| Summary: | The Nord Stream natural gas pipeline has been a controversial project. The debate was primarily escalated by Poland's strong negative reaction to the project in the spring of 2006 over safety and security and then alternated back and forth in Europe until the approval by the nations most concerned in the Baltic region during the autumn of 2009.In the case study an approach is used that primarily maps out the media image of the various viewpoints that deal with the pipeline and how these viewpoints position themselves, primarily through political and environmental dimensions. Simultaneously there’s an attempt to map out the spatial spread of the media image views as to the proximity and distance to the pipeline in Sweden, Poland and Germany. A key question is whether distance or proximity to a large facility can affect people's attitudes.A parallel focus of the study is to explore the role of the Nord Stream natural gas pipeline in the cross-border hinterland region of Szczecin-Świnoujście. The complex cross-border relationship between Germany and Poland is characterized by the opportunities and obstacles to mobility & the potential of conflict between the needs of the individual vs. the state, partly due to an unbalanced hierarchy between the two nations.An understanding of the pipeline's impact on the border region is shown in part by an analysis of the city of Szczecin's theoretical potential in its hinterland, with special reference to the impact of the state boundary before and after Poland's entry into the European Union and the Schengen regime.Other contributions to the outline of this thesis deal partly with Medialisation and Framing, as the media-investigation in the study handles concerns, arguments and opinions about the pipeline-project, highlighted by the media. Another subject deals with risk assessment, as no one can be certain what will happen in case of an accident to the pipeline.A general concluding comment to the results of the media-investigation is that they are too parsimonious. However there are some assumptions to be made: In the resulting discussion it is argued, among other things, that from the political aspect both Poland and Sweden share a negative opinion towards the pipeline, while the opinion of German people appears positive to the project, according to the media viewpoints. From the environmentalaspect the over-all picture is that the opinions of the whole of Poland and the local levels of Germany and Sweden respectively (i.e. people living near the Nord Stream pipeline) are negative also – feel unsafe according to the project, due to the media viewpoints.A second assumption is that the media location does not play a major role in the way media coverage highlights the views of those for the pipeline or those against the pipeline.The overall impression is that the media coverage largely follows state affinities, in the sense that the relative openness of the argument that every state seems to represent, seems also to be reflected through media coverage in each state.The Nord Stream natural gas pipeline has been a controversial project. The debate was primarily escalated by Poland's strong negative reaction to the project in the spring of 2006 over safety and security and then alternated back and forth in Europe until the approval by the nations most concerned in the Baltic region during the autumn of 2009.In the case study an approach is used that primarily maps out the media image of the various viewpoints that deal with the pipeline and how these viewpoints position themselves, primarily through political and environmental dimensions. Simultaneously there’s an attempt to map out the spatial spread of the media image views as to the proximity and distance to the pipeline in Sweden, Poland and Germany. A key question is whether distance or proximity to a large facility can affect people's attitudes.A parallel focus of the study is to explore the role of the Nord Stream natural gas pipeline in the cross-border hinterland region of Szczecin-Świnoujście. The complex cross-border relationship between Germany and Poland is characterized by the opportunities and obstacles to mobility & the potential of conflict between the needs of the individual vs. the state, partly due to an unbalanced hierarchy between the two nations.An understanding of the pipeline's impact on the border region is shown in part by an analysis of the city of Szczecin's theoretical potential in its hinterland, with special reference to the impact of the state boundary before and after Poland's entry into the European Union and the Schengen regime.Other contributions to the outline of this thesis deal partly with Medialisation and Framing, as the media-investigation in the study handles concerns, arguments and opinions about the pipeline-project, highlighted by the media. Another subject deals with risk assessment, as no one can be certain what will happen in case of an accident to the pipeline.A general concluding comment to the results of the media-investigation is that they are too parsimonious. However there are some assumptions to be made: In the resulting discussion it is argued, among other things, that from the political aspect both Poland and Sweden share a negative opinion towards the pipeline, while the opinion of German people appears positive to the project, according to the media viewpoints. From the environmentalaspect the over-all picture is that the opinions of the whole of Poland and the local levels of Germany and Sweden respectively (i.e. people living near the Nord Stream pipeline) are negative also – feel unsafe according to the project, due to the media viewpoints.A second assumption is that the media location does not play a major role in the way media coverage highlights the views of those for the pipeline or those against the pipeline.The overall impression is that the media coverage largely follows state affinities, in the sense that the relative openness of the argument that every state seems to represent, seems also to be reflected through media coverage in each state.
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