Networked Framing of GMO Risks and Discussion Fragmentation

The burgeoning of social media has created an online activist field in which participants utilize networked framing practices to engage in connective actions related to GMO risks. However, a dynamic perspective on the construction of GMO risk discourses has yet to be fully explored, and whether such a collective interpretation is fragmented is still being debated. To address this gap, this chapter investigates the risk-invoked GMO controversy by longitudinally exploring the structural characteristics and discursive power structures in the networked framing of GMO risks on social media. It examines 356,227 GMO risk posts from 2010 to 2020 on Weibo. A longitudinal social network analysis and computational text-mining approach were used to construct co-production networks among participants based on their joint sponsorship framing practices of GMO risks. The findings suggest that there is a multipolar discussion fragmentation in the networked framing of GMO risks. However, temporal evidence shows that the risk discussion has become increasingly interconnected and less structurally fragmented over time. Also, this chapter highlights the unequal distribution of discursive power among participants; nevertheless, the analysis reveals that this inequality has shown signs of easing over the study period.