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“Regulating the Wild West?”: The legitimation discourse of EU regulation on Big Data and its media coverage

Kapodistria, Anastasia LU (2022) SKOM12 20221
Department of Strategic Communication
Abstract
The thesis explores the growing discourse of Big Data and argues that political actors like the European Union are purposefully constructing the meaning of such an issue and promoting certain strategies. The study seeks to expand the spectrum of Strategic Communication by examining a supranational political institution and to add valuable insights to the knowledge of the critical stream of Data studies from a communicative perspective. Embracing van Leeuwen’s Legitimation in Discourse theory, this qualitative inquiry focuses on two key regulations - Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act- introduced by the European Commission in 2020. The compass of this study is two research questions: First, analyzing the strategies used by the EU... (More)
The thesis explores the growing discourse of Big Data and argues that political actors like the European Union are purposefully constructing the meaning of such an issue and promoting certain strategies. The study seeks to expand the spectrum of Strategic Communication by examining a supranational political institution and to add valuable insights to the knowledge of the critical stream of Data studies from a communicative perspective. Embracing van Leeuwen’s Legitimation in Discourse theory, this qualitative inquiry focuses on two key regulations - Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act- introduced by the European Commission in 2020. The compass of this study is two research questions: First, analyzing the strategies used by the EU to legitimize the reshaping of the digital economy and the major changes in Big Data practices, in the debates on the European Parliament. Second, four online news media outlets have been scrutinized to understand the ways the parliamentary discourse is being covered and how the regulation of Big Data is being framed. The findings of this thesis demonstrated discrepancies in the aspects of the debate that were brought forward and the strategies used to legitimize the regulation in the spheres analyzed. However, an important insight is that the legitimation of Big Data regulation is strictly connected to the attribution of problem responsibility -to the Big tech companies- and to the attribution of solution responsibility to the EU institutions. The legitimation discourse, created in the interplay of political and media sphere, is of strategic importance since it shapes the collective understanding on a dynamic phenomenon like Big Data. (Less)
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author
Kapodistria, Anastasia LU
supervisor
organization
course
SKOM12 20221
year
type
H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
subject
keywords
Big Data, European Union, regulation, legitimation strategy, political discourse, media framing
language
English
id
9087319
date added to LUP
2022-06-27 14:27:29
date last changed
2022-06-27 14:27:29
@misc{9087319,
  abstract     = {{The thesis explores the growing discourse of Big Data and argues that political actors like the European Union are purposefully constructing the meaning of such an issue and promoting certain strategies. The study seeks to expand the spectrum of Strategic Communication by examining a supranational political institution and to add valuable insights to the knowledge of the critical stream of Data studies from a communicative perspective. Embracing van Leeuwen’s Legitimation in Discourse theory, this qualitative inquiry focuses on two key regulations - Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act- introduced by the European Commission in 2020. The compass of this study is two research questions: First, analyzing the strategies used by the EU to legitimize the reshaping of the digital economy and the major changes in Big Data practices, in the debates on the European Parliament. Second, four online news media outlets have been scrutinized to understand the ways the parliamentary discourse is being covered and how the regulation of Big Data is being framed. The findings of this thesis demonstrated discrepancies in the aspects of the debate that were brought forward and the strategies used to legitimize the regulation in the spheres analyzed. However, an important insight is that the legitimation of Big Data regulation is strictly connected to the attribution of problem responsibility -to the Big tech companies- and to the attribution of solution responsibility to the EU institutions. The legitimation discourse, created in the interplay of political and media sphere, is of strategic importance since it shapes the collective understanding on a dynamic phenomenon like Big Data.}},
  author       = {{Kapodistria, Anastasia}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{“Regulating the Wild West?”: The legitimation discourse of EU regulation on Big Data and its media coverage}},
  year         = {{2022}},
}