Audiences of distant suffering in authoritarian regimes

Denial mechanisms and acts of moral justification

Bibliographic Data

ID11268221
AuthorsZhe Xu (0000-0002-0186-2978, University of Cologne, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume45
Issue5
Pages985-1002
Publication date2023-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueMedia Culture & Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0163-4437 • E-ISSN: 1460-3675
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/01634437231155339
OpenAlexW4320918277
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited42

The study of the audiences of distant suffering in authoritarian regimes has received relatively little scholarly attention. This article begins to ameliorate this gap in knowledge by examining how Chinese audiences legitimise their unresponsiveness to mediated victims of global disasters. Drawing upon data from semi-structured interviews and focus groups with participants ( N = 81), the study discusses the dominant regimes of justification which inform audience inactivity, the associated argumentation strategies and patterns of reasoning, and their sociocultural and ideological underpinnings. We find that decision-making about the moral justification for inactivity is influenced by state-propaganda media narratives, preferences for ideologies, perceptions of national identity and global responsibility, and geopolitical imaginations. These findings have implications for expanding the ontological horizons of distant suffering studies that are currently embedded in Western spatial and ideological dimensions, particularly in a world of crises spawned by globalisation and mediatisation

Argumentation theory · Authoritarianism · Democracy · Denial · Epistemology · Ideology · Narrative · National identity · Political science · Politics · Psychoanalysis · Sociocultural evolution · Sociology · Disaster Management and Resilience · Global Security and Public Health · Law · Psychology · Public Relations and Crisis Communication · Social Psychology

Tools

Open DOI