East German issues in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and NRC Handelsblad: a comparative content-analysis
Master thesis
Student Supervisor
Christine Steinhäuser Dr. Damian Trilling
Student number: 9967737
Master’s programme Date
Communication Science June, 27, 2014
1 Abstract
This explorative case study of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) and the NRC Handelsblad (NRC) shows how a German and a Dutch newspaper cover East German issues from the tenth to the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall (1999-2009).
The study takes a comparative in-depth look into the way in which East Germany and East Germans were presented regarding the main topics, main actuators and the tone of the news coverage. Four significant news frames could be generated from the material: the Economic misery frame and the Booming East frame prevail in the FAZ, while the GDR storytelling frame and the Political ‘Wende’ frame predominate in the NRC.
Keywords: East Germans, East Germany, reunification, framing, cluster analysis.
Introduction
After the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall in 2009, some German politicians announced that the ‘inner unification’ between West and East Germans had been completed. Case closed? Not at all. By 2012, a representative survey of the Allenbach institute observed a wide gap between the positive feelings which East and West Germans had been developing towards each other through personal contacts since reunification, and the strong, mostly negative stereotypes they still cling to when asked about the other part of Germany: West Germans thought East Germans to be dissatisfied (51 percent), suspicious (42 percent), and anxious (29 percent), while East Germans thought West Germans to be arrogant (71 percent), greedy (57 percent), and superficial (45 percent) (IfD Allensbach, 2012: 31-32). Outdated clichés as the Jammerossi (whiny East German), and the Besserwessi (know-it-all West German) seem to lurk behind these mutual attributions. Similarly, high unemployment rates, low economic power, shrinking cities and marching neo-Nazis dominate the image of the
2 region of eastern Germany, the five new states.
The role of the media in the process of public opinion has been widely discussed in the social sciences. On one hand, media mirror the public debate on a certain issue, on the other they also shape it, for example by agenda-setting and framing. In combination with typical news values in news production as an emphasis on negativity or conflict, these processes are known to reinforce clichés rather than to reduce them.
Since reunification, there has been a lot of criticism among various scientific disciplines on the depiction of East Germany and its people in the media, i.a. the
‘construction of the East Germans’ (Ahbe, 2004), their ‘marginalization’ (Hörschelmann, 2001), their ‘subalternation’ (Kollmorgen & Hans, 2011) and even their ‘colonization’ (Cooke, 2005). The imbalance in media representation resulted inevitably from the historical situation.
After reunification in 1990, the vast majority of East Germans had voted for an unification under the condition of the accession of the GDR (German Democratic Republic) to the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany). East Germans committed themselves to take over FRG’s law, its political system of decentralized parliamentary democracy and its structures of social market economy. The money and the expertise for this huge transformation process came from West Germany. Moreover, in reunited Germany the East Germans became a numerical minority (with 15 million people representing less than a fifth of the total German population). Against this historical backdrop it is not surprising that, for all their love, West Germans and East Germans have been finding themselves in a power struggle: the West German standard is the established norm from which the East German reality deviates and to whom it should confirm (Boyer, 2005; Cooke, 2005; den Hertog, 2004; Wagner, 2006). What Habermas observed as “two unequal parties, one of which is, in many respects, ‘evaluating’ the other” (Habermas, 1998: 38), is particularly true for the power relations
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within East German media institutions. There are only a handful small independent East German national newspapers (Der Freitag, Neues Deutschland or Junge Welt), while the regional newspaper market of the five new states is ruled by West German media concerns. Moreover, leadership positions in the East German regional press sector (Editor in chief, Publishing director, Managing director) were in 2004 to 65 percent filled with West Germans (Ahbe & Tesak, 2005). As Boyer (2001) learned from his newsroom study this had an impact on how East German journalists have been reported on (their own) East German issues. Maybe due to the sensitivity of the topic for German scholars (as described by Wagner, 2006: 8), there have been only a dozen studies conducted about the media
representation of East Germany. They mostly focus on the content of German newspapers and television. Comparisons with foreign news media content are very scarce1, although this has proved to be fruitful for a broader understanding of East German issues: Ahbe & Tesak (2005) analyzed German and Austrian news coverage on East and West Germans and, among other insights, found that the Austrian press took an outsider-position on the inner-German situation and covered it more balanced than the German press.
With this thesis, I intend to give comparative cross-national studies on this matter a new impulse by integrating Dutch media content. Apart from the assumed outsider position of the Dutch, there is a special relationship between Dutch people and former GDR citizens2. Therefore, the aim of this thesis is to explore how a German and a Dutch newspaper cover East German issues on the basis of a case-study of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) and NRC Handelsblad (NRC).
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In the almost 25 years since the peaceful revolution, only two studies focus on it: in her unpublished (and unavailable) PhD thesis on media practice and exclusion in (post)unification Germany, Hörschelmann (1999) compares East German media representations in the German and British press ten years after the ‘Wende’. Ahbe & Tesak (2005) did a similar study on the German and Austrian press for the first months of the ‘Wende’ in 1989/ 1990.
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4 East German issues
According to Früh et al. (1999), it is difficult to define terms such as ‘East Germany’ and ‘East Germans’ because the territory of the five new states and its people have been going through a permanent transformation process since the peaceful revolution in 1989. In the authors’ words, “[…] today’s East Germany is something else than it was, for example, in 1991 or 1995” (Früh et al., 1999: 21). However, they argue, East German issues in the media can be narrowed down by the place where events take place, the appearance of East German actuators, and special problems and challenges that emerge from the transformation process after 1989/ 1990 (Früh et al., 1999: 23). Hence, they concede that these issues have always been connected to West (and reunited) Germany3.
Terms including the addition ‘East German’ in this thesis follow the standard terminology as it is used in everyday life in Germany and in social science (i.a. Früh et al., 1999; den Hertog, 2004; Ahbe & Tesak, 2005; Cooke, 2005, Kolmer, 2009): an East German is born and socialized in GDR and lives in the territory of the former GDR, today East
Germany. A West German is born and socialized in FDR and lives in the territory of the ‘old’ FDR, today West Germany. Since there has been massive migration within reunited Germany, it should be clear that the boundaries are more fluid in reality.
East German issues in the media4
Amount of media attention
Früh et al. (1999) find that only 5 percent of the total German television coverage were reports on East Germany, while 20 percent were on West Germany and the rest dealt with
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For example, solidarity surcharge is a wage tax paid by all (West and East German) employees and therefore an all-German issue. At the same time, East Germans altogether have been paying less than West Germans: the reasons being they are numerically in the minority and they have been facing a higher unemployment rate. Also the yield of the tax goes to the transformation process in East Germany. Consequently, solidarity surcharge is (also) an East German issue.
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In this section, I discuss empirical studies about media representation of East Germans and East Germany. Since the focus of my research lies on the recent period, I only discuss publications from 1999 and later, even if this reduces the scope to a handful of studies.
