Journalists portray developing countries as helpless victims of climate change

A new paper by Hugh Doulton and Katrina Brown at UEA analyses how the media represent climate change and international development The analysis of UK 'quality press' finds that, for most part, newspapers promulgate views of developing countries as hapless victims of climate change which will inevitably be a catastrophe for development. 'Crisis' discourses dominated coverage in the Guardian and Independent. Until 2006-7 storylines that saw opportunities for poor countries with climate change were visible but these are now replaced. Overall, very few news articles actually cover climate change as an international development issue Doulton, H., and Brown, K., 2009 'Ten years to prevent catastrophe'? Discourses of climate change and international development in the UK press' Global Environmental Change 19, pp. 191-202 DOI: 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2008.10.004