Media discourse in China and Japan on the COVID-19 pandemic: comparative analysis of the first three months
Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society
ISSN: 1477-996X
Article publication date: 10 January 2022
Issue publication date: 18 April 2022
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to analyze how English-language versions of e-newspapers in the first two countries affected, China and Japan, which are non-English-speaking countries and have different socio-economic and political settings, have highlighted Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic news and informed the global community.
Design/methodology/approach
A text-mining approach was used to explore experts’ thoughts as published by the two leading English-language newspapers in China and Japan from January to March 2020. This study analyzes the Opinion section, which mainly comprises editorial and the op-ed section. The current study groups all editorial discussions and highlights into ten major aspects, which cover health, economy, politics, culture and others.
Findings
Within the first three months, the media in both China and Japan shifted their focus from health and preparedness to the economy, politics and social welfare. Governance and social welfare were key concerns in China’s news media, while, in contrast, global politics received the highest level of attention from experts in Japan’s news media. Environment and technologies aspects did not receive much attention by the expert’s columns.
Originality/value
At the initial stage of a world crisis, how leading nations and initially affected nations deal with the problem, how media play their role and guide mass population with experts’ thoughts are highlighted here. The understanding developed in this study can provide guidance to news media in other countries in playing effective roles in the management of this health crisis and catastrophes.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Author contribution statement.
Gulsan Ara Parvin: Conceptualization, methodology, data collection and analysis, methodology, writing original draft, writing review and editing, visualization and project administration.
Md. Habibur Rahman: Conceptualization, methodology, data collection and analysis, writing original draft and visualization.
Reazul Ahsan: Methodology, writing review and editing and visualization.
Md. Anwarul Abedin: Methodology, data curation, formal analysis, writing review and editing and visualization.
Mrittika Basu: Reviewing and editing.
Citation
Parvin, G.A., Rahman, M.H., Ahsan, S.M.R., Abedin, M.A. and Basu, M. (2022), "Media discourse in China and Japan on the COVID-19 pandemic: comparative analysis of the first three months", Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society, Vol. 20 No. 2, pp. 308-328. https://doi.org/10.1108/JICES-05-2021-0047
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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