Newspaper Reporting of Whaling in Australia and Japan: A Comparative Content Analysis

Abstract

!e ongoing dispute over whaling is a signi"cant issue of con#ict between Australia and Japan. It appears that the print media in each country supports the dominant opinion: anti-whaling in Australia, and pro-whaling in Japan. To investigate media perspectives, this study reviews newspaper coverage throughout a whaling season (15 December 2007 – 24 March 2008), analysing 48 articles from Australian newspapers (in English) and 51 articles from Japanese newspapers (in Japanese). Content analysis was employed to identify the characteristics of the newspaper articles. It is believed that reporting can contribute to cultural and political transparency by providing comprehensive views on the whaling issue. However, the "ndings here indicate that the current state of whaling reporting tends to be one-sided. !is study assesses how the whaling issue is reported in both Australia and Japan, and what in#uences that reporting. It also focuses on Japan’s kisha club (reporters’ club) system to shed some light on why Japanese journalists report pro-whaling perspectives given international criticism from Australia.