A framing analysis of the debate about waste imports in Albania 1

The present paper focuses on a political and environmental debate about the imports of foreign waste in Albania for the years 2011 to 2017. The aim of the paper is to examine the frames that parties of this debate use to argue their standpoints and at the same time frame reality. Following the perspective of critical discourse analysis that “discourses are ideological and that there is no arbitrariness of signs” (Wodak, de Cillia, 2006, 713), we try to analyse the way language is used to frame specific standpoints. Language is not a mirror of reality, nor is a certain fragment of discourse, yet through the use of language the parties included in this not only seek to win an argument, but also try to convince broader audiences. Starting from these theoretical considerations, the paper draws on the methodological toolkit of framing strategies to analyse the discourse fragments of the imports of foreign waste in Albania and examine which are the most common frames employed in this debate.


Introduction
The present paper focuses on a political and environmental debate about the imports of foreign waste in Albania for the years 2011 to 2017. The aim of the paper is to examine the frames that parties of this debate use to argue their standpoints and at the same time frame reality. Following the perspective of critical discourse analysis that "discourses are ideological and that there is no arbitrariness of signs" (Wodak, de Cillia, 2006, 713), we try to analyse the way language is used to frame specific standpoints. Language is not a mirror of reality, nor is a certain fragment of discourse, yet through the use of language the parties included in this not only seek to win an argument, but also try to convince broader audiences.
Starting from these theoretical considerations, the paper draws on the methodological toolkit of framing strategies to analyse the discourse fragments of the imports of foreign waste in Albania and examine which are the most common frames employed in this debate.

Foreign waste imports in Albania -ins and outs
Foreign waste imports in Albania are thought to have started in 1993, almost two years after the fall of the Communist regime. Initially the imported waste came from Italy. One decade later, from 2003 to 2004, there was a revival of the interest in importing foreign waste. At the time, an Italian company was in negotiations with the Albanian government. The company proposed providing processing of the raw waste for two of the main cities in Albania, on the condition that it could use 39% of its capacity to process imported waste from Italy. As a newspaper reported (Lapsi.al, 2016), the proposal was considered an infringement of the law on the environmental administration of solid waste, and it incited a public debate and massive protests organized by the opposition leader, Sali Berisha. Surprisingly, in 2013, when Sali Berisha was the Prime Minister of Albania, his government passed a new law on waste imports, which was then abolished by the socialist government of Edi Rama later in the same year. However, Prime Minister Edi Rama could not stay away from the idea of foreign waste imports, either. After having abolished the former law he proposed a new one in 2016.  Once more this proposal inspired a heated debate, which is the focus of the present paper. But before we look closer at the cognitive frames and framing endeavours of the various parties, the specificities of this recurrent debate should be explained.
Two main camps have been taking part in the debate on foreign waste imports. The side in favour of such imports includes the government and various companies offering waste recycling services. The side against foreign waste imports includes the parliamentary opposition, various environmental NGOs and civil society activists. What is really compelling about this debate is that whenever a political party came into power and formed the government, at some point it would be in favour of important foreign waste, despite its former opposition when out of power.
But why is importing foreign waste so worrisome for civil society and opposed by the political opposition, whether socialists or democrats? Since the 1990s Albania has been facing serious problems due to its lack of ability to manage its own waste. Rubbish dumped along riverbanks and in inappropriate landfills, along with the lack of waste recycling and treatment capacity, has over the years become an environmental threat. Given the fact that all governments seem to have failed in managing Albania's domestic waste, there is no guarantee that any foreign waste that is imported will be properly managed or recycled either (Fevziu, 2016;Klosi, 2010). Moreover, there is a reasonable fear that due to the poor control mechanisms at the borders or customs of the country, more harmful waste could be imported together with the recyclable, relatively harmless waste. Taken together, these factors suggest that Albania risks becoming "Europe's refuse dump" and suffering irreparable environmental damage, which would then affect the health and lives of the population.
The most recent law on foreign waste imports was passed by the Parliament on 22 Sept. 2016. This law only foresees the import of solid waste which belongs to the non-dangerous green list, and its stated aim is meeting the needs and requirements of the recycling industry in the country. However, the National Institute of Statistics of Albania (INSTAT) states that only 25% of domestic waste is processed or recycled, the remaining waste is deposited in landfills or burned, while the country struggles with growing pollution.

