Public Knowledge, Media and Foreign Policy-Making

1390000498 Knowledge Production in Peacebuilding Essay

1390000498

1

1. In how far can a knowledge-focused perspective enhance our understanding

of international politics? Discuss in general and/or with regard to a specific

policy field.

Public Knowledge, Media and Foreign Policy-Making Public knowledge related to international politics is significantly influenced by information provided

via media coverage, for the pragmatic reason that "most people have limited personal experience of

diverse countries and continents"1. In this essay, I propose to analyse how media coverage of foreign

politics produce public knowledge and influence public opinion. More specifically, I would like to

examine in how far is media coverage reporting constructed knowledge, from whom, and what does

it mean regarding its influence on public opinion and ultimately foreign-policy making. My main

argument is that media coverage reports a particular knowledge influenced by media environment,

elites and national interests, and that this knowledge can influence public opinion if it is transmitted

in intelligible ways. Moreover, I argue that the power of media to alter policy-making remains

hypothetic rather than proved, especially regarding the role of the elite, and for this reason I propose

to focus mainly on the conditions under which media can be an influential actor in international

politics.

This essay is constructed in two parts. First, I will examine how the public knowledge related to

foreign affairs is constructed, and thus what the impact of media on the formation of public opinion

is. Second, I will critically analyse under which conditions media (with a strong emphasis on satellite,

cable television and more generally broadcast news) can have an impact on foreign policy-making,

and whether media coverage does reflect a pre-existent constructed knowledge, mainly in focusing

on two different theoretical frameworks: the cable news network (CNN) effect and the

manufacturing consent.

1 Toril Aalberg and al., "International TV News, Foreign Affairs Interest and Public Knowledge", Journalism

studies Vol.14, No.3 (2013), 388.


1390000498

2

I. Public knowledge of foreign affairs In this section, I draw on studies related to political knowledge and media to underline some insights

significant to understand the relation between media and public knowledge. Regarding the relevant

academic literature, a clear limitation of this essay lies in the fact that most of the available studies

focus exclusively on the United States or at least to a great degree on Western states. In this limited

context, the mass media are said to be the foremost source of political information for people2 and

tend to "dominate the dissemination of information"3.

The first trend worth pointing out is that based on several studies4, the media (and especially

television) coverage concerning international politics is thought to be given relatively little attention

compared to domestic affairs5, and notably since the end of the Cold War6. The quite limited supply

of international television news can be explained by two principal factors: the expensive cost of

international news production and the perceived low demand for this type of news7. These two

elements are underpinned in a global context where "television is becoming more market-driven and

entertainment-centered, in that there has been a large increase in the number of privately owned

television channels"8. Indeed, private broadcasters are the very ones devoting generally less time to

international news and when they are doing so, are focusing more on soft news topics (that is,

"reports about celebrities, human interest, sport, and other entrainment-centered stories"9) than

public service providers10.

2 Doris Graber, Mass Media and American Politics, 6

th ed. (Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2002), cited in Jason

Barabas and Jennifer Jerit, "Estimating the Causal Effects of Media Coverage on Policy-Specific Knowledge", American Journal of Political Science vol.53, no.1 (2009), 74. 3 Jeffrey Mondak, Nothing to read: Newspapers and Election in a Social Experiment (Ann Arbor: University of

Michigan Press, 1995), 159. 4 See, e.g, Donald Shanor, News from Abroad (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003) and Steve Jones,

"Television news: geographic and sources biases", International Journal of Communication vol.2 (2008). 5 Aalberg "International TV News ", 387; Virgil Hawkins, "Media selectivity and the other side of the CNN effect:

the consequences of not paying attention to conflict", Media, War & Conflict vol.55, no.4 (2011), 56. 6 Pippa Norris, "The Restless Searchlight: Network News Framing of Post-Cold War World", Political

Communication vol.12, no.4 (1995), 365. 7 Aalberg "International TV News ", 388-389.

