Book part:

TV-Nachrichtenberichterstattung über Migranten - Von der Politik zum Terror / TV-Coverage about Immigrants - From Politics to Terror

The objective of this study is to examine the selective structures and contexts of journalists and recipients for TV news about immigrants especially focusing on the changed political situation after September 11th 2001. Studies about immigrants’ representation in German media have yielded similar results: relations between immigrants and crime are likely in news coverage as well as in news reception. Well-established and integrated immigrants are mostly presented as single-case individuals only serving as a subcategory to the larger category “immigrants”. News coverage about immigrants increases with news-factors like controversy, aggression, harm and demonstration. Immigrants are treated by the press as “objects” without any influence, taking no active part in political communication. Sensations as well as emotions usually dominate reports about immigrants. This study aims to scrutinize these findings in a new sample and time period. Considering recent global events such as terrorist’s attacks, we expect to find changing thematic backgrounds but similar patterns of news coverage in general. Events like September 11th 2001 or the recent bombardments in Madrid in 2004 and London in 2005 can be understood as key events that dramatically affect media coverage. Norris, Kern and Just (2003) postulate a new frame of news reporting – the so-called “war on terrorism frame”. They prove that the relevance of terrorism has increased drastically in American society. The danger of terrorist attacks is highly overestimated especially as it has actually decreased during the last 10 years. Looking at German news coverage this change is evident as well. Terrorism has become a major topic in news coverage about immigrants. Spectacular trials like against the Moroccan students Motassadeq and Mzoudi, who were supposed to have participated in the preparation of the September 11th attacks, or prohibitions of Islamic organizations mainly determine the current image of foreigners in Germany. Data from content analyses clearly correspond to the expectations. More than 35% of all TV news dealing with immigrants is about terrorism, which is the most frequent topic category. Most of these cases address Islamic fundamentalism or terrorist activities in describing trials or crackdowns and reporting on police investigations against presumable terrorists. Nationalities mentioned most often on TV are Moroccans and Turks. Such results indicate that the “war on terrorism frame” postulated by Norris/Kern/Just (2003) can also be found in German media. Therefore this research approach attempts to compare this coverage with data from former studies showing that the topic structure as well as selection criteria have changed during the last years. News about immigrants in Germany in 2003 is characterized by news factors like personalization, aggression and visualization drawing high attention from journalists. Concerning the special field of coverage about immigrants and terrorism we find four different clusters of news reports: “visualized terror in court”, “blighted terror and danger of terrorism”, “convictions in terror trials” and “anonymous Islamists in court” which strongly differ in the distribution of news factors. Interestingly, it seems that even events without any aggression or harm are potentially connected to the danger of terrorism and reported within this content frame. These findings seem problematic for the public image of immigrants and eventually for their integration within the German society.