American Journalism and International Relations: Foreign Correspondence from the Early Republic to the Digital Era

Description

American Journalism and International Relations argues that the American press' disengagement from world affairs has critical repercussions for American foreign policy. Giovanna Dell'Orto shows that discourses created, circulated and maintained through the media mold opinions about the world and shape foreign policy parameters. This book is a history of US foreign correspondence from the 1840s to the present. Americans' perceptions of other nations, combined with pervasive and enduring understandings of the United States' role in global politics, act as constraints on policies. Dell'Orto finds that reductive media discourse (as seen during the 1967 War in the Middle East or Afghanistan in the 1980s) has a negative effect on policy, whereas correspondence grounded in events (such as during the Japanese attack on Shanghai in the 1930s or the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991) fosters effective leadership and realistic assessments. Contents Acknowledgments 1 Introduction A Constructivist Perspective on IR, Communication, and Journalism Constructing International Affairs Distribution of Power and Ideas Discourses and Foreign Policy Choices Constructing Communication Creating Meaning through Mass Communication Media Discourses and Power Media Discourses, Media Effects News Media and Foreign Policy Interactions Public Opinions Role Constructing Foreign Correspondence Mediating between National Discourses Foreign Correspondence under Threat Evaluating Foreign News Coverage Studying the Construction of the World through Foreign Correspondence A Note on Method: Finding Discourses of National Identity and Role Conclusions 2 A New Country, A New Profession Journalisms Professionalization: Nineteenth-Century Writers and Readers From Pigeons to Eyewitnesses: Nineteenth-Century Foreign News Getting Entangled: U.S. Foreign Relations in the Nineteenth Century America Covers the World: Nineteenth-Century Media Discourses Revolutions of 1848: Can Europe Handle Republicanism? The 1853 Expedition: Opening Up Japan to Americas Trade and News The Franco-Prussian War: Americas Interest in Europes Conflicts The 1890s Cuban Revolution: Taking It on as a Reluctant World Power The Boxers at Beijings Foreign Compound: American Intervention in Asia Conclusions 3 America Takes Global Center Stage The Power of the Press: Taking on the World, in the Publics Interest Golden Age of Foreign Correspondence Taking the Lead: American Policy Goes Global America Covers the World: Media Discourses in the World Wars Era The Mexican Revolution of 1910: Too Close for Comfort The Russian Revolution of 1917: Rise of a Menace Mussolinis Takeover: Are Timely Trains Worth a Dictatorship? Japan Attacks Shanghai: Feeling Chinas Pain The Spanish Civil War: The Correspondents’ Fight Conclusions 4 The Media Are American in the American Century The Bulldog: U.S. Journalism Tackles the Cold War On All Fronts of the Cold War From a Bipolar to a Unipolar World: Winning the Cold War America Covers the World: Media Discourses in the Cold War Castros Cuba: Still the Pearl of the Antilles The 1967 War: Stunning Victory, Impossible Peace Normalizing Relations with China: Communism, Capitalism and Peking Duck Soviet Withdrawal from Afghanistan: A Pyrrhic Cold War Win Soviet Union Collapses in 1991: Pax Americana, or a Scarier World? Conclusions 5 A Web of Disentanglements Clicks for All: U.S. Journalism Stumbles into the Twenty-First Century Retrenching Foreign Correspondence Redefining Power: Global Leadership in the Twenty-First Century? America Covers the World: Post-Cold War Media Discourses Bosnian War: New Era, Timeless Atrocities Mandelas Election: The Rare African Good News Mexicos 2000 Election: Change to Americas Neighbor The Euro Debut: Can Europe Really Unite and Lead? Mumbai Attacks: Terrorism and Business among the “Rest” Conclusions 6 The Importance of Being There and Making People Care Can the Market Save the Marketplace of Ideas? Possible Futures of Journalism Staying Power: Possible Futures of Foreign Correspondence Its What We’re Here For: U.S. News Leaders Protect Foreign Reporting Doing More with Less A Reporters Paper, or What Readers Pay For Some Spinach on Your Plate (and, OK, Royal Weddings) The Importance of Being There, or, Whatever Happened to Fukushima? “Pretty Bloody Crucial”: International Correspondence Strategies Abroad United Kingdom: The BBC, the Guardian and Public Service France: Le Monde and the Value of News China: China Daily and News as Power Qatar: Al Jazeera English and Journalism Unbound Conclusions 7 Conclusion The Discursive Role of Media in International Relations Constructed Identities and the Policy Range A New Model of Media Effects Foreign Correspondence and Democracy Evolving Media Discourses of the World Evolving Foreign Policy Paradigms Foreign Correspondence and World Affairs The Eyewitness The Player The Lookout Conclusion: The Irreplaceable Mediator in Danger Bibliography Index