8 Aalberg "International TV News ", 389.

9 Aalberg "International TV News ", 396.

10 Aalberg "International TV News ", 395-397.


1390000498

3

This distinction between soft and hard news topics (the latter focusing rather on "reports about

political, economic and social issues including war and poverty"11) is important because to what

extent soft news has the ability to enhance political knowledge still remains a question without a

clear answer : on the one hand, according to Baum12, program formats perceived as soft news outlets

(including amongst others networks cable and syndicated entrainment newsmagazine shows, as well

as day-time and late-night talk shows13) can enhance the political knowledge – for instance about

international conflicts – of people who would not be exposed to any news on this subject otherwise.

On the other hand, Prior14 claims that soft news concerns a much smaller audience than hard news15,

and that people who watch soft news do not improve significantly their factual political knowledge in

doing so16. He concludes therefore that soft news remains marginal in the formation of well-

informed citizens17. In a latter article18, Baum responds to Prior's scepticism towards the effects of

soft news in arguing than soft news audiences are more significant than Prior demonstrated19 and

that they are constituted by individuals who are the most likely to learn some political knowledge in

consuming soft news, mostly because of their education level in the sense that less-educated people

are not very likely to be hard news consumers anyway20. In addition to this, he finds that "exposure

to soft news does most likely have at least some effect on factual knowledge"21, in particular

regarding certain aspects of foreign crisis "that soft news programmers elect to emphasize"22.

Moreover, he argues that there are other types of learning associated with soft news consummation

not necessarily linked to any increase in their long-term factual knowledge, but nonetheless

11

Aalberg "International TV News ", 396. 12

Matthew Baum, Soft News Goes to War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003) 13

Baum, Soft News, 6. 14

Markus Prior, "Any Good News in Soft News? The Impact of Soft News Preference on Political Knowledge", Political Communication vol.20 (2003) 15

Prior, "Any Good News", 154 16

Prior, "Any Good News", 158-162. 17

Prior, "Any Good News", 168. 18

Matthew Baum, "Soft News and Political Knowledge: Evidence of Absence or Absence of Evidence?" Political Communication vol.20 (2003) 19

Baum, "Soft News", 175-177. 20

Baum, "Soft News", 177. 21


Ibid.


1390000498

4

significant, such as the formation of particular political attitudes23. For instance, "the soft news

media, to a much greater extent than their hard news counterparts, disproportionately emphasize

negative coverage of U.S. foreign policy initiatives"24. Consequentially, according to Baum, this

negative coverage has repercussions on opinions and moral judgements of soft news consumers25.

What shall be highlighted here is that television news consumers do not necessary watch the same

kind of news and that this has probably at least some repercussions on their foreign affairs

knowledge. Indeed, beyond individual socio-economic factors, the features of information

environment are responsible for much of public political knowledge or ignorance26. In this sense, as

it has been already noted above, the media environment is different in term or relative amount of

domestic/foreign and soft/hard news available for people, depending if it is more or less dominated

by private channels.

It has been demonstrated that there is clearly a "positive relationship between the level of hard news

coverage offered by the news media in a country and citizens' level of hard news knowledge"27 but

there is no similar confirmation regarding soft news. Because "there is a clear evidence that market-

orientated broadcasting systems are less likely to supply their audiences with international hard

news coverage"28, it could be argued that the actual market-driven environment could hypothetically

have a negligible or even negative impact on public knowledge. Moreover, a negative relationship

between the importance of private broadcasters in the news media environment and public news

knowledge has been already suggested in other studies29.

23

Baum, "Soft News", 185-187. 24


Ibid. 26

Jennifer Jerit et al., "Citizens, Knowledge, and the Information Environment", American Journal of Political Science vol.50, no.2 (2006), 277-278 27



See, e.g., Toril Aalberg and James Curran, How Media Inform Democracy. A Comparative Approach (New York: Routledge, 2012)