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national and international issues. Kolmer (2009) and Schatz (2010), who have been
monitoring the German media continuously for the past twenty years by large-scaled content analyses, confirm this finding. Additionally, Kollmorgen & Hans (2011), who studied the headlines on East German issues in five national newspapers from 1993 to 2008 by discourse analysis, find a continuous shrinking of the amount of reporting on East Germany.
While Früh et al. (1999) have no concerns about this, Kollmorgen & Hans (2011) diagnose an underrepresentation of the subject in the press, and Schatz (2010) argues that such an amount is below the threshold of the audience perception. Kolmer (2009) adds that from the mid-2000s, East Germany has played a subordinate role in routine reporting, while events and crises break this pattern.
Main topics
According to Früh et al. (1999), Kolmer (2009) and Schatz (2010), the range of topics in reports on East Germany is limited in comparison with reports on West Germany. Typical ‘Eastern issues’ are party politics, economic policy and history. Apart from politics and economics, typical ‘Western issues’ are business and sport news. Schatz (2010) reports that East German politics are only covered if it is about (the election or resignation of) political leaders; the work of region parliaments is hardly covered. The news coverage of the East German economy is at a low level (Früh et al., 1999), if not “practically non-existent as in a disaster area” (Kolmer, 2009: 205). Since positive East German issues (innovations, success stories) are barely addressed, East Germany appears rather as an object of political activity, and less as a region of active citizens and entrepreneurs.
Regarding the retrospection of GDR, Früh et al. (1999) and Kolmer (2009) report that the Stasi theme dominates the news coverage. As Kolmer (2009) states, a significant
6 has been pictured more differentiated and less critical.
Questions about the mental processing of the ‘Wende’ or a certain Eastern mentality do not occur at all in the study of Früh et al. (1999). The researchers conclude that these themes are no longer an issue for German television ten years after the fall of the Wall. Although these three studies all point in the same direction, my first research question is whether and to what extent they can be confirmed by a cross-national case study. RQ1: What are the main topics in the news coverage on East German issues in the German FAZ and the Dutch NRC, and how do they change over time?
Main actuators
According to Früh et al. (1999), East German actuators on television are particularly common in relation with the issues of unemployment, poverty, environmental issues, private tragedies, and sex. Moreover, they are shown less frequently in their professional roles, and more often as private individuals (Früh, 1999; Wedl, 2009). Schatz (2010) notes that third parties like institutions and politicians dominate economic reporting on East Germany. Früh et al. (1999) find that East Germans in political talk shows are only seen when genuine East German issues are covered, while on all-German issues only West German actuators are present.
Additionally, Früh et al. (1999: 375) find that when East Germans appear on television, in many cases the information is added what they have done during the communist era. This seems also to be true for the press in the early 1990s. Ahbe (2009), who analyzes East German discourses of four German national newspapers at the time of the ‘Wende’ in 1989/ 1990 and around its fifth anniversary in 1995, writes regarding the FAZ: “East German actuators are almost entirely followers or henchmen of the Communist Party […]. The identification of the offenders is central to the discourse in the FAZ” (Ahbe, 2009: 104). Considering the mentioning of the actuator’s nativity in the press, Wedl (2009)
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investigated the use of the colloquial terms ‘Ossi’ and ‘Wessi’ by a discourse analysis of the national weekly newspaper Die Zeit over the years 1996 to 2007. This pair of terms occurred continuously in the entire period, and in the years 2001 to 2005 even more than in the 1990s. The terms are generally not used ironically and one third of them were found on the politics pages. The use of the terms did not change during the years: West Germans are only described as ‘Wessis’ when they are on East German territory. If they are in West Germany, they do not receive this designation. East Germans, by contrast, are always called ‘Ossis’.
My second research question explores to what extent these findings can be confirmed in a cross-national study. RQ2: What are the characteristics of East German actuators in the news coverage of the German FAZ and the Dutch NRC, and how do they change over time?
Tone
Früh et al (1999) find no uniform assessment of the East or the West in television coverage; positive or negative tones are rather related to certain topics in specific East German regions. In terms of political and economical topics the researchers report that the East is evaluated worse than the West, although the negative tones exist in both. Culture and some areas of private life are evaluated positive in East German news coverage. Considering the economic coverage of East Germany, Schatz (2010) states that almost half of the reports in 2009 are evaluated negatively, offset by almost 20 percent positive reports.
For the most recent years, Kollmorgen & Hans (2011) find increasing positive and negative tones on East German issues, while neutral statements decrease. Hence there is still an overhang of negative reporting. Kolmer (2009) argues that due to the low coverage and the comparatively weak communication activities of East German institutions, the negative aspects of the media picture dominate. In short, the tone of East German topics range from balanced but slightly negative to very negative.
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If it comes to the tone in which East German actuators are evaluated by the media, the scholars’ assessments become even more ambiguous: Früh et al. (1999) report that East and West German actuators are depicted more or less the same on television, but they also stress the point that West Germans are treated balanced, and East Germans are characterized clearly negatively by the journalists, while East and West Germans themselves avoid mutual
assessments on television5 (Früh et al., 1999: 229).
To gain more clarity at this point, my third research question refers to the tone. RQ3: What is the tone in the reporting of East German issues in the German FAZ and the Dutch NRC, and how does it change over time?
Patterns in reporting
The tone of the news coverage, especially when it is related to actuators of minority versus majority groups, has been an important indicator for communication scientists to identify larger patterns in news reporting (Van Dijk, 2000).
Based on the qualitative part of their study, Früh et al. (1999) argue that television reports wherein East and West German actuators appear, thrive on the premise that the unification process is a process of assimilation of the East to the West. East Germans are represented as positive if they behave according to Western habits. This dominant
representation pattern is partially disrupted by a "sympathy for East Germanness and their resistance to unreasonable demands of the unification process, and antipathy for overly patronizing West Germans" (Früh et al., 1999: 303).
Ahbe (2009) detects a similar pattern in the FAZ in 1995. In contrast with 1989/1990, he finds that the East no longer appears as an arena of villains and heroes, but as part of a
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Even more so, the people hardly speak about each other at all, let alone talk to each other on television. Although there is no evidence of a reinforcement of East/ West clichés or East/ West conflict at this point, Früh et al. argue that this “inner-German speechlessness, even if it is only in the media” ten years after the fall of the Wall demonstrates a bad state of affairs concerning the process of inner reunification (Früh et al., 1999: 229).
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good and rational functioning system. The dramatic tone has disappeared and becomes serene, but also patronizing. The focus of the FAZ in 1995 is on the assertion of normality: “If there are problems in the East at all, they are not yet solved problems. For example, the debate about the lack of inner-German unity is described by the FAZ as a wrong diagnosis of some intellectuals, in fact there is no such problem” (Ahbe, 2009: 104-106, his emphasis).