Theoretical background
Given the dichotomous character of the debate, there may be two endeavours to frame reality in this context, emphasizing either the benefits or drawbacks of importing foreign waste. Framing is a ubiquitous concept in the social sciences, as seen in the field of communication studies (Entman, 1993), linguistics (Fillmore's semantic frames, 1985; frames or schemata in critical discourse analysis), psychology (frames in thought), sociology (frames in communication), and so on. Related to this ubiquity, there are several definitions of framing that come from what Entman (1993) calls a "scattered conceptualization" from different disciplines and a "fractured paradigm". Brüggemann (2014) defines frames as "patterns of interpretation rooted in culture and articulated by the individual" (61), and the use of these patterns in making sense of the world is called framing. More or less along the same lines is the definition of Gamson and Modigliani (1989, 3), who claim that frames are "interpretative packages" that help to give meaning to an issue.
Regardless of the field of research, the most widely accepted definition of framing is that of Entman (1993, 52), who states that (F)raming essentially involves selection and salience. To frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation for the item described.
In this view, what framing does is draw attention to some salient aspects of reality instead of some others. Entman's model (1993) contains four elements that constitute framing: communicator (sender), text, receiver, and culture. A communicator makes "conscious or unconscious framing judgments in deciding what to say, guided by frames (often called schemata) that organize their belief systems" (Entman,1993, 52). Therefore the text is usually, although not always, comprised of frames that are "manifested by the presence or absence of certain keywords, stock phrases, stereotyped images, sources of information, and sentences that provide thematically reinforcing clusters of facts or judgments" (Entman, 1993, 53).
This text might incite the activation of certain frames of the receiver, not necessarily identical to those that the communicator intended to activate, nor identical to those that the text itself contains. Culture bears some sort of referential function, since it is conceptualized as a "stock of commonly invoked frames" (Matthes, Kohring, 2008, 263). The purpose of the study presented in this paper is to examine the frames that are contained in the text, not those that belong to the communicator or emanate from them. In our view, emphasis on the communicator would mean conducting some sort of psychological research, whereas focusing on the receiver imposes the need of a receptive study. A frame analysis at the text level is more feasible and reasonable with a linguistic approach. Such an approach seems to have a tradition in studying framing, because "any framing study uses linguistic devices to measure frames to some extent, although only the linguistic approach offers an extensive description of linguistic elements" (Matthes, Kohring, 2008, 263).
What is noticeable in the articles and present literature on framing is that there are hardly any empirical models for how to detect and reliably report the frames contained in the text. Matthes and Kohring (2008) argue the same when they observe that there is a lack of methodological clarity about how the frames are extracted. Apparently "there is a danger in this lone-scholar analysis that the identification of a set of possible frames can be done arbitrarily" (Tankard, 2001, 98;cited in Matthes and Kohring 2008, 259). This methodological challenge might be overcome if we take into account the existing linguistic approach to framing extractions. As mentioned above, to some extent all attempts at framing discovery have in common a linguistic basis. The linguistic approach is developed on Entman's idea that blocks of words (among other units, such as metaphors and catchphrases) serve to build frames.
The lack of a detailed and explained procedure used in frame detection is also emphasized by Olausson (2009), when he writes that "there is not much guidance within framing theory when it comes to specific methods for analysis. Much research has deployed quantitative methods of data analysis to render intelligible the nature of (media) frames" (424). Olausson (2009) takes a linguistic approach to analysing frames, suggesting that text linguistics procedures along with the approach of critical discourse analysis 1 result in a more convenient and reliable way to shed light on framing. The idea of the relevance of text linguistics is also prominent in Dahl (2015). She emphasizes that text linguistics is useful in providing a systematic approach to finding how frames are manifested in a text. Dahl argues that the "text linguistic approach will enable a more fine-grained analysis of individual texts … than allowed for in traditional framing studies undertaken by means of content analysis or survey-based studies" (Dahl, 2015, 41-42). Dahls' main idea is that semantic fields and genre features could be used as a starting point for identifying frames. Thus the use of positive attitudinal lexis implies the use of a positive frame, and the use of negative attitudinal lexis a negative one. In our framing analysis we take into account the first part of Dahl's model, that of semantic fields, but restricted by time and the scope of this paper we do not employ the appraisal framework she herself borrowed from Martin and White (2005).

