Media Portrayals of Migration: A Comparative Study of UK and French Press

This study examines the framing of migrants in six major national newspapers from France and the UK, with different ideological leanings—The Guardian (centre-left), The Times (centre-right), and i (centrist) from the UK, as well as Le Monde (centre-left), Le Figaro (centre-right), and Le Parisien (centrist) from France. The study covers a two-year period from 1 January 2020 to 31 December 2021, encompassing significant events heavily reported in the media, such as the UK's withdrawal from the EU, several boat tragedies in the Mediterranean, and the deportation of migrants from the "Calais Jungle" in France. It employs quantitative content analysis to compare fourteen different frames and fifteen sources across the six newspapers. A stratified sampling method, using two constructed weeks, was applied, yielding a total of 507 news stories focused on migrant issues. The study findings reveal noticeable differences in the use of frames and sources both at the country and newspaper levels. French newspapers generally applied a wider range of frames than their counterparts in the UK, which tended to adopt a more unilateral position towards the migration issue. The most prevalent frame across newspapers in both countries was the action frame, followed by the politicisation and conflict frames. The least used frame in the UK was the religion/morality frame, as compared to the ethnicisation frame in France. Moreover, the contextual frame was most likely to be used in central leftist newspapers, whereas the politicisation frame was heavily employed by central rightist newspapers. Ideological leanings also appear to influence sourcing strategies across the news outlets, with centre-right newspapers emphasising international organisations and police or security sources, while centre-left newspapers focus more on civil society sources. These findings are discussed in light of research on news media framing, migration coverage, and public opinion.