Discursive media representations on telecommunications privatization

This paper analyzes the discursive representation of the hegemonic written media on the privatization of telecommunications in Brazil. Since the country’s political re-democratization, the privatization of state-owned companies has remained on the agenda of governments from different ideological pos...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Hodge, Patricia Ayumi, Freitas, Cláudia, Costa, Alessandra de Sá Mello da
Format: article
Status:Published version
Publication Date:2021
Country:Brasil
Institution:Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV)
Repository:Revista de Administração Pública
Language:Portuguese
English
OAI Identifier:oai:ojs.periodicos.fgv.br:article/83611
Online Access:https://periodicos.fgv.br/rap/article/view/83611
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:privatization
telecommunications
discourse
media
corpus linguistics
privatización
telecomunicaciones
discurso
medios de comunicación
lingüística de corpus
privatização
telecomunicações
mídia
Description
Summary:This paper analyzes the discursive representation of the hegemonic written media on the privatization of telecommunications in Brazil. Since the country’s political re-democratization, the privatization of state-owned companies has remained on the agenda of governments from different ideological positions. Assuming the mainstream media as one of the leading influencers of public opinion, we analyzed a corpus of 869 articles from widely circulated newspapers and compared it to 344 articles in pro and anti-privatization media. The quantitative and qualitative analysis showed how the press restricts the lexical field of privatization to companies and businesses, suggesting the discourse that telecommunications is like any other business, which renders its discussion with society unnecessary. The analysis of the main collocations also showed how privatization has been represented as a historic landmark. The research contributes in two ways to public administration and organizational studies: it brings materiality to the discussion about the representations of privatization and presents a methodology of discursive analysis based on extensive collection of documents.