Framing China's Olympic Bid

Framing Beijing’s Olympic Bid - Human Rights Advocacy Groups and International Media - Ana ADI Dr Andy MIAH

Contents
Context
Theory
Research Questions
Methodology
Results
Q&A

Context
China’s pursuit of the Olympic dream
Pro-Tibet and media freedom protests during Olympic Torch Relay 2008
2001 Protests against China’s candidature

Theory Definition
“ To frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation and/or treatment recommendation for the item described”
(Entman, 1993)

Research Questions
RQ1 : Which frames are used by Advocacy Groups in their reports to present China?
RQ2 : What function do the Advocay Groups frames have: defining problems, diagnosing causes, making moral judgements, suggesting remedies/calling for action?
RQ3 : To which ideology do the advocacy groups texts belong?
RQ4 : Which frames are used by mainstream media in their articles to depict China’s winning bid?

Research Questions
RQ5: Looking at mainstream media accounts, to is there a relationship between ideology and any function frames they use/make reference to?
RQ6: Comparing with the advocacy groups’ reports, are the frames they used present in the mainstream media accounts? If yes, which frames?
RQ7: In terms of human rights framing, do the media present them more as a cause of conflict or as a problem with which China has to deal with?
RQ8: Is ideology determining the function frames to be used in a text?

Methodology
Qualitative discourse analysis of overall frames
Extract keywords, metaphors, concepts and symbols (Entman, 1993)
Turn concepts into variables to be quantitatively tested
Quantitative content analysis
Variables: ideology and function frames
Frequencies and Correlations
Inter-coder reliability (descriptive statistics)

Sampling
Texts were collected from their own websites, utilizing the search option “China AND Olympic* AND Bid” and double checking the results with online media search databases such as News Bank during July 10-16, 2001
Advocacy Groups
Amnesty International (3)
Human Rights Watch (3)
UK Media
Guardian Unlimited (10)
The Daily Telegraph (8)
BBC News (15)
US Media
CNN.com (27)
The New York Times (16)

Qualitative observations
Both advocacy groups focus on determining problems and suggesting remedies
Moral judgments, especially emphasizing the western moral superiority, are made as well
Human rights are depicted as a problem with which the Chinese government should deal before the Olympic Games arrive to Beijing
They are closer to depicting the elite ideology

Content analysis Variables
Ideology
Dominant
Elite
Journalistic/Occupational
Function Frames
Definition (political system, IOC regulations, bid, human rights, other)
Diagnosis (show, social stability, emancipation, human rights, other)
Moral judgment (western moral superiority, western political superiority, other)
Remedies suggestion (laws, international pressure, IOC pressure, boycott, other)

Quantitative results

Quantitative results
Independent Sample T-tests:
Dominant * moral judgement (t (74) = 2.405; p = .019)
Elite * defining problems (t (74)=2.650; p = .010)
Elite * moral judgement (t (74) = 2.255; p = .027)
Occupational * determining causes (t (74) = 2.312; p = .024)
Occupational * Moral judgement (t (74) = -4.260; p = .000)
Pearson’s Correlations
Dominant * DCshow (r = .288; p = .012)
Dominant * DC social stability (r = .294; p = .010)
Dominant * MJ political superiority (r = .220; p = .055)
Elite * DPIOC (r = .362; p = .002)
Elite * DCshow (r = -.248; p = .031)
Elite * DCother (r = .274; p = .017)
Elite * MJother (r = .257; p = .025)
Elite * SRlaws (r = .250; p = .030)
Occupational * DPbid (r = .239; p = .037)
Occupational * MJ western moral superiority (r = -.290; p = .012)
Occupational * MJ western political superiority (r = -.468; p = .000)
Occupational * SRother (r = -.301; p = .009)

Discussion
All ideologies show a statistically significant correlation with the making moral judgement frame
Dominant ideology is more prone to make moral judgements; elite ideology is in close connection to defining problems and occupational ideology is linked to determining causes.
Journalistic texts, based on the studied sample, show no statistically significant inclination to showcase frames suggesting remedies .

Discussion
The occupational ideology is predicted to have negative relationships with the making moral judgement frame and the suggesting remedies (so the stronger the occupational ideology is, the less moral judgements should one find)
Based on the data analysis, the elite ideology is the only one fully correlated with all four function frames (having thus the potential of being the only one presenting a fuller picture/wider angle of the reality)

Conclusions
Human rights emerge as the problem with which the Chinese Olympic organizers and their government have to deal with
A more strategic approach of media analysis could have prevented the protests of 2008
All ideologies are prone to make moral judgments affirming the tight relationship between media, those in power and the elites

Thank you!
Questions?
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Framing China's Olympic Bid

by Ana ADI

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