The article is an attempt to analyse the tabloid phenomenon from the perspective of D.C. Halin and P. Mancini's theory of three media systems. These types of newspapers emerged in liberal media systems (USA and the United Kingdom), but as early as in the second half of the 20th century, during a period of intense privatisation and commercialisation of the media this type of journalism also emerged in the democratic corporatism model, where many popular newspapers began turning into tabloids. This was also where we could see the emergence of new titles which today set the conventions of tabloid journalism (e.g. Bild, The Sun, Verdens Gang). Today, tabloids are present in every democratic country in the world with the exception of the Mediterranean countries, where their function seems to be performed by sports newspapers. They flourish in Japan, Canada, Australia or New Zealand. After 1989 new markets also emerged in Central Europe. Media groups which had limited investment opportunities in their own countries were quick to take advantage of that. Tabloid publishers – the Swiss Ringier and the German Axel Springer – did not miss this opportunity either. The former chose small markets similar to Switzerland, while the latter decided to risk a tabloid on the Polish market. Both publishers have been hugely successful. Today in countries with low readership level, such as Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary or Romania, tabloids have become a permanent feature of their media systems, while tabloid journalism sets general standards in the media.
Media participation in a political process is analyzed thanks to mediatization of politics and media coverage. Quantitative and qualitative content analysis let verify whether they exist in Polish weekly magazine and how strong is this phenomenon. Three concepts: mediatization of politics, media coverage of politics, and entrenched journalism (or it lacks) act together. Weekly opinion magazine market in Poland is a good example of external media pluralism. In a comparison with other media markets, de-professionalization of journalism is going slowly. However, the weekly magazines differ among them significantly in a case of a level of professionalism and journalistic culture, they represent a vast scale of political preferences, ideologies, norms and values from the left to the right.
PL
Udział mediów w procesie politycznym wyraża się w mediatyzacji polityki i nagłośnieniu medialnym. Analiza ilościowa i jakościowa zawartości mediów pozwala na empiryczne zweryfikowanie obecności i skali stronniczości. Zatem te trzy pojęcia: mediatyzacja polityki, nagłośnienie polityki w mediach oraz stronniczość mediów (lub jej brak) są ze sobą nierozerwalnie związane. Rynek tygodników opiniotwórczych w Polsce jest dobrym przykładem pluralizmu zewnętrznego. W porównaniu z innymi rynkami medialnymi, deprofesjonalizacja zawodu postępuje najwolniej. Choć czasopisma różnią się znacząco między sobą poziomem profesjonalizmu i kultury dziennikarskiej, to reprezentują one szeroką gamę politycznych opcji, ideologii i wartości – od skrajnej lewicy po radykalną prawicę.
New media has changed election campaign. Do Polish political parties recognize the opportunity which the Internet provides to reach potential voters? In order to test the quality of political communication through the Internet the content of websites of Polish political parties was analyzed. Research material consisted only of Polish political parties websites that exceeded election threshold in 2011 parliamentary elections. In the study we focused on the content of five websites and the news published on those websites between 1 July and 9 October 2011.