This thesis aims to investigate if there have been any changes regarding the framing of abortion in American opinion-based articles. This since the abortion laws in America has gone through a lot of changes in 2022, in comparison to the previous year 2021. This has been done by conducting a qualitative text analysis with a quantitative categorizing of 67 opinion-based articles published by CNN and Fox News. A theoretical framing analysis tool created by Goffman (1974) was used. This is supplemented by Dahl’s third criteria in his theory of democracy (Dahl, 1989). Three categories wereconstructed from the previous research presented in this thesis, which were named the framing of autonomy, moral and emotion. First, the framing of autonomy frames the woman as fully capable of making reproductive decisions on her ownsince she is logical enough. Second, the framing of moral describes how life starts at conception and therefore makes abortion immoral and cruel and should be compared to murder or infanticide. At last, the framing of emotion portrayswomen as victims incapable of making their own decisions, and as individuals who should be protected from going through an abortion since it could harm her. Moreover, in the analysis of Fox News the results show that the framing ofmoral was prominent. Furthermore, in CNN all three framings were represented while the framing of autonomy was mostoften shown in the opinion-based articles. The result concludes that both CNN’s and Fox News’ coverage of abortion, could be seen as partly nuanced because of their somewhat multilateral way of framing the topic according to Dahl’s theory of democracy (1989).

Uppsatsen undersöker utifrån ett normativt demokratiteoretiskt perspektiv och med hjälp av gestaltningsteoretiska analysverktyg om och hur det har skett en förändring i amerikansk nyhetsmedias gestaltning av abortfrågan mellan åren 2015 och 2021. Detta görs med en kvalitativ innehållsanalys av 63 debattartiklar publicerade i Fox News och CNN. Gestaltningarna delas in i tre kategorier, Självstyregestaltningen där kvinnan beskrivs som logisk nog att fatta reproduktiva beslut om sin kropp, Liv- och Moralgestaltningen som beskriver abort som någonting omoraliskt eftersom livet börjar vid befruktning samt Känslogestaltningen där den emotionella kvinnan behöver skyddas från att fatta felaktiga beslut. Resultatet visar att Fox News genomgående använt alla tre gestaltningar, dock syns en viss förskjutning från Liv- och Moralgestaltningen till Känslogestaltningen. CNN har gått från att tidigare gestaltat abortfrågan med samtliga tre kategorier till att enbart innehålla Självstyregestaltningen. Uppsatsens slutsats blir utifrån Dahls demokratikriterium med den upplysta medborgaren att Fox News rapportering av abortfrågan kan anses demokratisk medan CNN:s gestaltning har haft en negativ demokratiutveckling. / The thesis investigates if there has been a notable change during the last six years regarding the framing of abortion in American news media. This is done by conducting a qualitative content analysis of 63 op-ed articles, published by Fox News and CNN, using a theoretical framing analysis tool created by Entman (1993; 2010). This is supplemented by Dahl’s third democracy criterion and theory of democracy (Dahl, 1989). Three categories were constructed by revieews of previous research, which were named the framing of ‘Self-government’, ‘Life- & Moral’ and ‘Emotion’. First, the framing of Self-government frames the woman as someone who is logical enough to make decisions regarding her reproductive health. Second, the framing Life- & Moral describes how life begins at conception, which makes abortion immoral. Last, in the framing of Emotions, the women are narrated as victims and incapable of making their own decisions. Moreover, in the analysis of Fox News the results show us that the framing of Life- & Moral and the framing of Emotions both were prominent in the op-eds. Furthermore, in CNN 2015 all three framings were represented while the opinions in 2021 only were represented by the framing of Self-government. The thesis concludes that Fox News coverage of abortion, could be seen as democratic because of their multilateral way of framing the topic. On the other hand, CNNs coverage of abortion could be seen as a biased and more undemocratic, based on Dahl’s theory of democracy.