1390000498

5

However, the volume of international news is not the only determinant of public knowledge. Jerit

and al. notably display that "knowledge gaps"30 exist between the more and the less educated

people, and that when the media coverage on an issue increases, "certain news formats reinforce

existing differences in political knowledge; others diminish those differences"31. This study suggests

interestingly that to enhance political knowledge of less-educated people, an increase in the media

coverage is not enough; the political information has also to be transmitted "in ways that can be

comprehended by the least educated"32. Pragmatically, "easily digestive formats", such as television

news, "benefit the least educated"33 while "the abstract writing style of many newspapers"34 tends to

reinforce the existing knowledge gaps in favour of the most educated people. Moreover, Barabas and

Jerit demonstrated that the volume of coverage "is not the only or even the most determinant

predicator of knowledge,"35 and that "the breadth of coverage and the prominence of a story are

equally powerful predicators of knowledge and are more important than demographic characteristics

or indicators of socioeconomic status"36.

Turning to the presumed lack of interest of people for international news, it seems indeed that

people are more interested in domestic news, according to the research of Aalberg and al37, studying

eleven different countries. Hamilton38 explains that this low rate interest is one of the reasons

enlightening the low level of international news: people prefer watching domestic news and a

market-driven media environment responds logically to this demand with a limited supply39.

However, this lack of interest can be also explained by the public ignorance of certain international

30

Jerit "Citizens", 267. 31

Ibid. 32



Ibid. 35

Barabas and Jerit, "Estimating the Causal", 86. 36

Ibid. 37


James Hamilton, "The (Many) Markets For International News", Journalism Studies vol.11, no.5 (2010), 651-652. 39

Hamilton, "The (Many) Markets", 652.


1390000498

6

issues due to "a lack of prior media coverage"40. People are, therefore, not interested in international

issues because they do not understand them.

Consequentially, Powlick and Katz argue that a vicious cycle exists which implies that a "lack of media

coverage has resulted in lack of public interest, which in turn has made the market for international

news small, leading to less international coverage and perpetuating public ignorance of foreign policy

issues"41. They also claim that "if journalists consistently reported international events based upon

their intrinsic importance, public interest and knowledge about international events would

eventually increase"42. The question is therefore what does generate international news media

coverage if it is apparently not news' "intrinsic importance"43?

Earlier works on this question44 suggest that international news has a better chance of being covered

in countries where some economic, political, social and geographical relationships exist. Thereby,

"some events and/or countries are more likely to make it into the news"45, while others considered

as "peripheral" do not receive as much attention46. Notably, "this favors events that occur near the

reporting facilities, often in cosmopolitan centers with good communications, or where news editors

expect major events to happen"47 . According to Aalberg and al.48, more recent studies49 confirm

these initial conclusions. Furthermore, they highlight the importance of geographical proximity, and

40

Philip Powlick and Andrew Katz, "Defining the American Public Opinion/Foreign Policy Nexus", Mershon International Studies Review vol.42, no.1 (1998), 41. 41

Ibid. 42

Ibid. 43

Ibid. 44

Johan Galtung and Mari Ruge, "The Structure of Foreign News: The Presentation of the Congo, Cuba and Cyprus Crises in Four Norwegian Newspapers", Journal of International Peace Research vol.2, nol.1 (1965); Johan Galtung, "On the Role of the Media in Worldwide Security and Peace", In Peace and Communication, eds. Tapio Varis and San Jose (Costa Rica: Universidad par La Paz, 1986) 45


Johan Galtung, "On the Role of the Media in Worldwide Security and Peace", In Peace and Communication, eds. Tapio Varis and San Jose (Costa Rica: Universidad par La Paz, 1986), 264. 47


Ibid. 49

Pamela Shoemaker et al., "Deviant Acts, Risky Business, and U.S. interests: The Newsworthiness of World Events", Journalism Quarterly vol.68, no.4 (1991); Jürgen Wilke et al., "The Geography of Foreign News on Television: A Comparative Study of 17 countries", International Communication Gazette vol.74, no.4 (2012).


1390000498

7

more generally "Euro-centrism"50, as well as events or countries which have "political or economic

significance"51, or more generally superpowers52.

In conclusion, even if it has been demonstrated that there is "a strong relationship between the level

of international TV news and public knowledge about foreign affairs"53, the overall limited supply of

foreign politics news and the quality of them have some impacts on public knowledge which should

be examined carefully. In addition, even a large amount of international news has to be transmitted

in certain ways to have a global impact on political knowledge of certain categories of population.

