When the color of the news channel does not match the
color of the government
A content analysis of news coverage about Black Lives Matter protest
on partisan news outlets before and after the 2016 election
Master’s Thesis Political Communication Noémi Simone van de Pol
6173918
Master Programme of Communication Science, Graduate School of Communication Thesis supervisor: Ruud Wouters
June 29th, 2018
University of Amsterdam 2017-2018 Word count:7458
Since Black Lives Matter was established, the movement has generated much media attention in the United States. This study examines the movements’ news coverage by building on the protest paradigm. This paradigm describes how the media usually covers protest and protesters: using marginalization. However, we theorize that Black Lives Matter’s
goals entail typically democratic values. We wonder, when looking at partisan outlets, whether the protest paradigm can be extended to include not only marginalization, but also
legitimization when the goals of a movement correspond with the ideology of the partisan outlet. Furthermore, we attempted to do something completely new by extending part of the political opportunity structure to the media coverage of movements: we studied the influence
of allies in power on the coverage of like-minded media. In practice, this came down to whether the coverage by partisan news outlets on protest by Black Lives Matter was different
in times of a Republican and a Democratic government. Through a content analysis of video news regarding the movement from right-wing outlet Fox News, and left-wing outlet MSNBC, we found significant differences across these outlets in the use of marginalization and legitimization in the expected direction. We did not find significant differences between
the coverage in times of a Democratic or a Republican government.
When The Color Of The News Channel Does Not Match The Color Of The Government It all started with a hashtag. In July of 2013, #blacklivesmatter became a trending hashtag on social media to protest systematic police violence against Afro-Americans (Rickford, 2016). In the following years, Black Lives Matter became an internationally recognized activist movement after numerous street demonstrations following the deaths of African Americans due to police violence. This year, the Black Lives Matter movement celebrates its fifth birthday. During this time, the movement has found many ways to focus attention on the long-neglected issues of racial justice, gender, and economic inequality. To achieve this, the movement has not only been prevalent on social media; Black Lives Matter protests have also been covered in traditional news media.
Getting attention from the media is essential for movements to achieve several goals, like mobilizing people, influencing legislation (Walgrave & Manssens, 2005) and bringing more attention to the message of the movement (Gamson & Wolfsfeld, 1993). Therefore, this topic is often addressed in scientific research. A framework called the “protest paradigm” dominates the history of this research on protest-related media coverage in communication science (e.g., Chan & Lee, 1984; Gitlin, 1980; McLeod & Hertog, 1999). The protest paradigm is how the media usually covers protest: the media tends to marginalize movements and their members, while the attention is drawn away from the central issues of the movement (Smith, McCarthy, McPhail, & Augustyn, 2001). However, more recent studies have uncovered that when looking only at partisan news outlets, marginalization is mainly used when the views of the social movement or protest are not in line with the ideological view of the medium (Weaver & Scacco, 2013) while legitimization is used when the goals of the movement are in line with their political ideology (Rafail & McCarthy, 2018). Therefore, the tendency to only focus on the marginalization of protest movements in mass media might be obsolete, due to the recent changes in the media environment in the US, which includes the emergence of partisan news
outlets. Studying under which circumstances the Black Lives Matter movement is legitimized on partisan news outlets, in addition to marginalization, will contribute to scientific research on protest coverage.
A different framework that is often used to better understand movements is the political opportunity structure. Though, this structure does not focus on understanding the media
coverage they get, but on a movement’s impact, emergence and mobilization ((Meyer & Minkoff, 2004). According to political opportunity theory, having the support of elite allies in power can offer many benefits to a protest movement, for instance, access to the decision-making process (Meyer & Minkoff, 2004). When a movement is not observed as an ally, these elites may decide that the protest movement is a threat that they must oppose (Meyer &
Staggenborg, 1996). Tthe Democratic Party is usually an ally to a protest movement like Black Lives Matter, which message and goals entail traditionally democratic values (Petrocik, 1996). Therefore, we expect that Democratic news outlets will typically legitimize the movement, while Republican outlets may marginalize Black Lives Matter more often. However, we wonder how a Democratic news outlet will perceive the Black Lives Matter protest during a period of Democratic government, because the protest, at this point, is hostile towards their ally in power. Until now, political opportunity structure has never been extended to the media coverage of movements. For this reason, we will aspire to move beyond previous studies by exploring the relationship between the party in power and the tone (legitimizing or
marginalizing) of Black Lives Matter protest coverage on partisan media outlets. We do so by posing the following research question:
RQ: (How) Does the US media coverage on protest by The Black Lives Matter movement in partisan news outlets differ in times of a Republican and a Democratic government?
What we will aim to do in this study is something entirely new, and therefore
analysis on the news coverage from Democratic news channel MSNBC and Republican news channel FOX news (N=100). We have selected several major Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests before and after the election of Donald Trump and we will look at the news coverage on these selected protests. We will now proceed to discuss the theoretical framework behind this study, where previous literature will be detailed. Further on, the variables will be defined and the methods discussed, followed by the results. Conclusively, the discussion and
conclusion section will present a review of the study.
Theoretical framework Black Lives Matter
This study will focus on a specific case: the Black Lives Matter movement. The Black Lives Matter movement was founded in 2014 after the acquittal of a policeman that shot Trayvon Martin, an unarmed, black, 18-year-old in Ferguson. According to the activists, the preventable death of Trayvon Martin was only an example of the grave racial injustices in the United States (García & Sharif, 2015). To battle these injustices, the social media protest grew into a protest movement named Black Lives Matter. The movement’s primary goals are to eliminate police aggression against African Americans and systematic racial violence
(Rickford, 2016). Apart from changing public discourse about these issues, they primarily aim to change policies and legislation on both local and national level. To do so, they regularly confront US politics (Obasogie & Newman, 2016). Today, the movement has participants from different places in society, and they give a voice to the outrage of a large group of people (Rickford, 2016). Black Lives Matter is impartial; they do not affiliate with a specific party and they have stated that both Republicans and Democrats engage in these injustices (Obasogie & Newman, 2016). However, the issue ownership of civil rights traditionally lies with the Democratic Party (Petrocik, 1996). Also, according to a study by the Pew Research Center (2016a), Democrats are more supportive of Black Lives Matter than Republicans. About
two-thirds (64%) of (white) Democrats either somewhat or strongly support the movement, compared to only 20% of (white) Republicans. The “solidarity” between the party and the movement became more evident when the Democratic National Committee passed a resolution in 2015 supporting the Black Lives Matter movement (MSNBC, 2015), while Republicans have never done so. Therefore, we argue that the Democrats affiliate more strongly with Black Lives Matter than Republicans.