Materials and methods
The empirical materials that were analysed are excerpts of speeches or statements of representative actors included in the debate. These excerpts could be considered as discourse fragments, in the sense of critical discourse analysis, as they all have the same thematic concern. As Jäger (2001,46) puts it: Each discourse strand comprises a multitude of elements which are traditionally called texts. I prefer the term discourse fragment to 'text' since texts (can) address several themes and thus contain several discourse fragments. What I call a discourse fragment is therefore a text or part of a text which deals with a certain theme, for example, foreigners/foreigners' affairs (in the broadest sense).
The texts selected for analysis are part of a larger corpus which consists of several documents and materials about the debate, such as minutes reports from sessions of the Albanian Parliament, and news reports from different media and journals (Balla, 2011(Balla, , 2016Rama, 2013Rama, , 2016Shalsi, 2011Shalsi, , 2016Tepelena, 2016;Papa 2016). The minutes reports were downloaded from the online archives of the Albanian Parliament, which are freely accessible by the public, while news reports and interviews were also collected online, and were transcribed if needed.
The discourse fragments were chosen based on the criterion of representativeness and they were later divided in two categories. The first category is comprised of fragments of the debate in favour of foreign waste imports (Rama, 2016;Balla, 2016;Shalsi, 2016), which are written or spoken statements from the government (the Prime Minister, ministers, deputies close to or associated with the government). As already mentioned, every political party, either left-or right-wing, at the end of the day adjusts its political agenda in favour of foreign waste imports when it comes to power. For this reason no further division of the statements is made based on the political/ideological background of the speaker(s). There are three fragments in this category. All the fragments of this category were written or spoken in Albanian, and translated by the author of this paper.
The second category is comprised of fragments of the debate against the import of foreign waste, and it consists of written or spoken statements of actors from the opposition, civil society and/ or from environmental NGOs. It is clear that these actors do not speak in the same way about the issue at hand, since their statements belong to the political discourse, environmental and/or scientific discourse, respectively. However, all the statements have a common thematic strand and belong to the camp that argues against the legalization of waste imports. There are five fragments included in the analysis that belong to this category (Papa 2016;Tepelena, 2016;Rama, 2013;Balla, 2011;Shalsi, 2011).
After collecting the empirical data, we wanted to examine the main frames used by each camp when arguing in favour of or against foreign waste imports. Framing recognition was pinned down by taking into account the most salient semantic fields and lexical choices in the respective fragments. This framing indicator is what Dahl (2015, 46) refers to as salient lexical choices, noting that lexis reflecting a certain semantic field (science, politics, economics; or risk, uncertainty, ethics) serves as an important indicator of which aspect (or aspects of a potentially multifaceted phenomenon the journalist has chosen to make salient to his or her readers in a given context. The frames employed in the discourse fragments were reconstructed and presented using the methodological tool of frame packages applied by Touri and Koteyko (2015). According to the authors, a frame package reveals the logical chain of framing and reasoning devices that convey a specific idea: The packages are composed of a general definition of the problem or issue; the reasons why this is a problem or else, an explanation of the issue in question; the consequences and solution or action associated with the issue in question; and lastly, the moral values involved. (Touri, Koteyko, 2015, 608) Using frame packages in analysing discourse fragments helps the analyst to detect the whole story and go beyond the basic identification of frames. In our case study there are two main frames around which the reasoning and clusters of framing are gathered: the positive and negative frames of foreign waste imports. These general frames consist of several more specific frames.

Findings
The analysis of the discourse fragments on foreign waste imports in Albania based on the concept of frame packages (Touri, Koteyko, 2015) indicates that the debate contains two main frames around which the reasoning and clusters of framing are gathered: the positive and negative frames of foreign waste imports. The frames are presented in Tables 1 and 2 in the following way: each row shows a frame package (definition of the problem, cause, consequence, solution, evaluation, lexical choices), and each column shows the reasoning and framing strands for each frame.
In the discourse fragments, the emphasis is on lexemes that bundle around the semantic field of politics (Europe), economy (industrial development), environment (damage) and crime (mafia). These semantic fields are related to specific frames and frame packages within the two main frames.
As it demonstrated by Table 1, the positive frame package includes the following frames: (1) existing problems with domestic waste management, (2) the European Union, (3) economic development. On the other hand, Table 2 contains the negative frame package, which indicates how arguments are framed against foreign waste import. The negative frame package is comprised of the following frames: (1) existing problems with domestic waste management, (2) the European Union, (3) environmental damage, (4) the Mafia.

