The Civil and Political Rights in the Press Discourse of Britain’s Most Prominent News Websites

Abstract

This article deals with the civil and political rights in the press of the news websites, aims to identify the civil and political rights in the press discourse of the top news websites and newspapers in Britain. Between March-August 2022, a tool that includes the civil and political rights was prepared under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, adopted by the UN General Assembly on December 16, 1976 and became effective on March 23, 1976. In order to ensure the validity and reliability of the tool, Test-retest and Factor Analysis were conducted and the needed changes were applied, while to obtain the results; frequency, averages and percentages were utilized. Results have shown that the right to life spearheaded the percentages by (18.83%), followed by the right to equality (15.18%)—which is a civil right; then the economic rights (12.04%); and the social rights (10.34%). On the other hand, the political rights like the right of protest and peaceful demonstration (1.39%), the right to stand for elections (0.99%) and the freedom of association (0.57%) obtained the less percentages.

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Zaydeh, H. , Alzaeem, I. and Almeghari, H. (2023) The Civil and Political Rights in the Press Discourse of Britain’s Most Prominent News Websites. Open Journal of Political Science, 13, 162-179. doi: 10.4236/ojps.2023.132010.

1. Introduction

The standing of the e-media and communication networks grew up during the last decade, at the expense of the traditional (written and visual) media. Traditional media in the United Kingdom and the European countries have generally contributed to guiding public opinion for long decades; however, the ability of such media in shaping the public opinion in the free world countries has obviously started to decrease in favor of the digital media, social media or news websites. The European, therefore, derives information about several issues, including the civil and political rights issues, through live streaming filmed and published on Tik Tok, Facebook and Instagram, changing the stereotype of the civil and political rights ( Silaa, 2021 ).

Electronic media, on the other hand, is a new type of media that operates in the virtual space and uses the electronic means as tools run by countries, institutes and individuals with contradicted capabilities, as well as is characterized by rapid deployment, low cost, and severe impact ( Amer, 2018 ). It is also marked by certain features that contributed to its rapid proliferation and development of its content based on strong scientific bases, and doubled its impact either positively or negatively according to its goal, including the fast spread of information and access to the largest segment in the widest community locally and internationally. In addition to that, instant reporting of news, actions and realities, and follow-up of developments with the ability to edit and update news at any time.

It also saves time and efforts, and reduces costs, as this kind of media does not need a stable office nor printers, printing supplies, marketing and distribution requirements, or employees and editors. In addition to funding reliance on paid advertising, electronic media provides scientific evaluation and precise feedback. It moreover offers the possibility to acquire accurate statistics on the websites’ visitors, offers indicators to the number of viewers and information about them, and enables them to be communicated. From another side, it eases the archival of information and facilitates the formation of an information basis for media persons, as the electronic media provides a chance for saving a retrievable electronic archive, enabling the visitor or user to search for the details of an event, or return for old articles immediately, once the subject’s name is mentioned.

Allowing youth and all society segments to contribute with their creativities and identities and expanding the circle of media competition between websites, forums, newspapers and electronic magazines are other two prominent features of the electronic media ( Qader, 2014 ).

In recent statistics on internet users in 2022, the number of users worldwide has reached 5 milliard; 63% of the world’s population, which number is 7.93 milliard. More than 96% of the internet users depend on mobiles to connect to the internet and surf the web, and 34.5% of them use tablets to go online, while 60.9% utilize computers and laptops besides their basic dependence on smart phones. Following up the electronic media, the average time spent by users on reading newspapers is about an hour and 57 minutes, and the average time spent on TV either offline or online is three hours and 14 minutes ( ITU, 2022 ).

Europe is considered as the birthplace of modern democracies and the fertile soil from which the ideas of liberation and human rights principles with their modern formula were originated. European democracies with their liberal contents gradually developed over many centuries following ethnic and religious wars, and disputes over resources and assets that spent millions and destroyed whole communities. Therefore, John Locke theory (1632-1704) about the natural law and rights came out to be followed by Jean-Jacques Rousseau theory (1712-1778), the idea of social contract, Montesquieu (1689-1755), and the separation of powers principle.

Following the Second World War and the collapse of Nazism and fascism, the human rights organization greatly developed. The European system of human rights protection thus became the most developed regional system in the field of human rights and freedoms protection, based on several European conventions approved in Council of Europe, which is the first European organization in the period after the 2nd war—located in Strasbourg in France and consisted of 47 countries ( Al-Madani, 2014 ).

