Pathways to Freedom in the Digital Era: The Impact of News Media Framing on Social Movement Perceptions

The digital era has transformed the landscape for social movement organizations (SMOs), amplifying their ability to organize protests, disseminate information, and mobilize global support. Despite this digitized empowerment, traditional news media, as key information providers in society, continue to wield significant influence in shaping public opinion. For this reason, this thesis is interested in the impact of news media framing on public perceptions of social movements. The focus is on the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement during the salient 2023 Israeli-Hamas conflict, marked by entrenched public stances. Similar to other SMOs, the BDS strategically employs framing techniques to advocate for economic and cultural boycotts, financial divestment, and governmental sanctions against Israel. This is done to enforce compliance with international law and reform policies concerning Palestinians. In parallel, news media also engage in framing, often emphasizing specific actors and perspectives. Considering the news media’s power to influence opinions and shape perceptions, this thesis examines whether the alignment or misalignment of news frames with those of social movements like the BDS can significantly affect public opinion. Social movement communicators can leverage these insights to design BDS communication strategies that engage Dutch residents more effectively by aligning with media needs. Further, this research addresses a critical gap in current literature by focusing on how news media messages about social movements are received. Through a vignette survey experiment, news articles were manipulated to present either positive or negative frames of the BDS movement to people residing in the Netherlands. Although moderating effects, such as psychological distance and strength of partisanship, on the reception of news media framing were considered, it was found that news media framing significantly shapes public opinion on BDS, often overriding individual partisan biases. Notably, partisanship introduced complexity into this relationship, with framing effects varying across different demographic groups. Hence, contributing to the academic discourse by shedding light on the nuanced yet crucial interplay between news media framing and public perceptions of social movements. As a result, this thesis provides practical insights for SMOs on leveraging news media to influence public opinion and enhance their mobilization efforts, particularly in contexts of salient conflicts.