Discussion of findings
The comparison between the positive and negative frames shows that both sides of the debate recognize that there is an existing problem with domestic garbage management and use that frame in favour of their argument. Thus the camp in favour of foreign waste imports argues that the solution to the problem is empowering the existing recycling and treatment industry by bringing into Albania more raw materials that could be processed. Rama (2016), for example, combines the frame of economic development and the frame of the EU in the following statement in a Parliamentary speech in defence of foreign waste imports. These combination of these frames suggests that EU-certified factories are the solution to the problem of both economic development and waste disposal: it is clear that the law aims to open the way to give the industry an indispensable boost, and we are talking about an industry which in the last three years kept on making serious investments in its infrastructure. In Albania there are factories for waste processing which are certified by the European Union and there is nothing more irresponsible than to let these factories get closed. (Rama, 2016) The discourse of the negatively framed debate, on the other hand, insists that importing waste is not a solution to the problem, arguing that the existing industry is not going to bother selecting and processing the existing waste if there is imported waste that has already been prepared for treatment. The existing problem with Albania's own garbage is the central idea of the negative frame. Given that receivers of this frame already have some tacit understanding of this topic, it serves as an interpretative package to help raise awareness of the negative impact of importing foreign waste into Albania.
At the same time, the analysed fragments show the tendency for the politicians to change their frames completely from negative to positive by adopting a positive frame when they come into power. For example, Rama, who in 2016 argued in favour of foreign waste imports, was against it in 2013 (see also Balla in 2011vs. 2016, and Shalsi in 2011vs.2016. While Rama used the positive frames of economic development and progress in connection with waste imports in 2016, previously he was against them. In 2013 he adopted the negative frame with emphasis on the existing waste problem and environmental danger, arguing that the pollution caused by domestic waste would be exacerbated by imported waste: We keep on insisting that waste imports are a national betrayal. In today's Albania, that is not even able to gather and process its own waste, where 90% of the territory of Albania is a ground for dumping garbage, which is dumped, burned, and transformed, bringing considerable damage to the waters, to the land and to the health of the citizens. (Rama, 2013) The opposing voices also use an additional frame within the negative framing, i.e. the frame of the Mafia. This frame draws attention to aspects of wrongdoing and criminal activity. Waste imports are framed as some sort of criminal and Mafia-dominated activity, which directly activates all the negative clusters of negative evaluation that are associated the concept of organized crime. Shalsi (2011), for example, argues that "now we are aware that the waste Mafia is everywhere and aims especially at undeveloped countries". When the opposing parties employ their own frames, they also reject the positive frames from the opposing side which emphasize economic development (i.e. more jobs) and revitalization of the waste processing industry. They contrast these positive frames with the frame of environmental threat, which has serious consequences for the lives of future generations, for all Albanian children. The activist Andi Tepelena (2016) thus proclaims: First of all I am a citizen sensitive to environmental issues and an activist of the environment. As any Albanian citizen I worry about the grave situation of the environment. Not to mention the growing number of cancer cases in our country, especially breast cancer, skin cancer and liver cancer. So it is something that is directly affecting our health and that is why I pose a question of where are we going to raise our children? And here are even included the children of these deputies [who support waste imports].
Interestingly, the findings also indicate that frames can overlap to a certain extent, as both sides can employ the same specific frames in the positive or negative framing for arguing their positions. Thus both side employ the waste management frame and the frame of the European Union with diametrically opposed goals. In using the frame of the European Union, both sides of the debate share their conceptualization of Europe and/ or the European Union as some supreme authority or the final word on correct behaviour. If we recall the idea of Gamson et al. (1992), framing functions to connect cognition and culture. The frame of the European Union is embedded in the roots of Albanian contemporary culture. Europe and the European Union might be considered a collective symbol for Albanians, if we consider Wodak and Meyer (2001, 47-48), according to whose definition "[c]ollective symbols are 'cultural stereotypes' , also called 'topoi' which are handed down and used collectively. They are known to all members of a society. They provide the repertoire of images from which we construct a picture of reality for ourselves". One of the most important collective symbols for the Albanians is the European Dream. Because of its history, during the Communist era Albania was isolated from the other parts of Europe, and therefore Europe was seen as an emblem of freedom and democracy. In the 1990s, when the Communist regime fell, the slogan of the protesters seeking a bright future and a democratic government was: "E duam Shqipërinë, si gjithë Europa" (We want Albania to be as all of Europe!). The European dream, which basically consists of Albania being a "European" country and having European standards, functions as a collective symbol, which is also employed in the debate on foreign waste imports. As can be seen from the fragments of the debate, The European Union frame, signalled by catchphrases such as European standards or wording such as Europe, European countries, and certified by the EU, plays a dichotomous role in framing the foreign waste imports to Albania and is employed by both sides. Balla (2011), for example, argues against importing waste by giving the example of EU states: "Because in Europe 12 countries of the EU do not accept waste imports. And this is the best example we should have taken from Europe." At the same time Rama (2016) invokes the high standards of the EU employed in waste processing factories in defending foreign waste imports: "In Albania there are factories for waste processing which are certified by the European Union, and there is nothing more irresponsible than to let these factories get closed." Examining the frames employed in this debate highlights the fact that framing is crucial in seeing how an issue is characterized by the communicators and how frames draw attention to certain aspects of reality by dismissing others that might be just as crucial. A remarkable example of how "mind-bending" certain frames can be is the following quote from the statement of Shalsi (2016), a deputy of the Albanian parliament, who stated: "Let's give oxygen to the recycling industry. Let's not leave the recycling industry to die!" The conceptual metaphor of an abstract entity such as the recycling industry being mapped onto the human domain is quite striking. Here the deduction seems to be too simple, although it is rather sinister in the context of garbage and toxic waste: imported foreign waste would not lead to suffocation, but provide oxygen enabling life.

