IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/envirc/v31y2013i4p716-740.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sustainability-Related Media Coverage and Socioeconomic Development: A Regional and North–South Perspective

Author

Listed:
  • Ralf Barkemeyer

    (Sustainability Research Institute, School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT, England)

  • Frank Figge

    (Kedge Business School, Domaine de Luminy—BP 921, 13 288 Marseille cedex 9, France)

  • Diane Holt

    (Queen's University Management School, 25 University Square, Belfast BT7 1NN, Northern Ireland)

Abstract

With this paper we discuss the differences between sustainability-related media agendas across different countries and regions. Utilising a sample of 115 leading national newspapers covering forty-one countries, we show that typically no homogeneous global trends exist with regard to sustainability-related media agendas. Instead, significant differences exist regarding the national-level prioritisations of sustainability-related issues in the countries under review. To some extent, these observed differences can be attributed to different levels of socioeconomic development as measured by Human Development Index scores and gross domestic product per capita. Here, generic differences can be identified between newspapers from the Global North and South, with a range of issues such as climate change emerging as typically Northern issues, whereas issues such as corruption and poverty show significantly higher levels of coverage across newspapers from the Global South. We conclude with a discussion of the results in the context of global environmental governance.

Suggested Citation

  • Ralf Barkemeyer & Frank Figge & Diane Holt, 2013. "Sustainability-Related Media Coverage and Socioeconomic Development: A Regional and North–South Perspective," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 31(4), pages 716-740, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:31:y:2013:i:4:p:716-740
    DOI: 10.1068/c11176j
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1068/c11176j
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1068/c11176j?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jędrzej G. Frynas, 2008. "Corporate Social Responsibility and International Development: Critical Assessment," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(4), pages 274-281, July.
    2. Deepak Lal, 2003. "Asia And Western Dominance," Journal of the Asia Pacific Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(3), pages 283-299.
    3. Robinson, John, 2004. "Squaring the circle? Some thoughts on the idea of sustainable development," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 369-384, April.
    4. World Commission on Environment and Development,, 1987. "Our Common Future," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780192820808.
    5. Morfit, N. Simon, 2011. ""AIDS is Money": How Donor Preferences Reconfigure Local Realities," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 64-76, January.
    6. Moon, Jeremy & Crane, Andrew & Matten, Dirk, 2005. "Can Corporations be Citizens? Corporate Citizenship as a Metaphor for Business Participation in Society," Business Ethics Quarterly, Cambridge University Press, vol. 15(3), pages 429-453, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Cotton, Matthew & Barkemeyer, Ralf & Renzi, Barbara Gabriella & Napolitano, Giulio, 2019. "Fracking and metaphor: Analysing newspaper discourse in the USA, Australia and the United Kingdom," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 1-1.
    2. Cecilia Elizabeth Bayas Aldaz & Jesus Rodriguez-Pomeda & Leyla Angélica Sandoval Hamón & Fernando Casani, 2020. "Understanding the University-Sustainability Link through Media: A Spanish Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(12), pages 1-15, June.
    3. Barkemeyer, Ralf & Faugère, Christophe & Gergaud, Olivier & Preuss, Lutz, 2020. "Media attention to large-scale corporate scandals: Hype and boredom in the age of social media," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 385-398.
    4. Padmaja Argade & Fanny Salignac & Ralf Barkemeyer, 2021. "Opportunity identification for sustainable entrepreneurship: Exploring the interplay of individual and context level factors in India," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(8), pages 3528-3551, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Millar, Neal & McLaughlin, Eoin & Börger, Tobias, 2019. "The Circular Economy: Swings and Roundabouts?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 11-19.
