International news coverage in the Singapore media : a comparative analysis of newspapers and television

Abstract

The flow of news and information across the world is controlled by a handful of Western agencies that dominate the international news system and keep people everywhere updated on events and happenings that occur hundreds and thousands of kilometres away. These Western agencies - AP, Reuters and AFP - have held sway over the world’s news since their origins way back in the 19thcentury. They continue to do so even today, despite the establishment of a multitude of regional and national agencies in the developing countries in reaction to calls for a new world information order and complaints of the one-way, imbalanced flow of information from the western countries to the rest of the world. Studies in the past revealed that the US, because of its economic strength and superpower status, was the most reported country in the world.