Conclusion
The frame analysis presented above shows that the tool of frame packages can be usefully applied in analysing the logical chain of framing and reasoning devices that convey the arguments in favour or against waste imports. The fact that both camps use the same specific frames, such as the European Union and waste management, in their general positive or negative frames in order to convince the Albanian public, suggests that they have very clear knowledge of the frames the receivers already have in their cognitive and cultural contexts.
Further research could be conducted on how the use of these frames is related to the public's understanding of the debate, and how the frames are perceived by the public. There is also the potential for further analysis in examining how the specific frames of this debate reoccur in other debates. Such research would reveal which frames are culturally most central to the Albanian public, and thus more effective in rhetorical terms.

A framing analysis of the debate about waste imports in Albania
Key words: framing, environmental discourse, foreign waste, Albania This paper focuses on an essentially environmental and recurrent debate about foreign waste imports in Albania. The aim of this paper is to examine the frames that are used by parties in this debate in order to persuade the public in favour of or against importing foreign waste. The representative actors of the foreign waste debate are politicians and environmental activists. Salient fragments of their speeches were collected and divided into two groups (in favour vs. against). Framing analysis is a widely used methodological approach in social sciences, with various conceptualizations in different research fields, such as in communication studies (Entman 1993), linguistics (Fillmore's semantic frames; critical discourse analysis frames or schemata), psychology (frames in thought), sociology (frames in communication). The theoretical background section of the paper provides an overview of these main approaches in defining, detecting and extracting frames. In the present paper a linguistic approach is employed to detect and reconstruct frames of the debate. Following the methodological technique applied by Touri and Koteyko (2015), the frame packages extracted are: (a) environmental threat/ damage, (b) Albania's existing problem with its own waste, (c) the Mafia, (d) the European Union, and (e) economic development. The analysis shows that frames are crucial in understanding how an issue is characterized in persuasive discourse when speakers draw attention to certain aspects of reality by dismissing others.

About the author
Elsa Skënderi Rakipllari is a lecturer and researcher in the Department of Linguistics at the Faculty of History and Philology, University of Tirana, Albania. She teaches the courses Introduction to Psycholinguistics, Philosophy of Language, and Ethnography of Public Speaking. Her fields of interest include functional linguistics, critical discourse analysis and linguistic landscapes.