Aristotle University of Thessaloniki

Master of Arts in Digital Media, Communication and Journalism

Filippa Valavani

Subject: How did the German Media covered the Greek elections of 2015 and 2019- A comparative analysis

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Abstract The media play a major role in the shaping of the public opinion not only in what concerns national issues but international as well. The rise of the pan-European sphere is strongly related to the above, since the media can influence the public opinion as well in what concerns the European issues and the issues occurring in another member state. It is assumed that media in most of the European countries tend to cover international issues that are of political, economic and social interest and effect the current and future political situation in their country or the EU. However, it is observed that the coverage of issues of international interest is under-addressed and inadequate. In this assignment, we attempted to examine whether this hypothesis is valid. We have chosen four German media, Deutsche Welle, Die Zeit, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and Die Welt in particular, to investigate how they covered the case of the Greek national elections on the occasions of 2015 and 2019, one week before and after the elections, both of them were quite crucial for the political developments in Greece. Our conclusion is that the particular issue, that is the Greek national elections in a very important time frame for the country and Europe, were not adequate presented, the presentation of the news regarding the elections was biased and incomplete, and there was not enough information for the public in total.

Key – Words: Media, European Union, Pan-European Sphere, Greek Elections, Coverage of International Issues

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Table of Contents Introduction ...... 4

1. First Part: Literature Review ...... 7 1.1 Media and the public sphere ...... 12 1.2 The creation of the pan-European media field ...... 14 1.3 The contemporary impact of the media ...... 15 1.4 Media and international politics ...... 18 1.5 Social media and political marketing ...... 222 2. Second Part: Research ...... 25 2.1 The German tabloids and Greece ...... 25 2.2 Methodology ...... 26 2.3 Results ...... 27 2.3.1 Εlections of 2019 ...... 28 2.3.1.1 Deutsche Welle ...... 29 2.3.1.2 Die Zeit ...... 30 2.3.1.3 FAZ ...... 32 2.3.1.4 Die Welt ...... 32 2.3.2 Εlections of 2015 ...... 34 2.3.2.1. Deutsche Welle ...... 36 2.3.2.2. Die Zeit ...... 38 2.3.2.3. FAZ ...... 39 2.3.2.4. Die Welt ...... 40 2.4. Discussion ...... 400 2.4.1. Thematic Analysis 2015 ...... 400 2.4.2. Thematic Analysis 2019 ...... 42 2.4.3. Linguistic analysis ...... 44 2.4.4. Comparative analysis ...... 45 2.4.4.1 Elections 2015 ...... 455 2.4.4.2 Elections 2019 ...... 477 2.4.4.3 The axes of competition in elections ...... 500

Conclusion ...... 544

References ...... 566

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Introduction Nowadays, the media are an integral part of our daily lives. The media are primarily institutions that describe and interpret the events and phenomena that compose the world around us. Communication is as old as human society and every historical period and type of society, or social system has to show its own special and specific institutions and mechanisms in this field. So, what are the peculiarities of the media that developed in the societies of our time? The answer is given in condensed form in the adjective "mass" which indicates a number of distinct, albeit related features (Neuendorf & Jeffres, 2017). First, the institutions and processes through which communication takes place in modern society are of a mass nature in the sense that they address a quantitative, numerical οr huge audience. In addition, modern media are massive because they target the masses of people who are not in physical contact with the source of communication. On the contrary, they are often separated by a considerable geographical distance (Walker, Feild, Giles, Armenakis, & Bernerth, 2009). This type of communication presupposes the possibility of mass production and transmission or distribution of "messages", i.e. information, ideas and images. As a result, the variation, transmission and reception of messages nowadays takes place within large, complex organizations, whose operation requires the movement of significant capital, extensive financial management, advanced technology, specialized workforce, and developed bureaucratic administration (Carpentier, Van Hoye, & Weng, 2019; Walker et al., 2009). So, the messages that media address to their audiences are not unique, unpredictable or volatile, but standardized goods with exchange value. Second, communication is massive because it is public, open to all. It is addressed to men and women in all latitudes and longitudes, at all ages and in every race or nation, in all social classes and social strata. With other media they perceive their audience as uniform and homogeneous, as a sum, a mass of average people. Third, what communication is primarily, if not exclusively, one-way: from transmitter to receiver or audience, and never the other way around (Eveland & McLeod, 1999). Finally, the "massiveness" of modern media refers to the most significant amounts of time that the average person spends on them and even more to the impressive invasion of the media in all areas and aspects of the daily life of modern man. It is not only our public activities (economic, political, and cultural) but also the most private and occult moments of our lives (family relationships, sex life, groups) [4] that are the object of media penetration. So, our behavior is shaped accordingly with templates displayed in media messages. In all areas of life, the media urges and urges members of society to adopt a uniform, unified way of life and behavior, which is further, shaped and projected without, as mentioned above, any substantial participation of the average person in its formation. The news production theory supports that the media have undertaken a crucial role in forming the public opinion while the way in which the media cover the news affects the audience’s understanding and perceiving those issues. The main sources of information, in what concerns the political issues are the newspapers – printed or digital – and the television. However, this is not limited to the national affairs, but extends to international matters as well (Menendez-Alarcon, 2010). The creation, establishment and function of the European Union have led to the emergence of a pan-European media network and the rise of transnational media outlets that strive for the attraction of audiences transcending national borders (Heinderyckx, 2014). News media have created a “global village” in which they affect the way citizens view themselves and approach other nations (Coban, 2016). The media promote the exchange and supply of information and shape the learning of the processes in different states; therefore mass media have a great impact on the individual’s picture of the rest of the world (Coban, 2016, p. 46). In that context, the national elections of the European Union’s Member States are regarded as big events, that are constantly covered by the media of Europe in talk shows, in special programs and of course in the press (Machill, et al., 2006, p. 58). The media do not serve as simple observers, but they have an enormous impact in the thinking of the voters, since “documentaries, news stories, advertisements and docudramas are able to shape and even change voter’s minds” (Ramsden, 1996, p. 65). This is not observed only between the national borders, since all the media of the member states already cover those issues of European politics equally and with the same interest, that derives from the membership of the Union (Ramsden, 1996). Bearing the above in mind, the aim of the present dissertation is to present the way German media covered the issue of the Greek elections of 2015 and 2019 one week before and after the elections. For this aim to be fulfilled, the paper is divided in two parts. The first is the theoretical and the second is the research. In the first part that is based on the method of literature review, the most important theories over the power of the media and their impact will be presented and analyzed, in order to understand how [5] the public sphere and the public opinion can be formed by the news coverage, even in case of international politics. More specifically, the first part is divided in five chapters. The first one refers to the literature regarding the interaction of media and public sphere whereas the second revolves around the creation of a pan-European media field. In the third chapter, the impact of the media on the shaping of public opinion is examined as it is articulated in relevant theories that refer to the way the media select the facts and events that they will “transmit” to the public. The next chapter is dedicated to the role of media to international politics and to the formation of international policies and relations. Finally, a chapter is dedicated to the examination of the usage of social media and political marketing by politicians, mostly, in order to shape the public opinion and attract voters or supporters of their political proposals and ideas. In the second part, a research is conducted, that is based on the examination of the German press over the coverage of the Greek early national elections that took place in 2015 and 2019. Both election cycles were crucially important to the country as well as to the international actors for many reasons. First of all, after the elections of 2015 a left government was formed for the first time in Greece’s political history, in surprise to many political actors and players. Furthermore, the elections of 2019 were to determine the fate of this government as the snap elections were decided by the government after its defeat in the European elections and the local elections earlier the same year. The defeat was perceived as a result of dissatisfaction of their supporters and voters to the policies the government formulated and implemented, especially in the foreign relations department with the Prespa Agreement between the country and Northern Macedonia. As anyone can understand, these elections would also mark the future of the Agreement. So, this research is based on the collection of the relevant to the Greek elections’ articles via the digital platforms of four German media, i.e. Deutsche Welle, Die Zeit, FAZ, and Die Welt, one week before and one week after the elections of 2015 and 2019. The basic aim of this paper was to examine and compare whether there were differences between the two pre-electoral and after-electoral periods regarding the coverage of them by the German media. In particular, we examine the way the journalists have covered the pre-electoral conditions in the country and the statements of the political personnel, as well as how they presented the results of the elections and the reactions of the politicians in Greece and in the EU. In the last chapter, we focus on the main issues of the pre-electoral campaign, around of which the electoral competition between the Greek parties was developed. [6]

1. First Part: Literature Review The contribution of the media to the negotiation of public problems and to the influence of political issues cannot be separated from two important parameters of the wider environment: one parameter is the coordinates of the respective political media system in which the various media operate. This includes a number of variables that determine the degree of interaction and the possibilities of political influence by the media. In particular, the very structure of the political system and its type of organization, the degree of development of the private and public broadcasting sector, the tendency towards extroversion or introversion in the selection of news are parameters that greatly influence both the selection process and the and the process of influencing political issues by the media. The second parameter concerns the transformations in the media field and especially in terms of the influences exerted on it by the prevalence of the internet. It is interesting at this point to point out the frequent transfer within the Greek space, of political and media tendencies and structures of other systems and especially of the American one, where the literature on political media interactions remains particularly rich. We will rely on a text by Bennett (2000, p. 184) on the American political-media system, where the author notes that the US federal system and the purely commercial nature of the drama-dominated media system and emotional narrative flow into different interactions between the media and political parties. The same author points out that in most formal democracies, parliamentary sovereignty of the government, disciplined political parties and the limited involvement of different government sectors and levels in the production of government decisions make it easier for government politicians to communicate, political positions and the rationale of government decisions. It should be added here that in the "Mediterranean model" or the model of polarized pluralism in which Hallin & Mancini (2004, p.142) classify Greece, political parties enjoy significant influence on the political and media themes, resulting in countries with parliamentary systems to observe a journalistic "obsession" with journalistic issues concerning the activities of political parties. We can therefore argue here that the structures of the political system do indeed influence journalism as, after all, again according to Bennett (2000),journalism tends to differentiate in countries with

