Abstract
This dissertation explores how four newspapers from Southern Africa and the Global North presented the Russo-Ukrainian War between February 2022 and March 2023, with a great emphasis on whether their reporting adhered to War or Peace journalism ideals. Given the media's powerful influence in shaping public perception of distant conflicts, this study examines coverage from The Herald (South Africa), The Herald (Zimbabwe), The Guardian (USA), and the Daily Mail (UK). The study, which is based on framing theory and informed by the frameworks of Galtung (2003, 2006), Lynch and McGoldrick (2005), and Youngblood (2016), evaluates how dominant frames - peace-oriented or war-oriented were used in these newspapers and how they influenced audience perceptions of the conflict. Peace journalism focuses on the long-term implications of violence, such as trauma, displacement, and cultural degradation, whereas war news tends to focus on the immediate effects, such as casualties and combat successes. The study found major disparities in framing tactics between Western and Southern African publications. The Guardian and Daily Mail primarily used war journalism frameworks, depicting Russia as the principal aggressor and highlighting combat developments, Western alliances, and the geopolitical conflict between democracy and tyranny. Along with placing the conflict in the perspective of larger geopolitical concerns, the paper also discusses Russia's revanchist foreign policy and its resistance to NATO's eastward expansion. These elements have fuelled fierce worldwide divisions and conflicting stories in the world's media. In the end, the results show how political, cultural, and ideological factors influence media framing and how audiences perceive international conflicts. The significance of journalistic framing and the function of regional viewpoints in international news reporting are highlighted in this study, which advances media and conflict studies.