The riot, the people and the neighbourhood: how news articles frame social disorder

Abstract

This article looks at the ways newspaper articles, through their stories, frame social disorder in urban areas. The article compares reporting on four cases – two Dutch, two Belgian – of violent confrontations between societal groups and between societal groups and the police. News articles on the riots through time widen in terms of their geographic and social scale. At the same time, stories are told about a familiar cast of characters, leaving others out. The practices of newspapers seem to reinforce this pattern. The article contributes to the understanding of the role of traditional media in narrative framing of present-day public problems.