”Regeringen skyndar på åtgärder mot gängkriminaliteten - En kritisk diskursanalys om hur media framställer förebyggande åtgärder mot gängkriminalitet

Sammanfattning: Gang crime has increased significantly in Sweden over the past decade, deadly shootings are becoming more common. This led to the year 2022 being established as the deadliest year in Swedish crime statistics since the police began compiling national statistics on shootings. Gang crime is, therefore, a highly relevant topic in the Swedish mass media. Besides the mass media, the phenomenon is also of interest to politicians and the general public. Because of the escalation of violence in Sweden, daily reports discuss the measures that should be implemented to combat gang crime. This topic is debated among politicians who do not agree on which measures are the most effective. Therefore, this study aims to investigate, through a textual analysis, how preventive measures against gang crime are portrayed in editorial texts and news articles between the years 2020-2023. The more specific aim of this study is to chart and compare whether the newspaper's political ideological position affects the representation of preventive measures against gang crime and in that case, how? To attain the purpose of this study, critical discourse analysis have been applied. To achieve the study's purpose, a limited number of editorial articles and news articles from four newspaper editorials with various political ideological positions have been utilized. The results of this study show that there are similarities and differences in which preventive measures are portrayed in various newspapers. The results also show that political ideology is clearly presented in their arguments in measures against gang crime.