Mass Mediated Representations of Crime and Criminality

Julie B. Wiest, Julie B. Wiest

• Publisher: Emerald Publishing Limited
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781800437609
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Communication Studies
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Sponsored by the Communication, Information Technologies, and Media Sociology section of the American Sociological Association (CITAMS), this volume of Studies in Media and Communications features social science research that examines the practices, patterns, and messages related to representations of crime in mass media around the world. Chapters focus on a wide range of fact-based and fictional accounts of criminality as depicted in print and broadcast news, documentary and video-on-demand films, and television programs.
Stories about crime and criminality have long been the mainstay of news and entertainment media content, and the intersection of crime and media is a common topic in scholarly research. Moreover, substantial evidence indicates that these media depictions are highly influential as people in economically advanced societies - who tend to have little personal experience with crime-form perceptions about criminality, crime rates, characteristics of criminals, and even their own likelihood of victimization. Thus, ongoing examination of crime images within various types of mass media aids in understanding the associated messages and meanings that are disseminated to consumers. This volume will enhance the knowledge of junior and senior scholars in criminology, sociology, journalism, and communication/media studies, particularly because of its inclusion of crime stories in a variety of formats and that represent media content from nations spanning five continents.

PART I

REPRESENTATIONS IN NONFICTION

CHAPTER 1

CRIME NEWS IN THE ISRAELI DAILY PRESS: A COMPARISON BETWEEN THE QUALITY HAARETZ AND THE POPULAR ISRAEL HAYOM

Alina Korn

ABSTRACT

Purpose: This study is concerned with media representation of crime in the Israeli press. It examines the pattern of offenses reported in two daily newspapers of seemingly different characteristics, the “elitist” Haaretz and the “popular” Israel Hayom.

Methodology/approach: Crime reports appeared in the news pages during November 2016 were content analyzed in both newspapers by using a coding scheme, which operationalized several variables relating to type of crime, characteristics of offenders and victims, and court proceedings.

Findings: Violent and sex offenses featured disproportionately in the news reports in both newspapers, while conventional property offenses were under-reported relative to their prevalence in official crime statistics. In terms of the characteristics of offenders and victims, the vast majority of offenders portrayed in crime stories were adult Jewish males. Women were more likely to appear as victims of crime rather than perpetrators, and more likely to appear as victims of sex offenses rather than other offenses.

Research limitations: This study was based on an analysis of crime stories which appeared in two newspapers during one-month period of time. Future research should extend the sample size and collect data from a longer period of time and from additional media outlets.

Originality/value: Media coverage of crime stories has not yet been researched in Israel. Beyond the interest in the Israeli case or the potential contribution to comparative global knowledge, the value of the study may lie in expanding the lens of scholarship of media’s construction of crime.

Keywords: Crime construction; crime news; Haaretz; Israel Hayom; Israeli press; media coverage

Numerous studies have shown that crime reports are an important part of the content of all mass media (Chermak & Chapman, 2007; Garofalo, 1981; Greer & Reiner, 2012; McGregor, 2017; O’Hear, 2020; Sacco, 1995; Surette, 1998). Some researchers have used systematic sampling and measurement of the news space devoted to crime in order to describe the general patterns and changes in the amount and types of crimes reported. In some cases, this has included a comparison of different types of media, markets, or periods. Other studies have used official criminal statistics to compare crime representations with crime in “reality.” The current study examines crime reporting in November 2016 in two major daily newspapers in Israel: the popular Israel Hayom and the elitist Haaretz. Despite the proliferation of studies on the presentation of crime stories in the media, the nexus of media and crime has not yet been researched in Israel. This pilot study is intended to compare the “tabloid” with the “quality” newspaper, and to examine the differences between the two newspapers in the scope of reports and in the types of offenses reported. Beyond the interest in the Israeli case, the current study aims to contribute to the body of research that explores the ways in which crime is featured within the news media, adding more generally to the theoretical and empirical discussions on the role of crime in the construction of the social world.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Media Construction of Crime

The news media play a powerful role in the social construction of crime. They provide an important forum, in which private troubles are selectively gathered up, invested with a broader meaning, and made available for public consumption (Sacco, 1995). According to Surette and Otto (2001), media attention provides the “heat energy” needed to raise behaviors to criminalization levels. The media are so crucial that behaviors cannot be criminalized at all without media attention (Surette & Otto, 2001).

Analyses of media content demonstrate that crime news follows different patterns to both the “reality” of crime and its representation in official crime statistics (Jewkes, 2011). Media professionals report on a selected portion of criminal incidents and turn them into stories. However, events are not simply reported on, since they are fundamentally transformed by the news-gathering process and framed in larger systems of meaning (Sacco, 1995). By framing events and by making certain aspects of stories more salient than others, media outlets construct reality (M. J. Carter, 2013). According to Entman (1993), frames are understood as those media images that focus on some aspects of reality, elevating the importance of that reality. Frames work symbolically to meaningfully structure the social world (M. J. Carter, 2013).

