engleski

Second Electoral Round of the 2010 Croatian Presidential Election in Daily Newspapers: Uneven Coverage of Candidates

Using content analysis method, we examined the quantity and the quality of media coverage of the candidates for the Croatian president in the second circle of the campaign during the 2010 elections, from December 28, 2009, to January 8, 2010. The studied corpus encompasses six Croatian mainstream national political dailies as the sources of articles (units) for content analysis: Jutarnji list, Večernji list, Vjesnik, Glas Slavonije, Novi list and Slobodna Dalmacija. The analysis was conveyed on 625 newspaper articles on the presidential candidates, published in the mainstream dailies during the 12-day period of the second electoral round. Out of 625 analyzed articles, 276 (44.2 %) referred to the candidate Milan Bandić, 194 (31 %) items discussed both presidential candidates, and 155 (24.8 %) articles were about the candidate Ivo Josipović. The two presidential candidates made the cover of the investigated newspapers 43 times in a 12-day period during which articles on Milan Banadić were more frequently announced on newspaper covers. The candidate Milan Bandić was also granted more space in the political dailies during the campaign in second electoral round than his opponent Ivo Josipović. Research results demonstrated that the print media more frequently connoted both candidates negatively than positively in journalists’ and editorial comments. Negative statement bias is even more emphasized in comments on the independent candidate Milan Bandić. Analysis of the articles’ themes has shown that the candidate Milan Bandić was more often presented in articles that were campaign not-related. The results have confirmed that mainstream print media did not fulfill their task of ensuring even coverage for both parties in the electoral process.

presidential election; campaign coverage; media bias; mediatization of politics; personalization of politics; print media; Ivo Josipović; Milan Bandić

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