The most sophisticated patterns are detected by Kollmorgen & Hans (2011). Based on a long-term discourse analysis, they identified five ‘topoi’6 related to East Germans:
peculiarity, weakness, burdening, nativity and progressivity/avant-garde. Four topoi are related to negative tones and passive roles and form together a hegemonic circle: peculiarity captures media representations that picture East Germans “as something special, alien, other or even exotic” (Kollmorgen & Hans, 2011: 136). Nativity (one of the topoi most occurred) counts for the cause of East German peculiarity and describes the present East Germans as former citizens of GDR, for instance as offenders, followers or victims of the communist regime. Weakness is often directly derived from a past life in GDR. On the one hand, it refers to “deficits of moral, attitude and behavior that are related to democracy and freedom” (Kollmorgen & Hans, 2011: 138). Examples would be the volatile election behavior of East Germans, xenophobia, and sympathy for neo-Nazi parties. On the other hand, it refers to the economic and social situation in East Germany, for example the higher unemployment and poverty rates or the ongoing migration from East to West Germany. Because of its
dependence on West Germany (weakness), the East is described as a burden to the West and/or to reunited Germany. Here the circle is closing: burdening again intensifies the perception of East Germans as peculiar people and dissenters (Kollmorgen & Hans, 2011: 139). Fortunately, the topos of progressivity/avant-garde has been established in the German
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“A topos is a pattern of thinking, meaning or argumentation that embeds concrete verbal expressions of facts in plausible conclusions and substantiations. As such, it is characterized by its use of symbols, its habitual and ideological anchoring in collective knowledge, […] and its historical development in the context of societal and group-dynamic conditions and power relations” (Kollmorgen & Hans, 2011: 125).
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press in the middle of the 2000s. It corresponds with positive tones and reverses the East German peculiarity into experimental openness for new ways: ‘East Germanness’ is represented as a value of its own (and not as the antagonist of ‘West Germanness’).
Framing East German issues
In recent years the concept of framing has become of greater interest among media scholars. Although there is a lot of debate about what framing is, a widely accepted definition is provided by Entman: “To frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/ or treatment recommendation for the item described” (Entman, 1993: 52). The framing approach has been particularly useful to study the media representation of race, ethnicity and other minority aspects (for example Hall, 2000; Poindexter, 2003; Miller & Ross, 2004). Although East Germans are not to be defined as an ethnic entity (Den Hertog, 2004), they form a minority that is likely to be framed by the media along the same line, that is, stereotypical (under)representation (Hodkinson, 2011). Against this background it is striking that none of the existing studies on East German media representation so far makes use of empirical frame analysis to identify patterns of news reporting7. To bridge this gap I address a forth research question.
RQ4: Can meaningful East German frames be empirically generated from the German FAZ and the Dutch NRC, and if so, what kind of frames emerge?
7
For example, Kolmer (2009) and Schatz (2010) refer directly, but loosely, to the framing approach without applying it methodically. Früh et al. (1999) add a qualitative part to their content analysis which is merely based on systematic observation. Ahbe (2009) and Kollmorgen & Hans (2011) follow the discourse-analytical approach and methods to detect patterns, respectively ‘topoi’.
11 Methods
To answer the research questions I conduct a longitudinal comparative content analysis of a German and a Dutch newspaper.
Material
In this case study, following a most-similar design, the German Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and the Dutch NRC Handelsblad are compared. Both are nationally distributed daily quality papers with strong publication rates. In international communication science, both are considered to be liberal, if not on the centre-right of the political spectrum.
The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) sold 316,000 print copies on a daily basis in the first quarter of 2014 (FAZ Unternehmen). This corresponds to a range of approximately 1 million readers (IfM Mediendatenbank). It is known to be one of Germany’s opinion leader media outlets at home and abroad.
NRC Handelsblad (NRC) currently sells 202,700 online and print editions daily and reaches 495,000 people (NRC media). Its target group are 35 and older with high social status (NRC media). NRC is regarded as an important opinion leading medium in its country.
Sampling
In order to examine the East German news coverage over time, the population of newspaper articles is taken from August 1999 to December 2010. Three time intervals are constructed to mirror the most recent major anniversaries of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification. A stratified random sample is drawn through online archives which produced 208 articles in total, 122 from FAZ and 86 from NRC. A detailed description of the sampling procedure can be found in Appendix I.
12 Codebook
Before coding the articles, a codebook (see Appendix II) was created that could be applied to conduct a cluster analysis of frame elements following an approach of Matthes & Kohring (2008). Their cluster analysis is based on the four elements that, according to Entman (1993), form a media frame: problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and treatment recommendation. Based on these core elements, categories were formed.
The first one, problem definition, is operationalized in three variables: the place where the news story takes place, the topic of the problem and the actuators. Due to the complex issue of East Germany and its people, I decided on an extended category system (loosely based on Früh et al., 1999) that would also capture nuances in news reporting. In addition to classical topic categories like politics, economics, social welfare, et cetera, it contains codes which are typical for East Germany. For example: GDR history, Dealing with the Stasi, Reconstruction aid, Migration to Western Germany, or Personal life consequences from the ‘Wende’. There are also categories which measure the East/ West relationship of the Germans (stereotypes, conflict et cetera).
The second core category, causal interpretation, measures whether the cause of the problem was identified. Among various actuators and situations, East Germans and West Germans are listed as possible causes. The third core category, moral evaluation, was created to measure the tone of the coverage. In the final core category, treatment recommendations, it was coded whether and to whom or what advice was given to solve the problem (to certain actuators, institutions or state of affairs).
Coding process
The coding was done by one coder (the researcher) and proceeded in three phases: during the first phase, a smaller part of the body of articles was studied carefully in order to refine the
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categories and codes. From this a definitive codebook was created. Due to the selection of articles longer than 400 words, many pieces discuss several themes in detail. On this account, each new main topic or theme introduced in an article was coded as a new case (unit of analysis). To identify the theme units, I used a combination of ‘item’ and ‘paragraph’ elements as Berg (2011: 349) suggests. In total, 420 text units were identified.
The second phase was the actual coding process in which the data obtained was entered in the data processing program SPSS 20.
During the third phase, the data were recoded: after a first frequency analysis of all existing codes, most codes in the data set were below a threshold of 5 percent. In this very differentiated form, they were useless for further statistical procedures. Therefore,
thematically similar codes were put together. In addition, some codes did not occur, which were then combined into a larger category ‘Other topics’. The details of the recoding are in Table 1 in Appendix III.
Analyses
To answer RQ1 to 3, I make use of descriptive statistics, while RQ4 will be answered by a hierarchical cluster analyses that follows the approach of Matthes & Kohring (2008). As the researchers, I am interested in gaining media frames (or clusters) empirically from the material (and not testing predefined frames on the material).
For every category in the data set that occurred with frequencies higher than 4 percent a binary variable was computed. Matthes & Kohring recommend a threshold of 5 percent in order to avoid very low frequencies in the clusters to be formed (2008: 268). After viewing my data, however, only approximately 53 percent of the topic categories met this requirement. With a threshold of 4 percent I was able to raise the input of the topic variable to
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The variable Treatment recommendation (representing one of the four elements of a media frame) is excluded from the cluster analysis (for further discussion see result section). All variables included in the cluster analysis are presented in Table 1, Appendix V.
