Book Review: Foreign News on Television: Where in the World Is the Global Village?, edited by Akiba A. Cohen

Foreign News on Television: Where in the World Is the Global Village? Akiba A. Cohen, ed. New York: Peter Lang, 2013. 391 pp. $169.95 hbk. $42.95 pbk.This is a significant, large-scale study, by a team of thirty international communication scholars, of the television news provided by thirty-three stations in seventeen coun- tries, based on content analysis of content, a survey of audiences in thirteen of those countries, and in-depth interviews with gatekeepers in twelve of the countries. The study yields helpful data that support an argument that there is more variety in televi- sion news worldwide than what a "global village" model of the world might indicate. The countries were Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Egypt, Germany, Hong Kong, Israel, Italy, Japan, Poland, Portugal, Singapore, Switzerland, Taiwan, and the United States. The exclusion of India is particularly unfortunate.The study determined that in the majority of countries, foreign news receives less coverage and less emphasis than domestic, although absolute volumes varied signifi- cantly between countries. Highly specific local factors tended to drive topic choices even of foreign news items. Hard news predominated over soft and sensational news in all countries, and levels of sensationalism in the news were remarkably similar. In terms of topic, the only difference between domestic and foreign was that foreign news was slightly less sensational. The country that was featured most frequently (in all but six of the countries) was the United States; across all countries, more than one- fifth of all the foreign news was located in the United States. Other top-ranking coun- tries included the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Russia, and Germany. Europe was the most covered region (33%), followed by North America (24%), the Middle East (20%), Asia (19%), South America (12%), and Australia/Oceania and Africa (3% each). With the exception of North America, foreign news focuses primarily on the continent in which a given country is located.Three determining features of news selection were superpower status (USA), the neighboring region, and coverage of regions embroiled in conflict. A high proportion of foreign coverage, up to 70% in the United States, was news that involved the local country's national interest in some way. The study confirms that news is a form of representation of authority identifying who the authorities are and presenting their ver- sions of reality. Domestic news is more personalized than foreign. Almost half of actors in the news have high status, whereas the second most important category is of members of the general public, often anonymous. In thirteen of the seventeen coun- tries, the presence of politicians and other high-status actors was greater in foreign than in domestic news. In terms of the formal features of news broadcasts the authors identified five country clusters. These ranged from those that were quite "playful," (including the USA)-using many different tools of presentation-to a "sober" group at the other extreme that used rather few. Both public service and commercial stations were found in each group. Indeed, the study as a whole found far fewer than expected differences between public service and commercial. …