The European interest in human rights, including the civil and political rights, is manifested in the third action plan on Human Rights and Democracy approved by the European Union in November 2020. It is a 5-year road map that determines the priorities of European Union for human rights and democracy protection, whereby all member states are evidently committed to uniting efforts to empower human rights and democracy. It also identifies the five priorities that should be worked on: promoting a global system for human rights and democracy, building resilient, inclusive and democratic societies, protecting and empowering individuals, harassing opportunities and addressing new techniques, and delivering by working together ( The formal website of the European Union, 2020 ).

According to the freely accessible space of media freedoms, the official and unofficial electronic media tools practiced their right of work freely, bringing up contents of human rights (civil, political, economic, social and cultural) to reflect the European values of human rights, in line with the priorities of rights-especially civil ones. Nonetheless, the real question is about the degree of interest on these rights and their order at the level of the general rights themselves or the sub-rights.ng the applicable criteria that follow.

2. Method and Process

2.1. Methodology of the Study

The study follows the descriptive analysis method, which is based on identifying the phenomenon’s characteristics, and describing its nature and the type of relation between its variables, causes and attitudes ( Abedo & Al-Saleh, 2008 ). The content analysis, one of the branches of the descriptive analysis approach ( Al-Darini et al., 2000 ), is a scientific research tool that can be used by researchers in diverse research fields to describe the explicit content of the material to be analyzed in terms of form and content to meet the research needs formulated in the study’s questions or assumptions, under the condition that the analysis is being done regularly, and based on systematic bases and subjective criteria. In addition to that, the researcher shall basically depend on the quantitative method in collecting and analyzing the data ( Samir, 1983 ).

2.2. Study Tool

The researcher has prepared a tool to analyze the content of the sample chosen in line with the study goals of discovering the contents of civil and political rights in several British media platforms. The tool setting has passed through several steps, following are the most important of which:

· Viewing a group of studies that used tools to analyze the content, intersecting in a way or another with the study’s topic, especially those that tackle analyzing human rights and civil and political rights to benefit from them in preparing the study.

· Identifying the goal of analyzing the content, as the study has aimed to identify the content of civil and political rights in a sample of British media, syndicalist and research institutes.

· Viewing the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, which was adopted and viewed for signature, ratification and accession according to the UN General Assembly in December 1966, to determine the civil and political rights that the study seeks to discover ( University of Minnesota, 1966 ).

· Conducting several consultations with experts in the field of civil and political rights and merging their opinions with the suitable tool to achieve the study objectives.

· Determining the category of content analysis in the civil and political rights, as mentioned in the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, adopted in the UN General Assembly dated 1966, with some deletions and additions in line with the study’s nature and objectives. Thus, the following civil and political rights were included:

2.2.1. Civil Rights

· Right to life: includes planned assassinations, extrajudicial killing, arbitrary killing, and targeting for political, ethnic and religious reasons.

· Equality: includes granting individuals’ equal opportunities to enable them to benefit from their talents and lives, so everyone enjoys the same opportunities, treatment and support and becomes equal no matter what their ethnicity, ancestry, beliefs, and physical condition such as disability, right to fair litigation, presumption of innocence, and appeal to judicial institutions are.

· Right to movement: includes the individual’s right to move freely inside his nation, non-imposition of restrictions over his movement but in certain conditions and according to law, right to travel and return without any obstacles—such as military barriers that impede individuals’ movement, closure of main roads permanently or temporarily and compulsion of citizens to take hard, long paths as happening in West Bank and Al-Quds.

· Freedom of Religion: includes individuals’ right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion and belief, freedom to profess any religion or belief freely either individually or in group, and freedom to practice and learn.

· Right to Freedom of expression: includes individuals’ right to express rights and personal situations either personally or in front of traditional or new media platforms.

· Illegal detention: no one shall be arrested but for reasons stipulated by law and in accordance with the procedure established therein. Thus, whoever is arrested shall be informed of reasons for his arrest or of any charges against him, and the persons charged with criminal offences shall be brought promptly before a judge or other officer authorized by law to exercise judicial power, and has the right to be tried within a reasonable time or released instead.