Results
In general, the news reporting of FAZ and NRC on East German issues is very diverse and covers a broad range of topics and actuators. Consequently, the frequencies presented are rather low for the entire sample. To combine these in crosstabs and/or zoom into certain aspects led in many cases to cell counts less than 5. Consequently, none of the results
produced by descriptive analysis can be tested for significance. The statements I make in the following sections are not to generalize for the entire population of the coverage of FAZ and NRC on East German issues, but represent micro-trends within the sample. Nevertheless they are relevant as a preliminary step to detect media frames8.
Amount of media attention
Although not specifically raised as a research question, I noticed a profound difference in the amount of news coverage about East German topics in both national subsamples from the first stage of sampling (see Appendix I, Table 1). NRC has roughly one tenth of the number of articles the FAZ devotes to the topic. Obviously for the German FAZ it is an important issue, even if the reporting in the research period decreases continuously from 372 articles in the fall of 1999 to 121 in the fall of 2010. This trend is consistent with the finding of Kollmorgen & Hans (2011). The small amounts the Dutch NRC devotes to the matter could be an indication that East German issues are ‘just’ another aspect of foreign news reporting to NRC. The
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For readability, I avoid the citation of the standard errors and /or confidence intervals in the results of descriptive analyses. Instead I restrict to the percentages and the numbers on which they are based on. This information is sufficient to infer the standard error, if necessary.
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falling trend is here, albeit at a much lower level, as noticeable as in the FAZ. The only exception is in year 2009. NRC’s news coverage starts with 34 articles in the 10th year after the ‘Wende’, but has its highest point with 41 articles in the 20th
year after the ‘Wende’9.
Main topics
In the entire sample (N = 420), approximately one third of the total news coverage on East German issues is devoted to pure political (10%), economical (9.3%), social (2.6%) and cultural topics (8.3%). Due to the fact that I analyze the coverage around anniversaries, a rather large topic (17.4 %) is history of GDR and the ‘Wende’ in 1989/ 1990. The rest of the reporting covers various special East German aspects, for example, dealing with GDR crimes/ Stasi (5.5%), unemployment and low standard of living (6.2%), right wing extremism (5.2%), but also topics which Früh et al. (1999) missed in the television coverage of the late 1990s: the individual impact that the ‘Wende’ had on people’s lives (4.5%) and the relatively large topic of the East/ West relationship and the ‘inner’ reunification (16.9%).
Comparing FAZ (N = 243) (Figure 1.1) and NRC (N = 177) (Figure 1.2) reveals that East German economy (12.8%) and politics (11.1%) have higher amounts in FAZ than in NRC (4.5% respectively 8.5%). This could be a first indication for national priorities in news selection: To a German newspaper these subjects are part of the national agenda, to a Dutch newspaper they may lack relevance.
9 This exception can possibly be attributed to a large-scale ‘Wende’ festival that took place during the whole
month of November 2009 in Amsterdam with numerous cultural institutions, artists and media involved. In this case, it is likely that domestic and foreign news factors reinforced each other.
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However, NRC reports more often (10.7%) on East German culture than FAZ (6.6%), and it often combines reviewing a novel or movie with reporting on the situation in the East. In fact, its journalists seem to use this cultural input as a benchmark for understanding East German life. This might be a result of event reporting on the occasion of a ‘Wende’ anniversary (long, retrospective pieces featuring various subjects on the matter). But it could also point to the outsider perspective of foreign news reports.
The most striking difference between the two newspapers is the historical coverage of the GDR and the fall of the regime in 1989/1990: while this topic occurs in FAZ in only 8.6 percent of the cases, it occurs almost 30 percent in NRC. This could be attributed to a lack of creativity of a foreign news desk, meaning that historical anniversary periods are covered from the obvious historical point of view. Or, the former GDR might be of special interest to NRC readers. Also the related topic of how to deal with Stasi crimes occurs frequently in NRC (9.6%). It remains newsworthy for a Dutch newspaper, while FAZ (2.5%) seems to be more or less finished with this subject.
Similarly, current East German issues like unemployment, migration to West Germany or right wing extremism are more frequently discussed in FAZ than in NRC.
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In the FAZ, the main topics Economy, Dealing with the Stasi, and East/West relationship have higher frequencies in the periods 1999/2000 and 2009/2010 than in 2004/2005 (U-shape, Figure 2.1). The reverse pattern, frequencies relatively low for the 10th and 20th ‘Wende’ anniversary and high for the 15th anniversary, applies on Unemployment and Personal ‘Wende’ consequences. There is a declining trend for Politics, GDR history, Right wing extremism and Reconstruction/aid, while the subjects Economy, Social affairs, Culture and Migration to West Germany/demographic change occur more often over time.
Main topics in NRC over time (Figure 2.2) meet the U-shape for the subjects History of GDR/ ‘Wende’, Dealing with the Stasi, and Personal ‘Wende’ consequences, and, at a lower level, Social affairs and Right wing extremism, while the reversed pattern applies for Politics, Reconstruction/aid and Unemployment. A declining trend is found at the subjects Economy and East/West relationship, an upward trend only at Migration to West/demographic change. The U-shaped and the reversed pattern suggest that the major anniversaries (10 and 20 years after the ‘Wende’), are held by the editors to be more important than the minor
anniversary 15 years after. Yet it seems not to matter how long ago the historic event took place. For example, FAZ reports more frequently on the East/West relationship in 2009/2010 than in 1999/2000. The latter could be an indicator that the inner unification process, at least
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in the press, remains a subject of public negotiation. For other issues such as Unemployment and Migration to the West, both the newspapers are more likely to follow the external agenda: in 2004/2005 they report frequently about East German mass protests against the so-called Hartz IV reform of unemployment benefits. The effects of migration and demographic change on the East German society were gradual, so it is likely that the press would cover it more frequently in the recent years.
East/West relationship
With 71 text units (16.9 percent of the total coverage) the East/West relationship is one of the two largest topics. FAZ devoted 20.2 percent of its total coverage to it, NRC 12.4 percent. Table 1 in Appendix IV shows that there are no West German stereotypes and mentality aspects detected in the sample. In contrast, East German stereotypes do occur, but only in 3 cases (all in FAZ); an East German mentality is detected in 12 cases (mostly in NRC).
FAZ reports (N = 49) are relatively balanced concerning the relationship between East and West Germans, as they cover (more negative evaluated) East German stereotypes in the same frequency as (more positively evaluated) East German mentalities. They cover equally the aspects dialogue and conflict between East and West Germans. Both aspects do not occur before the research period of 2004/2005. To 2009/2010, the frequencies of conflict decreases, while dialogue increases. If the amounts were not that small, this could be interpreted as a relaxation of East/West German relations in the coverage of FAZ over recent years. Most frequently (in 15 cases), FAZ reports on the worse situation of East Germany compared to West Germany. Over time, this subject shows an U-shape with the most reports in 2009/2010. From 2004/2005 on, however, there are also reports in FAZ about the better situation of the East compared to the West. In addition, the FAZ discusses a greater range of topics than NRC (as can be seen in the relatively large category ‘Other’).
