https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6110-6656
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ABSTRACT
The study aims to describe the main lines of political division between Polish media and journalists characterized by a high degree of polarization and politicization. My research makes use of content (quantitative) and discourse (qualitative) analysis of two profiled web portals: wPolityce.pl (right-wing) and naTemat.pl (liberal). The focus is on publications addressing the topics of media and journalists (metajournalism) from 2016 to 2019 (with the conservative government’s ascension to power marking the turning point). The main research interest centers on the following particular elements of the analyzed texts: discussions about polarization, the assigning of political and party affiliations to the media, the framing effect applied to the media and journalists, thematic frames used against the “hostile camp”, and language demonstrating Polish media polarization. The present analysis contributes a cognitive insight into the political and ideological discourse that the Polish media are currently involved in.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 So far, polarization has been measured with reference to political issues (e.g. immigration, elections), the functions of topics, and the selection of information sources (European Parliamentary Research Service Citation2019, 12–13).
2 “I am convinced that the ‘good change’, or the 2015 victory, would not have happened without you, my dear ones, without your persistent faith in victory”, said Mateusz Morawiecki, Poland’s Prime Minister during the gala celebrating the 9th anniversary of wPolityce.pl as he was receiving the Fratria “White and Red Roses” Award (tw Citation2019b).
3 In 2018, the company ended with nearly PLN 3 million in net profit (and 33.5 million in net revenues), mainly thanks to financial assistance from Senator Grzegorz Bierecki representing the Law and Justice (PiS) party ruling in Poland since 2015 (Pawłowska and Chyż Citation2019, 7).
4 In 2015 and 2019 the portal was awarded a Google grant under the Digital News Innovation Fund (DNI).
5 The monthly average for wPolityce.pl was 46, and for naTemat.pl 33 texts.
6 The median of the publications concerned: wPolityce.pl (70.5/2016; 61/2017; 35/2018; 40.5/2019); naTemat.pl (23.5/2016; 31.5/2017; 36.5/2018; 40/2019).
7 In December 2016, the press office of the Chancellery of the Polish Sejm proposed (a) to transfer the media operations to a building 150 meters away from the Sejm building, (b) to prohibit the recording of parliamentarians before or after the sessions, (c) to create one venue for television stations to conduct “live” reports, and (d) to limit the number of correspondents to two per media outlet.
8 The study accounted for a drop or increase of at least 25% in the number of texts in each month in relation to the given portal’s average. For example, in August 2016 wPolityce.pl showed a 115% increase in the number of publications compared to its monthly average, while naTemat.pl showed a 27% decrease.
9 The author criticized the manners of Poles on holiday at the Baltic seaside. Allegedly, many of them went on holiday for the first time ever thanks to the “500+” program (financial support for each child), considered to be the current government’s greatest success in the social policy area.
10 Murder of the Mayor of Gdańsk during a national charitable festival (January 13, 2019). The accusations made by the assassin against PO stirred a discussion in the media on the divisions, growing aggression and hate speech in the public media directed against Adamowicz, and the insufficient – as some claimed – response of the State institutions to that (tw Citation2019a).
11 Barbara Bubula, Joanna Lichocka, Krystyna Pawłowicz – members of the Sejm; Patryk Jaki and Jarosław Sellin – representatives of ministries; Krzysztof Czabański (Chairman of the RMN).
12 Others were radio station TOK FM (owned by Agora S.A), tabloid Fakt (Ringier Axel Springer Polska), Radio ZET (Eurozet, with Agora as a shareholder) Polsat (Telewizja Polsat), Okopress (Fundacja Ośrodek Kontroli Obywatelskiej “OKO”) and Koduj24.pl (an independent portal).
13 The Polish nation-wide daily Gazeta Wyborcza (Agora) and its journalists (mainly former members of the anti-communist “Solidarity” movement), together with the editor-in-chief Adam Michnik (the so-called Michnik’s set-up), symbolized the 3rd RP, identified with the first Polish governments after 1989 which, according to some of the right-hand media, were made possible by an arrangement with the former communist authorities.
14 TVN (Scripps Networks Interactive) was identified with as liberal-left mainly due to its high market share (18.2%). So was the weekly Newsweek Polska owned by the Swiss-German company Ringier Axel Springer Polska.
15 KOD – a Polish social movement and association founded at the end of 2015 in response to the ruling Law and Justice party’s policy.
16 These include: Niezależne Wydawnictwo Polskie (the weekly Gazeta Polska. Strefa Wolnego Słowa), Forum (the daily Gazeta Polska Codziennie), Słowo Niezależne (niezalezna.pl) and the TV channel Telewizja Republika. These media support themselves principally from paid announcements and advertising ordered by the State (which in 2018 brought PLN 9 million, compared to PLN 90,000 four years earlier). Another form of links between this publisher and the ruling party is the organization of state-funded competitions, such as “Man of the Year” and “Man of Freedom”. The awards go to PiS politicians, while the events are funded by state-owned companies (e.g. Pekao SA, ENEA, Poczta Polska) (Pawłowska and Chyż Citation2019, 7).
17 Other media attributed with political affections or antipathies were: Sieci Prawdy (Fratria, Karnowskis brothers) (8); the Polish Radio (7); the conservative weekly Do Rzeczy (5) and the group of Redemptorist priest Tadeusz Rydzyk’s Catholic-nationalist media (the daily Nasz Dziennik and the TV channel Telewizja Trwam) (5).
18 They were: Warto rozmawiać (a talk show on controversial political and social life topics); Południk Wildsteina (discussions with guests on political topics); Magazyn śledczy Anity Gargas (an investigative show revealing abuses and violations of law at the interface between politics and business).