Mapping Emergence: Network Analysis of Climate Change Media Coverage

Abstract

Abstract: Network analysis is an established methodology in many disciplines. Attention to both the roles of actors and network structure has contributed to our understanding of mechanisms that are neither internal nor external to actors, but depend on the interactions among them. Media portrayals of climate change have been investigated by a number of researchers but most of this work has either used content analysis to delineate trends in coverage, or discourse analysis to explore particular aspects of representation. Complex issues such as climate change present a challenge to both strategies because they consist of multiple story lines and emerge from the interactions of many actors. This paper presents an experimental network analysis of Canadian media coverage of climate change between 1997 and 2006. The technique successfully provided a systematic view of the roles of key actors in several distinct storylines, and created compelling visualizations of the emergent nature of climate discourse. The primary limitations of network analysis in this case resulted from its ambiguous stance on agency and from practical coding decisions, both of which suggest the utility of further exploration.