Paper Titles & Abstracts

This paper aims at providing a comprehensive picture of media coverage on EU affairs by focusing on the EU level negotiations on directives in the ordinary legislative procedure. The day-to-day decision-making process on EU legislation seems to be a blind spot in studies on media coverage on EU affairs. This is remarkable, since the adoption of EU legislation by the European institutions is one of their core activities. It is assumed that journalists are confronted with variation in both information processing costs of the EU level decision making process, as well as in benefits in terms of providing relevant information to readers. Hypotheses on how this cost-benefit calculus influences the media coverage on EU affairs are tested with data from Dutch and British newspapers on 293 directives in the period 2000-2010. The results of the analysis indicate that overall, EU directives receive very little attention in national media coverage. However, EU directives with the following characteristics receive more media attention: directives need to be salient at the EU level in the eyes of the European institutions, directives need to introduce substantial policy change at the national level, and directives need to be discussed in national parliaments. The only finding indicating that national media do not notice all important decisions taken at the EU level in the ordinary legislative procedure, is the lack of attention for directives agreed upon in first reading through informal trilogues. Consequently, one can argue that national media only inform citizens partly about the workings of the European Union and thus only scarcely contribute to a European public sphere. The good news is that those that get covered can also be considered the most relevant ones. So citizens do get informed - but have to be very attentive to pick up the coverage.