· Prohibition of torture: includes the prohibition of rough, inhuman or humiliating treatment, physical or psychological attack, and outrages upon personal dignity.

· Other rights: includes economic, cultural or social rights.

2.2.3. Political Rights

· Political participation: includes the freedom of forming parties, freedom of individuals to join the party they consider appropriate without any restrictions, and freedom of parties to practice their political activities freely and run for elections.

· Elections: includes individuals’ right to participate in elections, whether by voting or nomination, to be allowed for unrestricted electoral publicity.

· Access to Public Service: includes citizens’ right to hold public office, with the right to transparent competition in line with law, away from nepotism and favoritism, while refraining from unlawful dismissal and non-refoulement for personal reasons.

· Formation of Associations: includes individuals’ right to formulate an association to achieve a mutual interest, defend a cross-cutting issue or join a formal or informal group. In contrast, it includes the right not to be compelled to join associations. The association includes civil society organizations, non-governmental organizations, cooperative societies, clubs, religious association, political parties and labor unions.

· Freedom of Assembly: includes individuals’ freedom of peaceful assembly at any time and for any objective in order to express their stances in any way they think it proper.

· Right to Face Occupation: especially the entities under occupation, in terms of initiating boycott campaigns, exposing occupation crimes, moving in international trials, and affecting the international public opinion.

2.3. Units of Measurement and Analysis

Unit of Analysis: represents the idea or topic, the material’s nature and the study’s subject, because the civil and political rights components might exist in a paragraph, sentence or the entire subject. They also might be explicit or implicit throughout the text, whether the text was a news, article, analysis, press investigation or research. Regarding the analysis limits, they are represented in the civil and political rights components, in line with the operational definition of such rights.

Unit of Measurement (Numeral Unit): is represented in the frequency related to civil and political rights, categories and variables mentioned in texts, which are being recorded quantitatively and transferred into numbers and figures that can be dealt with statistically. Categories of analysis: are those added by the researcher to the content to serve the study’s objectives and expand the analytical space, in a way that assures accuracy, objectivity and inclusiveness. Those categories include: subject (civil and political rights), framework: general framework (talking abstractly about civil and political human rights) and specific framework (human rights violations), the geographical zone (inside Britain, other countries of the world and Palestine), the existence or absence of a photo, and the journalistic genre (news—report—article—press investigation—interview).

2.4. Procedures of Validity and Reliability of the Tool

2.4.1. Validity Test

Validity is identified as the accuracy of a tool to measure the purpose of which it was designed for; to what degree it reflects the data collected from the tool, information and real data from the study’s sample, which is supposed to represent the study’s community ( Allam, 2006 ).

To meet the requirements of the Validity of the tool, the following steps were followed:

1) Preparing a content analysis tool for the civil and political rights and analyzing the analysis categories, in line with the study’s nature and objectives, with a list of vocabulary that directly or indirectly refers to the civil and political rights to facilitate and correct the analysis process.

2) Identifying the units of analysis and measurement, and choosing the suitable analysis categories to serve the study’s four objectives: subject, framework, geographical dimension, journalistic genre and photo.

3) Applying the tool initially to analyze the content of four electronic issues to formulate a first impression on the tool, analysis outputs, and the suitability of categories to analyze the press material.

4) Presenting the tool to a group of expert arbitrators related to the study subject. Media persons, two human rights specialists and academics such as scientific research experts in qualitative research were thus chosen.

5) Some amendments were applied to the tool, whether deletion or addition of civil and political rights, addition of several categories in line with the study’s subject, and addition of keywords to the civil and political rights.

2.4.2. Reliability Test

Reliability test is to obtain very close values in the event of the application of the tool more than one time, under similar conditions, and is measured by finding the correlation coefficient between the test and the test itself. So, results are acquired by conducting different groups of researchers to analyze the same sample of the scientific research and in the very similar conditions.

To measure the reliability coefficient, the researcher himself applied the tool for 14 days on: The Guardian—The Independent.

After a period of 2 weeks, the tool was applied to the same newspaper and website, and the Holistic equation was used to measure the reliability coefficient in percentage ( Hamid, 2010 ).

The proportion has reached 94.1%; the ratio of agreement between the two analyses is 94.1%, which is a high proportion that confirms the high reliability of the tool.