The Protest Paradigm
Mass media attention seems to be essential for movements that want to influence society and policy. The attention they get from the media shapes how the public views the movement because the citizens that engage in protest usually only make up a small portion of the population (Harris & Gillion 2010). Furthermore, media attention can be critical when mobilizing people (Walgrave & Manssens, 2005) and it can help to gain support for the cause (Gamson & Wolfsfeld, 1993) because the media is one of the primary ways to reach people. According to research, however, it is not easy for social movements to get positive attention from the media (Boykoff 2007). Wolfsfeld (1997) found that the first difficulty for social movements and protest is that they have to be selected by the media over many other events. According to Wolfsfeld (1997), this results in very few protests making it into the news. Factors that determine if protest makes the news are amongst others the number of participants that partake in the protest, whether or not the protest is disruptive and who has organized the protest (Hocke, 1998; McCarthy, McPhail, & Smith, 1996; Oliver & Maney, 2000; Wouters, 2015). When a protest does get media attention, the social movement behind the protest is often depicted in a way that is different from how the movement depicts themselves, so the
movements have difficulties to get the right image across in the media (Wolfsfeld, 1997). In protest-related communication studies, how protest is framed in the media is well researched. In this field of research, there is a tremendous amount of research on the keyframes identified
by what we call the “protest paradigm”. This term was created after the early research of Gitlin (1980), Chan and Lee (1984) and McLeod and Hertog (1999). The “protest paradigm’ holds many traits typically used by journalists when reporting on protest (Wouters, 2015). First and foremost, according to the protest paradigm, the media marginalizes a movement rather than legitimizing it. According to research, this causes the attention to be drawn away from the main issue of the movement. The media often focus on the protesters themselves, in a negative way, criminalizing and demonizing them (Weaver & Scacco, 2013). We will now shed more light on both these concepts: marginalization and legitimization.
Marginalization
The protest paradigm describes that the news media use marginalization when talking about protest. Several researchers have described marginalization tools that the media use that downplay the protesters’ issues and motives (Dardis, 2006; McFarlane & Hay, 2003; McLeod & Hertog, 1999). Previous research found that four of these tools are overly associated with negative media coverage (Dardis, 2006; Weaver & Scacco, 2013). The first two are general lawlessness and confrontation with police. General lawlessness is when the media places emphasis on criminal or violent activity (McFarlane & Hay, 2003; McLeod & Hertog, 1999). This includes violent protests or riots, but also nonviolent protests that are portrayed more aggressively than they actually were. Police confrontation implies that some form of conflict is described between protesters and police (McFarlane & Hay, 2003). The third tool is the use of official sources. In the United States, many political and other influential individuals have spoken out about BLM or their protest. Therefore, the media could be inclined to use of official sources or elite sources, like governmental actors, corporate figures or lobbyists, to give their opinion or information when covering protest which can be used to misrepresent the
movements issues and motives (McFarlane & Hay, 2003; McLeod & Hertog, 1999; Ryan, Carragee, & Meinhofer, 2001). The third and the fourth tool are about the presentation of the
protesters. “Romper Room” or “idiots at large”(McLeod & Hertog, 1999) focuses on negative aspects of the demonstrators’ behavior, like immaturity, or portray the protesters as not smart enough (idiots) to understand the significant issues that they are protesting for (McFarlane & Hay, 2003). Lastly, Weaver and Scacco (2013) found the importance of a fourth tool,
appearance-based coverage (McLeod & Hertog, 1999). Appearance-based coverage is when the focus lies on the physical characteristics amongst the protesters. Both of these tools are not explicitly linked to BLM protest, but according to protest paradigm research, a focus on the protesters is widely used in protest coverage (Weaver & Scacco, 2013). We will use these four tools to look at the degree of marginalization used by the media when talking about protest. However, while previous research has associated these tools mostly with negative media coverage, they can easily be used for the legitimization of movements as well. For instance: the media can describe the behavior of the police as provocative or as out of line, while the
demonstrators are portrayed as victims. The same goes for the other tools (see table 1).
Legitimization
While the focus of most protest paradigm studies have been on the marginalization of protest movements, we will broaden scientific research by also looking at legitimization. There is no such thing as an actual toolbox of legitimization for protest yet like there is for
marginalization (Weaver & Scacco, 2013). However, Boykoff & Laschever (2011) describe several legitimization frames that appear in the media when looking at news on the Tea Party Movement. These frames focused explicitly on the Tea Party Movement; but while studying Boykoff & Laschever’s (2011) frames, we discovered three underlying, general frames. The first is whether the media talks about the actual message of the movement. That is Black Lives Matter’s ultimate goal; they want to get their message out to the general public. The second frame is if the movement is portrayed as being powerful and influential. BLM has the ambition to change things from the bottom up: they aim to influence legislation (Obasogie & Newman,
2016). Therefore we will look at whether the outlet speaks about influence on politics. The third frame is whether or not the members of the movement/protest are portrayed positively. This last frame overlaps with the last two marginalization tools, as they are all about how the protesters are presented in the news. The marginalization tools make a distinction between mentions of the portrayal (romper room/idiots at large) of the protesters and coverage on their appearance. In this study, we will make this same distinction.
Similar to the earlier mentioned marginalization tools, all of these frames have a
“flipside.” While they are often used to legitimize a movement, they can be used to marginalize a movement as well. For instance, instead of talking about the actual message of the movement, the media can speak of the movement as having an assortment of different grievances or no cohesive message. Consequently, in this study, we will use all seven tools to measure the degree of legitimization and marginalization used by the media. Table 1 will give a clear overview of all seven tools and the way we have interpreted them.
Table 1.
Marginalization and legitimization tools
Tools Marginalization Legitimization
General lawlessness Condemnation of violence Violence is being
rationalized by the media Police
confrontation
Police is given credit for performance Condemnation of police violence
elite sources Undermining the social
movement/protest Supportive of social movement/protest Coverage on the message of the movement
The media speaks of the movement as having an assortment of different grievances or no cohesive message.
