Online news framing of police and protesters in Europe: Press treatment of street demonstrations in London, Athens and Barcelona (2020–21)

Abstract

This study investigates the online news framing of police and protesters in Europe by looking at three late 2020/early 2021 protests: the vigil for Sarah Everard, killed by a police officer, the 47th Athens Polytechnic uprising anniversary rally and the protests against the imprisonment of Catalan rapper Pablo Hasél. A qualitative content analysis was conducted to analyse a sample of 114 articles, gathered from six ideologically opposed news outlets in the three countries. The results indicate that police actions are predominantly located within either the ‘police brutality’ or the ‘order-maintenance’ frame depending on the political orientation of the outlet while the framing of the protesters appears to be more fragmented. Results also suggest that it would be inaccurate to claim that only the right-wing press insulates the police. Overall, this study found media framing to be dependent on the perceived level of deviance of the protest.