The Discourse of Risk: Environmental Problems and Environmentalism in Chinese Press Investigative Reports

Abstract

The previous chapter discussed the development of environmental investigative journalism over the 20-year period from the 1990s to the present and analysed the construction of nine agendas of environmental problems in the process and its implications for understanding the role of investigative journalism in mediating the rift between modernisation and the environment. Following the previous chapter, this chapter1 takes the discussion further and offers a detailed account of the discourse of environmental problems as constructed in Chinese newspaper investigative reports. Discourse analysis2 and framing analysis3 of investigative reports on environmental issues in selected Chinese newspapers from 2008–2011 will underpin this account.