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In contrast, the NRC (N = 22) hardly covers aspects of an East/West comparison, and if so, then rather in the sense of equality10. However, it reports much more about the conflict between East and West Germans (8 text units) than about a dialogue (1 text unit). Seen over time, this is a clear decreasing trend from 5 conflict-related text units in 1999/2000 to 1 in 2009/2010. Unlike FAZ, NRC does not report on stereotypes at all, but more on East German mentality (9 text units). However, this aspect occurs most frequently (5 text units) in
1999/2000, after which it remains at the low level of 2 text units. Also the range of covered aspects within the topic East/West relationship is very limited in comparison with the FAZ.
Retrospection of GDR/‘Wende’
73 text units (17.4 percent of the total coverage) deal with the other large topic, History of GDR/ ‘Wende’. In the FAZ 8.6 percent of the total coverage is devoted to it, in the NRC 29.9 percent. Table 2 in Appendix IV shows that NRC covers a broader range of aspects than FAZ. Over time, both newspapers have peaks around the 10th and the 20th ‘Wende’ anniversaries. When the FAZ (N = 21) reports on history it focuses on the events of 1989 and 1990. It devotes slightly more text units to the reunification (5) than to the revolution (4). Apart from everyday life in GDR (Other GDR history), 4 cases are about historical aspects of the former FRG and GDR. Although these counts are too small to generalize, they read like a continuation of the pattern that Ahbe (2009) found in the coverage of the FAZ in the early 1990's: The emphasis is not on East Germany as such, but on its integration in the (West) German system or what it meant to the ‘old’ FRG; in short, it’s a West German perspective. In contrast, NRC (N = 52) devotes more text units on the history of the revolution (15) than on the reunification (4). In addition, various aspects of GDR are depicted, and the category
10 The topic code ‘East/West are equal’ is a merged category, i.a. it contains the original codes ‘East has adapted
to West’ and ‘West has adapted to East’. Not surprisingly, the latter aspect was not present in the sample. In this respect, this category represents rather the West German perspective, that is, the situation between East and West is called ‘equal’ when the East has adapted to West German standards (and not vice versa).
20
Other history (everyday life) is proportionally slightly larger than in FAZ. It seems that NRC likes to explore East German issues more or less independently from their West German reference frame. Furthermore, NRC reports more than FAZ on commemorative aspects as GDR museums (one of them even located in the Netherlands) and anniversary celebrations. This could be attributed to the outsider position of the NRC. For example, to Dutch journalists and their readers, GDR artifacts in a museum are vehicles to get an understanding, while FAZ journalists and their readers might not necessarily need them.
Actuators
In the news coverage on East German issues (N = 420), actuators consist of approximately 38 percent Germans, 35 percent East Germans, 11 percent other nationalities than Dutch11, 10 percent West Germans and 6 percent Dutch people (the latter only in NRC).
Actuators in the FAZ (N = 243) are 25.5 percent East German, 12.3 percent West German, 51 percent Germans without an explicit East/ West affiliation and 11.1 percent foreign (no Dutch actuators), see Figure 3.1. The relatively large frequency of German actuators - ostensible
11
Actuators of foreign nativity other than Dutch occur in the sample because the four Allies played an important role in the reunification process (related to the relatively large category History of GDR/ ‘Wende’). In addition, there are a lot of foreign investors involved in the East German economy which is reflected in the coverage of economic topics.
21
neutral people12 - is hard to interpret: it could mean that when FAZ reports on East German issues, it prefers to treat the people involved as much as possible as ‘just’ German. (In the data, this is particularly true for the topic East/West relationship.) However, the frequencies for East and West German actuators increase over time, while the frequencies of German actuators decrease. This could mean that the distinction between East and West German nativity becomes more important to the FAZ over time (Figure 4.1).
In contrast, actuators in the NRC (N = 177) are 47.5 percent East German, 6.8 percent West German, 19.8 percent Germans without an explicit East/ West affiliation, 15.3 Dutch and 10.7 percent foreign, see Figure 3.2. Apart from the Dutch actuators involved, the relatively high rates of East German actuators are striking. At first glance, NRC seems to let East Germans speak and act much more for themselves than FAZ does. Hence, over time (see Figure 4.2), there is an U-shaped, but decreasing pattern for East German and German actuators. Since one third of the stories in NRC are devoted to the history of GDR and ‘Wende’, and one can hardly report on this without depicting the people who caused the historical events, NRC’s
12
It is not clear to which extent original East and West German actuators are presented as German by the press. While coding the material, I got the impression that West German actuators are indeed more often labeled as German, while East German actuators are labeled as East German, as Wedl (2009) concludes in her study. However, the chosen design of this thesis does not allow to test it.
22 focus on East German actuators is less impressive.
In FAZ, East German actuators (N = 62) appear more or less equally in low frequencies in most of the topic categories: approximately 14 percent in Politics, each 13 percent in Economy and East/West relationships, 10 percent each in Culture, History of GDR/ ‘Wende’ and Unemployment. West German actuators (N = 30) appear most in East/ West relationships (37%), probably because in this topic journalists cannot completely avoid labeling people by their nativity. At the same time, German actuators (N = 124) appear most in this category (23%), followed by Politics (14%) and Unemployment (11%). As already mentioned before this could mean, for example, that FAZ treats unemployed East Germans more or less neutrally by addressing them as ‘just’ Germans. Hence, a closer look on the topic category Unemployment in FAZ (N = 22) (Appendix IV, Table 3) suggests otherwise:
German actuators related to unemployment are politicians, businessmen, social workers, et cetra13 who are often in charge of solving the problem, and, whether they are originally East or West Germans, are not labeled by their nativity. Even if the counts are much too small to speak of a trend, this could mean that weaker people in East Germany (as the poor or the unemployed) are rather to be labeled by the FAZ as East Germans, while those who rule the East German society, are depicted as Germans.
In NRC, East German actuators (N = 84) appear most frequently in the topic categories History of GDR/ Wende (30%), Dealing with the Stasi (12%) and East/ West relationships (12%). West German actuators (N = 12) appear hardly at all, and if, then half of them occur in East/ West relationships. German (N = 35) and Dutch actuators (N = 27) appear in lower frequencies in all topic categories, but most frequently in the historical topics.
13
For reasons of space, I do without a detailed description of the functional roles of the actuators. In general, the functional role in which an actuator appears is consistent with the topic of the text unit (political actuators appear most in Politics and so on). East Germans in FAZ (N = 243) appear most frequently as political professionals (27.4%), private persons (24.2%) and economic professionals (16.1%), while in NRC (N = 177) they appear most frequently in cultural roles (35.7%). These are not only artists, but also historians commenting on East German issues (see code book in Appendix II). Furthermore, East Germans appear in NRC as historical persons (19%), private persons (19%) and political professionals (14.3%).
