(Re)constructing the Pipeline

Workers, Environmentalists and Ideology in Media Coverage of the Keystone XL Pipeline

Datos Bibliográficos

ID7737437
AutoresE Kojola (0000-0001-6229-1817, University of Minnesota, autor de correspondencia)
Año2017
Volumen43
Número6
Páginas893-917
Fecha de publicación2017-09-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaCritical Sociology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0896-9205 • E-ISSN: 1569-1632
EditorialSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0896920515598564
OpenAlexW2529993274
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas12
Referencias citadas85

Environmental protection is presumed to damper economic growth and media accounts of resource extraction often portray trade-offs between jobs and the environment. However, there is limited evidence that environmental protection universally costs jobs and heavily polluting industries provide few jobs in comparison to environmental impacts. Therefore, how has media discourse contributed to the taken-for-granted division between the economy and the environment? This paper uses the Keystone XL pipeline controversy as a case of the symbolical conflict between supporters of growth and conservation to explore the role of ideology and power in media discourse. I use frame analysis of newspaper articles to explore the representations of labor and the environment and how hegemonic ideology legitimizes resource extraction. My analysis reveals binary framing that constructed the pipeline as a political controversy over the trade-off between the environment and the economy, which made conflict between workers and environmentalists sensible, and silenced alternatives

Critical discourse analysis · Economics · Hegemony · Ideology · Media studies · Newspaper · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Climate Change Communication and Perception · Engineering · Environmental Education and Sustainability · Law · Social Acceptance of Renewable Energy