Cristina Archetti

News Coverage of 9/11 and the Demise of the Media Flows, Globalization and Localization Hypotheses

An international comparative study of the elite press framing of 9/11 in the US, Italy, France and Pakistan reveals that there is little empirical backing for the claims of three core strands of research about news exchanges within the field of international communications. The findings of the empirical investigation neither support the existence of international news flows, nor the idea that news is becoming homogenized on a global scale. The analysis does not suggest a localization of news at a national level either. News coverage, instead, appears to be markedly different at the level of the single newspaper and this can be explained through different variables than the international macro-processes addressed by news studies within the field. The analysis fundamentally suggests that, if research within international communications wants to explain news in the information age, it needs to broaden its horizons and to adopt a multidisciplinary perspective that includes both the analysis of national political processes and a deeper understanding of the dynamics of news production in each single media organization.

Comparing international coverage of 9/11: Towards an interdisciplinary explanation of the construction of news

This article presents an interdisciplinary model attempting to explain how news is constructed, by relying on the contributions of different fields of study: News Sociology, Political Communication, International Communications, and International Relations. It is a first step towards developing a holistic theoretical approach to what shapes the news that bridges current micro to macro approaches. More precisely, the model explains news variation across different media organizations and countries by focusing on the different ways the sense of newsworthiness of journalists is affected by three main variables: national interest, national journalistic culture, and the editorial policy of each media organization. The model is developed on the basis of an investigation into what shaped the media coverage of 9/11 in eight elite newspapers across the USA, France, Italy and Pakistan.

Journalism in the age of global media: The evolving practices of foreign correspondents in London

The article challenges the widespread notion that, in the age of global and instantaneous communication, foreign correspondence is becoming ‘redundant’. Based on a range of in-depth interviews with foreign correspondents in London, it examines the identity, newsgathering routines, and outputs of journalists working for a range of foreign media organizations. The study suggests that foreign correspondence is indeed evolving, but that the changes are not necessarily for the worse. In fact, not only are foreign journalists not disappearing, but the heavy use of new communication technologies – rather than leading to superficial and low-quality reporting – also supports the pursuit of exclusive news-story angles and a fuller delivery of the correspondent’s value.

“Which future for foreign correspondence? London foreign correspondents in the age of global media"

This article challenges the widespread idea that, in an age of instantaneous and ubiquitously accessible information, foreign correspondents are doomed to disappear. The last study of foreign correspondents in the London hub was conducted 30 years ago. Based on a new study involving a range of in-depth interviews with foreign correspondents in the British capital, the article reveals the “story behind their stories” and the changes that have occurred since then. It particularly focuses on the impact that advances in communication technologies have had on the correspondents’ professional identity, newsgathering routines, and news outputs. The findings contribute to a more nuanced and empirical understanding of the impact of media globalization on the practice of journalism. They underline the increasingly important role of foreign correspondents as “sense makers” within the huge tide of information available. While foreign journalists have to a large extent always fulfilled this function, they appear more needed than ever in a deeply interdependent world. Foreign correspondents are also developing novel ways of reporting. Indeed, rather than a “crisis” of foreign correspondence, we could perhaps be witnessing its renaissance.

The impact of new media on diplomatic practice : an evolutionary model of change

SummaryBased on a range of interviews with foreign diplomats in London, this article explains the considerable variation in the way that communication technologies both affect diplomatic practices and are appropriated by diplomats to pursue the respective countries’ information-gathering and public outreach objectives. The study shows that London, as an information environment, is experienced differently by each of the diplomats and embassy actors. The analysis elaborates a model of the ‘communication behaviour’ of foreign diplomats, based on an evolutionary analogy: foreign diplomats in the context of the British capital, within their respective embassy organizations, can each be compared to the members of a species that is attempting to survive in a natural environment. The nuances highlighted by the explanatory model challenge the largely homogeneous and generalized nature of current debates about media and diplomacy, as well as public diplomacy.