Moreover, the coverage is also determined by determinants, such its production place and its

political, economic or social relative significance for the news consumer countries, which means

ultimately that "the everyday representation of the world via news media is far from a direct

reflection of global realities"54.

II. Media, public opinion and foreign policy-making In this section, I provide some insights to grasp under which conditions media can be a significant

factor influencing a state's foreign policy-making. I argue that the degree of consensus among elites

toward which policy should be adopted and how an event is framed by media are both important

variables, in accordance with Robinson's policy-media interaction model55. Furthermore, I examine

the role of elite debate and media framing on the construction of international news, their impact on

public knowledge, and ultimately policy-making.

In simple words, The CNN effect stipulates that the media has the capacity to alter the state's

"decision-making process in defense and foreign affairs"56, especially in the case of humanitarian

50

Wilke, "The Geography of Foreign", 219. 51

Shoemaker, "Deviant Acts", 795. 52

Shoemaker, "Deviant Acts", 794. 53


Haoming Wu, "Investigating the Determinants of International News Flow: A Meta-Analysis", International Communication Gazette vol.60 (1998), 507. 55

Piers Robinson, The CNN Effect: The Myth of News, Foreign Policy and Intervention (London & New York: Routledge, 2002), 30-35. 56

Eytan Gilboa, "Global Television News and Foreign Policy: Debating the CNN effect", International Studies Perspectives vol.6 (2005), 328.


1390000498

8

interventions. The CNN effect has been wildly discussed amongst scholars since the rise of the 24h

news broadcasters and the extensive coverage of the Gulf conflict in 199157. However, ten years of

comparative studies did not succeed in reaching any substantial consensus amongst scholars about

whether or not the news media does have an impact in terms of forcing foreign-policy making during

humanitarian crisis58. Even its definition remains unclear59, which explains why I have defined this

concept in such broad terms. In this context, Gilboa suggests that the CNN effect "have been highly

exaggerated"60, and that "no sufficient evidence has yet been presented to validate the CNN effect

hypothesis"61. In fact, a large amount of comparatives studies, addressing the CNN effect62 in the

case of (amongst others) the Kurdish, the Somalia and the Bosnia crisis in the 1990s, contradict each

other without resolving the controversy63.

The manufacturing content tends to emphasis "the ability of government to influence the output of

journalists and the tendency of journalists to both self-censor and perceive global events through the

cultural and political prisms of their respective political and social elites"64. In his study about the

American intervention in Somalia, Mermin suggests for instance that, if television is thought to have

the power to move governments, "governments also have the power to move television"65.

Regarding the on-going debate, the policy-media interaction model, developed by Robinson66 (who is

a preeminent scholar well-known for his research about the CNN effect, but who has also pointed

57

Gilboa, "Global Television", 325. 58


Gilboa, "Global Television", 333-334. 60


Ibid. 62

See, e.g., Royce Ammon, Global Television and the Shaping of World Politics: CNN, Telediplomacy, and Foreign Policy (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarlan, 2001); Steven Livingston, "Media Coverage of the War: An Empirical Assessment", in Kosovo and the challenge of Humanitarian Intervention: Selective Indignation, Collective Action, and International Citizenship, eds. A. Schnabel and R. Thakur (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2000); Jonathan Mermin, "Television News and American Intervention in Somalia: The Myth of a Media-Driven Foreign Policy", Political Science Quarterly vol.112, no.3 (1997). 63


Robinson, The CNN Effect, 12. 65

Mermin, "Television News", 403. 66

Robinson, The CNN Effect, 30-35.


1390000498

9

out that past studies have exaggerated its effects67), seems to be one of the most suitable

approaches to address the role of media on foreign-policy making. Even if it did not reach a clear

consensus among scholars, it is widely used as one of the most relevant conceptualisations of the

CNN effect68. His study emphasises on "the degree of media influence on policy-makers when they

are deliberating over whether to intervene during a humanitarian crisis"69. Simultaneously, he

discredits the CNN effect as "political control"70 (an opinion largely accepted amongst other scholar

studying the CNN effect71). Moreover, his model tends to "reconcile"72 the "contrasting claims"73

between the CNN effect and the manufacturing consent in offering instead "a more nuanced, two-

ways understanding of the direction of influence between the news media and the state"74.