The media speaks of the actual message of the movement Movements influence on politics Impotent Powerful Portrayal of the protester
Negative: as idiots/ stupid Positive: as people with common sense
Appearance based coverage
Negative Positive
Modern day news media in the US
Accompanying the protest paradigm, previous studies have found several factors that may weaken or strengthen the marginalization in the news media. Chan and Lee (1984) found that right-wing media focused on keeping social order and the status quo when reporting on protest, whereas left-wing media outlets focused more on the protester’s perspective. Today,
this is interesting, as the US media landscape becomes more and more diverse and fragmented (PEW research, 2014b). In the past, the US media environment consisted of a few profit-driven mass media “broadcasters,” which were sending out homogenous messages to a large audience. These broadcasters were often trying their best not to offend any part of their mass audience, so the content of their messages was usually generalized and relatively nonpartisan (Mendelsohn & Nadeau, 1996; Prior, 2013). For a while now, narrowcasters have been taking away from the mass audiences of the broadcasters in the United States. Narrowcasting is a term that has existed since the 80s (Eastman, Head & Klein, 1997). It means that a TV network is trying to reach a niche audience, catering to the specific demands of this audience (Serazio, 2014). An example of narrowcasting, and the part of narrowcasting that we will discuss in this study, is the growing partisan media in the United States that caters specifically to a right- or left wing audience. According to Stroud (2011), the public in the United States seems to prefer media sources that have the same political views as they do. The emergence of the partisan media runs parallel to the growing political polarization within the American public, which is currently more widespread than at any point in the last twenty years (e.g., Hollander, 2008; Iyengar & Hahn, 2009; Stroud, 2011). These outlets are not only partisan, but they also share a clear opinion and create a strong politically colored view of the news (Jamieson & Cappella 2008). According to study, these opinionated, partisan media outlets in the US support polarization by influencing people’s political attitudes (Prior, 2013). People that follow partisan media,
gradually shift more towards the left or the right, depending on what media they follow (Jones, 2001). Accordingly, Weaver and Scacco (2013) have uncovered that when looking at partisan news outlets, marginalization, a known feature of the protest paradigm, is used far more often when the views of the social movement or protest are not in line with the ideological standpoint of the medium. When comparing MSNBC and Fox, left-wing MSNBC engaged in more
ideological standpoint of the outlet plays a significant role in how they cover news on protest. Rafail & McCarthy (2018) found similar results. On top of that, they found that partisan media did not necessarily cover protest in a manner consistent with the ideas of the movement. The coverage was more in line with the agenda of the party the outlet adheres. This is consistent with what Jamieson & Cappella (2008) call the conservative media echo chamber. They argue that especially conservative partisan media supports the Republican Party in their coverage of the news, not conservatism itself.
Both Weaver & Scacco (2013) and Rafail & McCarthy (2018) solely looked at a right-wing protest group. Their reason for this was that per usual, the protest paradigm has been applied to reporting on left-wing protest. However, the US media environment has undergone quite the transformation in the last decades, due to the aforementioned upcoming of political polarization and partisan media (Weaver & Scacco, 2013; Jones, 2001). Therefore we believe it is relevant to see whether marginalization happens more often when the ideology is not in line with the goals and message of the Black Lives Matter movement. In this study, we choose to compare FOX News and MSNBC because they traditionally stand on opposing sides of the country's ideological divide, but also because, according to the PEW Research Center (2014a) nearly half of consistent conservatives name Fox News as their primary source for news on television. No other sources come close to this amount. The same study (PEW Research, 2014a) finds that Democrats are less unified in their media loyalty; they watch several news outlets regularly. We have chosen to focus on one of the most prominent liberal networks, MSNBC. As we are looking at partisan outlets and their use of tools for the marginalization and legitimation of protest, we pose the following hypothesis based on past literature:
H1a: Fox News will use the tools to marginalize BLM more often compared to MSNBC, while MSNBC will use the tools to marginalize BLM less often, compared to Fox News.
H1b: MSNBC will use the tools to legitimize BLM more often compared to Fox News, while Fox News will use the tools to legitimize BLM less often, compared to MSNBC.
Allies in power
Many scholars in social movement research have written about the political opportunity theory (e.g., Tilly,1984; Tarrow,1994; McAdam, McCarthy & Zald, 1996; Koopmans 2004). Political opportunity theory states that social movements develop in response to the political opportunities they get. Through collective action, like protest, they create new opportunities. Furthermore, the context in which a movement operates affects the emergence, outcomes, and mobilization of the movement (Tarrow, 1994). The theory of political opportunity refers to specific features of the political system that can help social movements emerge (Koopmans, 2004). According to McAdam et al. (1996), one of these features is whether the social
movement has elite allies in power. Support from elite allies, like government authorities and other powerful institutions, can offer access to essential resources, like access to the decision-making process and support through subsidies and public recognition (Kriesi, 1996). When an elite is not an ally to the movement, the movement might be observed as a threat to a powerful elite. In this situation, elites may decide that the protest movement is a powerful political tool, which they must oppose, for instance by sponsoring or heavily support counter movements (Meyer & Staggenborg, 1996; Tarrow, 2011). While this theory is often referred to in research on protest, a possible connection to the media, especially partisan media, is left relatively untested.
Rohlinger (2006) attempted to bridge the gap between political opportunity theory and the media, by studying how the actions of opponents and allies affect the media strategies of social movements. She found that movements often use silence as a media tactic in times of political opportunity. Especially when a movement has access to powerful political elites, like when the government is on the same side as the movement. This allows the movement to
distance themselves from a debate and focus on other issues. In times of political threat, the movement will be more likely to take action. However, we wonder what happens to media coverage when the movement does not stay silent, but goes against powerful allies in the government. Di Cicco (2010) came close to making this connection. He took the
marginalization of the protest paradigm a bit further and theorized a new paradigm: “the Public Nuisance paradigm.” He stated in his study that since the 1960’s, the mass media coverage on protest in the United States has become more and more in terms of irritation and inconvenience. While the traditional protest paradigm usually speaks of specific protests or the participants of protests, the nuisance paradigm talks about a negative view of protest in general. This depiction of protest as a nuisance in the recent past, Di Cicco (2010) suggests, is possibly due to
increased conservatism in the US. During the time protest was mostly seen as a nuisance, the country was politically shifting to the right. Throughout this time, liberal protests were more frequently treated as a nuisance, more often than conservative ones. Around the year 1999, the presence of the nuisance coverage decreased, when a Democratic president, Bill Clinton, was in office.
