Social Representations of Political Polarization through Traditional Media: A Study of the Brazilian Case between 2015 and 2019

Abstract

Abstract Brazil has recently been experiencing a phenomenon of political polarization: a conflict involving political views and social identities. Considering the extent to which this socially constructed conflict has been partially fueled by the media, we propose to use the Social Representations Theory. The present study explores how discourses in the mainstream media construct the political polarization taking place in Brazil. The topics covered in 82 texts published between January 2015 and August 2019 in Brazilian mainstream press, Folha da S. Paulo and Estado de S. Paulo, were examined using content analysis and Reinert’s method with IRaMuTeQ software. A descending hierarchical analysis divided the corpus into four classes, and content analysis showed that both daily newspapers strongly criticized the political polarization underway, which was anchored to and objectified through episodes of violence, and they supported the valorization of democracy.