East-West news coverage of the Georgian And Crimean conflicts

Recent conflicts in Europe’s Black Sea region have stirred geopolitical tensions among world powers and drawn extensive media coverage. This study analyzes the narratives/frames in The New York Times’ and The Moscow Times’ early coverage of the 2014 Crimean crisis and one of its principal causes, the 2008 Russia-Georgia war. Coverage of the two conflicts provides a window into how national interests can infiltrate news agencies and impact the understanding of international crises. Atop providing a geopolitical understanding of the two conflicts, this study analyzes the similarities and differences between independent news agencies and state-controlled news agencies, primarily by using framing theory. The study finds that across both conflicts, US coverage relied more on a frame of invasion, while Russian coverage relied more on a frame of protection. Both news agencies utilized a frame of renewed Cold War / East-West rivalry, but the New York Times made twice as many judgment statements and three times as many assumptions as The Moscow Times. Across both news agencies, coverage and framing of the 2014 Crimean crisis was more homogeneous and less likely to discuss opposing viewpoints than the 2008 coverage of the Russia-Georgia war. In sum, free media and state-controlled media are more alike than commonly recognized