Cover not available
Article published In:
Media, Migration and Human Rights: Discourse and Resistance in the Context of the Erosion of Liberal Norms
Edited by Ekaterina Balabanova and Ruxandra Trandafoiu
[Journal of Language and Politics 19:3] 2020
► pp. 413–435

Norm destruction, norm resilience

The media and refugee protection in the UK and Hungary during Europe’s ‘Migrant Crisis’

ORCID logo | University of Liverpool
| University of Liverpool
Principles of refugee protection in Europe are said to have come under great pressure with the populist and nationalist backlash to the ‘migrant crisis’, often traced to illiberal regimes in post-communist countries. This paper tests these claims by comparatively analysing media coverage in the UK and Hungary, establishing the extent to which specific norms were challenged or upheld in April and September 2015. It develops a new methodology connecting ethical justifications for migration controls with the ‘normative terrain’ of refugee protection. The findings complicate existing assumptions about differences between conservative and progressive-leaning publications, and also the divide and direction of travel between Old/New and East/West in the European context. The article challenges the narrative of the ‘illiberal wind’ and advances understanding of the relationship between political culture and media systems in Europe, and the toxic nature of media coverage in relation to the survival of the normative regime around refugees.
Keywords: refugees, norms, media, UK, Hungary
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction: What/which ‘crisis’?
  • 2.Mapping the normative terrain
  • 3.Hungary and UK: At the forefront of Europe’s backlash
  • 4.Methodology
    • Datasets
  • 5.Results and discussion
    • 5.1April 2015 – UK
    • 5.2April 2015 – Hungary
    • 5.3September 2015 – UK
    • 5.4September 2015 – Hungary
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 25 March 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.19055.bal
References (48)
References
Altman, Andrew, and Christopher Heath Wellman. 2009. A Liberal Theory of International Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Amnesty International. 2017. “Amnesty International Annual Report 2015/16”. Amnesty International, available at: [URL]
Armbruster, Heidi. 2018. “It Was the Photograph of the Little Boy”: Reflections on the Syrian Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Programme in the UK”. Ethnic and Racial Studies 42(15): 2680–2699. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Balabanova, Ekaterina, and Alex Balch. 2010. “Sending and Receiving: The Ethical framing of Intra-EU Migration in the European Press”. European Journal of Communication 25(4): 82–97. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Balch, Alex. 2016. Immigration and the State: Fear, Greed and Hospitality. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Balch, Alex, and Ekaterina Balabanova. 2016. “Ethics, Politics and Migration: Public Debates on the Free Movement of Romanians and Bulgarians in the UK, 2006–2013”. Politics 36(1): 19–35. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bader, Veit. 2005. “The Ethics of Immigration”. Constellations 12(3): 331–361. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bajomi-Lázár, Peter. 2015. “Variations in Media Freedom: Why Do Some Governments in Central and Eastern Europe Respect Media Freedom More than Other Ones?”. Central European Journal of Communication 141: 4–20.Google Scholar
Bauböck, Rainer. 2018. “Refugee Protection and Burden-Sharing in the European Union”. Journal of Common Market Studies 56(1): 141–156. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Berry, Mike, Garcia-Blanco, Inaki, and Kerry Moore. 2015. Press Coverage of the Refugee and Migrant Crisis in the EU: A Content Analysis of Five European Countries. Report prepared for the United Nations High Commission for Refugees ([URL] – accessed 2 April 2019).
Beauchamp, Zack. 2018. “It Happened There: How Democracy Died in Hungary”, VOX ([URL] – accessed 12 April 2019).
Betts, Alexander. 2015. “The Normative Terrain of the Global Refugee Regime”. Ethics and International Affairs 29(4): 363–375. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Betts, Alexander, and Paul Collier. 2017. Refuge: Transforming a Broken Refugee System. Allen Lane, Penguin Random House: London.Google Scholar
Blinder, Scott, and William L. Allen. 2016. “Constructing Immigrants: Portrayals of Migrant Groups in British National Newspapers, 2010–2012”. International Migration Review 50(1): 3–40. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bocskor, Akos. 2018. “Anti-Immigration Discourses in Hungary during the “Crisis” Year: The Orbán Government’s “National Consultation” Campaign of 2015”. Sociology 52(3): 551–568. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brubaker, Rogers. 2017. “Between Nationalism and Civilizationism: The European Populist Moment in Comparative Perspective”. Ethnic and Racial Studies 40(8): 1191–1226. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Buchanan, Sara, Bethan Grillo, and Terry Threadgold. 2003. “What’s the Story”: Results from Research into Media Coverage of Refugees and Asylum Seekers in the UK. [URL].
Carens, Joseph H. 1987. “Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open Borders”. The Review of Politics 49(2): 251–273. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chouliaraki, Lilie, Myria Georgiou, and Rafal Zaborowski, (with Wouter Oomen). 2017. The European “Migration Crisis” and the Media: A Cross-European Press Content Analysis. Project report. London: Department of Media and Communications, London School of Economics and Political Science.Google Scholar
Duffy, Aoife. 2008. “Expulsion to Face Torture? Non-Refoulement in International Law”. International Journal of Refugee Law 20(3): 373–390. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ethical Journalism Network. 2015. Moving Stories: International Review of How Media Cover Migration. London: Ethical Journalism Network.Google Scholar
