Medijske Studije (Jun 2014)
European Elections in Croatian Media: A Content Analysis of Press Reports About the 2013 European Elections in Croatia
Abstract
The first European elections, held in Croatia on 14 April 2013, were marked by the victory of the oppositional right-wing coalition, the new electoral system and an extremely low turnout. This paper examines the extent and ways the media in Croatia have covered the country’s first European elections. It builds on the discussion concerning the contribution of the reporting of the national media in EU member states and the ways it fosters the perception of the European elections as a “second-order national competition”. Analysis of the articles published in Jutarnji list, Večernji list and Novi list reveals that the patterns detected in Croatia to a great extent substantiate the findings from other EU countries, primarily in terms of the relatively low visibility of European elections in national newspapers and the dominance of domestic actors in news reports as compared to the presence of European actors. It also reveals that Croatian newspapers have completely failed in informing the citizens about the new electoral system and more importantly, about the role and the work of the European Parliament.