Holisti Equation: 2 × M N 1 + N 2

M = number of times of agreement for the first analysis;

N1 = number of coding times for the first analysis;

N2 = number of coding times for the second analysis.

2.5. Limitations of the Study

Includes the following limitations:

1) The temporal limitation extended for four months (from April 2022-August 2022);

2) The analysis was limited to the most present websites in Britain;

3) The analysis content is connected to the civil and political rights, as described by the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, adopted by UN General Assembly 1976.

2.6. Statistical Methods

The researcher has used several statistical methods during the preparation of the study tool and the results analysis, the most important of which are:

1) Frequency and percentages in the tool and results’ analysis.

2) (Factor Analysis) to assure the internal consistency of the tool, regarding the civil and political rights and their branches.

3) T-test to compare between the results of the civil and political rights of two newspapers or two websites.

4) One-Way Anova test to compare between the results of more than two newspapers or websites.

3. Results

3.1. Results of Factor Analysis

3.1.1. Requirement for Sufficiency of Number of Analysis Samples and Homologation Test

Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) test was conducted to verify the sufficiency of the size of the study’s sample, while Bartlett test for homologation showed that the result of KMO test that the value (0.66) is good, higher than 0.5. This indicates the high reliability of the factors that we obtain from the factor analysis. We also observe that the rate of the Bartlett test is lower than 0.001, referring to that the correlation matrix was quite different from the original matrix (p < 0.00), lower than (05.0), meaning that it is possible to conduct the factor analysis (as shown in Table 1).

3.1.2. Results of Factor Analysis and the Degree to Which Each Paragraph Is Loaded on the Axis

The results of the Rotated Matrix Components (Factors) have shown the loading rates of every variable to every factor of the extracted factors after rotation. We find that the loading values (correlation coefficients) are in a descending order. The goal of this rotation is to reach a new position for factors to facilitate their explanations. Two factors were thus extracted; civil rights and political rights (as shown in Table 2).

3.2. Results of Sample’s Characteristics

The electronic content of the most followed American newspapers has been

Table 1. Requirement for sufficiency of number of analysis samples and homologation test.

Table 2. Loading rates of the civil rights, political rights and other rights.

chosen. They are: BBC; The Guardian; The Economist; The Independent; Edinburgh News; Reuters; The INews (as shown in Table 3).

3.3. Results of Frequencies

3.3.1. Frequency of the Vocabulary of Civil and Political Rights and Their Percentages

To identify the most repeated vocabulary of the civil and political rights, frequency and percentages were used.

Results have shown that the right to life spearheaded the percentages by (18.83%), followed by equality (15.18%), the economic rights (12.4%) and freedom of expression (11.57%), which belongs to civil rights. On the other side, the political rights like freedom of association (0.57%), freedom of protest and peaceful demonstration (1.39%), right to run (0.99%) obtained the lowest percentages (as shown in Table 4).

3.3.2. Frequency of the Framework Variable (Special Framework: Talking about Civil and Political Rights within the Context of Events That Occurred| General Framework: Talking about Civil and Political Rights in Their Abstract Formula.)

Results have shown a great distinction between the talk about the civil and political rights within their special context, according to specific events or geographical areas, and the general context as civil and political rights. The proportion of the special framework has reached 98.45, while the general one reached 1.55% (as shown in Table 5).

3.3.3. Frequency of the Variable of the Location Where the Civil and Political Rights Are Mentioned (Home Page - Inside Page)

Results have shown a great difference between the location where the civil and political rights are mentioned. 53.26% for the inside pages, while 46.74% for the home page (as shown in Table 6).

Table 3. Sample’s characteristics: Newspapers, number of articles or analyzed units.

Table 4. Order of the frequency of the vocabulary and percentages of the civil and political rights, and the other rights.

Table 5. Frequency of the vocabulary of the civil and political rights and their percentages according to the framework variable.

Table 6. Frequency of the vocabulary of the civil and political rights and their percentages according to the variable of the talk’s location.

3.3.4. Frequency of the Variable of the Geographical Zone (European Internal—External—Palestinian)

Results have shown the progress of talks about the civil and political rights outside Northern and Southern Europe, with 54.16%, closely followed inside Northern and Southern Europe (30.75%), while in Palestine, the talk did not exceed 15.09% (as shown in Table 7).