23
In the late 1990s, East Germans on German television were often depicted with information about their GDR past (Früh et al., 1999). This does not apply for my sample of the
newspapers FAZ and NRC (Table 4, Appendix IV). From the late 1990s on, 93.5 percent of all East German actuators in the FAZ (N = 62) are not brought into connection with their relation with the former GDR regime. Since Ahbe (2009) had been found a dominant FAZ discourse on the (perpetrator) roles of GDR citizens in the early 1990s, this result supports the argument that the FAZ is more or less finished with the topic of GDR past.
In contrast, the NRC (N= 84) emphasizes this regime connection in almost half of the cases. It focuses mostly on the initiatives of the ‘Wende’, the former GDR oppositionists (26.2%). They mainly appear in the topic categories History of GDR/ ‘Wende’, Dealing with the Stasi and Personal ‘Wende’ consequences.
Moral evaluation (tone)
Overall, reporting (N= 420) is very balanced: text units that are neutral of tone (or contain the same amount of positive and negative evaluations) predominate with 60 percent. Positive evaluations account for 21 percent, negative evaluations for 19 percent. A negative overhang as found by several scholars cannot be confirmed by my data. On the contrary, the positive evaluations slightly outweigh the negative in both newspapers: FAZ (N = 243) evaluates approximately 25 percent of the East German issues positively, 22 percent negatively and 53 percent neutrally, while the NRC (N = 177) evaluates approximately 16 percent positively, 15 percent negatively and 69 percent neutrally. Over time (see Figure 5.1), positive evaluations in the FAZ are slightly increasing with a peak in 2009/2010, while negative evaluations are slightly decreasing. Neutral evaluations occur most frequently in 2004/2005. In NRC (see Figure 5.2), the U-shaped pattern for positive and neutral tones, and the reversed pattern for negative tones is corresponding with the high emphasis on historical topics.
24
Concerning the main topics, FAZ reports rather positive/neutral on Economy, Culture and Personal consequences from the ‘Wende’, and neutral/negative on Politics, Dealing with the Stasi, Unemployment and Migration to the West/demographic change. Neutral tones
dominate the coverage of GDR/‘Wende’ history, Right wing extremism, and East/West relationship (see Figure 6.1).
Since NRC reports in general more neutrally, there is no topic in which the positive tones outweigh the neutral tones (as in FAZ). NRC is rather neutral/positive on Politics, Economy, GDR/‘Wende’ history, Personal ‘Wende’ consequences and East/West
relationship. It is rather negative/neutral on Unemployment and Migration to the West, and neutral on Dealing with the Stasi and Right wing extremism (see Figure 6.2).
FAZ and NRC do not differ much in their evaluations of the two largest main topics GDR/ ‘Wende’ history and East/West relationship. Both newspapers evaluate the revolution of 1989 slightly more positive/neutral than the reunification. East German stereotypes and the East/West conflict are evaluated negative/neutral, and East German mentality and East/West dialogue rather positive/neutral.
Concerning the actuators, in both subsamples East German actuators were evaluated most frequently in a neutral way, and apart from that, also slightly more positive than negative (see Figures 7.1 and 7.2). However, in the FAZ (N = 62) positive (25.8%) and negative
25
(24.2%) evaluations of East Germans are more or less in balance, while East Germans in NRC (N = 84) are clearly evaluated more positively (17.9%) than negatively (11.9%).
Over time, FAZ turns from a mostly negative tone on East Germans in 1999/2000 to a mostly neutral/positive tone from 2004/2005 on, while for NRC there are no major changes. In addition, West Germans in FAZ (N = 30) are evaluated rather positively (30%) than negatively (13%), while they hardly occur at all in NRC (N = 12), and if so, then mostly negatively (25%). Germans without East or West affiliation are evaluated by the domestic FAZ rather in a neutral/negative way, while outsider NRC goes for a neutral/positive approach.
26 Causal interpretation and treatment recommendation
Regarding the causes of a problem described in the coverage of both newspapers (N = 420), in one quarter of the cases there is no causal interpretation made, and in approximately 15
percent of the cases more than one actuator or situation are held responsible. The largest causes mentioned in FAZ (N = 243) are 22 percent politicians and 14 percent East Germans, while in NRC (N = 177) 21 percent are the historical situation and 12 percent East Germans. In both newspapers, the politicians are evaluated in a neutral/negative way, and the historical situation held responsible in a rather neutral tone. East Germans held responsible are
evaluated positively/neutrally by the FAZ (especially in text units on the East/West relationship), and neutrally/positively by the NRC.
Most story units (94%, N = 420) do not mention a consequence or treatment
recommendation. This might be due to the fact that journalists in general tend to observe and describe a situation rather than looking for a solution. If they do so, they do not address East or West Germans specifically. More typically, the recommendations address politicians (2%).
Media frames
A hierarchical cluster analysis using Ward’s linkage is run on 420 cases, each responding to items on the problem definition (place, main topic, main actuators), causal interpretation and moral evaluation (tone). The number of clusters is determined by the dendrogram (the plot of the heterogeneity measures) and by checking all competing cluster solutions in terms of interpretability and clarity.
According to the dendogram, a three-cluster or a four-cluster solution could be the most appropriate. After examining both of them closely, the four-cluster solution remained as the most clear and interpretable. Table 1 reports the mean values and standard deviations of all variables per cluster.
