Global Warming vs. Réchauffement Climatique

A new report, released yesterday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, reveals that the winter of 2006-2007 was the warmest ever in recorded history. And while you wouldn't miss this story if you were browsing the website of elite French newspaper Le Monde, you wouldn't even know about it if you looked at the New York Times website.

About midmorning today, Le Monde ran the story front and center on their site - despite being in the midst of a presidential campaign.

Not only did the New York Times fail to feature the story on their homepage, they also didn't even have one of their own reporters cover it. Their coverage was limited to an AP piece from last night and a Reuters piece from this morning.

The difference echoes the disparate agendas of elite newspapers in different countries, something Dominique looked at in a study called "Are Issue-Cycles Culturally Constructed? A Comparison of French and American Coverage of Global Climate Change," published in Mass Comm & Society in 2004. Dominique et al.'s article consisted of a content analysis of newspaper coverage in Le Monde and the New York Times from 1987-1997; if today's stories are any indication, it would appear the trend continues.