Networking or not working? A comparison of Arab spring coverage in Belgian newspapers and TV news

This paper examines journalists’ changing sourcing practices in the context of globalisation and developments in media technologies. Social media such as Facebook, Twitter or YouTube can be used to access a more diverse range of sources, including civil society organisations and ordinary citizens. We developed a quantitative content analysis to examine to what extent Belgian news coverage showed signs of diverse sourcing practices during the 2011 uprisings in three Arab countries. More specifically, we analysed a total sample of 1121 news items about the street protests in Syria, Egypt and Tunisia, in four Belgian newspapers (two popular and two quality dailies) and two Belgian broadcasters (the public broadcaster VRT and the commercial channel VTM). The analysis shows that ordinary citizens and non-mainstream groups are important news sources and that social media platforms are relatively often consulted compared to traditional news coverage. Quality media and TV news items showed more diverse sourcing practices than popular media and newspapers.