3.3.5. Frequency of the Journalistic Genres

Reports as a journalistic genre obtained 30.7% of the total percentage of the analysis, followed by news (28.7%), articles (10.1%), investigations (01.2%), dialogues (00.8%) and news stories (00.7%), and eventually research, which does not exceed 00.1% (as shown in Table 8).

3.4. Frequency of Photos

Results have shown that the number of photos in the content analysis of articles, research, reports and tweets reached 1812, with an average of 2.3 for every unit of analysis (as shown in Table 9).

Table 7. Frequency of the vocabularies and percentages of the civil and political rights according to the variable of the geographical zone.

Table 8. Frequency of the civil and political rights and their percentages, according to genre.

Table 9. Frequency of photos and vocabularies in the analysis units

4. Discussion

4.1. Discussion of the Results of Part One

The results of part one are related to other procedures of the scientific control of the tool, which is supposed to measure the contents of the civil and political rights. This part focuses on the results of the factor analysis.

The suitability test for the number of the sample’s collected data and the correlation matrix was conducted as a prerequisite for testing the study tool’s factor analysis. Thus, the result of the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin was (0.66 test), greater than 0.51, as recommended by Kriser ( Kaiser, 1970 ).

Bartlett’s test is lower than 0.001 (p < 0.00); lower than 0.05 as recommended by ( Guilford & Vaughan, 1962 ). Thus, the conditions of the use of the factor analysis have been verified, and the test can proceed, after testing and utilizing the Varimax Rotation, and considering the loading as no less than 0.3, as recommended by Gilford.

Emphasizing two axes by the affirmative factor analysis, civil rights paragraphs have emerged with statistically significant loadings excluding freedom of belief (below 0.30), right to life (0.49), equality (0.61), freedom of residence and movement (0.41), freedom of expression (0.56), freedom of belief (0.52), torture (0.76) and arrest (0.83). This is explained by 19.64% of the total variance.

The political rights have also emerged with statistically significant loadings, except the freedom of association (below 0.30). Regarding the other political rights: freedom of political participation obtained (0.65); elections and right to run (0.62); freedom of association (0.89); freedom of protest and peaceful demonstration (0.44) and access to public service (0.63), while other rights that were loaded in this axis (0.51). This is explained by 10.97% of the total variance.

The paragraph of freedom of belief was supposed to be removed from the civil rights, and elections and right to run from the political rights, but they would have been better kept in the current study for their importance and for being an integral part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1976.

4.2. Discussion of the Results of Part Two

The most popular and followed newspapers in Britain and the most interactive with the civil rights issues inside and outside Britain were chosen. They are The Guardian, BBC, Reuters, Edinburgh News, The Independent, The Economist and INews.

The number of analysis units relied on the daily-published material, which contains human rights contents. The attributes were different from one newspaper or media agency to another. They are, in order: The Guardian (27.1%), BBC (19.6%), Reuters (15.9%), INews (14.9%), Edinburgh News (11.2%), The Independent (8.4%), and The Economist (3.7%).

A sample was selected from the most active and present media platforms, allowing as much space as possible to analyze the content of what comes out of it within a short period of time. It is not an ideal sample, given the breadth of the study community, and the multitude of insights and directions. The American society is abundant in ethnic, religious and cultural diversity, but as indicated in the determinants of the study, the targeted category is calculated on the democratic current, supportive of the civil and political rights, and anti-persecution and policies of racial discrimination.

4.3. Discussion of the Results of Part Three

4.3.1. Discussion of Frequency of the Civil and Political Rights

Results have shown that the right to life was on top of the results, as it came in the forefront of the vocabularies of the civil and political rights by (18.83%), followed by equality (15.18%), economic rights (12.04%), freedom of expression (11.57%), social rights (10.34), freedom of residence movement (8.91%). The other rights, which are political participation, freedom of belief, cultural rights, torture, arrest, access to public office, elections and right to run, freedom of association, have ranged between 5.43% and 1.39%. Yet, the other rights were ranked in the end of the rights’ list by 0.33%.

As expected, the right to life spearheaded the proportions of the rights for its significance, as it is considered as innate and the basis to all rights. Neither of the rights are vital within the absence of this right. It outperformed all international conventions and treaties related to human rights. Individuals’ right to life is the most important of personal rights or even the basis to all of them since it is impossible to think to practice any other right without adequate guarantee and protection of this right. Thus, this reality has been reflected on the international law of human rights, so its sentences have come to confirm the sanctity of this right and the importance to secure it ( Al-Shafei, 2004 ).

