Media Effects on Support for European Integration in Old and New EU Member States

Abstract:The study measures the strength of media effects on attitudes to EU integration. Media exposure is the independent variable; support for European integration is the dependent variable; socio-economic conditions and cognitive-cultural variables are contextual variables. The analysis covers 27 EU member states at the time of 2009 EP election. Both micro-level variables and country-level effects were taken into consideration in hierarchical linear models. Data from the PIREDEU study was used. Analyses document weak influence of media exposure on attitudes. The overall positive effect is mostly concentrated in stable democracies with well-developed media systems.Keywords: international public opinion, attitude to European Union integration, media effects(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)The European Union in the post-crisis era is experiencing a crisis of legitimacy. The tide of enthusiasm which preceded and accompanied the 2004 accession waned, and European integration is a contentious issue in many member states, even traditionally federalist ones. The threshold of this process were the lost EU constitution referenda in France and the Netherlands, countries which long counted among the staunch supporters of strong European institutions. The attempts at establishing Europeanlevel supranational political and economic order meet with calls for re-nationalisation of policies and re-thinking of integration. Such calls can be heard both from the core north-western states and from the periphery.The legitimacy of the European project depends on the societal support. Many different factors predict the support for European integration. They are both economic and cultural/ideological; they operate both to the individual and to the country level. Some of the important factors operating throughout the EU include: position in the social structure, national identification, balance of EU costs-and-benefits for the country of residence. Moreover, there are factors associated with the East-West and NorthSouth divisions within the EU. In particular, the 2004 and 2007 accession waves redefined the internal structure of the EU and stood as an important factor in the dynamic of public opinion within member states. The emergence of common European public opinion is an indispensable for the formation of a common European democracy.This article is not about the public opinion per se, but about its formation. The broad question is: do the media matter for democracy? Do they have a role in changing citizens' minds, influencing their cognitive processes and, ultimately, decisions? The specific question is, whether opinions about integration are shaped by the media coverage of the European affairs. Different media outlets may set agenda in a manner that skews the attitudes in a more euro-enthusiastic or sceptic direction. These effects operate independently of the socio-economic and cultural variables; or, more precisely, they act as an intervening variable between the conditions and consciousness.This analysis seeks to measure the strength of media effects on attitudes to EU integration. Media exposure is the independent variable; support for European integration is the dependent variable; socio-economic conditions and cognitive-cultural variables are contextual variables. The analysis is broad in scope, since it covers all 27 countries of the European Union. The purpose of the present study is to draw a picture of the media influence on attitudes in both 'old' and 'new' EU member states, in which being a new member state is an important explanatory variable. Both micro-level variables and country-level effects are taken into consideration in hierarchical linear models. Data from the PIREDEU project1 is used. Within this study, both content analysis of the media (press and TV) and individual-level attitudes are measured. This enables me to trace the net influence of the media on attitudes.Attitudes, Attitude Formation and Sources of Media EffectsFormation of AttitudesThe dependent variable is attitudinal: it measures the strength of respondents' support for European integration. …