Whose Authority Drives the Narrative?: Framing the Spread of Mountain Pine Beetle in Canadian News Media

Abstract

Climate change is facilitating the expansion of biorisks (invasive species, viruses, diseases) into new environments. While news media are a key site where expert authorities communicate about risks in the public sphere, there is limited understanding of how media narratives change as biorisks spread into new areas. We use mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae) in Canada as a case study to examine how narratives in media coverage evolved as outbreaks intensified and spread eastward. Medical narratives were more common in British Columbia, where the beetle is endemic, and war narratives were more common in Alberta, where the beetle spread and is considered a “native invasive” species. Narrative framing in both places was driven by journalists, while quotes by authoritative sources lent support to journalistic framing. These findings demonstrate that affective narrative frames are widespread in environmental crisis communication and that framing of crises changes dynamically based on geographic context.