[7] an atrophic or non-existent public broadcaster, as is the case in relation to countries that have the tradition of a strong public service broadcaster (Patterson, 2007). Drama, scandals and conflicts are news values that are expected to dominate the private sector, in relation to international news and sectoral policy news that dominate the public broadcaster. And as much as it may seem that some news values are universal, such as the emotional charge, the conflicting and the majority nature of the news, there are some national differences that differentiate the news selection and promotion processes. Bennett (2000, p.185) notes that “decisions about what is news in America are determined by public opinion polls and profit calculations resulting in less detailed coverage of daily politics and more anthropocentric features of the news”. “Political journalism focuses on crime, scandals and the most dramatic or entertaining aspects of politics” (Bennett, 2000, p. 185). Continuing the comparative controversy, we quote Bale (2011, p. 360) who, based on Donsbach & Patterson's (2004) study of journalistic trends in Germany, Italy, Sweden and the USA, reveals some important differences: “The Germans Journalists combine reporting and commenting on events at a time when American journalists are doing one or the other, but not both” (Donsbach & Patterson, 2004). Italians, like Germans, are much less interested in what their colleagues in other countries would find objective, while Swedes are more likely to seek their own sources of information rather than relying more passively on those given by parties, groups pressure and government, compared to the British and Italians. There are also differences in the style of television and radio news. TV programs in Italy, Spain, and France tend to include more domestic news, more news from fewer journalists, and more studio-based content, while more "Teutonic" (as opposed to "romantic") news cultures, such as Britain and the Netherlands prefer short, serious reports from the news site. "There are, some "national" differences that reverse the common news values that imposed by media logic. Similarly, there are convergences, such as the Pfetsch (1996) advocacy of moving away from private television infotainment and reducing the "seriousness" of public service broadcasting, resulting in the convergence of the public with the commercial sector. This, after all, we have supported elsewhere (B. D. Jones & Wolfe, 2010), when the examination of news bulletins in the late 2000s revealed the departure from reports that had the forefront in the early 2000s, a period when drama and emotion, but also the experiences of citizens victims of state negligence, prevailed over other [8] approaches. It was noted, then, that private television newsletters tend to become "less experiential, more political, highlighting the role of television as a political medium, in the sense that, at least in terms of information, there is a tendency to move away from model of infotainment to a model of information that is purely politicized and covertly partisan, with a clear direction, now, in the effort to deconstruct an image of the political problems or to reconstruct it. We mean, therefore, that the highlighting or silencing of an issue functions more broadly as an "information environment" that favors or does not favor policy strategies, without using, by the media, the most obvious ways of delivering policy evaluation (Pfetsch, 1996). “The political evaluation is based on the indication of the political person in charge of managing the problem” (B. D. Jones & Wolfe, 2010). There are, however, developments that are transforming the very field of political communication, with more importantly the emergence of a powerful information pole, the internet. We must, therefore, keep another parameter: in recent decades there has been a decisive transformation in the types of political communication in the Western Republics (Crozier, 2007, p. 1). The changes offered by the new technological possibilities, led to the transition from a hierarchical and vertical communication model to a more egalitarian and horizontal model. In the first model of television domination, the basic function is that of one- dimensional communication of political information by the media to audiences that are considered rather more homogeneous and passive. In the case of this model of communication, the media elites - in collaboration with the political elites - control the political message in a much more elitist and much less egalitarian structure, where journalistic restrictions are varied and often limit the scope and variety of access to sources. We are talking about a model of political communication that was based much more on central control, with the aim of persuasion and political manipulation. The new modalities of political communication and the tendency to move to a new model of communication highlight the fragmentation of the political message due to the multiplication of communication channels and the parallel emergence of an audience that is more complex, active and diverse. New media have favored the acceleration of news circles with the corresponding contraction of political and journalistic frameworks (Crozier, 2007). In this context, Crozier (2007, p. 2) focus on “the removal of spatial and temporal constraints, the flexible use of news content, the horizontalization of communication that has led to the renegotiation of power relations between message [9] providers and their recipients, the transformation of political journalism, the abolition of the conventional understanding of democracy and statehood”(Blumler & Kavanagh, 1999; Luhmann, 2000; Meyer, 2002). The media in the Mediterranean countries are closely linked to politics and mark the history of each country, where there is a strong tradition of the media as a means of ideological expression and political mobilization (T. M. Jones, 2008). According to Hallin& Mancini, the communication system is called the "Mediterranean model" or "polarized pluralism" model. Characteristic of this model is the strong role of the state in the Media which developed as an institution of the political world. In such a system, the political elites necessarily go through the arrangements of the Media, making the Media themselves highly politicized. This is evident through the style of journalism that emphasizes commentary. Also from the way newspapers tend to represent different political decisions and this is reflected in the different behaviors of their readership (Patterson, 2007). For example, in Greece various newspapers represent political parties. The only thing that newspapers do is to promote their political patrons which in turn provide financial benefits to the newspaper for its distribution or other forms of aid. We therefore see as a typical model that the Media are used by various actors as tools to intervene in the political world. Mancini also states that the media are affiliated with political parties and the church is apparently largely established to facilitate the intervention of these bodies. It is no coincidence that in Spain there is talk of two paths to a career in politics, namely through the army or the media (Ortiz, 2001). Without the intervention of a trusted journalist, it is difficult for a politician to make a career and be able to pass on his political messages to the public. The theoretical background on which the study is based, concerns the theory of agenda‐ setting. As mentioned in the introduction, research on the theory of agenda ‐ setting formally began about forty years ago, in the early 1970s, but had already been formulated in 1922 by the American classic of public communication Lippmann, who said: “(the Media) is like the beam of a projector moving around incessantly, bringing one episode after another out of the darkness, to the common goddess”. Walter Lippmann and his first chapter from the book Public Opinion, (1922), "The world Outside and the pictures in our heads" states that the media is the main source of these images in our minds about the world of public affairs, a world where most citizens are far removed from reality. They build a connection between an event [10] in the real world and the images of that event in our minds. In this sense, the media creates symbolic images in our minds where they can be quite different from the world we experience outside (Rogers, 1997). What we know about the world is based on what the media chooses to tell us. More specifically, the result of this effect is that the priorities of the Media affect the priorities of the public. That is, the prominent elements in the Media Agenda become apparent to the public. The theory of agenda ‐ setting refers to a causal function between the emphasis given by the Media on certain public issues and the public's views on what is worth paying attention to and what is not. Basically, the social problems that receive the most attention in the newscasts become what the newspaper and television audiences consider to be the most important problems of the nation (Weaver, 1984). All this can be done and vice versa. That is, when the Media does not present an issue, it will bring the corresponding ignorance to the public. The selection of topics by the Media requires a preparation on the part of journalists regarding the selection, as they have to publish some of the many issues that exist. First, they are selected, displayed but at the same time the topics are prioritized in order to differentiate from each other in terms of their importance. By projecting specific issues and their constant presentation by the Media in order to come to the fore, they provoke specific reactions in the public and have a great impact on the general social whole. Through this option, they communicate to the public the relative importance of the various issues and events and influence their judgment of the importance of the issues. The influence of the subjects differs from media to media in terms of the duration it takes to affect the audience, but also the duration of its influence. For example, the influence that television has is immediate but has a shorter duration, in contrast to the newspaper that has a delay but the influence that it will eventually cause has a longer duration (Ortiz, 2001). The relationship between these parameters is characterized by conflict and constant competition, since in the limited time and space at their disposal they must find a way for the issue they want to come to the fore and see the light of day outweigh the other issues and to be the first news or if nothing else to be in the first places of the choices. An important gradation in the intensity of the influence of the media themes on the public themes is the exposure of a topic from the Media to the public. The media, when they want to promote an issue too much, then expose it more to the public because [11] that way it will have the corresponding effect on the citizens. Another important factor is the subject matter. There are issues that some citizens are directly related to, with the result that they have a strong influence on them. For example, one issue that the media can raise today is unemployment. Where it will affect many citizens, fearing that they too will lose their jobs or even sink deeper into stress when they are already unemployed (Bryant & Zillmann, 1994). Difficult issues can also have a similar effect on citizens. For example, one issue may be public debt. This will have a significant impact on public affairs as everyone will try to save money for fear that the financial crisis will affect everyone. The last rating in which the effect of the media themes on the public themes is distinguished is according to the individuals. At this point we see the need for orientation of some people in relation to others on specific issues. The need for guidance as a concept, which recognizes that people who are in unknown "conditions" will try to orient them until they feel comfortable. There are two important components to determining a person's level of orientation. The data also indicate the degree of uncertainty. People who have a high interest and low degree of certainty about the topics are more likely to feel and need guidance and are therefore easier to influence from the Media Agenda. On the other hand, people who have a low need for guidance are less exposed to the Media and are therefore less likely to be influenced by the Agenda (Zillmann & Bryant, 1994).

1.1 Media and the public sphere The public sphere can be understood as a communicative level of democracy, as a tool of democratization. It is opposed to the private life field and is the sphere that is open to every member of any society in what concerns issues of public interest. Its open character is the factor that permits the interactivity between different actors, like the mass media, the politics, the public opinion and the public relations (Poulakidakos & Frangonikolopoulos, 2019, p. 2). The public sphere is considered as a crucial element for the establishment of democratic governance, in which politics should be contacted publicly and political institutions should be subject to public control (Walter, 2017, p. 749). A wide range of messages is produced in the context of the public debate conducted in the public sphere. These messages are formulated under the influence of three different sources, meaning i. the events happening, ii. the communications from [12] the public actors and iii. the mediations, i.e., the media’s inputs (Poulakidakos & Frangonikolopoulos, 2019, pp. 2-3). Under that view, mass media are regarded as the primary forum of the public sphere, while journalists decide what is covered by the media and who has a say in that coverage (Walter, 2017, p. 749). In this context, the media transmits the public actors’ messages and statements, by framing them, choosing them, contextualizing them or being associated to them, putting focus on certain parts of them, editing them and elaborating them. This is the first type of the media’s input of the public sphere (Walter, 2017). The second form of that input refers to distinct inputs that the media actors offer to the public debate, through their comments and the media’s contribution. This proves the cardinal role attributed to the media as far as the mediation and negotiation of important issues in concerned in the field of the public sphere ( Poulakidakos & Frangonikolopoulos, 2019). The changes suffered by the central institution of the public sphere have a special weight for the present analysis. The control of the media by individuals aimed to secure this institution of the meditating public from the interventions of state power. The economic, technological and organizational concentration and the accumulation of social power pose the threat to the critical function of journalism in the eve of the media in private hands and the phenomenon of their transformation into a "gateway for the invasion of privileged private interests in public" (Habermas, 1997: 276). The full subordination to the commercialized logic of the market, on the other hand, implies the depoliticization of the content, while the one-way flow of information removes the feedback nature of communication. The "method of consensus", which is the main pursuit of sophisticated techniques of opinion-making, advertising and public relations, gives the public sphere again feudal characteristics; process of transforming citizens' consciousness into consumer consciousness ( Habermas, 1997). Apart from the media, Habermas examines the changes that other political institutions in the public sphere have undergone. Political parties are built on the basis of a mechanism of professional politicians with a central administration, aiming at the occasional mobilization of the most crucial parts of the electorate and the attachment of special interest groups in exchange for representation in the negotiation process for the prefecture. As a result, parliament, once a model of public debate, has been downgraded to a body for presenting decisions and party lines, which take the form of explicit mandates in cases of border conflicts. The masses of the population are seen as

[13] a manageable source from which political leaders can extract the consent they need to legitimize their political agendas( Firmstone, 2008). The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere is completed with a brief attempt to explore the concept of public opinion. Modern 'public' opinion refers to the masses and lacks the features of autonomy and rationality, once it ceases to be associated with public debate. The sum of opinions produced is inversely related to power: instead of referring to political domination, it is defined from the outset in relation to its manipulation by it. As a model, Habermas ultimately maps the modern landscape of publicity by contrasting two areas of communication: “the area of informal, personal, non-public [non-public] opinions, formed within group relationships, and the system of formal-formal, of institutionally authorized opinions”( Habermas, 1997: 335). The prospect of a resurgence of public opinion in its strict sense lies in the reactivation of critical public communication processes mediated by an organized private audience and internally democratized publicity bodies, achieving the rationalization of social and political power.

1.2 The creation of the pan-European media field

In the 21st century, national borders have been weakened (Firmstone, 2008, p. 423). A European public sphere has emerged especially due to the rise and the function of the European Union, while the European politics have been considered as an important field in which media coverage is essential ( Boomgaarden, et al., 2013, p. 608). The pan European public sphere is not independent from the national state media ( Machill, et al., 2006, p. 61). National news media promote representation, legitimacy and accountability. They have been recognized as the link between supranational elites and national publics (Machill, Beiler, & Fischer, 2006). Those media establish a forum in which information is being transferred and exchanged, deliberation is contacted and discussion takes place not only as for EU related issues but for domestic and national issues as well (Gattermann & Vasilopoulou, 2015, p. 121). However, the European public sphere consists of the national pubic spheres of the member states (Poulakidakos & Frangonikolopoulos, 2019, p. 3). After all, a genuine supranational public sphere is nowhere to be found, since the efforts to create a European-wide mass media either disappear, or are pushed to marginal existence

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(Koopmans, 2007, p. 185). Hence, the national mass media cover more and more other countries, the European affairs and actors. In many cases the media of one country pay attention to another European country events and political actors, since many policies of the Union present an intergovernmental basis, rather than a supranational one (Gattermann & Vasilopoulou, 2015). This phenomenon is referred to as horizontal Europeanization of the media, in which the European countries are not treated as foreign ones, as those whose internal affairs and politics are independent and irrelevant to the rest of the European countries. On the contrary, European Union, the establishment of the common market and the relevant policy making, the freedom of movement and the rest of the EU’s freedoms are factors that have created interdependence between the member States and their media. In that context, three different levels of Europeanization of the mass media are observed: “1. Supranational Europeanization: an increased role for actors and institutions from the European level in public debates in national news media 2. Vertical Europeanization: when national actors address or refer to European institutions, issues, legal frameworks, norms and identities, 3. Horizontal Europeanization: an increased attention for actors and institutions from other European countries in national news media”(Koopmans, 2007). It is apparent, that the main object of the present dissertation refers to horizontal Europeanization, i.e., the coverage of an issue of a Member State by the media of another Member State.

