The Media’s Coverage of Domestic Terrorism

Abstract

Scholarly interest in terrorism has grown dramatically since September 11. One important line of inquiry within this body of research has been the media’s coverage of terrorism. Although there have been several important studies published on this topic, there has been little research examining media coverage of domestic terrorism. This study fills this gap by examining the media’s coverage of terrorism in the United States from 1980 until September 10, 2001. The analysis is based on a list of terrorist‐related incidents and New York Times articles pertaining to each incident. This study documents the amount and type of coverage received by domestic terrorism incidents, and identifies the variables influencing whether an incident is covered and how much space it receives. The results indicate that most terrorism incidents receive little or no coverage in the news, but a few cases are sensationalized in the press. There are several characteristics that consistently explain which incidents are covered and receive substantial news space. Incidents with casualties, linked to domestic terrorist groups, targeting airlines, or when hijacking is used as a tactic are significantly more likely to be covered and have more articles and words written about them. This study concludes with a discussion of the policy implications of these findings for the understanding of terrorism as a social problem.

Keywords:

• Media Coverage
• Domestic Terrorism
• September 11

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank David McDowall and William A. Pridemore for their advice on the statistical procedures. We would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.

Notes

1. For example, see Abu‐Lughood (2002), Altheide (2004), Bligh, Kohles, and Meindl (2004), Burney (2002), Chermak, Bailey, and Brown (2003), Entman (2003), Hutcheson, Domke, Billeaudeaux, and Garland (2004), Nacos (2003a, 2003b), Reynolds and Barrett (2003), and Wright (2002).

2. We define domestic terrorism incidents in this study as events occurring within the continental United States. Acts committed by domestic or international terrorist groups are included in the analysis.

3. For a review, see Reiner (1997).

4. Terrorism in the United States is a public annual report summarizing suspected, prevented, and completed terrorist incidents investigated by the FBI. (for recent online copies go to http://www.fbi.gov).

5. The MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base integrates data from the RAND Terrorism Chronology 1968–1997; RAND®‐MIPT Terrorism Incident database (1998–Present); Terrorism Indictment database (University of Arkansas & University of Oklahoma); and DFI International’s research on terrorist organizations. The RAND and RAND‐MIPT databases include information from open‐source materials. Terrorist‐related incidents located in these databases were analytically useful in showing what types of terrorism were not investigated by the FBI during this time period. Information on terrorist indictments since 1980 is provided by the American Terrorism Study being conducted by Brent Smith (University of Arkansas) and Kelley Damphousse (University of Oklahoma). For more information or to access the MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base, go to http://db.mipt.org/Home.jsp

6. During the early 1980s, many Cubans hijacked airplanes in an attempt to fly back to Cuba. The location of the incident was coded as the US city in which the plane departed.

7. There is considerable scholarly debate on the problems with defining terrorism (see Gibbs, 1989; Silke, 1996; Smith, 1994). Moreover, the FBI has been criticized because their counts exclude certain types of attacks, such as incidents occurring at abortion clinics (Carlson 1995; Wilson & Lynxwiler 1988). We do acknowledge that we are comparing one socially constructed reality of terrorist occurrences to the media’s constructed reality. We do, however, still think such a comparison is a valuable contribution to the literature for several reasons. First, the FBI is the leading law‐enforcement agency responding to and investigating terrorism. Second, the FBI figures are used by politicians as fact and thus represent an important reality about terrorism, and aspects of that reality are provided to the public in the media. Finally, the FBI and other law‐enforcement agencies enjoy special access to news organizations, and research indicates the substantial efforts by these agencies to push specific agendas in the news (Chermak 1995; Chermak & Weiss 2005; Lovall 2001).

8. The FBI defines the scope of domestic terrorism in their 2001 Terrorism in the United States annual report. It reads: “Domestic terrorism refers to activities that involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any state; appear to be intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; to influence the policy of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States. [18 USC2331(5)].” In effect, the FBI also considers terrorist incidents occurring in Puerto Rico domestic terrorism. Because our analysis was primarily concerned with terrorist incidents within the United States, these cases were excluded from our data.

9. The FBI defines a completed incident as “a violent act or an act dangerous to human life, in violation of the criminal laws of the United States, or of any state, to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.” Their definition for a suspected terrorist incident “is a potential act of terrorism for which responsibility cannot be attributed to a known or suspected group. Assessment of the circumstances surrounding the act determines its inclusion in this category.” Finally, the definition for prevention “is a documented instance in which a violent act by a known or suspected terrorist group or individual with the means and a proven propensity for violence is successfully interdicted through investigative activity” (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1999, p. ii).

10. In order to be thorough, we would start the search process broadly. For example, if the incident involved a bombing, we would search for “bomb” in articles appearing within 7 days of the date of the incident. We would then search all years of the media databases using names (suspects, aliases, affiliates, attorneys), then group names (Animal Liberation Front, The Order), and then target (victim’s name or location). We would also read the articles to identify additional criteria.

11. The main concern with these two variables is multicollinearity. The airline (target) and hijacking (tactic) variables are strongly correlated (r = .80; p < .01).

12. According to Standard Rate and Data Service figures, the states in the Northeast region (Connecticut, Main, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont) account for 66 percent of the morning circulation of the New York Times and 64 percent of the Sunday circulation (Standard Rate and Data Service, 2005).

13. We were able to estimate statistical significant models for these variables using ordinary least‐squares regression and eliminating the outlier cases. Although as we mentioned earlier this is the least desirable approach for dealing with outliers, it is interesting to note that seriousness and origin were significant predictors in each model. That is, terrorism incidents that resulted in a death and domestic terrorism events received significantly more articles, words, and, on average, a larger number of words per article as general incident stories.

14. We ran both the logistic and robust regression models for completed incidents only. The findings are very similar to the complete models‐death, domestic events, incidents in the Northeast, hijackings or when the target is an airline, and incidents involving firearms are significant predictors. Please contact the authors for the tables including these results.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Steven M. Chermak

Steven M. Chermak is an Associate Professor in the School of Criminal Justice at Michigan State University. His research interests include identifying effective strategies for reducing crime/violence, policing, domestic terrorism, and media coverage of crime and justice. His current research projects include a National Institute of Justice funded project examining the impact of a violence reduction strategy on gun violence in Indianapolis, a project that examines the causes of domestic terrorism, and probation recidivism. Steven M. Chermak is the author of Victims in the News: Crime and the American News Media (Westview Press, 1995), in which he examines how the news production process affects the ways in which crime, victims, and criminal justice are presented to the public. His second book, Searching for a Demon: The Media Construction of the Militia Movement (Northeastern University Press, 2002), explores media coverage of the militia movement following the Oklahoma City bombing.

Jeffrey Gruenewald

Jeff Gruenewald is a doctoral student in the School of Criminal Justice at Michigan State University. His research interests include homicide and theories of violence, domestic extremism, and news media coverage of terrorism, crime, and criminal justice issues.