The policy-media interaction model "is designed to help identify instances when media coverage

comes to play a significant role in persuading policy-makers to pursue a particular policy"75, based on

two basic variables. First, there is the policy uncertainty, defined as "a function of the degree of

consensus and co-ordination of the sub-systems of the executive with respect to an issue"76. Second,

there is the media framing, which is subdivided in three categories: the distance framing and the

support framing, which both are "implicitly supportive of a government policy opposed to military

intervention and as such either implicitly or explicitly promotes a policy of non-intervention"77.

Indeed, while the former creates an "emotional distance between the audience and the people

suffering in a conflict"78, the latter focuses on the adequacy of the policy deferred to the conflict79.

The third type of media coverage is the emotional framing, which emphasizes on

67

Ibid. 68






Ibid. 74

Ibid. 75




Ibid. 79

Ibid.


1390000498

10

"humanitarianism"80 and human suffering, while simultaneously "tends to avoid underlying political

and social issues"81. This type of media framing is more likely to be strongly critical towards policy-

makers when no government intervention is planned82 and to produce "a "do something" reaction

amongst the global television audiences"83. This is interesting in regard to the previous discussion

about soft and hard news, in the sense that this emphasis on human suffering eluding the complexity

of the conflict tends to bring closer soft news coverage and emotional framing coverage, with the

consequences for public knowledge noted above. Moreover, according to Gaber84, one of the most

effective frames to memorizing news stories is the human interest, which also gives credit to the

hypothesis that empathy-framed news could be assimilated to soft news, and in turn can have a

significant impact on public attitudes towards foreign affairs.

In accordance with manufacturing consent theory, Robinson argues that "when there exists elite

consensus over an issue the news media are unlikely to produce coverage that challenges that

consensus"85; on the opposite "when there exists elite dissensus with respect to an issue, […], news

media coverage reflects this debate and we can expect to observe a variety of critical and supportive

framing in news reports"86. In addition, if empathy-framed media coverage occurs and challenges

government action or inaction, the conditions under which the CNN effect is likely to come out are

met87. I propose, therefore, to analyse these two variables in focusing, firstly, on how media

coverage is influenced by policy certainty or uncertainty, and afterwards, how certain types of media

framing can impact public knowledge and political attitudes.

80


Ibid. 82

Ibid. 83

Ekaterina Balabanova, Media, Wars and Politics (Chippenham: Ashgate, 2007), 1. 84

Graber, Mass Media, cited in Powlick and Katz, "Defining the American", 36. 85


Ibid. 87

Robinson, The CNN Effect, 31.


1390000498

11

a. Policy uncertainty What should be highlighted first is that "there is a difference between "forcing" policy makers to

adopt policy and "pressuring" them to do so"88, and that studies conceptualising the CNN effect as a

policy forcing only succeed in demonstrating an evidence of pressure89. The critical factor lying in

many of these studies is leadership. Indeed, one of the evidences often suggested in studies about

the CNN effect is that "if leaders do not have a clear policy on a significant issue, the media may step

in and replace them"90. On the contrary, it is generally assumed that "the media cannot influence

policy-making when policy certainty exists"91. The role of media should, therefore, be always

evaluated regarding the degree of consensus amongst elite and policy certainty.

To illustrate the concept of "elite", according to Holsti in the case of the U.S., elite are constituted of:

"(1) current actors within the executive branch of the U.S. government, (2) members of the U.S.

Congress, (3) leaders and officers of organized interest groups, and (4) commentators and experts

from the media, academia, and research foundations"92. Interestingly, Page, Shapiro and Dempsey

suggest that "the greatest mover of public opinion [is] the commentary and news analysis done by

prominent journalists and "experts""93, due to their high credibility lying in "their actual or portrayed

experience and expertise and nonpartisan status"94. Assessing if media elite are co-ordinated with

policy-makers or, on the opposite, have a critical discourse is, therefore, important to analyse the

role of media on public opinion.