1.3 The contemporary impact of the media Every communication contributes to the creation, or transformation, of a system of values, beliefs, perceptions, in other words, a symbolic representation of reality. The basic function of any communication is to give meaning, to interpret our life, our experiences, to make the world around us understandable. If the world around us is not to look like a chaotic patchwork of random events, then these events must be identified, correlated with other events, and generally placed in familiar conceptual contexts. Modern media determine what are the important events that take place around us (Boomgaarden et al., 2013). In addition, they offer interpretations of how these facts should be understood. Each person approaches and understands reality, and then walks through it, based on some semantic maps he has acquired over the years through the various phases of his socialization. The media interpret reality, give it meaning, by producing messages about [15] the world around us. Thus, information about people and events that are outside the close and familiar circles in which we move every day, is filtered by modern communication transmitters, by their choices and decisions as to what will become "news" and how it will be interpreted. This is the reason, e.g., that each newspaper or radio and television network offers its own image and interpretation of reality The impact of the media on the shaping of the public opinion has been expressed in many relevant theories. The first one refers to media negativity, the negative attitudes of the media logics and the media biases that are being reproduced. After all the negativity bias in media coverage is a universal phenomenon (Galpin & Trenz, 2016). Negative news is usually preferred compared to balanced news or positive reports, while the selection of the news is often driven by values reproduced by the media. Moreover, media negativity is usually related to the distance from the events that are being covered, while on the other hand proximity to the news leads to goods news coverage. Therefore, it is understood why foreign news coverage is often linked with negative coverage (Galpin & Trenz, 2016, pp. 3-4). Another relevant expression is that of framing. Framing refers to the way in which the news media frame the messages they transmit and the way in which those frames have an impact on the audience. Those frames affect the public opinion, not necessarily through the change of the public’s perception of the events, but through rendering already existent ideas more accessible. This means that they feed the public opinion. One function of framing is the “belief importance”, which means that the media framing alters the importance given to an issue or to certain aspects of it. Moreover, it affects the “belief content”, in a sense that the media’s frames provide new considerations to the individuals. The presentation of information to the public leads to becoming aware of links between their beliefs and the presented topics, in ways that they had not thought of before the coverage. Hence the beliefs are enhanced and changed over the course of time. Therefore, framing has indirect effects on the importance of an issue and direct effect on the content of the beliefs of the public (Vreese, et al., 2011, pp. 182-183; Poulakidakos & Frangonikolopoulos, 2019, pp. 2- 3). Moreover, according to the agenda setting theory, the mass media is considered as a key source for the public to perceive important issues especially in the political context. Two levels of agenda setting are to be found. The first level refers to the influence exerted by the media on the public’s perceptions of the most important issues; [16] the second level refers to a deeper process of the information provided by the media (Zhang & Meadows, 2012, pp. 78-79). In that context, role of the media is crucial in what concerns civic consensus. They are “important tools for agenda setting as well as for the dissemination of hegemonic discourse in society” (Mylonas, 2012, p. 654). Finally, the CNN effect theory has to be examined, in order to understand the enormous impact of the media on the public opinion (Zhang & Iii, 2012). In the 1980s the advances in the new technologies led to the transformation of the news media and developed the ability to produce and transmit a constant flow of real time news, globally (Robinson, 1999, p. 301; Coban, 2016, pp. 51-52). In 1991 CNN broadcasted 24-hour coverage from the front line of the Persian Gulf War aiming at enabling the international society understand what was happening (Coban, 2016, pp. 51-52). Moreover, during the Cold War the US exploited the media – the constant flow of real time news to a global level - in order to get their ideological message to the rest of the world. The media contributed to the enhancement of the hegemony of the US. The flows of information by the media from the US to the rest of the countries served as a tool to expand the anti-communist propaganda and for the provision of reassurance to the alliances that were formed as opposed to the Soviet threat. Disinformation concerning the opposing forces were aimed at the undermining of the soviet attempts and served as a manipulative tool for the formulation of the international public opinion (Robinson, 2002, pp. 37-38). Therefore, it is apparent that the media is a tool that is being used by political actors, in order to “develop, refine, and promote their own agendas and strategies” (Gilboa, et al., 2016, p. 654). The CNN effect can be understood by three points of view: the media can serve 1. as an agenda setting agent in what concerns the choice of news in favor of the national interests, 2. as an accelerant for decisions to be taken and policies to be formed and applied or 3. as an impediment actor operating through the impact that is created to the public opinion (Livingstone, 1997, pp. 4-6). More specifically, the media serve as an agenda setting agent, since they define the issues that will be presented and will enable the public to comprehend the priorities and the alliance of the international politics (Gilboa, Jumbert, Miklian, & Robinson, 2016). They can justify actions of the governments through that function. For example, this happened when the USA’s war against Iraq in 2003 was presented as a war of liberation by the White House while a media campaign aimed at establishing that idea. In that case, the media served as a tool for the promotion and acceptance of the war by the public and as a way to ensure its [17] support (Coban, 2016, p. 53). Moreover, the media serve as an accelerant factor, because they have an impact on the formulation of the strategies and the behavior of the people in power through the demonstration of the urgent issues and the public awareness and anxiety they create to the citizens. Under that view, the media exercise pressure to those in power to act. However, this is not always the case, as the coverage of the media in the case of the Bosnian atrocities or the Rwanda genocides did not lead to the intervention of the western powers for many years (Coban, 2016, p. 53). Finally, the CNN effect in its last function means that the media can be considered as well as an impediment actor. Multiple frames are presented, third parties are involved in conflicts, and public opinion is shaped all of which can affect the decisions of the policy makers. Media can produce, however, the opposition to the foreign policies when it derives from domestic political division. Therefore, the CNN effect entails the distribution by the media of the reactions against official policies, the pressure, the destabilization of the power balance etc (Coban, 2016, pp. 53-54).

1.4 Media and international politics Baumgarten &Voltmer (2010: 2) point out that the picture of research on the influence of the media on public policy is inconsistent. There are studies (Page & Shapiro, 1992) that show that political decisions respond to the pressures of the media and public opinion, while others emphasize their resistance to external pressures such as the media (Kleinnijenhuis & Rietberg, 2006). Different views are expressed regarding the existence or not of the media influences on political decisions but also on the degree of this influence. Walgrave & Van Aelst (2006) reviewed nineteen studies on the relationship between SMEs and public policy. The authors concluded that twelve of them showed strong or even significant influences on the public policy process, while seven of them showed weak or minimal influences (Koch-Baumgarten & Voltmer, 2010). Therefore, according to this meta-analysis, it appears that the media is an important force in the public policy process as well. The authors (Koch-Baumgarten & Voltmer, 2010) point out three parameters that make it difficult for SMEs and public policy to coexist. The first is the duration of the news, which is more concise than the time of public policy, which shows a slower development. The second concerns the discrepancy between the representation of politics by the media, which focuses on political figures without reflecting the specialization of the political staff involved in the public policy process. The third is the inconsistency of the media with the public [18] policy agenda (Walgrave & Van Aelst, 2006). The media agenda is made up of news items that have news value. The public policy agenda is based on structural issues such as the health system, economic development or the budget. There is, therefore, a very deep mismatch between media operations and public policy processes. In political life, political parties and professional politicians resort to methods of deceiving or misleading the public in order to "sell" their own products - political positions, ideology, programs - which are not substantially different from the rest in politics. Buy. Thus, "advertising style triumphs in western countries, even in the field of political poster". Pre-election propaganda uses the same graphic arts procedures as commercial propaganda." As politics becomes another consumer good that requires the same methods and techniques for its disposal as the other goods of consumer society, the role of the politician also acquires corresponding forms and dimensions (Bob, 2001). The main means of these new methods of modern political life are the mass media. The modern media are widely used, on a daily and continuous basis, by all political parties and every government to "reach" the "average citizen", hoping, through its incessant bombardment, not so much with arguments as with political symbols, "Slogans" and images, to create addictive reflexes. This kind of organization and operation of political life leaves room for only certain and very specific political attitudes on the part of the popular masses (Gil de Zúñiga, Weeks, & Ardèvol-Abreu, 2017). The process of political socialization in modern society leads the "average citizen" to adopt one of the following ways of political participation or behavior, which have as their common denominator their "one-dimensional" character, i.e. the lack of any critical attitude or questioning of the existing political and wider socio-economic system (Kushin & Yamamoto, 2010). Thus, the media cultivate the feeling or even the belief that the average citizen, either as an individual or collectively, cannot substantially influence the flow of things. Polar issues and problems are presented as so complex that understanding them seems to require specialized knowledge. As a result, the average citizen becomes a mere spectator in a game that does not concern him, nor can he influence it. Convinced that he cannot decisively influence or control political life, he decides to take advantage of the current situation as best he can to his advantage. In this case the policy in relation to the influence of the media operates as a consumer good not only on the part of the policies that "market" it, but also on the part of the public that consumes it. The care of [19] the state to determine the rules of the game, to settle the conflicts, especially in the pre- election period (Kushin & Yamamoto, 2010). From the above it can be supported that the media have a great impact on international politics. It is apparent that the domestic as well as the global public opinion are crucial factors of the formulation of foreign policy, especially in the current era of mediation. In the past, the international politics were dealt with behind closed doors and in secrecy. However, this has changed in the 20th century that the governments use the media to exercise influence on the formulation of the public opinion, especially in what concerns foreign policies (Coban, 2016, p. 51). Under the classical realist approach, the state serves as the main actor in the arena of the international affairs and foreign policy is created by the politicians according to the national interests and should not and is not influenced by extraneous domestic factor, like the news media. However, in the 70s- 80s international political economy was designated to new actors, non-state as well, like multinational corporations and groups. The traditional balance in politics changed, while the state lost its dominant position in the context of international relations. In the latter part of the 1980s, postmodernism entered international relations theories and promoted the role of non-state factors, while citizens and organizations of the civil society were recognized as new international actors with an expanded influence in cross border issues with international character based in the use of new communication technologies and the mass media function. Therefore, a new international relations approach considers that the media has an important role in the international policy making and international affairs (Coban, 2016, pp. 46-47). In that context, the overall national image of one country as presented by transnational media is reflected on two dimensions, visibility and valence. Visibility can be conceived as the total number of media coverage of that specific country by the transnational media. Valence deals with that country’s being portrayed in a favorable or unfavorable way. Those two dimensions constitute the overall national image of the country in question and the depiction of international affairs by national media (Zhang & Meadows, 2012, pp. 80-81). Finally, in order to understand the media’s influence on the states and on international relations level, five crucial elements have to be referred to:

1. Information provision: the relationship between a national society and the media is based on the fact that the latter provides the former with information, values [20]

and ideologies (Kuhn, 2007). Therefore, media is rendered an ideological instrument that creates meanings, naturalizes relations of power, and promotes domination. The media’s role is the selection, organization and emphasis on certain news and the promotion of the subjects of public discussions. Of course, they cannot force people what to think, but they influence the thinking procedures through the agenda building (Zhang & Meadows, 2012, pp. 80-81; Kuhn, 2007, p. 21). 2. Agenda setting: how the media act “as a window on the political affairs or as megaphones for the messages of politicians” (Coban, 2016, p. 48). Nye (2004, p. 53) describes how the information flows that are increased by the media led to the loss of the control that governments preserved over the information flows in what concerns politics. A new system has been created in which the power over information is distributed in a wide way, hence it is decentralized. Therefore, the media do not only reproduce power relations but promote the pluralization of forces that destabilize the ability of the governments to exercise control and influence. 3. Public watchdog: how the media check the elite behavior and render political actors accountable towards the individuals and the public as a whole while empowering the public to being citizens of a society and voters at the same time (Coban, 2016, p. 49). 4. Political mobilization: how the media can be used for the purpose of political mobilization by the political parties and by pressure groups in order to promote membership recruitment, protests, campaigns and demonstration (Coban, 2016, p. 49). 5. Regime legitimation: how the media can legitimate the regime which enhances the socialization of the citizens, the acceptance of dominant social rules, norms and the institutions embodying them. Under that view it seems that the legitimization of the political system is achieved. Moreover, the media may promote political cynicism and apathy on behalf of the voters which can result into demobilizing or delegitimizing effect of their audiences (Kuhn, 2007, p. 30).