27
Table 1. Means and Standard Deviations per Variable per Frame
GDR storytelling (N = 127) Economic misery (N = 107) Booming East (N = 95) Political ‘Wende’ (N = 91)
Problem Place: East Germany 0.59 (0.49)* 0.50 (0.50) 0.81 (0.39)* 0.44 (0.50)
definition Place: Equally East/West& Berlin 0.09 (0.29) 0.48 (0.50) 0.12 (0.32) 0.45 (0.50)*
Place: Not applicable 0.20 (0.40)* 0.01 (0.09) 0.02 (0.14) 0.03 (0.18)
Topic: History of the ‘Wende’ 0.04 (0.19) 0.02 (0.13) 0.07 (0.26) 0.23 (0.42)*
Topic: Other GDR history 0.17 (0.37)* 0.04 (0.19) 0.03 (0.17) 0.03 (0.18)
Topic: Dealing with Stasi 0.06 (0.24) 0.05 (0.21) 0.01 (0.10) 0.10 (0.30)*
Topic: Party politics 0.00 (0.00) 0.02 (0.13) 0.12 (0.32)* 0.21 (0.41)*
Topic: Right wing extremism 0.06 (0.24) 0.06 (0.23) 0.01 (0.10) 0.08 (0.27)*
Topic: Entrepreneurs investing 0.00 (0.00) 0.04 (0.19) 0.15 (0.35)* 0.00 (0.00)
Topic: Unemployment 0.03 (0.17) 0.10 (0.30)* 0.09 (0.29) 0.02 (0.14)
Topic: Economic development 0.02 (0.12) 0.09 (0.29)* 0.08 (0.28)* 0.01 (0.10)
Topic: East German culture 0.22 (0.42)* 0.03 (0.16) 0.04 (0.20) 0.00 (0.00)
Topic: ‘Wende’ consequences 0.09 (0.28)* 0.01 (0.09) 0.07 (0.26) 0.00 (0.00)
Topic: Stereotypes & conflict 0.04 (0.19) 0.05 (0.21) 0.02 (0.14) 0.05 (0.23) Topic: Mentality & dialogue 0.06 (0.23) 0.05 (0.21) 0.06 (0.24) 0.01 (0.10) Actuator nativity: East German 0.61 (0.49)* 0.10 (0.30) 0.34 (0.47)* 0.27 (0.45)* Actuator nativity: West German 0.07 (0.26) 0.21 (0.41)* 0.17 (0.37) 0.13 (0.34)
Actuator nativity: German 0.16 (0.36) 0.70 (0.46)* 0.42 (0.49)* 0.57 (0.50)*
Actuator nativity: Dutch 0.17 (0.37) 0.03 (0.16) 0.00 (0.00) 0.05 (0.23)
Actuator nativity: Other nativity 0.06 (0.24) 0.12 (0.33) 0.17 (0.37)* 0.10 (0.30) Actuator position: Individual 0.94 (023)* 0.55 (0.50) 0.89 (0.30)* 0.96 (0.20)*
Actuator position: Group 0.20 (0.40) 0.79 (0.40)* 0.46 (0.50) 0.34 (0.47)
Actuator function: Historical 0.17 (0.38)* 0.01 (0.09) 0.12 (0.32) 0.29 (0.45)* Actuator function: Political/ law 0.00 (0.00) 0.02 (0.13) 0.26 (0.44)* 0.67 (0.47)* Actuator function: Economical 0.05 (0.21) 0.36 (0.48)* 0.36 (0.48)* 0.01 (0.10)
Actuator function: Social 0.12 (0.32) 0.24 (0.43)* 0.04 (0.20) 0.02 (0.14)
Actuator function: Cultural 0.68 (0.47)* 0.07 (0.25) 0.13 (0.33) 0.07 (0.25)
Actuator function: Interest group 0.06 (0.23) 0.10 (0.30) 0.06 (0.24) 0.02 (0.14) Actuator function: Private realm 0.18 (0.39)* 0.41 (0.49)* 0.16 (0.36) 0.05 (0.23)
Causal Cause: East Germans 0.14 (0.35) 0.08 (0.28) 0.28 (0.45)* 0.02 (0.14)
Interpr. Cause: Politicians 0.01 (0.89) 0.02 (0.13) 0.26 (0.44)* 0.43 (0.50)*
(responsi- Cause: Historical situation 0.25 (0.43)* 0.09 (0.29) 0.02 (0.14) 0.07 (0.25)
bility) Cause: Economical circumstances 0.02 (0.15) 0.12 (0.33)* 0.06 (0.24) 0.03 (0.18)
Cause: Other/ several act. or sit. 0.17 (0.37) 0.27 (0.44)* 0.08 (0.28) 0.10 (0.30)
Cause: No responsibility 0.28 (0.45)* 0.28 (0.45)* 0.16 (0.36) 0.23 (0.42)*
Moral Moral evaluation: positive 0.09 (0.29) 0.07 (0.26) 0.69 (0.46)* 0.02 (0.14)
evaluation Moral evaluation: neutral 0.66 (0.47)* 0.79 (0.40)* 0.00 (0.00) 0.92 (0.27)*
(tone) Moral evaluation: negative 0.24 (0.43)* 0.13 (0.34) 0.31 (0.46) 0.05 (0.23)
28
The largest cluster (30 percent of the news coverage) is called GDR storytelling. This frame is characterized by the topics East German culture, GDR history, and personal consequences from the ‘Wende’. East German individuals appear in a cultural role (artists, writers, historians and other scientists), as ordinary people (private realm) and as historical persons. The scene of events is mostly a place in East Germany and partly not detectable; in most cases there is no responsibility mentioned, and if so, then the historical situation of the divided Germanys is held responsible. The tone in this frame is mostly neutral and partly negative. Text units within this frame discuss either contemporary East German literature, theater, fine arts, sports and media, or GDR history, or, because cultural expressions often reflect on one’s identity, they combine both aspects. For one part, articles containing this frame are reviews on cultural products, so the slightly negative tone reflects critical judgments by journalists. Text units about GDR history are partly negative of tone because the author and/or the quoted East Germans are negative about certain aspects of GDR (i.e. the repressive state). Hence, an important characteristic of this frame is that it contains an East German point of view. The smallest cluster (22 percent of the news coverage) deals also with history, but from a different angle: the Political ‘Wende’ frame is characterized by the topics History of the revolution of 1989 and reunification of 1990, Party politics and Dealing with GDR crimes/ Stasi. The events take slightly more place in Berlin (the political centre of Germany) than in East Germany. Mainly German, but also East German individuals appear as politicians or political experts, and as historical persons. If there is any mention of responsibility, politicians are held responsible. The tone of the text units in this frame is overwhelmingly neutral.
Interestingly, in this frame the history of the peaceful revolution and the reunification are mainly reflected as a political act (and not as a liberation act caused by East German people). This could be attributed to the fact that in each of the three chosen sampling periods there were also elections of the German national and state parliaments. Text units within this frame
29
contain many statements from politicians of several parties not only on East German issues (for example, right wing extremism), but also on what certain politicians or parties did or did not do to effect a smooth reunification in 1990. This frame represents mainly the political debate about the reunification process as an economical failure or success story. The overwhelmingly neutral approach identified simply indicates that the newspapers report the same amount of negative and positive political statements in one text unit; nevertheless, the debate is highly polarized in these cases.
The second largest cluster (25% of the news coverage) is called the Economic misery frame. It refers to the problem of high unemployment rates and the stagnant general economic development in East Germany. Germans14 and West Germans appear as groups of private citizens, businessmen, companies and financial experts as well as social institutions. If there is a responsibility mentioned, then several actuators or situations are called, or, to a lesser
extent, the economical circumstances are held responsible. The tone of this frame is mostly neutral and only slightly negative because there are many, often statistical, reports on the state of affairs in the sample. It is also possible that, in the meantime, these long-term problems are perceived as the new normality and therefore addressed in a more neutral, matter-of-fact way. Another cluster that deals with economic aspects (23 percent of the news coverage) is called the Booming East frame. It is characterized by entrepreneurs and companies investing in East Germany, party politics and general economical development. Mostly individual Germans, but also East Germans and foreigners appear as business people, economists and politicians. The tone within this frame is mainly positive, and sometimes negative, but never neutral. For the most part, East Germans and also politicians are held responsible. Text units within this frame report either on the joint efforts of politicians and (mainly foreign) investors to create jobs in the East, or on successful East German entrepreneurs who have worked hard
14 As discussed before, the category of German actuators is highly ambiguous. In the context of this frame it is
likely that a German group partly manifests as an expert institution (for example, Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung Halle), and partly as a anonymous mass of unemployed people.
