Conflict and Consonance in Media Opinion: Political Positions of Five German Quality Newspapers

In: European journal of communication, Band 17, Heft 1, S. 25-63

Abstract

This article examines the degree of conflict and consonance in the editorials of five German quality newspapers between 1994 and 1998. The degree of correspondence in the media system is discussed against the background of Germany's pluralistic media structure on the one hand and concepts of public opinion on the other hand. Rather than investigating the differential issue selection among the newspapers, the analysis compares the opinions on issues correspondingly addressed by several newspapers. It focuses on the newspapers' positions regarding fundamental political conflicts and identifies spheres of consensus and conflict in the media system. Although the newspapers represent distinctly different political orientations, each of them also showed issue-specific deviations from its general preference for left or right policy alternatives. Results indicate considerable degrees of consonance regarding external relations issues and education policy. Conflict evolved around law and order and migration issues.