Triadic Relationship Between Social Movement,News Media, and Geopolitics : Government affiliated transnational media and its’ coverage of 2020-2021 Belarusian Protests

Sammanfattning: As the media followed the turn of events in Belarus, increasing arrests and the violence that followed brought tens of thousands of Belarusians into the streets to demand change, end police brutality, and display how far human rights abuses have come in Lukashenko's regime. This thesis argues that in the cases like this, foreign media comes forward to either further protester's voices or shut them down, which, drawing on the previous research, is considered dependent on the geopolitical relations of the countries involved. Departing from the normative knowledge that media, politics, and protests are interrelated, this thesis bridges theories of all three of the latter fields to craft an interdisciplinary theoretical framework for the research. Building on political and media opportunity structures and indexing theories, this thesis addresses questions of how independent from authorities is the media and how a geopolitical position might influence the coverage of the conflict. The framing analysis of LRT English, Deutsche Welle, RT, and Daily Sabah coverage during the 22 weeks is conducted to identify the coverage's patterns, developments, and changes in the coverage. The results have shown that the amount of coverage is related to the authorities position announcement. Democratic and protest supportive countries cover the protest extensively even before the authorities react; meanwhile, less democratic countries show that the coverage significantly increases as soon as the government reaction is publicised. Furthermore, the framing of the protesters differs as well. On the one hand, protesters and violence are depicted differently, on the other, frames employed in opposition supportive countries' media outlets are more diverse and explorative than in the media of Lukashenko's allies.