To test the assumption of a deep cultural divide between Canada and the United States, the researchers employed critical discourse analysis to examine the texts of one U.S. and one Canadian newspaper as artifacts and productions of the two countries' cultural inclinations toward international conflict and peace. The authors found differences in the intensity and pervasiveness of pro-militaristic discourse in the two nations' media texts but did not find evidence to support the thesis that Canada and the United States are divided by profound and intractable distinctions of values, beliefs or cultures. Instead the two newspapers demonstrated a noteworthy similarity of language, tone and text that presented shared perspectives on distant political and electoral initiatives in Israel and Palestine.
Several strong similarities appeared across some two years of news coverage and political statements in Canada and the United States about the Palestinian parliamentary and presidential elections as well as the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Five familiar themes emerged to present Israelis and Palestinians in largely dichotomous and oppositional terms. When the news context was an election or a withdrawal from occupied territory, rather than military aggression, media nevertheless represented the two parties as engaged in a zero-sum game. The consistent narratives of "othering" established and re-enforced narrow roles for both parties, placed blame and responsibility, and charged Palestinians with the (often unilateral) obligation to resolve the conflict.
This media coverage demonstrates a convergence rather than a division of cultures across the longest undefended border in the world. These findings also support earlier work establishing the prevalence of "war journalism" in mainstream news coverage by the West. In news contexts that might have provided an opportunity to embrace significant components of Johan Galtung's concept of peace journalism, neither the Canadian nor the U.S. newspaper did so, choosing instead to rely upon the time-worn tactics of oppositional reporting.