Di Cicco (2010) merely suggests a possible relationship between allies in government and the tone of the media coverage on protest, from a mass media standpoint. But as
narrowcasting allows the partisan media outlets to stress the views of the parties they adhere explicitly, it is plausible that the support or lack of support from the party in power will have a significant impact on the tone of their coverage about a protest movement. Following the logic of elite allies as described by political opportunity theory: when BLM is protesting for
legislative changes in a time of Democratic government, the movement is protesting against the government, and therefore against their powerful ally. At this point, the movement can be seen as a threat (Meyer & Staggenborg, 1996) to Democratic partisan media, because the movement may destabilize the government by protesting. Also, by criticizing the government, they might
give Republicans ammunition to attack the Democratic government. This means the movement might receive more marginalization from a Democratic news outlet, like MSNBC, as they defend the interest of the Democratic Party. When Republicans are in power, Democratic outlets see BLM protest as a confirmation of the alliance between the party and the movement, as they go against the Republican government. Hence, they might legitimize the movement more often. For a Republican news outlet, like Fox News, it will not matter which party is in power, as the Republican Party is never an ally to Black Lives Matter. This leads us to the following hypotheses:
H2a: When a democratic government is in power, MSNBC will use less legitimizing tools to describe BLM compared to when a republican government is in power
H2b: When a democratic government is in power, MSNBC will use more marginalizing tools to describe BLM compared to when a republican government is in power
H2c: FOX News will always marginalize Black Lives Matter protest, in times of a Democratic government and with a Republican government.
Figure 1. Conceptual model of the hypotheses Outlet Legitimization/ Marginalization of BLM Government in power H2a,b,c H1a,b
Methods Sample
The hypotheses will be tested through a content analysis of video material of different Black Lives Matter protests on MSNBC and Fox News in two periods of time: 2015 and 2017/2018 (N=100). These periods of time have been selected because we are looking at both a period of Democratic leadership and a period of Republican leadership. For the Democratic period, we chose to look at 2015, because 2016, the last year of the Obama administration, was an election year. Because the elections usually dominate the media in this period, we feared that this would influence our data. In addition to that, the material was collected through the websites of MSNBC and Fox News, which both did not allow a search for years earlier than 2015. For the second period, we chose to look at 2017, the first year of a new Republican administration. However, Trump was inaugurated as the new President of the United States at the end of January that year, and we believed, that alike 2015, the news in the first few months of a new presidency are usually focused on the new president and his politics. Therefore we chose to look at the period from April 2017 to April 2018. Within these periods, we have chosen several Black Lives Matter protests (and protest aligned with or supported by Black Lives Matter), on which we have focused. We chose these particular protests because through thorough research, we believed these protests were the most “newsworthy” protests, as they were well covered on both networks (Fox News and MSNBC). To determine which protests we would look at, we first looked at other news outlets and in research to see what big Black Lives Matter protests had occurred in that period. For 2015, a PEW research study (2016b) showed that, after the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore, the shooting at a church in Charleston, and during the beginning of the campaigns of the presidential election, the hashtag
outlets; protests around these events were well covered. We used several search words (see appendix 1) to find video news on these protests on both the Fox News and MSNBC websites and ended up having three separate protests we would analyze: one large protest and two smaller protests. The large protests were the protests in Baltimore after Freddie Gray died in police custody. Important to note is that the protests in Baltimore eventually turned into riots. This makes this the only violent protest in this study. But, this was the largest Black Lives Matter protest in this period, therefore we still chose to include this protest. The smaller protests were the protests surrounding the Confederate flag that flared up after the mass
shooting in in church in Charleston, and the Black Lives Matter protests during the presidential campaigns (see table 2).
For 2017-2018, it was a bit harder to distinguish several protests, as there was no research on this yet. Therefore, we only looked at coverage on BLM protest on different (large) news sites (like CNN, New York Times, Google Trends) and on the outlets in question: Fox News and MSNBC. We used multiple search words (see appendix 1) which led us to one big protest: the anthem protests during NFL (National Football League) games. These protests can be divided into two different protests: (1) the initial act of symbolic protest by NFL players through kneeling during the anthem before games and (2) the “aftermath” of these protests. This entailed negotiations with NFL officials and club owners, and ultimately led to harsh criticisms in politics, which flared up the debate about the goals of the anthem protests. The third protest is the protest that followed the brutal arrest of two men of color at a Starbucks in Philadelphia, without an apparent reason (see table 2).
Table 2.
Summary of the protests
Protests Coded items
Type of protest Period Fox News MSNBC Total Democratic government
Baltimore protests Demonstration April to May 16 16 32
Confederate flag/ statues Symbolic June to July 4 4 8
Presidential campaigns Demonstration August to September
5 5 10
Republican government
NFL Anthem protest Symbolic September to November (2017)
16 15 31
NFL protest “aftermath” Symbolic November to January (2017)
5 5 10
Starbucks protests Demonstration April (2018) 4 4 8
Total of coded items 100
Codebook & variables
A codebook (see appendix 1) was developed that contained links to all the videos that were collected (N=100) together with 18 questions. Coding was done through the online survey tool Qualtrics, but the data was later transferred to SPSS to do analyses. The first questions in the codebook dealt with the outlet (Fox News/ MSNBC), the period the video was aired (the democratic period or the republican period). Furthermore, the type of protest was coded and the length of the video. Subsequently, we asked two questions about each
marginalization/legitimization tool we have chosen to study. First, for all items (all videos), we checked if the tool was mentioned (with dichotomous answer categories: yes or no). When the tool was mentioned, a second question was asked (when the tool was not mentioned, the next question was skipped, and you were referred to the following question), which was about the way the tool was portrayed, used to either legitimize or marginalize the protest (see table 1). The second question was not always measured dichotomously (positive/negative, or similar). For some categories, it was also possible to choose the option “neither”(when the tone of the item was neutral) or both (when both legitimization and marginalization was mentioned). However, these options were never selected during the coding process. Therefore, these options were made “missing” in SPSS, later in the process. This way, all questions were dichotomous. Inevitably, this also means: when an item was coded as marginalizing the movement, it automatically does not legitimize the movement and vice versa.