Voltmer et al. (2010) insists and is right that the main contribution of media to policy issues lies more in the first stage of the emergence and definition of problems [21] and the definition of public problems, and less in the stage of public policy formulation and implementation processes. During the public debate over public problems, the process of recognizing choice and prioritizing problems takes place. Since issues require political attention at all times, selecting problems, highlighting them and integrating them into the public policy agenda is a key element in the public policy process (Voltmer, 2010). The role of the media in highlighting and prioritizing problems is based on the cognitive approach where problems are not objective conditions that speak for themselves but cognitive constructs that acquire different meanings. Even if unemployment can be measured, the extent to which society tolerates unemployment, its identifiable causes, and the proposed solutions to this problem are issues open to interpretation. Crime rates are another example. Even if the increase in crime rates is real, the way it is interpreted by political and social actors, especially in terms of the causes of the increase and the ways to deal with it, are elements open to a variety of meanings. In both cases the interpretation of the problem affects the direction of public policies. In all these cases, the media is the pre-eminent public arena where some of the alternatives, the causes, those responsible and the culprits, the identified causes and the proposed solutions are confronted.

1.5 Social media and political marketing The insertion of social media in everyday life, which occupy more and more information, has changed the terms of political communication. Obama was the first politician to make extensive use of these media during the 2008 US election campaign, with his team broadcasting behind-the-scenes, behind-the-scenes and daily actions (Parmelee, Davies, & McMahan, 2011), creating in voters a sense of intimacy and identification with the politician. With the explosion of social media, more and more politicians are using them to promote and convey their messages. The political influence of the internet continues to grow as new elections take place. 40% of American voters said the internet was the main source of information in the 2008 election. A survey based on data from the same election attempted to measure whether voters using the internet were accessing well- known news sites or using non-traditional media for their information (Moon & Hadley, 2014). Also researched were factors such as demographics, political interest and social ties, to determine the extent to which they influence citizens to turn to online media [22]

(Parmelee et al., 2011). Early data show that online information is somehow linked to political commitment and participation. Interpersonal discussions, through the exchange of messages in various online groups of political or social interest, increase citizens' participation in social events and enhance their political socialization (Greer & Moreland, 2016). However, the electoral market is heterogeneous, with different groups of voters influencing election results to a greater or lesser extent and in different ways. In this way, networking becomes an important tool in the field of political marketing, as it can to influence everything that is said about it and to extract information from what the users say in order to improve their future actions. The purpose is for the users - candidate voters to accept the message, the idea or the political position that will be displayed with the help of social media. At the same time, we observe cases in which the means are used to serve the party's goals, rather than to produce a policy that meets the needs of the citizen. On the other hand, the use of the internet in politics enables voters to communicate directly with politicians and relevant bodies. Digital Democracy includes all those actions that ensure that voters maintain contact with politicians, while enhancing transparency, while at the same time demanding immediate answers. In Italy, Pepe Grillo is an advocate of this new form of democracy, having as the main position of the party, the participation of citizens through social media in shaping political attitudes. We also see politicians announcing decisions, expressing opinions on current issues or inviting citizens to take a position on them via Facebook or Twitter, which are social media. The penetration of the internet in society and politics is such that it no longer means a modern political campaign without including in its strategic planning the use of the internet at a central point. In the Greek case, the ANEL party was innovative in terms of the use of social media. The name of the party was first announced on social networking sites by its leader, Panagiotis Kammenos. In addition, its principles and its founding proclamation were co-formed by a number of Greek citizens through extra-collective consultation procedures carried out through the internet. This tactic was successful, as the "Independent Greeks" for the first time participating in the electoral process received 10.6% of the vote, a particularly high percentage for a party that was founded 4 months before the elections.

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We therefore observe that the rapid spread of social media has made them an essential component of what we call political marketing and aims to attract voters. More and more politicians are promoting their positions through the internet in order to exert influence and provoke greater citizen participation in political events. It is certain that as social media develops, their importance to the political industry grows and it is reasonable to assume that they will prevail in the near future.

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2. Second Part: Research

2.1 The German tabloids and Greece Before examining the German press, it has to be mentioned that the German tabloids are not known as for promoting the image of Greece, or covering Greek affairs. Greece faced its worst financial crisis after the elections of 9th of October 2009 deriving from its excessive public deficit in conjunction with its unsustainable sovereign debt (Mylonas, 2012, p. 653; Poulakidakos & Frangonikolopoulos, 2019, p. 5). Greece was “dragged into the whirlpool of transnational journalism” through “a tsunami of aggressive media treatment, amounting to a sustained denigration campaign” (Kaitatzi-Whitlock, 2014, pp. 32 - 33). As it has been established by relevant studies the German vulgar tabloid adopted dirty campaigns while setting the intermedia – agenda. The Greek drama was as well fed by people of the financial elite of the European Union while the German press kept an approach against Greece. Coverage of the relevant Greek events used adjectives like “lazy”, untrustworthy”, “corrupt, Profligate” while negative opinions and stereotypical images as for the corrupted Greece were presented by the tabloids, like Bild Zeitung, Focus, Der Spiegel (Kaitatzi- Whitlock, 2014, pp. 33-34). By February 2010, the German press started a biased campaign against Greece and the main German media initiated a campaign with the main characteristic of one- sided views and strong and severe judgments. The most representative proof of the above mentioned is the FOCUS’s cover containing a digitally manipulated photo of Aphrodite giving the finger and the headline “Betrüger in der Euro-Familie”, meaning Betrayers in the Euro family (Bickes, et al., 2014, p. 452). The dominant German economic interests and the Eurozone and the relevance of the German politics to it served as an indicator of the way the popular media of Germany dealt with Greece in the case of the financial crisis (Bickes, Otten, & Weymann, 2014). The German political elites, alongside the economical ones formed the hegemonic frames of the crisis and the way in which it should be reproduced by the mass media (Mylonas, 2012, p. 656). Having mentioned all the above it is apparent that the history of the German tabloids and Greece is not always in good terms, while bias was dominant and this leads to the conclusion there is an intra-European racism that is fed by the single market and of course by the interests and the policies adopted between the member states (Kaitatzi- Whitlock, 2014). [25]

2.2 Methodology Under this part four well known German media are examined, in order to assess the way in which they presented the Greek elections of 2015 and 2019. For the present work, four national online and print newspapers (Deutsche Welle, Die Zeit, Die Welt and FAZ) were selected. Newspapers had very high average annual circulation for 2015 and 2019 (Deutsche Welle, Die Zeit, Die Welt and FAZ). All four media outlets have a global reach and are not subject to any political dogma. More specifically, we chose to analyze the front page as a statement of the position and the special reason that each newspaper chooses to cover the elections in Greece in 2015 and 2019. As Abastado (1980, p. 151) argues, “the front page of a newspaper acts as a form of advertising for the publication, indicates information axes and public trends and determines reading attitudes” (Abastado, 1980). Regarding the study period, 2015 and 2019 were selected, i.e., the two electoral processes that took place in Greece. The main research questions are the following: 1. How did the above-mentioned media cover the Greek elections? 2. Were there enough relevant articles, what was their framing and content and how did that content change before and after the elections?

For those questions to be answered, the Official Websites of the four media served as the basis of the present research. More specifically, the sites were visited and the articles were searched on the criterion of being published between the 13th and 27th of September 2015 and the 1st and the 14th of July 2019, meaning one week before and after the respected Greek elections, using relevant key-words (“Greek elections”, “Greece”, “Tsipras”, “Mitsotakis” etc.). The search of the articles concerned the English posts of them in the web; however, only in one newspaper (DW) the results were satisfying. Therefore, translating tools were used in order to understand the content of those articles. Finally, it has to be mentioned that the specific four media were selected to be examined as for the above, since the results in the rest (Der Spiegel, Bild etc.) were not adequate in order to cover the scope of this research. Based on the above hypothesis, our methodology was based on the adoption of the classical thematic analysis aimed at the semantic analysis of the content of the titles and the content of the front page. The application of this method enables us to locate and assemble the content sections that characterize the message being analyzed and constitute individual parameters of the event itself, as it is constructed by each [26] newspaper. As Van Dijk (2009, p. 68) notes on topics, "they are more deliberate (intentional) and consciously controlled by the speaker (...), representing the meaning and information that most readers will remember best for a reason as a whole"(Van Dijk, 2006). In a second stage, the need arises for further deepening and investigation not only of the explicit but also of the implicit ways of recording the subject in the speech, as well as of his ideological position towards the event. The necessity, therefore, of studying the secret registration of the subject in speech leads us to the application of the methodology of speech analysis, which is basically based on the concepts and methodological tools of linguistics. This is because the choice of thematic categories may obviously be more appropriate than the detailed syntactic structure and emphasis of a sentence, but often specific words are chosen with intent, based on the type and environment being controlled, in particular in written communication (Van Dijk, 2006, p. 124). Such a view presupposes the ideological reading of the journalistic text, with the aim of ascertaining the correlation of the linguistic form, which is chosen to give the ideological background of each subject. In this context, as Maingueneau (1987, p. 9) notes, discourse analysis "does not treat a corpus as a product of a particular subject, but mainly as an expression resulting from the correlation of a particular socio- historical position / position". In this sense, the study of the journalistic discourse of the four newspapers does not focus on the specific subjects of speech as individual versions, but on the subjects of speech as expressions of a specific socio-historical position. In the context of speech analysis, therefore, the construction of meaning is a social process in which the subjects of speech as expressions of a particular individuality are transcended in the face of their social dimension (Maingueneau, 2002). What interests us in this analysis is to examine the mediated speech produced by the Mass Media about the current economic and social crisis in Greece on the occasion of the fact of the electoral processes of 2015 and 2019 in the country. More specifically, we are interested in both the explicit and the implicit signification of the event to which the press proceeds, on the one hand, through the themes it promotes and, on the other hand, through linguistic choices dictated by ideological expediencies.

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2.3 Results 2.3.1 Εlections of 2019 All the articles in the German media celebrate the victory of Kyriakos Mitsotakis, presenting him as the ideal technocrat to take over the job of the country's economic recovery and the continuation of the repayment of the country's unbearable debts. In the entire article of the German media, the correlation between the acceptance of the Greek Prime Minister and the continuation of the repayment of the country's loans is obvious. "The center-right leader of the New Democracy party, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, is sworn in as prime minister of Greece, after his election victory and the mandate to deal with the nation's chronic woes after a ten-year economic crisis," Bloomberg reports. New Democracy won 39.7% of the vote, compared to 31.6% for the left-wing SYRIZA party of the outgoing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras. The results generally confirmed the pre-election polls, although SYRIZA did not do so badly, as some predictions showed. "New Democracy will have a clear parliamentary majority as expected, with about 158 seats out of a total of 300 deputies" Bloomberg reports. The agency emphasizes that investors expect the 51-year-old Mitsotakis to prove that his business-friendly reputation is valid. “The former Harvard-educated management consultant will have to live up to his promise to address issues, including public finances, loans and bureaucracy, working under tight fiscal constraints on the country”, Bloomberg reports. It adds: "Mitsotakis must ensure that Greece can attract the investments it desperately needs and create jobs, as the country emerges from the crisis that has hit the living standards of its citizens". The crucial element here is the way in which the media themselves choose the issues they raise. In other words, the question concerns the criteria for selecting and prioritizing the media proposed by the media; highlighting or hiding the problems that emerge as major issues is an important parameter and the role of the media is crucial at this point, as they choose each time to illuminate only part of the issues proposed by political and social actors. Therefore, the media act as thermostats for the visibility system of problems and the actors who are legitimized to manage these problems.

