Deconstruction of a taboo: press coverage of sexual violence against children in pedagogical institutions in Germany 1950–2013

Abstract

In 2010, Germany was shattered by a cluster of scandals concerning child sexual abuse in residential educational institutions. Previous attempts to broach the issue of child sexual abuse in institutions have repeatedly failed. This article investigates the historical preconditions that led to the immense awareness of child sexual abuse as raised by the media during this particular time. In order to create a holistic picture of the preconditions and awareness potential of the scandal, a database based on searching using a semantic field approach was created. The results were analyzed with respect to published discourses on child sexual abuse generally and in institutions in particular. Quantitatively, until the beginning of the 1990s, search results show a low but stable level of publication activity. This level increased strongly in the 1990s and, after a slight decrease in the new millennium, reached its peak in 2010. Qualitatively, the way violence against children in institutional settings was framed in the media coverage changed from emphasizing the motives of the perpetrator only (until the 1990s) to including more and more institutional and structural conditions that contribute to child sexual abuse.