Media type and framing of the Sino–US Trade War

Abstract

This chapter investigates how online portals of news organisations in China, including party and nonparty news outlets, frame the Sino–US Trade War which broke out in March 2018. While existing studies have identified significant differences in news reporting across Chinese news organisations which vary in terms of political affiliation, i.e., party vs. nonparty, few specifically explain how their online outlets frame international conflicts involving national interests. To answer this under-explored question, the author conducted a quantitative content analysis of 240 sampled news items from the online outlets of two party news organisations, i.e., Xinhua Net and People’s Daily, and two nonparty ones, including The Paper and Global Times. Findings from the project are expected to further people’s understanding of how media type of news organisations interacts with the framing of international conflicts.