Coding
A single coder coded all videos in approximately a week and a half. To check the reliability of the codings, a second coder was introduced to code a random sample of items, combined10% of the whole sample. The intercoder reliability was measured for all relevant variables. SPSS automatically disregarded the missing values, and we left them disregarded. We have calculated the intercoder reliability in three ways: the measure of agreement, Kappa and Krippendorff's Alpha. We have reported these measurements for 14 variables in table 3.
Table 3.
Intercoder Reliability
From the table, we can conclude that the intercoder reliability for all variables is high, since all our variables have a Krippendorf’s alpha higher than .80. This means we can assume that we do not have to alter our codebook before we start to interpret the data that was collected.
Results Exploring our tools
Before we answer our hypotheses, it is important to see which tools were mentioned more by Fox News and which were mentioned more by MSNBC. Therefore, we performed several chi-square tests for association through SPSS. From table 4 we can conclude that all the items, both from MSNBC and Fox News mentioned “the members” of the protest movement.
M.O.A.* Kappa Kripp.
Alpha**
General lawlessness 92.3% .88 .89
General lawlessness portrayal 92.3% .88 .89
Confrontation with police 100% 1 1
Confrontation portrayal 100% 1 1
Official/ elite sources 100% 1 1
Official/ elite sources portrayal 100% 1 1
Members 100% 1 1
Members portrayed 100% 1 1
Appearance based coverage 100% 1 1
App. based cov. portrayal*** 92.3% .87 .88
Message 92.3% .88 .89
Message portrayed 100% 1 1
Influence on politics 100% 1 1
Influence on politics portrayal 100% 1 1
Note. * Measure of agreement, ** Krippendorf’s Alpha, ***Appearance Based coverage portrayal
Furthermore, “general lawlessness” and “confrontation with the police” were used slightly more by Fox news, while “official/ elite sources”, “appearance-based coverage”, “influence on politics” and “the message of the movement” were used more by MSNBC. However, for most variables, the differences between Fox News and MSNBC showed not to be significant, except for “general lawlessness” and “the message of the movement”. There is a significant difference between the outlets for “general lawlessness”, χ2(1)=5.09, p<.05. Fox News mentions general lawlessness more often than MSNBC. Cramer’s V= .23, which means that the strength of association between the variables is weak. There also appears to be a significant difference between the outlets for “the message of the movement”, χ2(1)=15.97, p < .001. MSNBC mentions the message of the movement significantly more often than Fox News. Cramer’s V= .4, which means that the strength of association between the variables is reasonably strong. The use of these tools is therefore in line with possible expectations, as discussed earlier.
Table 4.
Mentions of the tools
Tools Mentioned Not mentioned
Fox News MSNBC Fox News MSNBC χ2 Cramer’s V General lawlessness 44.9% 23.5% 55.1% 76.5% 5.09 .22* Confrontation with the police 16.3% 11.8% 83.7% 88.2% .43 .07
Official/ Elite sources 34.7% 51% 65.3% 49% 2.70 .16
Members 100% 100% 0% 0% Appearance based coverage 0% 3.9% 100% 96.1% 1.96 .14 Influence on politics 53.1% 58.8% 46.9% 41.2% .34 .06 Message 49% 86.3% 51% 13.7% 15.97 .4*** Notes. *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001.
Legitimization and marginalization
Now we have described how often the tools were mentioned, we will attempt to answer the hypotheses. To answer hypotheses 1a and 1b, we need to look at whether the mentioned tools were used to marginalize or legitimize BLM. When a tool was mentioned in an item, a second variable is introduced to see if the tool is used for marginalization or legitimization (therefore, N is different for all tools; we could only look at legitimization/marginalization when the tool was mentioned. If it was not mentioned, the item was not included. For N, see table 5). To answer the hypotheses, we have performed several chi-square tests for association. We have collected all the relevant data on the variables in table 5. We see that the differences between the outlets are significant for all variables; except for “appearance-based coverage”. This variable was only used twice on MSNBC, for legitimization. This means there is too little data to calculate the chi-square. Judging from these results, we accept both H1a and H1b, because all differences between the outlets are in the expected direction: Fox News significantly uses the tools to marginalize BLM more often compared to MSNBC, while MSNBC significantly uses the tools to legitimize BLM more often, compared to Fox News.
Table 5.
Marginalization and legitimization for both outlets
Tools Marginalization Legitimization
Fox News MSNBC Fox News MSNBC N χ2 Cramer’s V General Lawlessness portrayal 95.5% 33.3% 4.5% 66.7% 34 15.4 .67*** Confrontation w. police Portrayal 100% 0% 0.00% 100% 14 14 1*** Official/Elite sources portrayal 58% 19.2% 41.2% 80.8% 43 7.09 .41** Member portrayal 75% 15.7% 24.5% 84.3% 100 36.1 4 .60*** Appearance based coverage port. 0% 0% 0% 100% 2 Influence on politics portrayal 69.2% 3.3% 30.8% 96.7% 70 26.9 8 .69*** Message portrayal 57.7% 0% 42.3% 100% 56 32.3 1 .68*** Notes. *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001.
Exploring the Democratic and Republican periods
To answer hypotheses 2a,b and c we need to include another variable because these hypotheses concern the period in which the item was broadcasted. This dichotomous variable, which is named “year of airing”, is used to determine whether there was more legitimization or marginalization for both outlets in a period of Democratic government (2015), or Republican government (2017-2018). To answer these hypotheses, we need to explore this variable first. When we look at how many times the tools are mentioned in both periods, it shows that both outlets mention “general lawlessness’ in the Democratic period (2015), while it is not
mentioned in the Republican period (2017-2018). ‘Confrontation with the police” is only mentioned once in the Republican period (2017-2018). This is due to our case selection, as the protests that were selected in 2017-2018 were nonviolent. We will discuss this further in our discussion. The rest of the tools were mentioned in both periods, on both outlets.
