Framing Inequality : News Media, Public Opinion, and the Neoliberal Turn in U.S. Public Policy

This book examines how major news media have influenced the politics of economic inequality by shaping U.S. public opinion toward key policies since the early 1980s. The book describes the substance and ideological texture of news coverage during economic and social welfare policy debates across the neoliberal era. It also compares this news content to patterns of official and nongovernmental discourse. The book argues that the media’s structural position as a corporately organized and commercially driven institution helps to explain politically significant discrepancies between news coverage and broader policy discussions. The book also shows how framing patterns in the news produced through these political-economic processes may influence concrete policy attitudes. Its experimental analysis demonstrates that news coverage can shape public opinion to favor neoliberal policies, including among key segments of the American public that otherwise would not express support. The book contends that structural and institutional shifts which mark the rise of neoliberalism as a governing framework for media policy and practices have reinforced patterns of superficial and narrow news content during policy debates. Ultimately, the book argues that media coverage has fostered political climates conducive to neoliberal domestic policies at important historical moments. It suggests that changing media technologies have done little to arrest these trends in corporate news media, and that significant shifts in public policy coverage would require changes in media policy. Neoliberal policy approaches have swept over the American political economy in recent decades. In Framing Inequality, Matt Guardino focuses on the power of corporate news media in shaping how the public understands the pivotal policy debates of this period. Drawing on a wide range of empirical evidence from the dawn of the Reagan era into the Trump administration, he explains how profit pressures and commercial imperatives in the media have narrowed and trivialized news coverage and influenced public attitudes in the process. Guardino highlights how the political-economic structure of mainstream media operates to magnify some political messages and to mute or shut out others. He contends that news framing of policies that contribute to economic inequality has been unequal, and that this has undermined Americans' opportunities to express their views on an equal basis. Framing Inequality is a unique study that offers critical understanding of not only how neoliberalism succeeded as a political project, but also how Americans might begin to build a more democratic and egalitarian media system. Neoliberal policy approaches have swept over the American political economy in recent decades. In Framing Inequality, Matt Guardino focuses on the power of corporate news media in shaping how the public understands the pivotal policy debates of this period. Drawing on a wide range of empirical evidence from the dawn of the Reagan era into the Trump administration, he explains how profit pressures and commercial imperatives in the media have narrowed and trivialized news coverage and influenced public attitudes in the process. Guardino highlights how the political-economic structure of mainstream media operates to magnify some political messages and to mute or shut out others. He contends that news framing of policies that contribute to economic inequality has0been unequal, and that this has undermined Americans' opportunities to express their views on an equal basis. Framing Inequality is a unique study that offers critical understanding of not only how neoliberalism succeeded as a political project, but also how Americans might begin to build a more democratic and egalitarian media system Cover Series Framing Inequality Copyright Dedication Contents Acknowledgments 1. Introduction 2. Toward a Critical Understanding of News Media, Public Opinion, and the Politics of Economic Inequality 3. “Gipper Sweeps Congress”: Commercial News Media and the Launch of the Reagan Revolution 4. “No One Wants to Change the System as Much as Those Who Are Trapped by the System”: Commercial News Media and the End of Welfare as We Knew It 5. Framing Inequality at the Ground Level: An Experiment 6. What’s New? Media, Public Opinion, and Democracy in the 21st Century 7. Looking Backward, Looking Forward: Media, Power, and Inequality Appendix A: Content Analysis Information for Chapters 3–​6 Appendix B1: Study Design Information for Chapter 5 Appendix B2: Supplementary Analyses for Chapter 5 Notes References Index Пустая страница This text examines how major news media have influenced the politics of economic inequality by shaping U.S. public opinion toward key policies since the early 1980s. The author describes the substance and ideological texture of news coverage during economic and social welfare policy debates across the neoliberal era. It also compares this news content to patterns of official and nongovernmental discourse This book argues that political-economic features of the U.S. commercial media system have generated news coverage that favors neoliberal viewpoints during pivotal domestic policy debates since the early 1980s. It also demonstrates that this coverage can shape public opinion to support policies that exacerbate economic and political inequality.