Between Denial and Celebritization

Abstract

The phenomenon of global warming and its consequences are challenges we face in modern society. In addition to these issues, the paper is motivated by media reports on the 2019 worldwide climate strikes and the UN Climate Action Summit, held in New York in September of the same year. Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, whose performance at the Summit sparked a lot of interest in the media worldwide, found herself in the centre of media attention. The goal of this paper is to explore the image of climate change presented on Croatian and Slovenian online portals, which were selected based on their readership (tracked using Alexa.com). These included Croatian online portals: 24sata.hr, Index.hr, Net.hr, Narod.hr, Vecernji.hr. Net.hr, and Slovenian online portals: 24ur.com, nova 24TV, SIOL.net, Slovenske novice, Svet24, TV SLO. The paper applies the method of qualitative and quantitative content analysis. The research corpus consisted of 194 articles published in Croatian and Slovenian online media (136 and 58 respectively). The research focuses on the scope of reporting on climate change, identification of the main topics and attitudes, and the question of celebritization of the issue itself. Research results showed that there are significant differences when it comes to the framing of climate change issues, particularly Greta Thunberg’s activism, in Croatian and Slovenian online media.