Narratives of the pandemic – framing of containment measures in Germany in 2020 : An analysis of public broadcasting tv news

Abstract: The pandemic resulting from the spread of COVID-19 is an ongoing event. What started as a public health crisis, has triggered political, economic and social crises all over the world. In 2022, the term COVID-19 crisis (and its equivalents), in addition, of course, to the millions of lives lost to the disease, describes economic depression, personal economic hardship, lost livelihoods, psychotic fear of the disease, change of public order, loss of basic personal freedoms, educational crisis, and so much more. This study was designed to understand the role media reporting has had in the COVID-19 crisis. In particular, it will focus on how containment measures were established for the German society through their discussion in the media. The study is based on the analysis of German evening news programme Tagesschau from the periods 15 March to 15 April and 15 October to 15 November 2020. Containment measures dominated human lives and the media in 2020. This paper seeks to answer the following research questions: How was opposition to the containment measures framed in German public tv news? and Which frames to containment measures can be identified in public broadcast news media in Germany? Using a mixed method approach, this study is based on a deductive and an inductive frame analysis as well as public opinion data. Based on agenda-setting and framing theory as well as the spiral of silence theory, it comes to the conclusion that lopsided media coverage shaped public opinion to the extent that the public largely accepted and supported the government's containment strategy.