A multidisciplinary understanding of news: Comparing elite press framing of 9/11 in the US, Italy, France and Pakistan

Political Communications, International Communications, News Sociology, all claim to offer an explanation for what shapes the news, but provide extremely different, if not contradictory suggestions. Political communications almost takes for granted the fact that official actors have a major role in shaping news stories at the national level. International Communications points at several possibilities: structural economic imbalances lead to unidirectional news flows from rich countries towards poor countries; globalization causes news to become homogenised on a worldwide scale; news is geared to the tastes of local audiences by national news producers. News sociology, instead, argues that the news product of each media organization is the unique output of patterns of social interactions among media professionals. An international comparative study of the elite press framing of 9/11 in the US, Italy, France, and Pakistan reveals the limits of these approaches: none of them alone is able to explain the patterns of news contents that were detected in the empirical investigation.The analysis suggests that the content of press coverage in the newspapers under analysis is more effectively explained in terms of selection of newsworthy sources, guided by national interest, journalistic culture, and editorial policy. The study points to the benefit of adopting international comparative research designs and fundamentally argues that, if we want to explain news in the information age, we need to approach its study in a multidisciplinary perspective.

The Role of Narratives

The previous chapter has shown that it is unfounded to assert that the terrorists’ narrative has the power to cause a law-abiding citizen to turn to extreme acts of violence. Not only that, the chapter also exposed the lack of explanations in current literature about the way narratives (whether individual or collective) lead to political action. Yet, if one reads terrorism-related literature, progress in counterterrorism appears to be related to both establishing a credible narrative and damaging “their” narrative. This present chapter further examines the nature of narratives by demonstrating that, contrary to what is overwhelmingly suggested, a narrative is not a simple “story” or “message.” While narratives can be constructed, planned, and promoted by specific actors to achieve desired objectives, they are not messages that get “delivered.” They do not “spread” like viruses either. Instead, they keep on existing through a collective reconstruction and retelling process. This chapter ultimately suggests that a greater understanding of the social construction of narratives can inform a better assessment of what is feasible in the “war of ideas” against violent extremism.

Explaining news : national politics and journalistic cultures in global context

Is globalization leading to a worldwide homogenization of news? Is news shaped by political spin? Or is news controlled by the professionals who produce it? By systematically testing a range of theories, this book demonstrates the inability of current communication research to explain the nature of news. By comparing the coverage of two defining crises of our time—9/11 and the War in Afghanistan—across the US, Italy, France, and Pakistan, the study develops a new theoretical framework. The model brings together previously distinct levels of analysis: the organizational environment of the single news organization, national social and political contexts, the macro level of international relations. Translated excerpts of political statements and news stories from around the world offer a rich and colorful insight into the least-known aspects of the political and public reactions in the aftermath of 9/11.

A Communication Approach

Chapter 2 has established that terrorism is inextricably linked to communication. There are, however, two major obstacles to understanding the role of communication. On the one hand is the lack of solid explanatory frameworks in the field of terrorism studies within which to “place” the exchange, sharing, and processing of information. On the other hand is the existence of assumptions shaped by the way terrorism has been studied over decades. They do not even allow us to register communication as relevant to the study of terrorism — what has been called in the previous chapter the “terrorism paradigm.” The combination of these aspects is an hindrance to understanding the role of communication technologies, media organisations, and the effects that messages carried by the media can have, for instance, in the individual development of radical views, mobilisation of terrorist groups across borders, or the weaving of a terrorist plot.

Image, self-presentation and political communication in the age of interconnection: An alternative understanding of the mediatization of politics

The way politicians ‘look’ is taken to be one of the essential aspects of the ‘mediatization’ and ‘professionalization’ of politics. Yet there is very little research about the role of image and selfpresentation in political communication. This article presents the results of a study that aims to fill this gap by mapping where and how image fits within broader processes of identity and meaning construction in contemporary politics. On the basis of 51 interviews, it compares the role of personal image in the everyday political practices of both British and Italian local politicians and members of the European Parliament. The analysis develops an alternative conceptual framework to make sense of the role of image in twenty-first century politics, showing that the alleged deleterious effects of a ‘cult of appearances’ on democracy reflects more the narrowness of academic enquiry and the legacy of outdated linear models of politicsmedia relationships than the much more variegated and networked reality of contemporary politics.