Right to life has come at the forefront of rights in the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, which was presented and approved in 1966. It came in the third part of article 6 “every person has the right to life and has the right not to be arbitrarily deprived life. It shall be protected by law.” ( Human Rights Office, 1966 ).

The European States have early established the important principles of civil rights, especially fundamental ones, as stated in the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights, part I, Article 2, on the right to life. "Everyone’s right to life shall be protected by law. No one shall be deprived of his life intentionally save in the execution of a sentence of a court following his conviction of a crime for which the penalty is provided by law. Deprivation of life shall not be regarded as inflicted in contravention of this Article when it results from the use of force which is no more than absolutely necessary”:

1) In defence of any person from unlawful violence;

2) In order to affect a lawful arrest or to prevent the escape of a person lawfully detained.

In action lawfully taken for the purpose of quelling a riot or insurrection ( Human Rights Office, 1966 ).

The right to life is directly followed by the right to equality by 15.18% of the total proportion of all other rights. This ratio reflects the position of the right to equality at least among the European elites. The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union for 2000 elaborated on the right to equality. In the third chapter, Article 20, the right to equality essentially means that everyone is equal before the law. In Article 21, “Non-discrimination is an integral part of the principle of equality. It ensures that no one is denied their rights because of factors such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property or birth. Within the scope of application of the treaty establishing the European Community, the Treaty on the European Union and without prejudice to the special provisions of those treaties, any discrimination on the basis of nationality is prohibited.”

The war between Russia and Ukraine exposed some of Europe’s racism, contrary to the spirit of equality as stated in the European Charters, when hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees crawled west towards Poland, Hungary and Germany. The authorities on the border distinguished between racial or ethnic; between Ukrainian of European or eastern origin, and Ukrainian of color.

In a televised statement, Prime Minister of Bulgaria Kirill Petkov said that “Ukrainian refugees are not the refugees we are used to, so we will welcome them. These are Europeans, smart and educated. They have no mysterious past, like terrorists.” On the other side, the British Telegraph said: “This is a different war, it’s a war against European people who look like us and use Netflix and Instagram. It is not a war against a far, poor country.” ( Fouad, 2022 ).

Freedom of expression, which came in the fourth place by 11.57% of the total percentage of all other rights included in the study, reflects the importance of this right on the European continent, with the exception of some Eastern European countries. Freedom of expression was embodied in theory early, when it was incorporated into the 1950 European Charter on Human Rights, Article 10 of the Charter states that “Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.” ( Shairf, 2003 ).

The remaining rights, the majority of which are political rights, amount to less than 10%, ranging from 8.91% in favor of the right to freedom of residence and movement from civil rights, to 1.39% and 0.33% in favor of freedom of protest and peaceful demonstration, and other rights, respectively.

The repercussions of the war in Eastern Europe between Russia and Ukraine on the European public mood, especially life rights and equality, cannot be ruled out. Tens of thousands of Ukrainian military and civilian deaths have so far fell down in the fighting zones in Eastern Ukrainian cities and territories, while tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees have gone to other European states, especially Poland and Hungary, bordering Ukraine from the West.

4.3.2. Discussion of the Results of the Framework Variable (Specific Framework: Talking about Civil and Political Rights within Events That Occurred, General Framework: Talking about Rights in Their Abstract Formula)

The difference was obvious between the talks about the civil and political rights in their abstract formula and within the context of signs and samples related to events. The speech about the civil and political rights in their abstract formula was confined to 1.55%, while the remaining rates (98.45%) came in light of the talking about events imposed by the reality, such as assassinations, committing massacres, arresting opposition figures and torturing them, protests and violations, targeting active institutes and personnel in human rights under tyranny, persecution of ethnic or religious minorities, and chasing opponents. This evidently applies to the reality of Ukraine in Eastern Europe after the Russian invasion to a part of the Ukrainian lands and the subsequent violations against civilians in several countries invaded by the Russian forces.

The results are relatively consistent with the study ( Hassouna, 2014 ), which was conducted by a number of Palestinian newspapers in 2014. The results indicated that the proportion of the talk about civil and political rights in their abstract general framework is 15.9%, while within the framework of attitudes and events, the rate is 84.1% ( Hassouna, 2014 ).

