De kriminaliserade Andra : En diskursanalys av ”utsatta områden” och konstruktionen av en kollektiv identitet

Sammanfattning: The present Bachelor thesis examines the medial representations of ”vulnerable areas” (Swedish:”utsatta områden”) and the people living in those areas. In order to achieve my purpose a qualitative discourse analysis is conducted by applying Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe's discourse theory. A total of 14 debate articles and editorial pages published in the two Swedish newspapers Aftonbladet and Expressen are analyzed. Three prominent discourses are identified in the analysis: a criminalization discourse, an ethnification discourse and a poverty discourse. The first two are found to be most prominent in the empirical material. The result shows that the construction of the collective identity of people living in ”vulnerable areas” substantially is fixated around ethnicity and criminality. This is believed to have an impact on the public debate about interventions in these areas.