The other aspect of the CNN effect, which reaches a large degree of consensus, is that "global

television news coverage has accelerated the foreign-policy making process"95. Indeed, according to

88


Ibid. 90

Ibid. 91


Ole Holsti, Public opinion and American Foreign Policy (Ann Harbor: University of Michigan Press, 1996), cited in Powlick and Katz, "Defining the American", 34. 93

Benjamin Page, Robert Shapiro and Glenn Dempsey, "What Moves Public Opinion?", in American Political Science Review vol.81, no.1 (1987), 35-36., cited in Powlick and Katz, "Defining the American", 37. 94

Page et al., "What Moves", 35. 95

Gilboa, "Global Television", 336.


1390000498

12

Gowing, "real-time images […] compress transmission and policy response times"96, which in turn

"puts pressure on choice and priorities in crisis management. [Television news'] images distort and

skew the work of diplomats, military planners and politicians"97. In this sense, the policy uncertainty

is also more likely to come out when the time allowed to policy makers to take a decision shrinks

significantly.

By and large, studies tend to show that elite dissensus and the speed of news increase policy

uncertainty, and, therefore, allow media to be an influential actor in a context of "policy vacuum"98.

However, the relation between elite and news media is more complex and cannot be reduced to the

pressuring impact — increasing the policy uncertainty — of non-stop news on hesitant policy-

makers. According to manufacturing consent theory, the elite have capacities to influence the output

of media.

For instance, Mermin suggests that the American intervention in Somalia in 1992 is not "about the

influence of television on Washington"99 but rather "about the influence of Washington on

television"100. Indeed, regarding the Somalia crisis, he finds that "the evidence indicates that the

major networks focused on the possibility of American intervention only after it had first been

advocated in Washington"101 and that "journalists worked closely with the governmental sources in

deciding when to cover Somalia, how to frame the story, and how much coverage it deserved"102.

This example illustrates simultaneously the role of journalists as elite having the capacity to influence

public opinion and the co-ordination of this elitist group with others, such as governmental policy-

makers. In turn, public opinion is exposed in this context to news susceptible to enhance support

96

Nik Gowing, "Real-time TV Coverage of Armed Conflicts and Diplomatic Crises: Does it Pressure or Distort Foreign Policy Decisions?", The Joan Shorenstein Center on the press, Politics and Public Policy [Working Paper] (1994), 1. 97

Ibid. 98

Philip Seib, The Global Journalist: News and Conscience in a World of Conflict (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), 28. 99

Mermin, "Television News", 389. 100

Ibid. 101

Ibid. 102

Ibid.


1390000498

13

towards a governmental policy previously decided amongst policy-makers. This also highlights

Gilboa's claim that "many studies confuse cause and effect relationship between coverage and

policy"103 and that consequentially "global television cannot force policy makers to do what they

intend to do anyway"104. In this context, news media is more an elitist tool to expose public audience

to a certain form of knowledge accrediting policy consensus in order to enhance public support, than

an actor influencing policy-makers.

b. Media framing According to Spencer, "news coverage invariably depicts conflicts and crises in terms of perpetrators

and victims"105. Indeed, it has been said that television news enhances public knowledge for the

great majority if it transmit news in understandable ways. Therefore, television news "inevitably

overlook the complexities of policy"106. Robinson argues that emotional media framing is a

determinant of the CNN effect107, but he remains unclear why one conflict is framed this way and

another one in another way. Hence, it is important to look at the sources of media framing.

It has been already stated that elite can likewise have an impact in framing news media reports.