30
to found small new businesses. The positive evaluation of these East Germans is slightly accompanied by East German mentality aspects. This is similar to Kollmorgen & Hans’ (2011) topos of progressivity/avant-garde.
Consistently with the descriptive results, FAZ and NRC adapt the four frames
differently: 33 percent of the news coverage in FAZ (N = 243) is framed as Economic misery, 29 percent as Booming East, 21 percent as Political ‘Wende’ and 17 percent as GDR
storytelling. In NRC (N = 177), the GDR storytelling frame dominates with 49 percent of the news coverage, followed by the frame of Political ‘Wende’ (23%), Economic misery (15%) and Booming East (13%). A chi-square test shows that these differences are significant (Chi² = 57.83, df = 3, p = .000). Between 1999 and 2009, the frames Economic misery and
Booming East show an increasing trend in the FAZ, while GDR storytelling shows an U-shape and Political ‘Wende’ is decreasing. In NRC the frames GDR storytelling, Political ‘Wende’ and Economic misery show an shape, while Booming East shows the reversed U-shape. All the differences per newspaper and period are not significant at the 5% level (Chi² = 10.84, df = 6, p = .093).
The descriptive results of the FAZ and NRC are so dissimilar that it is likely that each of the newspapers uses different frame sets. That’s why I conducted two additional separate cluster analyses for the newspapers. However, the (combinations of) clusters emerged did not profoundly differ from the four frames I identified in the entire sample. From this one can conclude that, at least in this case study, a domestic and a foreign newspaper make use of the same frames, albeit to varying degrees.
Conclusion and discussion
The aim of this thesis was to explore how a German and a Dutch newspaper cover East German issues since the 10th anniversary of the peaceful revolution in 1999. The comparative
31
content analysis of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and NRC Handelsblad showed that the domestic FAZ focuses mainly on political and economic topics and on the relationship between East and West Germans, while the foreign NRC concentrates on the retrospective of GDR and the ‘Wende’.
Four significant frames could be generated from the material by cluster analyses: Economic misery and Booming East prevail in the FAZ, while GDR storytelling and Political ‘Wende’ predominate in the NRC. Since these frames appear cross-nationally and in the entire research period, they more or less confirm what is already known from the literature and add to it by specifying the knowledge about the coverage of historical aspects. Limited as the frames are by various methodical shortcomings, they can still be used as a starting point for further framing analysis on the matter.
Since the transformation process of East Germany is mainly about economic
development prompted by politics, it is not surprising that the FAZ focuses on that. However, the picture of East Germany as a social-economic crisis region described by Kolmer (2009) and Schatz (2010), is only partly true for my study: The frame of Economic misery agrees more or less with their findings, but the smaller positive Booming East frame contradicts them. Moreover, East Germans appear here – similar to Kollmorgen & Hans’ (2011) topos of progressivity – as professionals who take responsibility for their own situation.
While Früh (1999) and Kolmer (2009) found historical topics, the Stasi in particular, very present in the German news coverage over time, my results suggests that the FAZ is more or less finished with it. In contrast, the frames GDR storytelling and Political ‘Wende’ account for almost three quarters of NRC’s coverage. In the complete absence of research, we can only speculate about the reasons: a special interest in GDR history, a result of event reporting (in periods around the anniversaries), or the view of an outsider who has a cultural perspective. The latter is supported by the fact that the GDR storytelling frame thrives on East
32
German actuators. Even if this is inherent to the topic, the bottom line seems to be that the Dutch NRC puts an emphasis on East German nativity (in the sense of an independent identity), while the FAZ has only limited use for such an approach. However, it remains unclear whether NRC is a special case within the foreign news reporting on East German issues or not. In order to draw stronger conclusions from a comparison between domestic and foreign media, future research should study newspapers from several countries, and during periods of routine reporting instead of major anniversaries.
With regard to the media representation of East German people, the results found are ambiguous: the FAZ reports describe more German than East German actuators. If these Germans are indeed West Germans in disguise (as Wedl’s results would suggest), than the notion of Ahbe (2009) could be confirmed by my results: In that case, the FAZ still reports from a mostly West German perspective on East German issues. If these Germans are East Germans, that could mean that it is not relevant for the FAZ anymore to emphasize the East German nativity of the actuators. In this case, Wedl’s notion (‘an East German is always an East German’) must be adjusted. From my results, I would suggest the following working hypothesis for further research: East Germans are only called East Germans by the media if they are in a very weak role (i.e. the unemployed) or if they are very successful (i.e.
entrepreneurs), while in the majority of situations, they are attributed as Germans. However, it is obvious that further research is better served by clarifying the use of the term ‘German’ in the coverage of East German issues than by leaning on the terms ‘East’ and ‘West’ German. Contrarily to the findings of Kolmer (2009) and Schatz (2010), but in line with Früh et al. (1999), I found no overhang of negative evaluations in my case study; rather the tone of the reporting was highly balanced. While the domestic FAZ reports mostly neutrally and, to a lower extent, equally positive and negative, the outsider NRC is remarkably neutral. In this sense, one could argue that the foreign NRC indeed reports more open-minded on East
33
German issues than the domestic FAZ. As mentioned earlier, there are methodical limitations to this interpretation. Moreover, measuring tone is a very subjective matter. Since I
investigated a newspaper that is also studied by Ahble (2009), Kolmer (2009) and Schatz (2010) for the same research period, I attribute the differences between our results merely to the methodical differences and the subjectivity of the concept ‘tone’.
Apart from the methodical shortcomings mentioned so far, I will not go into further detail because sampling deficiencies are already discussed in Appendix I. In general, the study suffers from the operationalization into too small variables (see original codebook).
Consequently, the recoding was not always satisfactory. Moreover, a cluster analysis requires not too many variables in order to generate meaningful clusters. A closer look on Table 1 shows indeed that the chosen design was barely feasible.
The East/West relationship category in particular consisted of too many small, diverse variables to make it into the cluster analysis. Consequently, I cannot make any statement about these aspects, while the high frequency of this category in the FAZ suggests that it would be worthwhile to study it more closely. Kollmorgen’s (2005: 181) sociological prognosis is that it will take two generations (40 to 60 years after reunification) before the different socializations of East and West Germans will have vanished. So far, the Allenbach-survey of 2012 on mutual stereotypes quoted in the introduction of this paper seems to confirm his assessment. Therefore, it is likely that the state of the inner unification and the question of an East German identity will still be reflected in the media in the years to come. That’s why detecting media frames on this particular aspect, preferably in a cross-national design, would be a fruitful approach for future research.
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