At the eye of the cyclone: the Greek crisis in global media

Abstract

Using discourse analysis, this paper offers an in-depth investigation of the discourse of key European and international newspapers on the Greek economic crisis. The aim is to analyse the way in which the issue of Greek economic crisis emerged in the public discourse of different countries and global regions, as well as to assess the impact that this process had on how Greece is viewed ‘from the outside’. The findings point to the generation and consolidation of very negative attitudes towards Greece. During the 14-month period of examination, Greece evolves from an ‘object of critique’ to a ‘negative reference point’. In some sense, Greece is (re)constructed in the international press as the (corrupted) other of the (rational) western society