In a process that is far from random or personal, editors and journalists select, produce, and present news according to a variety of professional criteria that are used as benchmarks to determine a story’s newsworthiness (Jewkes, 2011). Journalists rely on news perceptions to help them decide which stories to choose (Johnstone, Hawkins, & Michener, 1994). Moreover, because newspapers strive to increase their profits and their readership, selection decisions are influenced by a combination of market forces and social and cultural dynamics (Beckett & Sasson, 2004; Petersen, 2016).

Most people rely on the mass media as a primary source of information about crime and its control (Colburn & Melander, 2018), and much of what the general public believes to be true about the prevalence of crime and the operation of the criminal justice system is potentially collected from information presented through the mass media (Chermak & Chapman, 2007). Constructionist scholars have clearly demonstrated that some criminal events are more newsworthy than others (Lin & Phillips, 2014). Violent crime is over-represented in the news; the characteristics of criminals and victims in the news do not represent their demographic distribution in criminal statistics; and in respect to many “crime waves” reported in the media, the perception that crime is on the rise is not consistent with a real rise in crime (Chermak & Chapman, 2007; Fishman, 1978; Sacco, 1995).

These constructions have far-reaching implications regarding the public perception of the crime problem and how to deal with it. Distorted public perceptions of crime and criminal-justice realities and pervasive coverage of unusual violent or outrageous crimes can give rise to excessive fear and lead to the adoption or maintenance of harshly punitive policies (Chermak & Chapman, 2007; O’Hear, 2020).

Most of the research on the Israeli media published in scholarly journals focuses on the coverage of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict especially during periods of crisis such as the Gaza war and the Palestinian uprisings in the Occupies Territories. Studies have explored various aspects of the coverage of the political violence of Israeli and Palestinians, analyzing biases in the framing of the conflict, the reporting on casualties or the portrayal of male and female terrorists (Dor, 2003; Korn, 2005; Lavie-Dinur, Yarchi, & Karniel, 2019; Liebes & Kampf, 2009; Rinnawi, 2007; Viser, 2003; Wolfsfeld, Frosh, & Awabdy, 2008). Some researchers compared different news outlets within Israeli media (Arqoub & Ozad, 2019; Dor, 2003; Korn, 2004; Lavie-Dinur et al., 2019; Liebes & Kampf, 2009; Rinnawi, 2007; Sela-Shayovitz, 2007; Tenenboim-Weinblatt, Hanitzsch, & Nagar, 2016), while others compared the coverage in the Israeli media with newspapers and news networks in the United States, Canada and Europe or with the Palestinian media (Karniel, Lavie-Dinur, & Samuel-Azran, 2017; Lowenstein-Barkai, 2018; Samuel-Azran, Lavie-Dinur, & Karniel, 2015; Shinar, 2009; Viser, 2003; Wolfsfeld et al., 2008).

The representation of violence and “conventional” crime in the Israeli media has not been investigated at all. The present study seeks to fill the gap in this area and examine how a quality newspaper and a popular newspaper cover “common” crime and what are the journalistic considerations that guide decision-making regarding crime news.

Beyond the interest in the Israeli case or the potential contribution to comparative global knowledge, the study seeks to contribute to the scholarship on the construction of crime news. The social construction of the “reality” of crime is important, because the media play an important role in shaping the public’s perceptions about prevalence of crime and the nature of offenders and victims. Crime stories selected for publication may also provide support for stereotypical images of innocence and guilt regarding to minorities (Colburn & Melander, 2018) and may fuel negative attitudes and encourage harmful images and practices regarding disadvantaged and minority groups (O’Hear, 2020).

An examination of the Israeli case in this context might be interesting in light of the problematic status of the Arab minority in Israel, which suffers from exclusion and marginalization in many respects (Lustick, 1980; Rouhana, 1997; Yiftachel, 2006). The present study could contribute to the debate in the research literature regarding ethnic and racial representation in crime stories, reflecting on whether members of minority groups are over-represented as perpetrators and under-represented as victims of violent crime. These issues will be discussed in more detail below. The next section will present an overview of the studies analyzing the factors that explain the prominence of crime stories in the news.

Amount of Crime News

News reports on crime figure prominently in all types of media, but there are significant differences between print and broadcast media, and between elite and popular media. Estimates of the scope of crime news vary widely, depending on methodology and definitions of “crime” used, narrow or broad. Some researchers have adopted a broad definition of deviance, referring to a variety of behaviors that deviate from the norm, while others have focused on the narrower sense of violations of criminal law. Some of the studies consider political violence and acts of terrorism in various parts of the world as crime news, while others perceive such reports as “foreign” or “international” news; some examine only reports on specific criminal incidents, while others include editorials, features, opinion columns, and reports and articles on ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Part I. Representations in Nonfiction
• Part II. Representations in Fiction
• Index