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2.3.1.1 Deutsche Welle The first media selected is Deutsche Welle (herein after DW), a state owned public international broadcaster. It has to be mentioned that this site of DW is the only one that offered adequate results of articles over the Greek elections. Most of the articles refer to the political survival of the Leftist (then) Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and the fight in order to win the elections. The articles quote arguments of the Prime Minister and present the content of his campaign. It is mentioned that the conservative party (Nea Dimokratia) has a clear lead in the polls and the possibility of gaining a ruling majority is pointed out. It is presented what allegedly Greece has gained from the Syriza governance, i.e., the end of austerity, the ending of control of IMF over Greek finances etc1. The articles reproduce the arguments of Syriza, related to the alleged future return of austerity, the reversal of the reform measures while it presents the views of a candidate as well of the socialist party KINAL and of one opposition politician. While in the articles three different views are presented it seems that the tone of the articles are neutral to positive towards Syriza but this is not obvious and apparent. The frame is politics and economics while it is linked to the humanitarian crisis through the related videos. However, it has to be mentioned that the main focus is placed on the former (then current) government and little attention is paid to the conservative and socialist party with few references to them. Moreover, the articles criticisms exerted on Alexis Tsipras for ignoring the previous political wisdom and ruining the holiday of the Greek population2. Once again, the elections are being referred to alongside the victory of the conservative party. It is mentioned that the change of the government cannot be attributed only to the summer temperatures, but it is associated to the indignation towards Alexis Tsipras for not “tearing apart” the austerity programs, for not promoting the financial markets, and thanks to these facts the Greek population is now disillusioned3. It is mentioned that Greeks that are disappointed by Tsipras’ governance, confide in Mitsotakis in order to push investments. “The country urgently needs the investments that the left-wing Syriza party was unable to push forward because of its original aversion to the private sector.

1https://www.dw.com/en/greece-elections-alexis-tsipras-and-his-left-wing-mandate-face-uphill- battle/a-49477991, retrieved at 25/2/21 2https://www.dw.com/en/opinion-greek-government-change-amid-beach-holiday/a-49511911, retrieved at 25/2/21 3https://www.dw.com/en/opinion-greek-government-change-amid-beach-holiday/a-49511911, retrieved at 25/2/21 [29]

Nea Dimokratia — one of the parties that bear the main responsibility for the Greek crisis — must now prove to be a responsible force”, is written in the article. The agreement with North Macedonia is referred to as well as an issue that Mitsotakis will not renegotiate in order not to alienate the country from the international community. Most of the articles seem friendly towards the new Government while it is the first time during the examined period of the elections that criticism is applied to the previous government. The frames of the article refer to politics, financial, economy and the international community as well. Finally, it is the first article of DW that examines the loss of Syriza and the victory of Nea Dimokratia as being directly related to the governance of Tsipras.

2.3.1.2 Die Zeit Die Zeit is a weekly German newspaper. Not a single English article was found in its Official website related to the Greek elections. Therefore, only the German ones were examined, which were measured less than the case of DW and sometimes not directly related to the elections. Die Zeit had no article in July before the elections, therefore the first article is dated back to 28th of July. The position of Syriza is criticized for its approach to the austerity measures, the fulfillment of its promises and the compromise with Northern Macedonia. It is mentioned that Tsipras might lose the elections. Greek elections are compared to the Turkish ones and it is stated that “Greeks are expected to vote for the middle-class center right”4 and that “The wisdom that Western Europe likes to pass around that impoverishment and social injustice could produce populists is not true”5. The framing is neutral and related to politics while no photo or video is included. The articles refer to the disappointment of the Greek population towards the governing party (Syriza). Corruption, mismanagement and not fulfillment of the promises are mentioned. It is apparent that political and financial frames cover this article, while it is indirectly linked to the outcome of the elections and constitutes a form of criticism towards Syriza. Moreover, it presents the statements of the prime minister and refers to his promises to enhance the economy, promote growth and create

4DemokratischeWahlen: Wirsolltenaufhören, Wähler von Rechtsextremistenzuentschuldigen | ZEIT ONLINE, 28/6/2019, written by Michael Thumann, retrieved at 25/2/21 5DemokratischeWahlen: Wirsolltenaufhören, Wähler von Rechtsextremistenzuentschuldigen | ZEIT ONLINE, 28/6/2019, written by Michael Thumann, retrieved at 25/2/21

[30] jobs. The articles are friendly towards Mitsotakis and rather negative towards Tsipras. It is mentioned that the outcome of the elections is the result of the dissatisfaction of the Greek towards the Tsipras’ governance. The journalists report that Kyriakos Mitsotakis won the elections in Greece, perhaps because he did not make false promises to the citizens. Here the journalist takes a stand against Tsipras' policy. He also mentions Greece's commitment to the EU: "The problem is that the Greeks are still waiting for a miracle and in this respect, it is dependent on the EU" They continue to support the policy of their newspaper, stating that “In Greece, in one of the worst economic crises of all time, sensible politicians are elected. The country has managed to preserve its culture”. This statement clearly seems to be influenced by Mr. Mitsotakis' statements about a return to previous policies and obligations of Greece to the country's creditors. In the question in what led voters to change their minds? Most of the articles support the idea that four years of Tsipras were enough to completely blur the political memory of the country. The authors drew the greatest indignation when he failed in his most important pre-election case. Tsipras came to liberate the country, but the opposite happened. The government implemented another program and implemented it so dedicatedly that Greece can now operate its economy almost autonomously and can be financed in the markets. However, the positive consequences of the economic development are so far only a little felt by the people, while the cuts from ten years of crisis are much more, and the authors estimates and states that Mr. Tsipras became unpopular with many Greeks due to the Prespa Agreement. The reasons given by the authors for the defeat of Tsipras are fast, but not those for the victory of his opponent. Certainly, Kyriakos Mitsotakis gave many people an answer to their pressing questions. He promised investments in the state education system and a significant increase in the minimum wage and tax cuts. After his election to the leadership of the party, Mitsotakis primarily avoided making mistakes, he knew that Tsipras, due to the situation, would have difficulties in the elections. So Mitsotakis restrained himself, avoided attacks and provocations and presented himself as a new reformer, with a feeling for the social needs of the people without showing much of his own history and that of his party. It took no more to achieve this victory. It happened without much fuss - as if the people in Greece submitted to their fate.

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2.3.1.3 Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Another media examined is Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung- FAZ, a German daily newspaper. Once again, no English article was found, while many relevant German posts were published. However, the access to them was limited since subscription is required. The first article bears the title “Greece’s new chance”. From the very first paragraphs of this article, it is argued that the elections constitute a big chance for the improvement of the economics of Greece, while criticism towards Tsipras is apparent6. In the articles, emphasis is given to the opportunities for economic growth that would arise in Greece from a government of K. Mitsotakis and the possibility that “Golden Dawn” will be left out of the Greek parliament in Sunday's elections. It is mentioned that the conservative Kyriakos Mitsotakis promises tax cuts and investments. Leading economists hope that the change of course will succeed. However, there is a warning from the central bank.

2.3.1.4 Die Welt The first issue in the online edition of Die Welt is the election result in Greece with the German newspaper emphasizing that "the conservative party of New Democracy led by Kyriakos Mitsotakis won the parliamentary elections in Greece"7 The German newspaper notes that according to the exit poll, ND accounts for around 40% while the ruling left-wing party of SYRIZA under Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras accounts for 28.5%. "In the general elections in Greece, we have a change of government" writes Die Welt, stressing that, according to initial forecasts, the conservative New Democracy party is far ahead of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras' SYRIZA. "Polls outside the polls show that ND is achieving a clear victory. ND with party leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis receives 38-42% of the votes and SYRIZA follows with 26.5 to 30.5%"8, writes the German magazine.

6https://www.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/griechenlands-neue-chance-16264971.html,Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 3/7/2019, written by Tobias Piller, retrieved at 25/2/21 7https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article196496485/Griechenland-Wahl-Konservative-gewinnen- Alexis-Tsipras-abgewaehlt.html, Die Welt, 8/7/19, retrieved at 25/2/21 8https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article196496485/Griechenland-Wahl-Konservative-gewinnen- Alexis-Tsipras-abgewaehlt.html, Die Welt, retrieved at 20/2/21 [32]

"In front of the winner of the elections, Mitsotakis, there is a terrible job"9, writes the newspaper "Die Welt" in its headline and emphasizes that "the patience of the Greeks is almost exhausted, they want to see quick financial successes and an improvement in their standard of living - a difficult task for the winner Mitsotakis, despite the clear majority of conservatives"10. “The victory of New Democracy was expected. Most Greeks no longer have any hope that things will get better soon. In the middle class there has been a very bad economic bleeding for the last four years. Reluctant economic growth does not reach most people. Greeks want hope. Above all, young people dream of politicians who will finally act better. This is the only reason why the liberal economist Kyriakos Mitsotakis managed to win. It is the opposite of the current Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, a man of the people”11. The author mentions that Mitsotakis is the embodiment of the old hated elites of the country. But today it expresses the hopes of the desperate. His promises of reform and his vision for an "aggressive plan for reform and economic development" are well received by the people. "They finally want another message and light at the end of the tunnel"12, writes the columnist. The European Commission, he claims, has identified many problems, such as debt, red loans, unemployment, weak economic growth and the slow pace of reforms. Mr. Mitsotakis, however, according to the newspaper, is expected to achieve at least a relaxation of the strict conditions of the lenders, so that the primary surplus is reduced by 3.5%. It is not ruled out that the new Prime Minister, despite the ambitious reform program, will fail, because the patience of the Greeks in the meantime is almost exhausted and they want to see quick financial success and improvement of their

9https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article196503273/Griechenland-Wahl-Vor-Kyriakos-Mitsotakis- liegt-jetzt-ein-Hoellenjob.html?cid=onsite.onsitesearch, Die Welt, 8/7/19, written by Christoph B. Schiltz, retrieved at 25/2/21 10https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article196503273/Griechenland-Wahl-Vor-Kyriakos-Mitsotakis- liegt-jetzt-ein-Hoellenjob.html?cid=onsite.onsitesearch, Die Welt, 8/7/19, written by Christoph B. Schiltz, retrieved at 25/2/21 11https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article196503273/Griechenland-Wahl-Vor-Kyriakos-Mitsotakis- liegt-jetzt-ein-Hoellenjob.html?cid=onsite.onsitesearch, Die Welt, 8/7/19, written by Christoph B. Schiltz, retrieved at 25/2/21 12https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article196503273/Griechenland-Wahl-Vor-Kyriakos-Mitsotakis- liegt-jetzt-ein-Hoellenjob.html?cid=onsite.onsitesearch, Die Welt, 8/7/19, written by Christoph B. Schiltz, retrieved at 25/2/21 [33] standard of living. If Mitsotakis achieves his goals, he could become the new hero of Greece. If not, he will enter the big line of tragic people in the levers of power in Greece.

