Poliitikute arvamuslood ja reklaamid valimiste eel Postimehes 1992-2007
Date
2008
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Tartu Ülikool
Abstract
Description
The aim of Bachelor's thesis „Politician's editorials and advertisements before the elections in
the Postimees 1992-2007” was to analyse the editorials and advertisements of politicians
before Parliament elections throughout the years after Estonia regained its independence. The
author of the thesis believed, that the editorials by politicians in the Postimees had decreased
from one year to the next and that the politicians' advertisements have increased, and also
that the Postimees own view point was largely dominated by the Isamaa Party in 1992, and
starting in 1995 had mostly editorials from members of the Reform Party.
Politicians's editorials and advertisements appearing in Postimees before national elections in
the years 1992, 1995, 1999, 2003 and 2007 were used to fulfill the research objectives. The
research methods used were content analysis and interviews. The analysis unit that was used
for the content analysis was one polictician's editorial or advertisement. The essential
categories were type of text and area discussed, party, the thickness of the newspaper edition
and the year that newspaper was published. There were 51 Postimees editions that appeared
before national elections, to be chosen from. Those individuals being interviewed were the
Chief Editors and the managing editorial editors that were working at the Postimees during
each of the election periods. The author was lucky enough to talk to each of the desired
individuals for the research paper, except for Vahur Kalmre (Chief Editor of the Postimess in
1995) and Merit Kopli ( Chief Editor of the Postimees in 2007).
The goal of applying the conent analysis was to get an overview of what amount of
politicians' advertisements as well as editorials were within the volume of the newspaper
before the elections occurred, and from that, compare how much space the parties were given
for their given views. The idea for the penetrating interviews, was to get commentary from
the Chief Editors and managing editorial editors working at the Postimees during the years
that elections were occurring, to find out the limitations that were placed for the politicians'
editorials as well as the general conduct principles the newspaper had.
The research results revealed that in 2003 and 2007, there was significantly fewer political
advertisements as well as editorials before the national elections than in other election years.
Namely, the amount of political advertisement and the importance of editorials grew until the 1999 elections, and since the 2003 elections, the amount of advertisement and editorial columns have decreased. It can be assumed that the decrease in advertisement does not have
to do with the activity of the newspaper, even though the Postimees has played a big roll in
the decrease of importance of opinion polls durnig elections. Firstly, the politicians'
conscious deterrence from the opinion polls and secondly, politicians' active presentation of
ideas in different formats (different rubriks, questionnaires, diagrams, interviews, panel
discussions). Politicians have also ordered less advertisement and written fewer editorials for
the paper, thanks to development of new forms of communcation as well as as the editorial
staff active actions in introducing the programmes and ideas of different parties.
With the support of the results of the conent analysis, it can also be concluded, that before the
1992 national elections, the Isamaa party member editorials did not outweigh other parties
editorials, unlike in other election years where the Refrom party editorials considerably
outweigh other parties in the Postimees. At the same time, the author would like to point out,
that the amount and intercourse of party member editorials in other election years, has been
very changeable. The author connected the disproportional presentation of party member
editorials, with the development of environmental and media systems, the stance of the
newspaper and the outlook on life as well as the topic of an editorial over the dominating
party's balancing principle.