Factors influencing cross-national news treatment of a critical national event

Abstract

This study is designed to assess four factors which may account for differences in the six countries/areas' media coverage of the 1989 Chinese student demonstrations.

Four major findings emerge from the analysis: (1) political ideology played an important role in the direction, but not necessarily the extent, of the coverage of the events; (2) diplomatic sensitivity played an important role in the direction of coverage, especially for official or government media and even ameliorated differences in political ideology; (3) cultural affinity did not necessarily produce positive news coverage; and (4) geographical proximity did not affect the extent nor the direction of the coverage as much as the political ideology and diplomatic sensitivity did.