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“But it is not getting any safer!”: The Contested Dynamic of Framing Canada's Military Mission in Afghanistan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2017

Brooks DeCillia
Brooks DeCillia*
Affiliation:
London School of Economics
*
London School of Economics and Political Science, Department of Media and Communication, Houghton Street, London UK, WC2A 2AE, email: c.b.decillia@lse.ac.uk
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Abstract

The Canadian government and military struggled to control its media framing of the war in Afghanistan between 2006 and 2009. This content analysis (n = 900) critically investigates the mediated dynamic of framing Canada's military mission in Afghanistan. This study found that while journalists overwhelmingly indexed their stories to elite sources, they frequently impeached the frames sponsored by government and military leaders. Journalists used elite criteria to fact check the frames of military and government leaders. Most of the coverage was episodic and event-oriented rather than thematic and contextual. While Canadian journalists challenged official claims of improving security, for instance, their coverage lacked context and critical appraisal of Canada's military mission in Afghanistan, raising questions about journalism's normative role in Canadian democracy.

Résumé

Le gouvernement canadien et les militaires se sont efforcés de contrôler la présentation de la guerre en Afghanistan par les médias entre 2006 et 2009. Cette analyse de la couverture médiatique (n = 900) examine de façon critique la dynamique médiatisée de l’encadrement de la mission militaire du Canada en Afghanistan. Cette étude a révélé que tandis que les journalistes ont dans leur grande majorité fondé leurs reportages sur des sources d’élite, ils ont fréquemment boudé les cadres soutenus par le gouvernement et les chefs militaires. Les journalistes ont privilégié des critères d’élite pour vérifier factuellement les cadres des dirigeants militaires et gouvernementaux. La couverture était en grande partie épisodique et axée sur les événements plutôt que d’ordre thématique ou contextuel. Alors que les journalistes canadiens ont remis en question des allégations officielles concernant l’amélioration de la sécurité, par exemple, leur couverture a manqué de contexte et d’appréciation critique de la mission militaire du Canada, soulevant des interrogatifs sur le rôle normatif du journalisme dans le cadre de la démocratie canadienne.

Type
Research Article/Étude originale
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 51 , Issue 1 , March 2018 , pp. 155 - 177
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 2017 

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