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Predicting the Image of Turkey and the Prime Minister Erdoğan… (68-75)
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also puts emphasis on “frame” as a construct
and defines it as “a central organizing idea for
making sense of relevant events and suggesting
what is at issue”. Although framing has diverse
definitions, a consensus seems to exist among
scholars working on the subject on certain
characteristics: it’s “a process of selection and
exclusion and involves bias” (Bantimaroudis et
al. 2001: 176). In other words, by using fram-
ing communicators construct a particular point
of view through rendering the facts more no-
ticeable or ignored.
Gamson (2001: ix) classifies 3 research do-
mains regarding framing: 1) the origins and use
of frames in the construction of messages 2)
the examination of specific frames in messages
and 3) the interaction between audiences and
these messages. This paper falls under the
second category of research according to Gam-
son’s classification. Within the confines of this
paper, specific frames concerning the image of
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
and national image of Turkey are examined in
selected national newspapers.
Ghanem (1996: 40) describes different framing
mechanisms (photographs, graphics, quotes,
headlines, subheads, etc.). She (1996: 32) as-
serts  that  the  more  a  topic  is  mentioned  in  a
media content more powerful it becomes as a
framing  mechanism.  In  the  light  of  this  ap-
proach, this paper’s frames are established by
selecting the most mentioned image attributes
for  Turkish  Prime  Minister  Recep  Tayyip  Er-
doğan and national image of Turkey.
Kunczik (1997: 47) explains that national im-
age is “the cognitive representation that a per-
son  holds  of  a  given  country,  what  a  person
believes to be true about a nation and its peo-
ple”. However, a national image may not al-
ways be constructed through an individual’s
cognitive capacity. Li and Chitty (2009: 1)
proposes that national images involve two
different aspects: perceived images and pro-
jected images. While perceived images are
described  as  a  function  of  stereotypes  that
provide a consistent and ordered view of the
world for individuals and personal experiences
(Lippmann 2004: 52), projected images are
shaped by media representations of a given
country. This study focuses not on perceived
national image of Turkey but its projected
image examining public frames displayed by
selected Turkish newspapers.
In sum, this paper aims to examine national
news media coverage of Davos incident in
Turkey through which Turkish Prime Minister
Erdoğan’s image and Turkey’s national image
is studied.
2. METHODOLOGY
As mentioned earlier, this study proceeded
from a quantitative content analysis of the
frames used in the Turkish national newspapers
regarding the national image of Turkey and
personal image of Turkish Prime Minister
Erdoğan in the aftermath of the Davos incident.
The study was conducted based on the follow-
ing research questions:
1. How was the incident that has happened in
Davos Economic Forum framed by Turk-
ish newspapers?
2. Do newspapers vary in their portrayals of
the incident?
3. What characteristics about Turkey and
Prime Minister Erdoğan are used by Turk-
ish newspapers in their framing of Davos
incident?
2.1 Sampling
All the news articles containing the word
“Davos” in Turkish newspapers constituted the
study population. It was given special attention
to two important points for sampling proce-
dure. The first one was selecting the newspa-
pers; the second one was select the time period.
Four national newspapers; Hürriyet, Zaman,
Cumhuriyet and Yeni Şafak were selected by
judgmental sampling method. The main con-
cern for this selection was to be able to identify
different viewpoints regarding the national
image of Turkey in general and the image of
Prime Minister Erdoğan in particular in the
aftermath of the Davos incident. Hürriyet and
Cumhuriyet are chosen for its republican-laic
stand within the political spectrum of the
newspapers. For that part, Zaman and Yeni

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Selçuk İletişim, 6, 3, 2010
70
Şafak are chosen for their conservative-
democrat line.
Time period of this study covers from 30 Janu-
ary 2009 - the day after the Davos incident
happened - to 14 February 2009. The reason
behind this two-week selection is the assump-
tion that the hard news takes place within the
first week of the incident. After the first week
the hard news gave way to opinion oriented
news, hence column news. Therefore, to select
the second week after the incident provided us
the content for these opinion related news arti-
cles.
From this perspective, two week period should
produce appropriate variety of articles on the
frames regarding Turkey and Prime Minister
Erdoğan.
2.2. Data Collection Procedure
For gathering news articles, Prnet newspaper
database was used. The sample was obtained
by using the specified dates and keyword
“Davos” appearing anywhere in the text. From
the census of the news articles returned, irrele-
vant articles on Davos Economic Forum and
press ads were eliminated, leaving 325 news
articles to be examined. Examples of news
articles eliminated included news on global
economic crisis and Davos, press ads congratu-
lating Prime Minister Erdoğan to leave the
session in Davos.
The definitions used in content analyses are
operational definitions, which use operations
and indicator to define concepts (Berger 2000).
So, one of most important point of this research
is to determine the unit of analysis and make
the other operational definitions. The unit of
analysis of this study was “news article”. The
newspaper name, publication date, section of
the newspaper, type of the news coverage, style
of the news coverage, frame of the news cover-
age, the clusters of the news articles about
Turkey and the clusters of the news articles
about Prime Minister Erdoğan were coded.
·
Section of the newspaper: This categoriza-
tion  was  coded  as  headline,  agenda,  for-
eign news, economy and other.
·
Types of news coverage: This categoriza-
tion was coded as general news, column
and other. General news stands for every
news article other than column and fea-
tured or special interviews.
·
Style of the news coverage: This categori-
zation was coded as fact/declaration, opin-
ion/comment, unidentified.
·
Frames of news coverage: This categoriza-
tion  was  coded  as  positive,  neutral  and
negative. News articles favorable toward
the incident Davos and its reflection on the
image  of  Turkey  and  Prime  Minister  Er-
doğan were classified as positive, and
those unfavorable toward the Davos inci-
dent as negative. Those that were neither
favorable nor unfavorable were classified
as neutral.
·
To identify the images of Turkey and
characteristics of Prime Minister Erdoğan
framed by the selected newspapers this
present study classified selected news arti-
cles into 7 clusters for Turkey and 10 clus-
ters for Prime Minister Erdoğan.
·
The clusters about news articles about
Turkey: This categorization was coded as;
- Friend of Muslim countries
- Mediator in the Middle East peace proc-
ess
- Lost its role and objectivity as a media-
tor in the Middle East
- Moving away from the West
- A country with its own political will
- Key player in the region working for the
peace/human rights
- A global actor
·
The clusters about news articles about
Prime Minister Erdoğan: This categoriza-
tion was coded as;
- Hero/Brave/Sincere
- Not diplomatic
- Fake Hero
- A world leader
- Spokesperson of Hamas

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