Analysis of Volkswagen Emission Crisis in the Context of Crisis Response Strategies and Newspapers Framing

Frequently experienced crises have adverse effects on the corporations although the reasons for their occurrence and their characteristics are variable. As the corporations develop certain response strategies in connection with such crises also affecting their stakeholders in addition to them, media publicly carries the news in connection with crises. The objective of this research which has been carried out by taking as a starting element the point where crisis, corporations and media intersect, is to study the press releases by Volkswagen as part of the crisis over exhaust emission on the basis of the strategies of responses to crisis and demonstrate how the crisis is publicly covered by media in the context of crisis framing and toning. Accordingly, 116 crisis related news contained in five largest circulating newspapers in Turkey as well as 29 press releases as posted on both international and Turkey websites of the company have been analyzed. According to the results of the research, the news on the corporation have mostly been presented negatively on the basis of the sub-framework of “solutions to the problem” contained in the framework of responsibility. It has been observed that in the crisis response strategies, the crisis and responsibility thereof have been admitted by the corporation and that the sub-framework of “internalizing” contained in the strategy of providing information has been used in connection therewith. As the “global dimensions” of the crisis have been highlighted in the themes of the news; the press releases have focused on the “restructuring of the company.”