According to Powlick and Katz, drawing on Zaller's research108, elite debate towards a particular

policy has two effects which can be observed on media. On the one hand, when elite consensus

exists, news media are likely to report mainly this consensual point of view. This is the mainstream

effect. In turn, public knowledge is strongly affected in the sense that people have only one set of

viewpoints to form their opinions. On the other hand, the polarization effect occurs when elite do

not agree on a policy, which leads to conflicting information in media and ultimately, people are

likely to take sides in choosing "the arguments [which] are more consistent with the contextual

103


Ibid. 105

Graham Spencer, The Media and Peace (Chippenham: Palgrave, 2005), 33. 106

Philip seib, Headline Diplomacy: How News Coverage Affects Foreign Policy (Westport: Praeger, 1997), 139; cited in Graham Spencer, The Media and Peace (Chippenham: Palgrave, 2005), 35. 107


John Zaller, The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992); "The Converse-McGuire Model of Attitude Change and the Gulf War Opinion Rally", Political Communication vol.10, no.4 (1993), cited in Powlick and Katz, "Defining the American", 35.


1390000498

14

frames already in a person's memory"109. Accordingly, if elite opposed to official policy are more

successful in taping "into the public's frames", they can significantly influence public opinion. This is

another example of how media reports knowledge constructed by elite. However, as noted in the

first section, this debate has to be reported in some way allowing the great majority to acknowledge

it; otherwise the public is less likely to know and to take side in the controversy110.

Conclusion To conclude, news media seems to have a significant role in the formation of public knowledge

related of foreign affairs. The environment, the degree of elite consensus and the framing that media

choose to emphasise when they cover an international event are several factors — certainly not the

only ones — which influence public knowledge and attitudes towards government action. What I

have found interesting in particular is that it seems that the transmission of international news by

many broadcasters — and especially the private ones — in stressing soft and emotional coverage, is,

on the one hand the best way to activate public attention and the formation of attitudes, even if the

increase of factual political knowledge is difficult to assess. On the other hand, these simplifications

represent also a powerful tool for elite, in accordance with or without media experts, to emphasis or

elude the complexity of certain international crisis and hence, exposing audiences to news which

implicitly support a pre-existent policy-making.

It seems clear that media can only play a very marginal role if elite consensus and policy certainty

exist. Whether uncertain policy-makers are possibly influenced by public opinion informed by media

or by media transmitting to them a certain perception of public opinion is an interesting question

which should be developed in further studies. Nevertheless, it seems that knowledge production via

media is a stimulating perspective to understand international politics.

109

Powlick and Katz, "Defining the American", 35. 110

Powlick and Katz, "Defining the American", 34.


1390000498

15

BIBLIOGRAPHY

AALBERG, Toril and CURRAN, James. How Media Inform Democracy. A Comparative Approach. New

York: Routledge, 2012.

AALBERG, Toril; PAPATHANASSOPOULOS, Stylianos; SOROKA, Stuart; CURRAN, James; HAYASHI,

Kaori; IYENGAR, Shanto; JONES, Paul; MAZZOLENI, Gianpetro; ROJAS, Hernando; ROWE, David and

TIFFEN, Rodney. "International TV News, Foreign Affairs Interest and Public Knowledge." Journalism

studies Vol.14, No.3 (2013): 387-405.

AMMON, Royce. Global Television and the Shaping of World Politics: CNN, Telediplomacy, and Foreign

Policy. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarlan, 2001.

BALABANOVA, Ekaterina. Media, Wars and Politics. Chippenham: Ashgate, 2007.

BARABAS, Jason and JERIT, Jennifer. "Estimating the Causal Effects of Media Coverage on Policy-

Specific Knowledge." American Journal of Political Science vol.53, no.1 (2009): 73-89.

BAUM, Matthew.

"Soft News and Political Knowledge: Evidence of Absence or Absence of Evidence?" Political

Communication vol.20 (2003): 173-190.

Soft News Goes to War. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003.

GALTUNG, Johan and RUGE, Mari. "The Structure of Foreign News: The Presentation of the Congo,

Cuba and Cyprus Crises in Four Norwegian Newspapers." Journal of International Peace Research vol.2,

nol.1 (1965):64-91.

GALTUNG, Johan. "On the Role of the Media in Worldwide Security and Peace." In Peace and

Communication, edited by Tapio Varis and San Jose: 249–266. Costa Rica: Universidad par La Paz,

1986.