Entman, Robert. 1993. “Framing: Toward a Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm”. Journal of Communication 43(4): 51–58. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gavin, Neil. 2018. “Media Definitely Do Matter: Brexit, Immigration, Climate Change and Beyond”. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 20(4): 827–845. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Georgiou, Myria and Rafal Zaborowski. 2017. Media Coverage of the “Refugee Crisis”: A Cross-European Perspective. Council of Europe report DG1 (2017)031.Google Scholar
Goodman, Simon, Ala Sirriyeh, and Simon McMahon. 2017. “The Evolving (Re)Categorisations of Refugees Throughout the “Refugee/Migrant Crisis”. Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology 27(2): 105–114. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Grigonis, Simas. 2016. “EU in the Face of Migrant Crisis: Reasons for Ineffective Human Rights Protection”. International Comparative Jurisprudence 2(2): 93–98.Google Scholar
Greussing, Esther and Hajo G. Boomgaarden. 2017. “Shifting the Refugee Narrative? An Automated Frame Analysis of Europe’s 2015 Refugee Crisis”. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 43(11): 1749–1774. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gunther, Albert C., Daniel Bolt, Dina L. G. Borzekowski, Janice L. Liebhart, and James P. Dillard. 2006. “Presumed Influence on Peer Norms: How Mass Media Indirectly Affect Adolescent Smoking”. Journal of Communication 56(1): 52–68. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Higgins, Peter. 2008. “Open Borders and the Right to Immigration: Response to Richard Nunan’s Comments”. Human Rights Review: 543–544. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
IOM. 2015. Over 3,770 Migrants Have Died Trying to Cross the Mediterranean to Europe in 2015. 31 December ([URL] – accessed 21 March 2019).
. 2017. Mediterranean Migrant Arrivals Top 363,348 in 2016; Deaths at Sea: 5,079. 6 January. ([URL] – accessed 21 March 2019).
Karyotis, Georgios. 2012. “Securitization of Migration in Greece: Process, Motives, and Implications”. International Political Sociology 6(4): 390–408. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kneebone, Susan. 2016. “Comparative Regional Protection Frameworks for Refugees: Norms and Norm Entrepreneurs”. The International Journal of Human Rights 20(2): 153-172. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Krzyżanowski, Michal, Anna Triandafyllidou, and Ruth Wodak. 2018. “The Mediatization and the Politicization of the “Refugee Crisis” in Europe”. Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies 16(1–2): 1–14. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lams, Lutgard. 2018. “Discursive Constructions of the Summer 2015 Refugee Crisis: A Comparative Analysis of French, Dutch, Belgian Francophone and British Centre-of-Right Press Narratives”. Journal of Applied Journalism & Media Studies 7(1): 103–127. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lavenex, Sandra. 2018. “Failing Forward” Towards Which Europe? Organized Hypocrisy in the Common European Asylum System”. Journal of Common Market Studies 56(5): 1195–1212. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Nougayrède, Natalie. 2016. Refugees Aren’t the Problem. Europe’s Identity Crisis Is. The Guardian , 31 October.Google Scholar
Philo, Greg, Emma Briant, and Pauline Donald. 2013. Bad News for Refugees. Pluto Press.Google Scholar
Poon, Jenny. 2016. “EU-Turkey Deal: Violation of, or Consistency with, International Law?”. European Papers 1(3): 1195–1203.Google Scholar
Robinson, Duncan. 2015. “Why Hungary Wanted Out of EU’s Refugee Scheme”. September 22, 2015, The Financial Times [URL]
Rydliński, Bartosz. 2017. “Illiberal Winds from the East”. New Eastern Europe 2/171 available at [URL]
Singer, Jane. 2007. “Contested Autonomy: Professional and Popular Claims on Journalistic Norms”. Journalism Studies 8(1): 79–95. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Singer, Sarah. 2017. ““Undesirable and Unreturnable” in the United Kingdom”. Refugee Survey Quarterly 36(1): 9–34. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Spindler, William. 2015. “2015: The Year of Europe’s Refugee Crisis” UNHCR: Geneva [URL]
Thielemann, Eiko. 2018. “Why Refugee Burden-Sharing Initiatives Fail: Public Goods, Free-Riding and Symbolic Solidarity in the EU”. Journal of Common Market Studies 56(1): 63–82. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Voynov, Georgi, Hana Franková, Anikó Bakonyi, Marta Górczyńska, and Miha Nabergoj. 2017. “Pushed Back at the Door: Denial of Access to Asylum in Eastern EU Member States”. Hungarian Helsinki Committee.Google Scholar
Walzer, Michael. 1983. Spheres of Justice: A Defence of Pluralism and Equality. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Webber, Frances. 2013. “UK: The Way to Pariah Status in Europe”. Race & Class 55(2): 99–108. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (5)

Cited by five other publications

Ajana, Btihaj, Hannah Connell & Tyler Liddle
2024. “It Could Have Been Us”: media frames and the coverage of Ukrainian, Afghan and Syrian refugee crises. SN Social Sciences 4:7 DOI logo
de Keulenaar, Emillie, Thomas Poell, Anne Helmond, Bernhard Rieder & Jasmijn Van Gorp
2024. Computational cross-media research: tracing divergences between normative Dutch television and social media discourses on the ‘refugee crisis’ (2013-2018). Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies DOI logo
Benczes, Réka & Bence Ságvári
2022. Migrants are not welcome. Journal of Language and Politics 21:3 ► pp. 413 ff. DOI logo
Parker, Samuel, Sophie Bennett, Chyna Mae Cobden & Deborah Earnshaw
2022. ‘It’s time we invested in stronger borders’: media representations of refugees crossing the English Channel by boat. Critical Discourse Studies 19:4 ► pp. 348 ff. DOI logo
Seo, Soomin & Sezgi Başak Kavakli
2022. Media representations of refugees, asylum seekers and immigrants: a meta-analysis of research. Annals of the International Communication Association 46:3 ► pp. 159 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 14 september 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.