2.3.2 Εlections of 2015 All of the published articles claim that Tsipras’s victory in the elections is based on the austerity measures of the previous years. Initially, the German media reported that the impossibility of electing a President of the Republic in Greece and the early recourse to the polls rekindled concerns about the progress of the Greek support program. According to German analysts, they express reservations about the future of the Greek reform program. "I hope that the New Greek government will not make any illusionary promises that the country cannot afford,” said the German Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann, according to one article13. A factor of concern is the policy that Alexis Tsipras will follow in case he takes over the government. However, the possibility of SYRIZA prevailing in the upcoming national elections gave Greece's European partners new reasons for the "next day" in Greece. This was underlined by the whole and the vast majority of the German media. The statements of the president of SYRIZA Alexis Tsipras about the end of the followed political austerity are accepted with consideration by a portion of German representatives and analysts of the financial sector. As we will see in all the publications in the German media, Berlin calmly welcomed the election result, emphasizing through the German Minister of Finance Wolfgang Schieble that the agreements concluded by Greece are binding on the future governments. Statements by officials were broadcast in all German media. As Gertrude Trud, chief economist at the Landesbank Hessen- Thüringen, told German radio station Deutschland radio, "…we see structural changes, areas in which Greece is strong, such as tourism." "So that was exactly the right path and it is such a pity that political instability is hindering the overall venture, at least for the time being, if it does not reverse it". However, they still reproduce threats from investors in the event of non-compliance with financial commitments such as "The worst-case scenario is unlikely." Wolfgang Gerke, president of the independent Bavarian Financial Center (BFZ), comments on Alexis Tsipras' announcements of social benefits and a new Greek

13Left-wing Syriza wins Greek parliamentary election with near absolute majority | News | DW | 25.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, retrieved at 25/2/21 [34] debt cut: "Unfortunately, anyone who promises a lot often gets a lot of votes and citizens can not appreciate them consequences. Therefore, the worst-case scenario (i.e., the possible exit of Greece from the Eurozone) is unfortunately not unlikely. Unless the troika pressure pushes citizens to say they do not want to play with fire," told the German expert to Deutschland radio Kultur. Despite the fact that the European treaties do not provide a process for a member state to leave the Eurozone, Mr Gerke has a different view: "If one declares the European treaties invalid - for example the Maastricht Treaty, the deficit limits set out in her- then of course she can be expelled". It is not possible to say that everyone should remain in the euro at all costs. The control of political issues, i.e the issues that concern public opinion and are part of the field of political decision-making, is a central issue in modern democracies to the extent that, on the one hand, the media monopolize the public sphere and, on the other, political forces organize their action in order for it to become visible and competitive through the media. Contemporary political publicity, as defined by Blumler (2018), lies in "competing for influence and control, through the mainstream media, of political stakes perceived by the public", once the media has shifted from their role as internal observers in that of active participants in shaping influence in the political system (Blumler, 2018). It is a competitive approach to political communication (Gerstlé, 2014) where the media play the most critical role in the processes of setting up and defining problems, to the extent that they control the visibility of issues (Gerstlé, 2001). Social and political actors who publicly oppose public problems seek the visibility of the media in order to make visible the problems they promote in public space. The way the media is portrayed can therefore influence the political decision itself. The question then is whether the media have the power to influence the field of political decision-making and public policy. At this point it is appropriate to consider all possible influences of the media in the field of political power and political issues. In the cases below is presented the aspect that the media are the ultimate regulators of the visibility of the problems that political and social actors promote in the public space, that the media have the ability to impose issues in political issues and thus speed up political decision-making processes in the fields of public policy.

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2.3.2.1. Deutsche Welle On its front page, the Deutsche Welle newspaper presents and analyzes the election results under a photo by Alexis Tsipras. In a comment, the newspaper notes the "awakening" of the Greek people. "After the elections, Greece is another country. There is no hope for a quick and convenient solution to the financial crisis. The left- wing politician Alexis Tsipras had initially promised this to the Greeks. He had convinced them that they only needed to fight hard. That is why he was elected Prime Minister in January with an impressive majority. Then Tsipras again deprived the Greeks of hope. He did not stop the policy of austerity but took care of its continuation. It took seven months to get the country out of this delusion. Is this just the bitter end? No, this is the beginning. This election produced a clear result. The vast majority of citizens accepted that Greece can only be consolidated within the Eurozone. (…) Greece understood that the greatest contribution to salvation must come from the country itself. (…) The direction of the policy in the coming years has been recorded in the agreement with the lenders. This is the real government program regardless of who enters the Prime Minister's Palace. No one should feel like an election winner. That would be a big misunderstanding. The article from DW is titled “Left-wing alliance Syriza wins election in Greece”. The author mentioned that the voters have decided. It is referred that the frustration of the austerity program did not give the radical left in Greece an absolute majority, but it did give them a clear victory. This threatens a confrontation with the EU. According to projections, the left-wing alliance Syriza won the parliamentary elections in Greece. Alexis Tsipras' party came with a clear margin of about 36.3 percent of the vote. According to the Interior Ministry, however, the left missed an absolute majority. Smaller parties that passed the three percent hurdle in Greece indicated that they were ready to support Syriza. The pro-European To Potami party, founded in 2014, said it was open to an alliance with Syriza. Everything will be done to prevent new elections. The right-wing Populist Party "Independent Greeks" also declared that it was ready to support the left alliance. The articles mentioned that the simulation games are already running: In Athens, as in Berlin and Brussels, people are preparing for the day after the election in Greece. The left-wing populists continue to gain in surveys - they want a haircut. The day before the eagerly awaited parliamentary elections in Greece, the left-wing Syriza party expanded its lead in the polls. In a poll, Alexis Tsipras’left-wing alliance was [36] seven percentage points ahead of Prime Minister Antonis Samaras' conservative Nea Dimokratia. Syriza could therefore get 33.5 percent of the vote on Sunday. The Conservatives were 26.5 percent in the poll. With this result, Syriza would have to rely on a coalition partner. The choice is a directional decision for future debt and social policy - and it is decisive for Greece's future in the euro zone14. Left-wing populist Tsipras, who chose the Argentine-Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara as a model, promises rising wages and pensions and an end to the privatization of state property. In the event of an election victory, he wants to negotiate a haircut with international donors. Greece has a national debt of around 320 billion euros, a large part of it with public lenders. The reason for the possible election of Syriza, is that a large part of the Greek population is suffering from the consequences of the debt crisis and the austerity policies that have been imposed since 2010, as Dimitris Papadimoulis, leading politician of Syriza party and Vice President of the EU Parliament, explains in an interview with DW: "The Greek people want an End to the austerity policy that has destroyed our society and our country"15. In the past five years, the austerity program imposed in Greece has cut the country economic output by 25 percent and caused record unemployment of over 25 percent. Every second young person is now unemployed. The left-wing politician complains that the Greek debt has not decreased in recent years, but on the contrary has increased. Finally it is mentioned that “…after the election in Greece, the reactions in the EU fluctuated between hope, fear and, above all, waiting. A haircut is unlikely”16. "The election victory of Syriza will further aggravate the weakness of the EU economy,"17 said British conservative Prime Minister David Cameron from London. In Paris, the Socialist President, Francois Hollande, congratulated the new Prime Minister of Greece on his election victory and hopes for good cooperation. In Brussels, the President of the EU Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, announced that he would of course work with every Greek government. "It would have been missing that we would refuse to talk to the New Greek government. We will study in detail what the Greek

14Left-wing Syriza wins Greek parliamentary election with near absolute majority | News | DW | 25.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, retrieved at 25/2/21 15Richtungswahl in Hellas | Europa | DW | 21.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, retrieved at 25/2/21 16GemischteGefühle in der EU nachGriechenland-Wahl | Europa | DW | 26.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, written by Bernd Riegert, retrieved at 25/2/21 17GemischteGefühle in der EU nachGriechenland-Wahl | Europa | DW | 26.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, written by Bernd Riegert, retrieved at 25/2/21 [37] government's wish list looks like,"18 said Juncker after the landslide victory of the radical left in heavily indebted Greece. It is expected that Alexis Tsipras, the new head of government, will travel to Brussels this week to present his wish list to the Council, the EU Commission and the President of Parliament. During the election campaign, Tsipras announced a haircut and an end to the austerity policies imposed by the lenders. However, it is referred all the time that a “Haircut is a long way off”19. The authors mentioned the opinion of Parliament President Martin Schulz (SPD) of DW: “Tsipras will realize very quickly that the question of the haircut is not the most important question for Greece”20.

2.3.2.2. Die Zeit In an article entitled "The revolution failed, the leftist dream will remain", published in the newspaper Die Zeit, the well-known German journalist Michael Tuman points out that the Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras returned after his new victory in the parliamentary elections with a new «mandate», no longer to revolt against Brussels, but to fight corruption in the country. As Tuman notes, in January Tsipras was talking about a principle that would change Europe. Citizens from Lisbon to Athens would jointly fight austerity and fight for a left-wing Europe. But a few days after the second victory of SYRIZA and a few days before the parliamentary elections in Portugal, one cannot distinguish left-wing Europe. The revolution against austerity seems to have failed, the columnist adds. Now Alexis Tsipras has returned to the prime minister's office with another mandate. In January, he called on people to rise up against the EU and end austerity policies. That could not be achieved, says Touman. Instead, he signed a new bailout package for Greece that includes austerity measures. This time, however, the Greek prime minister was elected because people believe that he is more likely to implement reforms than the New Democracy, Touman stressed. According to SYRIZA MEP Stelios Kouloglou, the party's new victory is explained by the desire of the Greeks to overcome the old system.

18GemischteGefühle in der EU nachGriechenland-Wahl | Europa | DW | 26.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, written by Bernd Riegert, retrieved at 25/2/21 19GemischteGefühle in der EU nachGriechenland-Wahl | Europa | DW | 26.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, written by Bernd Riegert, retrieved at 25/2/21 20GemischteGefühle in der EU nachGriechenland-Wahl | Europa | DW | 26.01.2015, Deutsche Welle, written by Bernd Riegert, retrieved at 25/2/21

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Following the signing of the agreement with Athens 'creditors, Alexis Tsipras' priorities have changed. Now he will deal with the radical reform of Greece and no longer with the revolution in Europe. Fotis Kouvelis has stated that SYRIZA now represents "a mixture of left and social democratic views". If Kouloglou and Kouvelis are right, the German columnist estimates, then it is good that Tsipras was elected and not New Democracy. Because, as the journalist explains, only Alexis Tsipras has the power of political persuasion as a real leftist to implement crucial reforms, which may seem right-wing. Only he can convince the bureaucrats and the unions that he means them. A precondition for this, of course, according to Die Zeit journalists, is that the government does not lose MPs as it did in the summer. If all this happens, then Tsipras will fit in better with the European landscape: Italy has long been ruled by a Social Democrat with a reform agenda. In Portugal, the Socialists and the center-right ruling coalition are fighting a fierce battle in the run-up to the October 4 elections. In Spain, Podemos, which sees its share fall, is likely to form a coalition government with the Social Democrats if it eventually wins the election. In Britain, an extreme leftist was elected to the presidency of the Labor Party. The leftist dream will remain, Die Zeit concludes. Alexis Tsipras cannot fulfill it with the austerity program he must implement. But Greece can bring this dream closer by proving that the left can better implement reforms than the right, he concludes.

2.3.2.3. FAZ After his election victory, Alexis Tsipras can really succeed, according to an article in the German FAZ. "Unfortunately," the newspaper says, "the drama in Greece is not over" and, although voters again preferred Alexis Tsipras and above all want stability for the country, the ruling coalition is threatened by unrest. FAZ estimates that critics and challengers within his party may stand in his way. The main mission of Alexis Tsipras is "to successfully implement the reforms", the article states, because this "is a condition for the return of private investors in the country and the creation of jobs." However, the newspaper concludes, the Greek Prime Minister will be able to achieve this only if he imposes himself on his party.

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The newspaper points out that the "most optimistic of Greece's partners" were hoping for a victory for Tsipras as they believed that it would be easier to implement the necessary reforms in Greece than he did. In fact, he estimates that if Alexis Tsipras proceeds with the reforms, the majority of the pro-European opposition parties will not show much resistance. FAZ reports that the Greek Prime Minister has repeatedly said that he will try to achieve a relaxation of the terms, but nevertheless Greece's European partners should cease to be considered scapegoats from Athens. "The rescue package was agreed and signed, now it must be implemented," the newspaper said. 2.3.2.4 Die Welt. According to the German newspaper, die Welt, Greeks were threatened by Germany with ouster from the euro if left-wing radical Syriza come to power. As an example the Federal Finance Minister Schäuble warned Greek citizens before the election that the country could lose the euro if it voted incorrectly,resulting that for the new government it will be difficult to find common ground with him. For his part, Tsipras announced that he would "force" Schäuble to accept the Greek proposals. The prime minister of Austria clearly stated that it is not good to interfere in the Greek elections within the federal republic of Germany and that with virtual discussions the opposite is achieved than what Germany wants and that the main guideline is to help against the reforms. After five years of crisis, the people are tired of the government. Alexis Tsipras wants to use his clear electoral victory to renegotiate the promised reforms in the EU. “Brussels must now recognize: Europe will not get rid of this man any time soon” states Boris Kalnoky, the author of the article.

