Community Structure and Social Protest: Influences on Newspaper Coverage

Abstract

Research on news coverage of social protest has yielded evidence of a “protest paradigm,” a framework of common news attributes that contribute to the marginalizing of protesters as social deviants. Analysis here investigates whether adherence to the protest paradigm varies by structural characteristics of the communities in which news organizations originate. More specifically, news organizations in less pluralistic communities may exhibit lower tolerance for social conflict than news organizations in more pluralistic communities. This research compares newspaper coverage of social protest from communities with varied levels of pluralism. Results showed that newspapers in less pluralistic communities were more critical of protesters when local government was the target and were less likely to quote protesters in stories. Further, newspapers in less pluralistic communities were more critical of protesters when stories were on the front page than those appearing elsewhere in the newspaper. Implications for understanding the protest paradigm and influences of community structure on news coverage patterns were explored.