables ............................................ 22 3.3.2 Coding Procedure .................................................................................................... 25 3.4 Inter-coder Reliability ..................................................................................................... 25 4. Results and Analysis ........................................................................................................... 26 4.1 Attention ......................................................................................................................... 26 4.1.1 Air Time .................................................................................................................