Nordicom Review has recently published an article by Agnes Liminga and Jesper Strömbäck titled “Undermining the legitimacy of the news media: How Swedish members of parliament use Twitter to criticise the news media”. Johannes Bjerling (JB), an editor of Nordicom Review, has had the opportunity to talk to Agnes (AL) about the study.
JB: Citizens in contemporary societies depend on the news media for information. Since we don’t have first-hand access to all events and situations that affect us, we need the news media to be able to make informed choices. Given this, the question of media trust becomes central: To be able to fulfil its societal role, the news media depend on citizens to trust them. Could we say that this is the overall background, or point of departure, for your study?
AL: Yes, that’s right. But while the news media are, indeed, central in functioning democratic societies, they are also objects for critique – and sometimes questioned. The critique can come from organisations, individuals, or politicians. And while not something new, the possibilities or affordances brought by social media and digital platforms have lowered the barriers for this, not least for political attacks. Donald Trump and his use of Twitter is, perhaps, the most obvious example.
JB: In your article, you focus on what you refer to as “delegitimising media criticism”. Please explain…
AL: Media criticism itself is not the problem; in democratic societies there, obviously, must always be a place for critique of societal power holders and institutions. The problem, we argue, is when the critique becomes marked by certain characteristics. To us, media criticism is delegitimising when it is characterised by a lack of reasoning and/or a presence of incivility.
JB: Delegitimising media criticism is rude, or without arguments that can be met?
AL: Yeah, that is a good summary. It is often imprecise, unsubstantial, and rude.
JB: As the title of your article indicates, you have studied tweets by members of the Swedish parliament, and all media-related tweets between 31 October 2020 and 31 October 2021 were examined?
AL: Yes. Much of what has previously been published has focused on populist politicians and the US. In this study, we include all parliamentarians at the time the data was collected, in a study setting different from the US in several relevant ways.
JB: So, tell us about the results.
AL: First of all, I think it’s worth mentioning that a large majority of the tweets are not media-related at all. Of almost 120,000 tweets, only 5,620 contained references to the news media. And having decided to exclude replies and re-
tweets, our final sample consisted of 2,244 tweets. However, when members of the parliament do refer to the news media, negative sentiments or attitudes are clearly more prevalent than supportive ones. And while critique, as said earlier, is not a problem in itself, three out of four negative tweets included delegitimising media criticism.
JB: Any patterns? Are there differences between the eight parties in the Riksdag?
AL: Yes, we found several significant patterns. First of all, nine out of ten tweets containing delegitimising media criticism come from parliamentarians representing either the Moderate Party or the Sweden Democrats. And while it, perhaps, isn’t surprising to find that many of these tweets are written by Sweden Democrats, it did come as a surprise that most tweets are from representatives of the Moderate Party. And having said this, it should also be stressed that a majority of the delegitimising tweets come from just a handful of individuals, which is a further significant pattern.
JB: Lars Beckman, representing the Moderate Party, is in a class of his own?
AL: Yes, almost every second of the tweets that contained delegitimising media criticism were from Lars Beckman.
JB: And while one characteristic of “the delegitimising tweet” is that it is not very precise, there is one medium that is criticised more often than others?
AL: That’s true. While we had hypothesised that the news media in general would be the main target, it turned out that roughly every second of the delegitimising tweets are about the Swedish public service media. And looking at the type of criticism – that is, what kind of criticism that is being expressed – nearly 60 per cent of all tweets contain accusations of bias. An overwhelming majority of these are allegations of left-wing bias.
JB: So, to a great extent, the delegitimising tweets stem from representatives from the Sweden Democrats and the Moderate Party; the tweets are often targeting public service media; and accusations of left-wing bias is the, overall, most dominant theme. How should we understand these findings? What are the implications on a societal level?
AL: There are several layers in this that cannot be summarised simply. But if I try to put it shortly, I think you said it quite well yourself in the beginning of our conversation. Citizens today depend on the news media, and a situation where many don’t trust the news media is therefore problematic. Feelings of distrust are not, to put it simple, beneficial in relation to a democratic ideal of an informed and engaged citizenry.
JB: Your data is from one year. How about a longitudinal follow up-study?
AL: Since we, with the data at hand, cannot know whether delegitimising media criticism has become more common over time, that would, of course, be interesting. We’ll see what happens…
JB: Alright, we’ll wait and see… Thanks for talking to me.
AL: You too – thanks!
Photo credit: Janwikifoto
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Related reading
Media criticism as a propaganda strategy in political communication
Ekman, M., & Widholm, A. (2023). Media criticism as a propaganda strategy in political communication. Nordic Journal of Media Studies, 5(1), 115–133.
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