The Syrian crisis in U.S. and Lebanese newspapers: A cross-national analysis

Abstract

Building on scholarship on media systems, framing, bias, sourcing, and war journalism, this comparative content analysis explores how elite newspapers in the United States and Lebanon covered the international reaction to Syria's use of chemical weapons against its own citizens in August 2013. The analysis addresses the overlap between media and politics from a dual perspective: how news media in different countries frame international political crises and how the underlying political and media systems lead to similarities and variations. The comparison found that Lebanese newspapers dedicated four times as many stories to the crisis, but coverage in both countries relied heavily on officials and the conflict frame. When present, bias in Lebanese newspapers aligned with the partisan ownership of the news outlets, but their reportage was more thematic than U.S. coverage.