Interest groups in the media: Bias and diversity over time

Abstract

A prominent presence in the news media is important for interest groups. This article investigates the development in the diversity of interest group media attention over time. The analysis draws on a dataset of 19,000 group appearances in the Danish news media in the period 1984–2003. It demonstrates how diversity has risen continually over time, leading to a media agenda less dominated by labour and business and more by public interest groups and sectional groups. This development is related to the increasing political importance of the news media and the decline in group integration in public decision‐making processes. The article also shows how the development of group appearances is closely related to changes in media attention towards different policy areas.

Why interest organizations do what they do: Assessing the explanatory potential of ‘exchange’ approaches

“…At the same time, research interest in the effect of public opinion and the news media has also been growing (for example, Kollman, 1998;Thrall, 2006;Kriesi et al, 2007;Binderkrantz, 2012), associated with debates about the 'mediatisation' of contemporary politics (for example, Mazzoleni and Schulz, 1999;Kriesi, 2004). In order to reflect this, I include a third exchange relationship -that between the news media and the interest organization -which I label 'logic of reputation'.…”

“…Interest organizations, for various reasons, do not or cannot 'compensate' their institutional absence with strong media presence. As regards the receptiveness of the news media to interest organizations, recent research is concerned with the relative presence of interest organizations in the media compared with other actors or with the difference among interest organizations in media attention (Danielian and Page, 1994;Thrall, 2006;Binderkrantz, 2012;van Dalen, 2012). Both 'biases' are sometimes labeled 'media bias' and tend to be supported by empirical evidence.…”

“…11, 27). However, despite 'colorful copy' and information subsidies, various recent studies point to the disadvantaged position of interest organizations relative to other policy actors in getting media attention (Thrall, 2006;Binderkrantz, 2012;van Dalen, 2012). Such studies find support for Bennett's (1990) 'idea that news is "indexed" implicitly to the range and dynamics of government debate'; in other words, interest organizations rank 'low' on the index of sources of journalists, with official, government sources being 'high' on their index (for similar argument see Cook, 1998).…”

Diversity in the News? A Study of Interest Groups in the Media in the UK, Spain and Denmark

“…Drawing on the existing literature, we argue that interest group access to the media largely depends on media preferences (Binderkrantz, 2012;Danielan and Page, 1994;de Bruycker and Beyers, 2015;Thrall, 2006). Media attention is limited and in choosing which sources to include in news stories reporters rely on journalistic norms.…”

“…Our current knowledge regarding how and why interest groups get media coverage is scant (see however: Bernhagen & Trani, 2012;Binderkrantz, 2012;Binderkrantz & Christiansen, 2013; de Bruycker and Beyers, 2015;Danielian & Page, 1994;Thrall, 2006;Grossman 2012;Thrall et al, 2014). Most analyses are single country studies, and the few existing comparative studies deal with interest groups as an aggregate category compared to, for example, political parties and bureaucrats (Tiffen et al, 2013;Dimitrova & Strömbäck, 2009).…”