Democratic vs Republican government
To answer hypotheses H2a, b and c, we will now look at the interaction-effect of “year of airing”(Democratic or Republican government in power) on the outlet (MSNBC/Fox News). To do so, a mean scale was created that includes all seven variables that measured the portrayal of the tools: marginalizing or legitimizing the movement. The scale (M = .43, SD = .44) is the average score of all these tools. It runs from 0 to 1: 0= legitimization, 1= marginalization. Therefore, we call this new scale the “legitimization to marginalization scale”, the higher an item scores on this scale, the more marginalization is used. The lower an item scores on the scale, the more legitimization is used.
First, we will explore this new scale a bit further. Figure 2 shows the means on the scale for both the Republican and the Democratic period. This implies that, when looking at all the coded items, during the Democratic period (2015) there was slightly more marginalization of the movement, while in the Republican period (2017-2018) there was slightly more
legitimization. However, a one-way ANOVA showed that the difference between these periods was not statistically significant F(1, 98) = .36, p =.550.
Figure 2. Degree of marginalization/legitimization (μ) in the Republican and the Democratic period .
Now, the actual hypotheses will be answered. To determine whether there is a
difference in the degree of marginalization/legitimization between the Democratic period and the Republican period on both outlets, a two-way ANOVA is performed to establish a possible interaction-effect. However, a two-way ANOVA shows that the interaction-effect, as shown in figure 3, is not statistically significant F(1, 96) =.46 , p = .500. Therefore, H2a and H2b can be rejected: when a Democratic government is in power, MSNBC does not use less legitimizing tools, or more marginalizing tools to describe BLM compared to when a Republican
government is in power. H2c can be accepted; as we have learned that Fox News marginalizes Black Lives Matter protest equally in times of a Democratic government and a Republican government. Conclusively, even though outlet matters for the legitimization and
marginalization of BLM, which government is in power does not, nor is the effect of outlet moderated by who is in power matters.
Democratic period (μ =0.46, SD=.42) Republican period (μ =0.40, SD=.46) 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
μ
m a rg in a liz a tio n /le g it im iz a tio nμ=.13 μ=.09
μ=.75 μ=.79
Democratic (2015) Republican (2017-2018)
Interaction effect of government in
power
MSNBC Fox News
Figure 3. Interaction-effect of government in power on marginalization/legitimization on both outlets.
Conclusion & Discussion
This study started out with the question “does the US media coverage on protest by the Black Lives Matter movement in partisan news outlets differ in times of a Republican and a Democratic government?” We specified this question further by systematically looking at the legitimization and marginalization of BLM news coverage on partisan outlets Fox News and MSNBC. We used seven tools to assess the amount of legitimization/ marginalization on both outlets. We have based our results on data collected during two periods of protest, entailing six different protest-moments. The results show that, within the sample, Fox News used the seven tools to marginalize BLM more often, while MSNBC used the tools to legitimize BLM more often, as was expected in the hypotheses. In most previous scientific research, some of these tools were strictly seen as marginalization tools, while other tools were assigned specifically to legitimization. This study has presented, that for BLM protest, all of the tested tools were more
often used to marginalize the movement on Fox News, while MSNBC mostly used the tools to legitimize the movement. These results demonstrate convincing updates to the protest paradigm and how we should approach this paradigm in the current media environment. First of all, this reinforces the assumption that for partisan outlets, legitimization is also an important part of the paradigm. Second of all, it supports findings by Weaver & Scacco (2013) and Rafail &
McCarthy (2018) that partisan news outlets use both marginalization and legitimation in ways consistent with their ideological views.
While further exploring these seven tools, we learned that appearance-based coverage was almost never used. While almost none of the items mentioned the appearance of the protesters, all of the items mentioned the members of the protest. So, the focus was more on the
presentation of the members in general, not necessarily on their appearance. We believe appearance-based coverage, introduced by Weaver & Scacco (2013), might not be prevalent in the items because of the type of movement that was studied. Black Lives Matter is a movement that stands up for racial equality. The issue of race is a very sensitive subject in the US, which could be why news outlets won’t explicitly talk about the appearance of the protesters; it is simply not acceptable to mention the color of the protesters skin, which is inevitable to mention when describing their appearance.
What we can conclude from the data on the general lawlessness is that Fox News mentions general lawlessness more often than MSNBC. Furthermore, Fox News almost exclusively uses the tool to marginalize BLM. So when reporting on violence in protests, the tool is indeed mostly used to marginalize the movement on Fox News. While general
lawlessness was mostly used to marginalize BLM on Fox, MSNBC mentions the message of the movement more often than Fox News, mostly to legitimize the movement. So for news coverage on BLM, general lawlessness is the strongest marginalizing tool, and mentioning the message is the strongest legitimizing tool. However, a closer look at general lawlessness and
police based coverage showed that both were only used in 2015 (in 2017-2018, confrontation with the police was only used once, general lawlessness was never used). We believe that for both general lawlessness and confrontation with the police, this has a simple explanation. Though we believed these tools would occur more in the coverage of BLM protest, also potentially for rather nonviolent protest, our sample contained only one protest that actually turned violent: the Baltimore protests (2015). These protests started peacefully, but were overshadowed by the violence that followed, leading to countless confrontations with the police. The lack of the tools in 2017-2018 suggest that these tools only occur when violence and police confrontations are clearly present during a protest.
Additionally, we have looked at two different periods in time to see whether there is a difference in partisan news coverage on BLM when the Democratic Party is in power when and the Republican party is in government. Our study has shown that the differences between the two outlets are not dependent on the year in which the video was broadcast. This study was the first scientific study to look at the possible influence of the party in government on the protest coverage of partisan outlets. Therefore this was partially an exploratory study. As the first study to look at this, the lack of differences can be attributed to many factors. For instance, the
dataset was relatively small. This is possibly the biggest limitation in this study. As mentioned, our data was collected from the Fox News and MSNBC website. It was hard to find more video news on BLM protests on both outlets, as some protests were exclusively covered on one outlet, but were not even mentioned on the other. Due to the limited video history that both websites had, it was not possible to look at news from before 2015. If it would have gone back further, more Republican and Democratic administrations could have been studied. In addition to that, we believe that the specific choices that have been made for this study; choosing to do a single case to study, and the case that was chosen (BLM) has also influenced our outcomes. Therefore, future research could, for example, expand this research by studying several civil
rights movements throughout the years, or both left-wing (Civil rights, pro-abortion, pro-gun control movements) and right-wing ( pro-gun, pro-life, alt-lit movements) protests, during several Democratic and Republican administrations. This way, we leave an important task to future researchers.
