Social Movements and Peace Journalism: News Framing of Gezi Park Protests in Turkey

The immediate aim of this research is to develop a novel Peace Journalism Model associated with the representations of social movements in the Turkish press. Newspapers addressing the case of the Gezi Park protests serve as the main focal point of the study. 14 daily newspapers from the Turkish press were examined with respect to their coverage of the Gezi Park protests from 28 May 2013 to 30 June 2013. The analysis centered on front pages and the publications of newspaper columnists. By examining the front pages and columnist publications, a quantitative framing analysis was conducted to illuminate the areas of headline formation, dominant frames, and official or unofficial sources usage. Regarding the front pages data were derived from an initial sample of 41 daily newspapers from the Turkish press. Regarding the columnist publications, 222 articles dating from 28 May 2013 to 7 June 2013 were obtained from the 5 most circulated Turkish newspapers and evaluated independently. Also, same 5 newspapers dating from 28 May 2013 to 30 June 2013 were been used for physical content analysis of photographs. The results indicate that the dominant frames used in the 14 newspapers when covering the Gezi Park protests were conflict and information frames; the preferred form was quotation form; and official sources were most the most prevalent source type in front page news stories and column articles. An interpretation of these results in terms of Peace Journalism, Gatekeeping Theory, and Framing Theory suggests that the coverage of peace-oriented news pertaining to social movements in the Turkish news media is insufficient. Keywords: Peace Journalism, Social Movements, News Framing, Gezi Park protests