2.4. Discussion 2.4.1. Thematic Analysis 2015 The application of the classical thematic analysis enabled us to group the content of the journalistic discourse into the following micro-thematic categories.

a) Cuts, contributions, salaries, pensions, b) Reactions / feelings of people c) Voting on a memorandum

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d) EU support mechanism e) European dimension of the crisis

These micro-themes were then categorized into two macro-themes that were formed on the basis of our research objectives and through which the fact is mainly highlighted: a) Electoral behavior of the Greeks, through the effects / reactions (in which we included the micro-thematic "cuts, contributions, salaries, pensions, measures", "voting of memoranda" "reactions / feelings of the people") and b) the perspective of European countries to which we have acceded ("the support mechanism" and the "European dimension of the crisis"). The thematic analysis showed that, while in the case of Deutsche Welle, both the macro-thematic electoral behavior of the Greeks and the view of the European states are projected with the same weight, which means that neither of these two thematic articles is rewarded in the newspaper like Die Zeit where the emphasis is on the electoral behavior of the Greeks. More specifically, Deutsche Welle divides its issues equally between the two macro-themes, devoting 54% to the perspective of European states and 46% to the effects / reactions of the electoral behavior of Greeks. In the case of Die Zeit, we see a greater emphasis on the electoral behavior of Greeks, which the newspaper highlights at 67%, and, consequently, less emphasis on the macro-thematic perspective of European states, which it highlights at 33%. As for the other two newspapers, the thematic analysis showed a lower profile on the macro-thematic electoral behavior of the Greeks (at a rate of 29% on average) and a greater emphasis on of the European states (at a rate of 71% on average).More specifically, in the newspaper Die Welt only 25% of its topics are devoted to the macro-thematic electoral behavior of Greeks through the effects / reactions. On the contrary, the largest percentage of the articles is dedicated to the perspective of the European countries at 75%. In the newspaper FAZ, we observe a smaller projection of the macro-thematic perspective of Greeks electoral behavior, which is reported at a rate of only 33%, and a greater projection of the macro-thematic perspective of European countries which is reported by 67%.

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Table 1 Percentage of two macro-topics per newspaper Newspaper Electoral behavior of the Perspectives of Greeks, through the European countries effects / reactions Deutsche Welle 46% 54% Die Zeit 67% 33% Die Welt 25% 75% FAZ 33% 67%

From the thematic analysis, therefore, it becomes clear that Deutsche Welle is the newspaper that divides its content almost equally between the two thematic. We should also note the special role played by die Welt and FAZ, emphasizing the perspective of European countries to which we have acceded. Equally noteworthy is the position of the newspaper Die Zeit, in terms of the importance it attaches to the macro-thematic effects / reactions, which it likens to the position adopted by the regional press. Such a tendency can be interpreted on the basis of the ideological identity of the newspaper which expresses greater closeness to the reader and gives it a more popular character. But beyond the explicit treatment of the fact, the question arises: to what extent do the linguistic choices, through which each subject is represented, reflect the ideological position of the speaking subject, which in this case is identical with the collective subject of each newspaper?

2.4.2. Thematic Analysis 2019 The defeat of SYRIZA in the European elections 2019 with a difference of 9.5 points from New Democracy and the early recourse to the polls on June 30 are covered in the front pages of the German political newspapers. With headlines such as "Overwhelming victory of Mitsotakis", "Finally ends", "They are leaving, elections on June 30" the press captures the prevailing climate in the political field and the rapid developments that lead the country to early elections. Once again, the classical thematic analysis enabled us to group the content of the journalistic discourse into the following 5 micro-thematic categories

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a) Cuts, contributions, salaries, pensions, b) Reactions / feelings of people c) Voting on a memorandum d) EU support mechanism e) European dimension of the crisis

These micro-themes were then categorized into two macro-themes that were formed on the basis of our research objectives and through which the fact is mainly highlighted: a) Electoral behavior of the Greeks, through the effects / reactions (in which we included the micro-thematic "cuts, contributions, salaries, pensions, measures", "voting of memoranda" "reactions / feelings of the people") and b) the perspective of European countries to which we have acceded ("the support mechanism" and the "European dimension of the crisis"). The thematic analysis showed that Deutsche Welle again highlights both macro- thematic factors. Similarly, the publications related to the Greek elections by Die Zeit highlight both macro-thematic factors. Specifically, during the period from 04 May 2019 to 02 June 2019, the two newspapers had 9 and 10 published articles, whether they were main articles, or reports, or comments / opinions, or interviews. In the case of the newspapers Die Welt and FAZ, the thematic analysis showed a smaller projection of the macro-thematic Perspectives of European countries (29% on average) and a greater emphasis on the macro-thematic Electoral behavior of the Greeks, through the effects / reactions (71% on average) which further emphasizes the nature of these effects.

Table 2 Percentage of two macro-topics per newspaper Newspaper Electoral behavior of the Perspectives of Greeks, through the European countries effects / reactions Deutsche Welle 54% 46% Die Zeit 52% 48% Die Welt 71% 29% FAZ 71% 29%

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2.4.3 Linguistic Analysis In order to investigate in particular, the registration of the subject in the speech, we will study some linguistic indicators that highlight in an implicit way ideologically directed choices. It should be noted in advance that the choice of specific language indicators to determine the degree of involvement of the subject is partly required by the choice of analysis of the particular journalistic genre, which in this case are the headlines, as well as journalistic practices, which shape the form that these titles should take (avoiding verbs, using nouns, elliptical sentences) and, finally, from the purpose they serve (to inform, to gain the reader's interest and to provoke). We therefore consider that these definitions summarize the reasons for choosing intention to vote in 2015 and 2019. Thus, choosing and using one or the other definition means presenting specific semantic interpretations and the ideological position of the speaking subjects regarding the interpretations. The use of various adjectives, on the one hand, one large number of different nomenclatures, on the other hand, demonstrate the strong interest with which the two national newspapers characterize the factors that influenced the voting intention for the 2015 and 2019, of the measures of the crisis that entails the event (hard, difficult, painful measures, cuts, hope, financial difficulties), as well as in its "necessity" (compulsory, necessary). The concept of the necessity of the measures is also projected through the use of the names sacrifice and heavy price, which project the negative side of the appeal to the IMF (negative procedure), while at the same time signifying the positive result of the event. At the same time, emphasis is placed on the effectiveness of the changes (how different things will be), without giving an appreciative tone to the changes, which are characterized in a neutral way (reversals, new measures).

Table 2 Linguistic analysis Newspaper Αdjectives Νaming Deutsche Welle Painful measures Aid Cuts Rescue Radical upheavals IMF Great sacrifices Guardianship Die Zeit Heavy price Sacrifices

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Painful salvation Heavy price Hope Die Welt Harsh measures Survival appeal Call to mobilization FAZ New measures Support Mechanism New tough measures Realism Painful measures

2.4.4. Comparative analysis The articles in all four newspapers deal with the economic effects of the crisis, the cuts, the social injustices and the imposition of harsh measures by the country's creditors. The combination of these factors shaped the intention to vote in the two electoral contests in Greece for 2015 and 2019 according to the German press. However, there are two important variables that are reported by journalists and differentiate the intention to vote. The first is related to the existence of the hope that "gave" Alexis Tsipras in 2015 to reduce the painful measures, something that helped him win the election. And the second is related to his failure to win the trust of the Greek people and to lose in the elections in 2019.

2.4.4.1Elections 2015 In the run-up to the election, German newspapers reported on the sudden fear of Alexis Tsipras regarding his re-election, noting that the outgoing prime minister's plan when announcing early elections was to secure autonomy, but a plan that does not seem to work. Now, according to the latest polls, SYRIZA is fighting a head-to-head battle with the ND, which significantly reduces the difference, international media comment. According to the German newspaper Die Welt, when Tsipras came to power in January, he had a clear lead over the ND, but now the gap with the main opposition party is dangerously closing. The newspaper emphasizes also that the percentage of undecided, which is around 7%, will play a decisive role in the election result. Initially, Tsipras's plan was

[45] to secure an absolute majority in Parliament. In the process, however, things became difficult for the outgoing Prime Minister of Greece. Three weeks before the early parliamentary elections in Greece, Alexis Tsipras's party maintains a small lead, the German newspaper "Bild" comments, noting that the plan of the outgoing Greek Prime Minister was to secure an absolute majority in Parliament, but which did not seem to work. According to the newspapers, the failure to limit the memorandum measures was a factor in the loss of votes for Mr. Tsipras. As for the victory of Syriza, German newspapers report that Tsipras is succeeding for the second time. However, "the new Greek government has no room for maneuver. Its mission is to implement what its predecessors agreed with the lenders, if necessary, even against the will of the people. This weakness is manifested only by the fact that there is not enough time for meaningful negotiations to form a government. In case of delay, the disbursement of the much-needed installments may be delayed ". According to the newspaper, the disbursement of the next installments depends on the evaluation. "Previously, the Greek government should have implemented other reforms. Details of prerequisite actions are negotiated with lenders. Due to the pre- election campaign, however, contacts were made recently only at a technical level". The German press sees the result of the Greek elections as the desire of the Greeks to remain in the Eurozone, as they rejected the pro-drachma parties, but also their intention to give a second chance to Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras. At the same time, however, he emphasizes that the Greek people have now understood that they must proceed with reforms, and on the other hand, the creditors of Athens that they must cooperate with Tsipras. "Greece is a different country after the elections," comments FAZ. "There is no hope for an easy way out of the debt crisis," is added. These elections proved, according to the German newspaper, that the majority of Greeks have accepted that Greece should be consolidated within the Eurozone and have understood that without reforms it cannot be saved. "After this Sunday, the time has come not only to rebuild the country, but also to restore confidence in politics," he concludes. DW reports that “The Greeks offered a second term to Alexis Tsipras”21.Now he has to prove that he can rule," said Wirtschaft Woche. However, the magazine

21https://www.dw.com/en/tsipras-a-second-chance/a-18727811, Deutsche Welle, retrieved at 20/2/21 [46] emphasizes that Tsipras is the first Greek prime minister, after the outbreak of the crisis, to sign a rescue plan for the country and despite that he is re-elected. The Greek prime minister has several problems in front of him, the article notes. Athens' international creditors expect what has been agreed to be implemented as soon as possible, and Tsipras will have to prove that he is taking his commitments seriously. “International creditors have now realized that they have to work with Tsipras. If Tsipras does not follow the rules of the creditors' game, a Grexit could be put on the table again quickly.” “The credibility of the second Tsipras government may be tested faster than he would like,” the magazine concludes. Alexis Tsipras won the elections, but the demands of the creditors do not leave him much room for maneuver. This could be an opportunity: he does not want to want to change the whole of Europe now, but he can focus on his country. The Greek Prime Minister can now put his own signature on the reforms, he can take advantage of the margins he has and prove that despite the demands of the creditors, he chooses the policy he follows. Die Welt reports that the new government will not have time to rejoice in its victory, as it has much to do. It emphasizes that Alexis Tsipras managed to defeat his conservative opponents for the third time, while he adds that the elections clearly showed that the vast majority of Greeks want the country to remain in the Eurozone. “Many Greeks gave a second chance to Alexis Tsipras”. “They obviously believe that, unlike the previous Greek governments, it fought in the negotiations with the creditors”, it explains. Finally, Die Welt emphasizes that the most important result of these elections is the fact that Greeks want to remain in the Eurozone.