    2. John Holmberg & Johan Larsson, 2018. "A Sustainability Lighthouse—Supporting Transition Leadership and Conversations on Desirable Futures," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(11), pages 1-25, October.
    3. Mähönen Jukka, 2020. "Integrated Reporting and Sustainable Corporate Governance from European Perspective," Accounting, Economics, and Law: A Convivium, De Gruyter, vol. 10(2), pages 1-40, July.
    4. Anderson, Mark W. & Teisl, Mario & Noblet, Caroline, 2012. "Giving voice to the future in sustainability: Retrospective assessment to learn prospective stakeholder engagement," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 1-6.
    5. Gabriel Jobidon & Pierre Lemieux & Robert Beauregard, 2019. "Comparison of Quebec’s Project Delivery Methods: Relational Contract Law and Differences in Contractual Language," Laws, MDPI, vol. 8(2), pages 1-75, April.
    6. Caniato, Federico & Caridi, Maria & Crippa, Luca & Moretto, Antonella, 2012. "Environmental sustainability in fashion supply chains: An exploratory case based research," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(2), pages 659-670.
    7. Lauri Lidstone & Tarah Wright & Kate Sherren, 2015. "An analysis of Canadian STARS-rated higher education sustainability policies," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 259-278, April.
    8. Alex Aylett, 2010. "Participatory Planning, Justice, and Climate Change in Durban, South Africa," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 42(1), pages 99-115, January.
    9. Lejano, Raul P. & Newbery, Nicola & Ciolino, Maegan & Newbery, David, 2019. "Sustainability and incommensurability: Narrative policy analysis with application to urban ecology," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 1-1.
    10. Siarhei Manzhynski & Frank Figge, 2020. "Coopetition for sustainability: Between organizational benefit and societal good," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(3), pages 827-837, March.
    11. Emmanuel Kumi & Albert Arhin & Thomas Yeboah, 2014. "Can post-2015 sustainable development goals survive neoliberalism? A critical examination of the sustainable development–neoliberalism nexus in developing countries," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 16(3), pages 539-554, June.
    12. Itziar Castelló & Michael Etter & Finn Årup Nielsen, 2016. "Strategies of Legitimacy Through Social Media: The Networked Strategy," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(3), pages 402-432, May.
    13. Gengyuan Liu & Mark T. Brown & Marco Casazza, 2017. "Enhancing the Sustainability Narrative through a Deeper Understanding of Sustainable Development Indicators," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(6), pages 1-19, June.
    14. Ioanna Boulouta & Christos Pitelis, 2014. "Who Needs CSR? The Impact of Corporate Social Responsibility on National Competitiveness," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 119(3), pages 349-364, February.
    15. Brennan Lowery & John Dagevos & Ratana Chuenpagdee & Kelly Vodden, 2020. "Storytelling for sustainable development in rural communities: An alternative approach," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(6), pages 1813-1826, November.
    16. Shaminder Takhar, 2015. "Sustainability, human rights, and sexuality: Making the right connections," Local Economy, London South Bank University, vol. 30(3), pages 256-264, May.
    17. Samuel Howard Quartey, 2019. "Geographies of Knowledge and Sustainable Development: Towards a Conceptual Model with Research Propositions," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 10(2), pages 878-897, June.
    18. Tung Manh Ho & Hong Kong Nguyen-To & Thu-Trang Vuong & Quan-Hoang Vuong, 2017. "Social Network Sustainability Metrics: A Study of Co-authoring Behaviors in the Social Sciences, Using 2008-2017 Scopus Data for Vietnam," Working Papers CEB 17-027, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    19. Tung Manh Ho & Hong Kong T. Nguyen & Thu-Trang Vuong & Quan-Hoang Vuong, 2017. "On the Sustainability of Co-Authoring Behaviors in Vietnamese Social Sciences: A Preliminary Analysis of Network Data," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(11), pages 1-21, November.
    20. Ciliberti, Francesco & Pontrandolfo, Pierpaolo & Scozzi, Barbara, 2008. "Logistics social responsibility: Standard adoption and practices in Italian companies," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(1), pages 88-106, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:31:y:2013:i:4:p:716-740. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.