GAMSON, William. Talking Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.

GILBOA, Eytan. "Global Television News and Foreign Policy: Debating the CNN effect." International

Studies Perspectives vol.6 (2005): 325-341.

GOWING, Nik. "Real-time TV Coverage of Armed Conflicts and Diplomatic Crises: Does it Pressure or

Distort Foreign Policy Decisions?" The Joan Shorenstein Center on the press, Politics and Public Policy

[Working Paper] (1994): 84 pages.

GRABER, Doris. Mass Media and American Politics, 6th

edition. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2002.

HAMILTON, James. "The (Many) Markets For International News." Journalism Studies vol.11, no.5

(2010): 650-666.

HAWKINS, Virgil. "Media selectivity and the other side of the CNN effect: the consequences of not

paying attention to conflict." Media, War & Conflict vol.55, no.4 (2011): 55-68.

HOLSTI, Ole. Public opinion and American Foreign Policy. Ann Harbor: University of Michigan Press,

1996.

JERIT, Jennifer; BARABAS, Jason; and BOLSEN, Toby. "Citizens, Knowledge, and the Information

Environment." American Journal of Political Science vol.50, no.2 (2006): 266-282.


1390000498

16

JONES, Steve. "Television news: geographic and sources biases." International Journal of

Communication vol.2 (2008): 223-252.

LIVINGSTON, Steven. "Media Coverage of the War: An Empirical Assessment." In Kosovo and the

challenge of Humanitarian Intervention: Selective Indignation, Collective Action, and International

Citizenship, edited by A. Schnabel and R. Thakur: 291-318. Tokyo: United Nations University Press,

2000.

MERMIN, Jonathan. "Television News and American Intervention in Somalia: The Myth of a Media-

Driven Foreign Policy", Political Science Quarterly vol.112, no.3 (1997): 385-403.

MONDAK, Jeffrey. Nothing to read: Newspapers and Election in a Social Experiment. Ann Arbor:

University of Michigan Press, 1995.

NORRIS, Pippa. "The Restless Searchlight: Network News Framing of Post-Cold War World." Political

Communication vol.12, no.4 (1995): 357-370.

PAGE, Benjamin; SHAPIRO, Robert; and DEMPSEY, Glenn. "What Moves Public Opinion?" In American

Political Science Review vol.81, no.1 (1987): 23-44.

POWLICK, Philip and KATZ, Andrew. "Defining the American Public Opinion/Foreign Policy Nexus."

Mershon International Studies Review vol.42, no.1 (1998): 29-61.

PRIOR, Markus. "Any Good News in Soft News? The Impact of Soft News Preference on Political

Knowledge." Political Communication vol.20 (2003): 149-171.

ROBINSON, Piers. The CNN Effect: The Myth of News, Foreign Policy and Intervention. London & New

York: Routledge, 2002.

SEIB, Philip. The Global Journalist: News and Conscience in a World of Conflict. Lanham, MD: Rowman

& Littlefield, 2002.

SHANOR, Donald. News from Abroad. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003.

SHOEMAKER, Pamela; DANIELIAN, Lucig; and BRENDLINGER, Nancy. "Deviant Acts, Risky Business,

and U.S. interests: The Newsworthiness of World Events." Journalism Quarterly vol.68, no.4 (1991):

781-795.

SPENCER, Graham. The Media and Peace. Chippenham: Palgrave, 2005.

WILKE, Jürgen; HEIMPRECHT, Christine; and COHEN, Akiba. "The Geography of Foreign News on

Television: A Comparative Study of 17 countries." International Communication Gazette vol.74, no.4

(2012): 301-322.

WU, Haoming. "Investigating the Determinants of International News Flow: A Meta-

Analysis." International Communication Gazette vol.60 (1998): 493-512.

ZALLER, John.

"The Converse-McGuire Model of Attitude Change and the Gulf War Opinion Rally." Political

Communication vol.10, no.4 (1993): 369-388.

The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.

Public Knowledge, Media and Foreign Policy-Making

Documents

Transcript of Public Knowledge, Media and Foreign Policy-Making