Talking about civil and political rights can be more exciting and convincing from the point of view of writers, analysts, journalists and researchers, when reviewed or stereotyped in the context of certain events and witnesses. This has a scientific basis, because the style of the event or the story within certain events aims to find meanings and connotations for the reader about the life and environment around them, so that questions and important issues are raised within conflicts faced by the event’s personalities to convey certain messages, facilitate the teaching of abstract concepts and theoretical principles, attract attention to the theme of the event and prepare them for the new situation, increase their motivation, excitement and curiosity. It also helps to expand imagination and the ability to describe, and helps create logical links between concepts by sequencing events ( Darling-Hammond et al., 2019 ).

Discussion of the results of the variable of the location of the talk on civil and political rights (Home page or inside page).

Results have revealed that there is a marked difference between where civil and political rights are talked about; on inside pages, the percentage is (53.26%) and on main pages, it is (45.74%). This means that the majority of the talk about civil and political rights was displayed on the inside page and this distinction is linked to events and evidence outside Europe, especially the war in Eastern Europe between Russia and Ukraine. The talk about civil and political rights in Northern and Southern European countries were only 30.75%, while the other 70% were distributed to civil and political rights in the outside world, especially in Ukraine.

4.3.3. Discussion of Frequency of the Civil and Political Rights

The number of images in the content of the analysis of news, articles, reports, investigations, research and tweets involving civil and political rights was found to be 1540, averaging 1.42 per unit of analysis. This indicates that there is more than one picture for each news, article, research, information material or analyzed tweets, reflecting the importance of the photo for the material displayed in cyberspace, including articles on civil and political rights.

The photo has undoubtedly been transformed in our modern era into a key element in addressing the other, representing one of our world’s most important cognitive, cultural, economic and media instruments.

The significance of the photo is that the sense of sight is more important and more widely used in the acquisition of information. It also addresses all human beings, regardless of age, educational level or social background. The photo breaks the language barrier, because the spoken or written word is associated with something concrete and specific, and the word is associated with something abstract, intangible and generalized. Also, the photo is different from the written text which requires an effort, focus and slowness to dismantle the relationships between words while the image gives the message at once. It also differs from the written word in the ease of receipt, as well as does not need much mental effort to receive it ( Al-Shamemri, 2010 ).

4.3.4. Discussion of the Results of Frequency of the Journalist Genres

The results have shown that the report—as a journalistic genre-accounted for 30.7% of the total ratio of analysis, followed by news (28.7%), articles (10.1%), investigations (01.2%), talks or dialogues (00.8%), news stories (00.7%), and eventually; research which has not exceeded 00.1%.

This ratio makes sense, in terms of the general distribution of journalistic genres in serious and sober media, including the talk on civil and political rights. In a study on (Education News) website, press reports ranked first by 49.5%, followed by press news at the second place by (27.7%); press articles at the third place by (10.3%); press investigations at the fourth place by (6.2%); and press talk at the fifth place at 2.6% ( Alawneh, 2016 ).

5. Conclusion

1) There is a human rights pattern, language or mark in the European human rights, political, and media discourse, which is a transitory language for mass media, institutions and personalities, with multiple and different expressions, yet with a single human rights cognitive content.

2) The European communities and their active institutions cannot be seen outside official frameworks through one path or specific templates, as there is a general culture that brings together the majority of the spectrums and components of these communities. This is a misconceived entry point that leads to untrue and far-fetched conclusions. There is also a wide variety of races, religious backgrounds, beliefs and opinions that have resonance in the attitude to humanitarian, human rights issues, the attitude to racism, and the fight against injustice and persecution.

3) The component of civil rights clearly outperforms the political rights in the human rights, humanitarian and media discourse.

4) The right to life offers other civil rights, followed by the right to equality, which is almost the most addressed and debated issue in the American public discourse.

5) The overwhelming majority of civil and political rights came within the context of certain events inside and outside the United States. In contrast, little talk was confined to civil and political rights in their definitive and abstract formula.

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank of translator team, the staff of Hiwar Research Center. I am also grateful to my classmates and cohort members, especially my center mates, for their editing help, late-night feedback sessions, and moral support. Thanks, should also go to the librarians, research assistants, and study participants from the PALM Centre, who impacted and inspired me.

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Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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