The invisibility of social movements in international press coverage of the Catalan sovereignty process

Abstract

We describe partial results from a study on the construction of the international image of the political process in Catalonia in recent years in the main European and the US newspapers. In particular, using several analytical techniques we determine the presence of civil society organisations for and against independence in press articles between July 2010 (the first mass demonstration, in this case against a Spanish Constitutional Court ruling on the Catalan Statute of Autonomy) and October 2017 (the self-determination referendum). To detect the dominant frame, a framing analysis was undertaken from a communicative and deductive perspective, applying the widely tested and used Semetko and Valkenburg (2000) classification. The international press has generally depicted the Catalan sovereignty process as a conflict involving institutions and politicians, despite the fact that the Catalan process has always been claimed as an initiative with social and cultural roots. The research concludes that, although social movements and civil society played a significant role in the emergence of the sovereignty movement, these have been rendered largely invisible by the international press.