Heightening Environmental Awareness as a Political Strategy

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Year:
Pages:196
ISBN:0-7734-5493-4
978-0-7734-5493-4
Price:$159.95 + shipping
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This book focuses on the news coverage of an environmental movement against the construction of Pak Mun Dam – a political and environmental conflict that lasted nearly twelve years in Thailand. This book examines how the environmental movement was perceived and portrayed by four influential Thai daily newspapers – Thai Rath, Matichon, The Nation and Bangkok Post. Combining the conceptual frameworks of global environmental movements and news construction, this study views the role of local news media based on the dynamic discourse of glocalization. The author proposes that through their routine process of news construction, local news media institutions work as conduits or “glocal conjunctures” between the local and the global. Under various intra- and extra-organizational factors and circumstances, local media has the power to link global meanings to local environmental discourse.

Reviews

“As a journalist, Dr. Ishida wrote about the [Pak Mun Dam] project. Now, as a professor of international journalism, she has gone back and looked at the Thai media’s coverage of Pak Mun as a ‘news construction.’ – Ann Danaiya Usher, Editor, Development Today

“Dr. Ishida proposes that we see news media as a ‘glocal conjuncture.’ Glocal conjuncture, as defined by the author, ‘signifies the role(s) of local media news institutions in linking global environmental movements with domestic environmental problems.’ To put ‘glocal conjuncture’ to the test, Dr. Ishida examines how four newspapers in Thailand covered the Pak Mun Dam controversy ... Dr. Ishida argues throughout the book that the media has the ability to define environmental problems and influence how people make decisions about the world in which they live.” – Dr. Christa J. Ward, Assistant Professor, Grady College, University of Georgia

“In a nutshell, the author brought into the limelight the significance of Thai media and the multi-dimensional role that Thai journalists played in shaping local and global public opinion on an intense environmental conflict in Thailand.” – Nauvarat Suksamran, Political Editor, Bangkok Post

Table of Contents

Foreword
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Introduction
1 Conceptual Formulation: Glocalization, the Environment and News Media
2 Political and Social Development in Thailand
3 Global and Local Environmental Movement
4 Coverage and News Source
5 The Construction of News Meanings
6 Summary and Discussion
Epilogue
Appendix
Bibliography
Index

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