A diversionary benevolent media strategy: Lobbying Saudi Arabia's humanitarian aid in Arabic and English

Humanitarian aid is often accompanied by broad media coverage. In academic research, there is a dominant bias toward Western studies on the topic. Following studies that emphasize the negative role of autocratic regimes using their media to frame threats as an intra-state diversionary strategy, this study contributes to our understating of how autocratic regimes use the media and illuminates how they employ a diversionary benevolent strategy in the media through framing humanitarian activities. We illustrate this theory by using the case of media strategy models used by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) that frame its provision of humanitarian aid to global and national audiences. The empirical approach is based on an analysis of 263 articles from four leading Saudi newspapers published online in English and Arabic. The result indicates that the KSA encourages two different diversionary benevolent strategies. The first strategy is aimed at increasing the KSAs international community prestige, focusing on mediatization that depicts its alliance with global efforts while employing “threat” strategy towards its adversaries. The second strategy is aimed mainly at Saudi nationals with the purpose of increasing their support of the royal family.