The Stefan Batory Foundation

Pre-election monitoring of the public TV news programs

From October 16, 2006, we ran a pilot project of monitoring of the public television (TVP) news programs before local government elections. The monitoring covered the main editions of the news shows Wiadomości (TVP1, 19:30) and Panorama (TVP2, 22:30) as well as local news shows of TVP3 aired at 18:00 in five cities: Białystok, Gdańsk, Cracow, Szczecin, and Warsaw. Each program was rated by three observers, with the average of the rates becoming the final score.

The scheme of observation was based on the experiences of international organizations that monitor elections: Council of Europe, European Union, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe described in textbooks for NGOs: Monitoring Election Campaign Finance published in 2005 by the Open Society Institute and Media Monitoring to Promote Democratic Elections published by American National Democratic Institute in 2002.

The observers of selected TV news programs recorded the duration of the election coverage, its placement in the program, the number and duration of quotes from candidates per main political parties. They also similarly rated other election material that in their view influenced voter decisions. In the qualitative observation, they rated editorial material, taking into consideration the tone, level of detail, comprehension, balance, topicality and bias. The project took place between October 16 and the election blackout on November 12, 2006 and between the first and second round of voting on November 26 – in places where the second round was organized.

Report from monitoring of selected TVP information newscasts at the time of local elections 2006 [PDF 105 KB]