Conclusively, this study broadens the field of research on protest-related media coverage, by exploring the role of allies in power. Though no differences in legitimization and
marginalization were found between the Democratic period and the Republican period, the differences in coverage between the partisan outlets are undeniable. It is revealing how clear these partisan news channels used marginalization and legitimization in line with their ideology while covering Black Lives Matter protest. We therefore follow Weaver & Scacco (2013) by stating that we are beyond the point that we can say that all protest coverage fits in the "protest paradigm" framework. With the results of this study in mind, we see a unique opportunity arise for protest movements. While the US media environment follows the growing polarization in the country (Iyengar & Hahn, 2009), partisan media provide a platform for protest movements to get the right image across to an audiences of allies, while, on the other hand, the gap between them and the “unfriendly” audience grows larger.
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Appendix I – Codebook General guidelines
· Open coding scheme in Qualtrics through following link:
https://uvacommscience.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_3IDMP5eeRDZslBr
· When you can’t answer a question, do not fill anything in (missing value)
· Each question contains a short explanation when needed, to make sure the coder knows how to interpret the question.
· The clips that will be coded can be found here:
Democratic period: Links for 2015 Baltimore protest (April to May)
Search words (and combinations): Baltimore, protest, Freddie Gray, protesters, Black Lives Matter FOX 1. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4200499480001/?#sp=show-clips 2. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4200588453001/?#sp=show-clips 3. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4212867428001/?#sp=show-clips 4. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4200178816001/?#sp=show-clips 5. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4211310751001/?#sp=show-clips 6. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4202827290001/?#sp=show-clips 7. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4202510729001/?#sp=show-clips 8. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4216757088001/?#sp=show-clips 9. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4216010848001/?#sp=show-clips 10. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4212721607001/?#sp=show-clips 11. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4203807623001/?#sp=show-clips
12. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4202730593001/?#sp=show-clips 13. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4202827304001/?#sp=show-clips 14. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4202746808001/?#sp=show-clips 140. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4265473018001/?#sp=show-clips 141. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4210276226001/?#sp=show-clips MSNBC
Search word(and combination): Baltimore, protest, Freddie Gray, protesters, Black Lives Matter 15. http://www.msnbc.com/alex-witt/watch/father-turns-protest-into-learning-experience-438299715676 16. http://www.msnbc.com/thomas-roberts/watch/baltimore-mom-sparks-national-discussion-437074499809 17. http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/watch/frustration-mixes-with-hope-in-baltimore-436754499976 18.http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/-the-protests-today-were-beautiful--436764227564 19. http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/rough-treatment-for-youths-arrested-in-protests-436737091830?playlist=associated 20. http://www.msnbc.com/melissa-harris-perry/watch/framing-rioting-as-political-protest-438303300002 21. http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/another-day-of-protests-in-baltimore-434734659613 22. http://www.msnbc.com/andrea-mitchell-reports/watch/doj-opens-investigation-in-baltimore-432248387606 23. http://www.msnbc.com/politicsnation/watch/protests-erupt-in-baltimore-over-gray-death-431739459975
24.http://www.msnbc.com/now/watch/protestors-throw--potentially-lethal--rocks-435290179974 25. http://www.msnbc.com/the-cycle/watch/police-and-protesters-clash-in-baltimore-435252291758 26. http://www.msnbc.com/the-ed-show/watch/protestors-demand-answers-in-baltimore-433293379697 27. http://www.msnbc.com/alex-witt/watch/protests-turn-violent-in-baltimore-434708035504 28. http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/gray-family-lawyer-reacts-to-baltimore-riots-435485763504 29. http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/baltimore-pastor--this-is-not-our-city-435480643540 30. http://www.msnbc.com/alex-witt/watch/mothers-protest-police-brutality-442566723823
confederate flag protest (June to July) MSNBC
Search words (and combinations): Confederate, confederate flag, protest, confederate statues, rallies, confederate symbols, Black Lives Matter
31. http://www.msnbc.com/alex-witt/watch/dueling-rallies-over-confederate-flag-in-sc-486975043621 32.http://www.msnbc.com/the-ed-show/watch/confederate-flag-protests-spread-470116419909 33.http://www.msnbc.com/the-ed-show/watch/kristol-defends-confederate-legacy-470824003775 34.http://www.msnbc.com/politicsnation/watch/moving-past-a-symbol-of-hate-473879619629 FOXNEWS
Search words (and combinations): Confederate, confederate flag, protest, confederate statues, rallies, confederate symbols, Black Lives Matter
36. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4313643831001/?#sp=show-clips
37. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4325504629001/?#sp=show-clips
380. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4316878051001/?#sp=show-clips
Elections (August to September) FOX
Search words (and combinations): Black Lives Matter, elections, Hilary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, presidential candidates, interruption
38. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4457138133001/?#sp=show-clips 39. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4411695972001/?#sp=show-clips 40. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4415059554001/?#sp=show-clips 41. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4420357069001/?#sp=show-clips 410. http://video.foxnews.com/v/4364152628001/?#sp=show-clips MSNBC
Search words (and combinations): Black Lives Matter, elections, Hilary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, presidential candidates, interruption
42. http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/hillary-clinton-and-black-lives-matter-508091459681 43. http://www.msnbc.com/up-with-steve-kornacki/watch/how-black-lives-matter-is-influencing-2016-506211395703 44. http://www.msnbc.com/melissa-harris-perry/watch/yancey--candidates--expect-to-hear-from-us-505796163525 45. http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/bernie-sanders-v-black-lives-matter-502576707783
46. http://www.msnbc.com/thomas-roberts/watch/black-lives-matter-activists-meet-with-clinton-507803203580
Republican period: links for 2017-2018
Anthem protests (September to November 2017/ November to January 2017) FOX
Search words: Search words (and combinations): Super Bowl, Anthem, protest, NFL, kneel for the flag negotiations, politics, Black Lives Matter
47. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5762836885001/?#sp=show-clips 48. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5661039617001/?#sp=show-clips 49. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5616489456001/?#sp=show-clips 50. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5615799279001/?#sp=show-clips 51. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5613541750001/?#sp=show-clips 52. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5612842659001/?#sp=show-clips 53. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5607518178001/?#sp=show-clips 54. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5602496290001/?#sp=show-clips 55. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5602132517001/?#sp=show-clips 56. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5594115196001/?#sp=show-clips 57. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5593762146001/?#sp=show-clips 58. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5593344927001/?#sp=show-clips 59. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5593288736001/?#sp=show-clips 60. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5593023016001/?#sp=show-clips 61. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5591846081001/?#sp=show-clips 62. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5591272971001/?#sp=show-clips 63. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5590433633001/?#sp=show-clips
64. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5590328363001/?#sp=show-clips 65. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5592013400001/?#sp=show-clips 650. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5588569332001/?#sp=show-clips 651.http://video.foxnews.com/v/5663230030001/?#sp=show-clips MSNBC
Search words (and combinations): Super Bowl, Black Lives Matter, Anthem, protest, NFL, kneel for the flag, negotiations, politics
66. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/watch/super-bowl-politics-of-the-nfl-1153133123685 67. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/watch/nfl-players-and-owners-meet-to-discuss-social-issues-1075297859897 68.http://www.msnbc.com/velshi-ruhle/watch/trump-blasts-nfl-over-protests-1072839747981 69. http://www.msnbc.com/deadline-white-house/watch/is-president-trump-winning-the-nfl-debate-1068842051919 70. http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/trump-defends-mike-pence-for-walking-out-on-nfl-game-1067324483800 71. http://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/-this-was-a-stunt-vp-mike-pence-leaves-nfl-game-in-indianapolis-1066124867959?playlist=associated 72. http://www.msnbc.com/mtp-daily/watch/kareem-abdul-jabbar-calls-nfl-anthem-protests-remarkable-1056446531710 73. http://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/afghanistan-war-vet-to-trump-i-didn-t-fight-for-flag-anthem-1055783491644 74. http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/cowboys-owner-jerry-jones-kneels-with-team-before-anthem-1054898755850
75. http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/bob-costas-protests-and-patriotism-are-reconcilable-1054893635942 76. http://www.msnbc.com/mtp-daily/watch/trump-escalates-war-with-nfl-over-national-anthem-protests-1054591555539 77. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-news/watch/nfl-player-to-president-trump-demonstrations-are-about-about-race-1054368323910 78. http://www.msnbc.com/weekends-with-alex-witt/watch/emotional-defense-of-why-nfl-players-take-the-knee-1053828675839 79. http://www.msnbc.com/weekends-with-alex-witt/watch/nfl-protests-sow-wide-divisions-among-fans-and-players-1053824579563 80. http://www.msnbc.com/mtp-daily/watch/trump-escalates-war-with-nfl-over-national-anthem-protests-1054591555539 81. http://www.msnbc.com/hardball/watch/divider-in-chief-nfl-players-protest-potus-1054693443523 82.http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-news/watch/a-closer-look-activism-in-sports-1053743683721 83. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-news/watch/soccer-star-joins-national-anthem-protests-758262851619 84. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-news/watch/willie-colon-we-must-continue-to-kneel-1072124995868 85. http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/mike-pence-didn-t-fool-anyone-with-football-game-stunt-1066994243697
Starbucks (April 2018) MSNBC
Search words (and combinations): Starbucks, arrests, Black Lives Matter, protest, racism, boycott 86. http://www.msnbc.com/ali-velshi/watch/deray-mckesson-on-starbucks-controversy-we-can-t-let-the-police-off-the-hook-1213962307733 87. http://www.msnbc.com/craig-melvin/watch/starbucks-stores-to-close-nationwide-may-29th-for-one-day-to-conduct-racial-bias-training-1212938307843 88. http://www.msnbc.com/velshi-ruhle/watch/starbucks-boycott-after-2-black-men-handcuffed-1212056131939 89. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/watch/starbucks-arrests-highlights-disparity-of-racial-experiences-1211580995589 FOX
Search words: Search words (and combinations): Starbucks, arrests, Black Lives Matter, protest, racism, boycott
90. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5771260653001/?#sp=show-clips
91. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5773433336001/?#sp=show-clips
92. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5772909386001/?#sp=show-clips
93. http://video.foxnews.com/v/5770889961001/?#sp=show-clips
Codes (as provided in Qualtrics) Q1
Number of the item (unit of analysis)
Write down the number of the item as given in the general guidelines (1, 2, 3, 4…) ….
Q2
Outlet
Please choose the outlet where the clip is originally from. • Fox News • MSNBC Q3 Year of airing • 2015 • 2017-2018 Q4 Length
The total length of the item in seconds. …
Q5
Protest
Forms of protest: choose the protest that is described in the item. (You can click on multiple forms when more forms of protest are mentioned)
• A. Demonstration (protest that disrupt the daily life of a society) • B. Petition
• C. Symbolic protest (like bra-burnings by feminists) • D. Sit-in
• E. Boycotting • F. Strikes
• G. Mobilization around death (like wakes) • H. Internet activism
• I. Other forms of protest:
Q6
General lawlessness
Is there talk or emphasis on criminal or violent behavior?
Not only violence or vandalism, but also other violations such as blocking traffic, trespassing and other.
• Not mentioned • Mentioned
Condition: Not mentioned Is Selected. Skip To: Confrontation with police (Q8)
Q7
When mentioned: the tone of the coverage about criminal or violent behavior is…
• Condemnation of violence
• Violence is being rationalized by the media
Confrontation with police
Is there any mentioning of police confrontation?
Police confrontation implies that not only the police was mentioned, but also that some form of conflict is described between protesters and police.
• Not mentioned • Mentioned
Condition: Not mentioned Is Selected. Skip To: Official sources or elite sources (Q10)
Q9
When mentioned: the tone of the coverage about the confrontation with the police is…
• Condemnation of police violence • Police is given credit for performance
Q10
Official sources or elite sources
Are official or elite sources asked for their opinions? Like governmental actors, corporate figures, lobbyists. • No
• Yes
Condition: No Is Selected. Skip To: Members (Q12)
