Climates of risk: A field analysis of global climate change in US media discourse, 1997-2004

Abstract

How are industry and environmentalist discourses of climate risk related to dominant scientific and political discourses? This study operationalizes Bourdieu's concept of symbolic capital in order to map dimensions of risk description and prescription onto a journalistic field of industry, environmentalist, scientific, and political media. Results show that conventional definitions of risk mirror an opposition between scientific and political discourses. Prescriptions for action on risk are partly autonomous from definitions however. Environmentalist and scientific media feature more proactive discourse, and industry and political media feature more reactive discourse. Implications for future research on climate risk and relational studies of media discourse are discussed.

Trends in research on global climate change: A Science Citation Index Expanded-based analysis

“…The number of articles related to "risk" already exceeded that of "greenhouse gas" and "sea level" in 2007. Along with the continual occurrence of natural disasters due to climate change, both governments and academia focused special attention on potential risk (Harte et al, 2004;Thomas et al, 2004;Sonnett, 2010). Thus a risk society emerged with a link to the contemporary climatic fears, which resulted from the unknown climatic futures and would in the end be dissipated by the cultural change (Hulme, 2008).…”

Media representations of risk: The reporting of dredge spoil disposal in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park at Abbot Point

“…In this paper, 'risk' is interpreted from a social-cultural perspective as a broader term that encapsulates complex social, ecological, political and economic processes [2]. As noted by Sonnett [12], the construction of perceptions of risk (i.e. is there a risk?…”

“…Public risk perceptions, for example, shaped by media representations can fundamentally compel or constrain political, economic and social action to address particular risks [12]. Images, created by interacting public and media discourse on an issue, carry strong positive or negative emotional 'charges' that guide risk decision-making [18].…”

“…The media's construction of risk concerning environmental issues has been extensively researched [12][13][14]. Ulrich Beck notes "news media do not only function in terms of a global focusing of events; rather, the news media adopt a more performative stand, actively enacting certain issues as global risks" [15].…”

Storylines in the Sands: News, Narrative, and Ideology in the Calgary Herald

“…The only article that has focused on news media (Way, 2011) reviewed national Canadian press coverage between 2005 and 2007 to assess Prime Minister Stephen Harper's efforts to brand Canada as an "energy superpower," and was largely focused on business reporting. This overall lack of attention is especially noteworthy when compared to the substantial volume of recent work analyzing Canadian and U.S. reporting on climate change (e.g., Antilla, 2010; Boyce & Lewis, 2009;Boykoff, 2011;DiFrancesco & Young, 2011;Feldman, Maibach, Roser-Renouf & Leiserowitz, 2012;Gunster, 2011Gunster, , 2012Sonnett, 2010;Young & Dugas, 2011, or exploring the discursive politics of other energy sources, such as nuclear energy (e.g., Bickerstaff, Lorenzoni, Pidgeon, Poortinga & Simmons, 2008;Culley, Ogley-Oliver, Carton, & Street, 2010;Doyle, 2011;Friedman, 2011;Luoma-aho & Vos, 2009;Perko, Turcanu, & Carle, 2012;Pralle & Boscarino, 2011).…”