2.4.4.2Elections 2019 According to German newspaper articles, “The victory of the New Democracy was expected. Most Greeks no longer have any hope that things will get better soon. In the middle class there has been a very bad economic bleeding for the last four years. Reluctant economic growth does not reach most people. Greeks want hope. Above all, young people dream of politicians who will finally act better. This is the only reason why the liberal economist Kyriakos Mitsotakis managed to win. It is the opposite of the current Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, a man of the people”. Mitsotakis is the embodiment of the old, hated elites of the country. But today it expresses the hopes of the desperate. His promises of reform and his vision of an [47]

"aggressive plan for reform and economic development" are well received by the people. "They finally want another message and light at the end of the tunnel," said the Die Welt columnist. According to several articles, it is not ruled out that the new Prime Minister, despite the ambitious reform program, will fail, because the patience of the Greeks in the meantime is almost exhausted and they want to see quick economic success and improvement of their standard of living. If Mitsotakis achieves his goals, he could become the new hero of Greece. If not, he will enter the big series of tragic people in the levers of power in Greece ", the author concludes. “Return to zero” is the headline of a Die Zeit newspaper report, which states that "with Kyriakos Mitsotakis, an old dynasty returns to power - its agenda is not enough to understand how we achieved this success." "The break is over." For four years Greece was ruled by the political newcomer Alexis Tsipras and his left-wing party, SYRIZA, but this historic exception has now passed. Sunday's elections were clearly won by his opponent and so far opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis. Most likely, his triumph will bring him an absolute majority in Parliament. "This leads Greek politics back to zero and in fact in many senses", the columnist continues and points out that this is the first time since the beginning of the crisis that the country will have an autonomous government. Together with New Democracy, "a family that for a century co-decides the country's politics also takes over the power of the Prime Minister again", the author continues and refers to the story of Eleftherios Venizelos and Konstantinos Mitsotakis, while referring to the years of crisis and finally with the takeover of power by Alexis Tsipras it was considered that the era of political dynasties was over and people in Greece were tired of these families, which they considered responsible for the mismanagement in the economy and the customer policy that led to the biggest debt crisis since World War II. "But what led the voters to change their minds? Probably four years of Tsipras were enough to completely blur the political memory of the country. He drew the greatest indignation when he failed in his most important pre-election affair. Tsipras came to liberate the country "at once" (…), but the opposite happened. The government implemented another program and implemented it so dedicatedly that Greece can now operate its economy almost autonomously and can be financed in the markets. However, the positive consequences of the economic development are so far only a little felt by the people, while the cuts from ten years of crisis are much more ",

[48] estimates the author of Zeit and states that Mr. Tsipras became unpopular with many Greeks due to the Prespa Agreement. "The reasons for Tsipras' defeat are fast, but not those for the victory of his opponent. Certainly, Kyriakos Mitsotakis gave many people an answer to their pressing questions. He promised investments in the state education system and a significant increase in the minimum wage and tax cuts. How it will fund this program has yet to be explained. (…) After his election to the leadership of the party, Mitsotakis primarily avoided making mistakes, he knew that Tsipras, due to the situation, would have difficulties in the elections. So Mitsotakis restrained himself, avoided attacks and challenges and presented himself as a new reformer, with a feeling for the social needs of the people. Without showing much of his own history and that of his party. It took no more to achieve this victory. "It happened without much fuss - as if the people in Greece submitted to their fate", the comment concludes. "No discount for Mitsotakis", is the title in a comment of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, which states that "after the wrong path that Greece took, not for the first time, with Alexis Tsipras, Greeks can now hope for a way out with the Mitsotakis government ", while the assessment is expressed that"… this road will also be long and difficult - and can cost new money to the Europeans ". "In 2015, the Greeks gave the order to Alexis Tsipras to change their country. Now they have withdrawn their mandate again. Many Greeks still want another country - but Tsipras is no longer the man they trust for a turn for the better. Now they trust Kyriakos Mitsotakis", writes the author of FAZ and emphasizes that Mr. Mitsotakis may have many plans - maybe too many for four years - but he received a clear mandate from the Greeks. "The years of crisis shook a lot of data in Greece and not only the view that the country can be charged without limit. Gone are the days when many Greeks took to the streets against even the slightest reform and where the unions refused to change even the most obvious flaws ", the author notes and refers to the era of the country's rule by Konstantinos Mitsotakis and his own reform efforts. The columnist estimates that Kyriakos Mitsotakis partners may be called upon to help again, as the election winner announced that after some structural reforms at the beginning of his term he wants to go to his partners and ask to reduce the primary surpluses in Greece. "Tsipras achieved high primary surpluses through excessive taxation, as well as a drastic reduction in public spending and investment. Mitsotakis warns that the high [49] tax burden is suffocating the Greek economy and preventing it from growing. That is why he wants to reduce primary surpluses. But then Greece will not be able to repay its debt as planned. In other words: it should be covered by the taxpayers of other Eurozone countries and this may meet political resistance ", continues the FAZ columnist, to conclude: “When Mitsotakis became the leader of ND in 2016, there was optimism in his environment. Apparently, they believed that for Mitsotakis there would be - and not only in Berlin - something like a political discount, because unlike Tsipras, he belongs to the same political family as the Chancellor. But it could only be difficult to explain why Mitsotakis should be given such a discount. What was valid for Tsipras must also be valid for his successors". "Why was Tsipras punished now" writes in a comment of FAZ and points out that "the fact that the New Democracy achieved such a clear victory shows that many people would like to leave behind the years of crisis and that they want something normal again". The columnist also points out that "the fact that Alexis Tsipras was punished, has a lot to do with the discontent that gathered during the long years of austerity, which turned the daily life of many Greeks into a constant struggle for survival" and notes that SYRIZA covered some ground from the European elections and "the result gives the left a mandate for a strong opposition". Kyriakos Mitsotakis assumes a great responsibility. "If it wants to do something good for the country, it must not only reduce taxes, but also end the political polarization that has so poisoned the climate in Greece," DW's comment concludes.

2.4.4.3 The axes of competition in the elections As we can see from the articles published in German newspapers, the intention of the voters to vote depends on the avoidance of painful measures due to the crisis and the management of the crisis by the respective political party. Something that is also mentioned in the entire international literature as a factor of voting intention. Regardless of whether the election promises are applicable, the voters follow those who will "bring" Salvation, in an easy way. All four newspapers agree with this and report that, as in the 2015 elections, the memorandum-anti-memorandum divide was the axis of controversy, with SYRIZA proposing an alternative plan by abolishing the memoranda and austerity measures, with a simultaneous effort to restructure Europe, in cooperation with other Member States that have also suffered from similar policies. On the other hand, ND warned that any election of SYRIZA as the first party, meant leaving the

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European Union and bankrupting the country. The programmatic reasons of the smaller parties were moving in the same axis of controversy. The results of the elections of January 25, 2015, reflected the desire of the majority of citizens for the end of the memoranda and the formulation of a different policy. Denying the majority of polls that have a marginal lead to Alexis Tsipras, SYRIZA emerged victorious with 36.4%, with ND second by 27.8%. Since it did not secure a marginal majority in Parliament, SYRIZA in the first investigative mandate, formed a governing coalition with ANEL, drawing up a policy map towards the memorandum, with the ultimate goal of convincing European partners to end austerity measures. The Minister of Finance was taken over by the unconventional economist Giannis Varoufakis, who took responsibility for starting negotiations with European officials, armed with a new political and economic vision that he represented. The Europeans, however, were not in the mood for a change in economic policy, with Germany mainly putting the brakes on the claims of the Greek side. The months- long negotiations had a negative impact on the Greek economy, which fell back into recession, with the country meeting its obligations with difficulty. The nightmare of bankruptcy had returned, despite the government's assurances to the contrary. The European institutions remained unchanged in their positions, with their patience running out, mainly to the person of their key interlocutor, the Minister of Finance, who was in a mood of conflict rather than compromise in the economic policy guidelines of the European partners. The margins of the economy had dried up, finding a solution seemed impossible due to the government's intransigence, with the Europeans proposing a third rescue package as a last resort for pressure on the Greek side. Alexis Tsipras decides to put the partners' proposal to a referendum, arguing that it strengthens democracy and offers citizens the opportunity to determine their own future. The holding of the referendum provokes reactions abroad and inside the country, with the opposition pitting against the government. The latter is campaigning for the rejection of the European proposal, without, however, showing a clear alternative political proposal. At the same time, the developments in the economy, during the pre- referendum period, are dramatic. Capital controls are imposed on banks, with panicked citizens withdrawing deposits, but limited by the limits set on bank withdrawals. At the same time the market is paralyzed, companies cannot raise the necessary funds to serve their financial needs, for fear of the future of the country after the referendum, [51] overshadowing the pace of society. The tense climate and the narrow economic context did not reflect the fear of the citizens at the ballot box, with the result of the referendum of June 28, 2015, being a big surprise. The proposal of the European institutions was rejected by the citizens with a percentage of 61.3%, with the government celebrating, while abroad there was concern. However, Alexis Tsipras emphasizes that the high percentage is a tool in the hands of the government, to achieve more favorable conditions in the new round of negotiations that would begin with the institutions. As a sign of goodwill, the Minister of Finance is led to resign and his position is taken by Tsakalotos, in order to reach a compromise with European positions. Indeed, the new round of talks raises hopes for a solution, based on the government's shift to more realistic positions, similar to those of the Europeans, but far removed from its programmatic rhetoric. The tough negotiations, after continuous concessions from the Greek side, led to an agreement on the lines to be followed by the Greek side, at the long meeting of the Heads of State in August 2015. The agreement nevertheless provoked reactions within SYRIZA, with members of its parliamentary group and the government voting against the measures in the plenary session of the Parliament. On the other hand, the new program, the Third Memorandum, was voted by opposition parties. Fearing the collapse of the party and consequently the government, due to internal party reactions, Alexis Tsipras calls new elections for September 2015. Accepting the initially anti-memorandum government, the need for austerity measures in order to restore economy, the memorandum-counter- memorandum divide is reportedly declining. However, the leading role in two national elections will be matter of interest to researchers in the field of electoral behavior in the future. Regarding the elections of September 2015, the electoral dilemma for the first time is not about ideological background but revolves around faces. The implementation of a new memorandum, with the measures that accompany it, seems given in the eyes of the citizens, who have to choose between parties, the majority of which will move within a specific policy framework that has already been defined. The personification of the electoral process, in conditions of economic crisis, is an innovative and special research piece. The deepening of the research, if carried out, will give several answers regarding the Greek case that appears. In the September elections, SYRIZA, placing its leader in the foreground, repeated its victory with a percentage of 35.5%, a fact that shows that the citizens did [52] not withdraw their confidence, despite the change in the party's political positions. Alexis Tsipras, with his communication talent, managed to convince his voters that he will eliminate the political remnants of the past, giving new life to the country. ND with its historical executive Evangelos Meimarakis as in term leader recorded 28%. In the upcoming elections in 2019, Kyriakos Mitsotakis won the elections, taking advantage of Tsipras' inability to lead Greece out of the memorandum. In conclusion, it appears that the harsh measures and memorandum policies implemented during the crisis years, resulted in the rearrangement of the Greek political scene, leading to the end of the coup. Initially, the reactions of the citizens to the austerity policies offered space on the political map, for the promotion of new political ideas, with the main axis being anti-memorandum positions. Remarkable is the emergence of new parties, some of which managed to enter parliament, adopting anti- memorandum rhetoric. But then the gradual transformation of all the parties into memoranda, to a greater or lesser degree, is identified. As a consequence of this change, we are witnessing the disappearance of the memorandum-counter-memorandum divide in the last elections. Although it is too early to draw definite conclusions, we see a new division forming, which on the one hand includes the proponents of the reforms, within the framework of the memorandum, while on the other hand there is the conservative pole, which does not want drastic changes in its state structure.

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Conclusion The most “satisfying” results are found in the articles of DW. First of all, its articles are in English which make them accessible to many more readers. In the elections of 2015, the newspaper holds a very neutral position between the two parties and focuses more in what Greek people seem to think about them and the elections. Most of the articles refer to the reform program that the new government must implement and the consequences if this path won’t be followed. One can conclude that the media create the notion that the future of the country is uncertain and vague if Syriza might win the elections. As anyone can observe, the positions and proposal of the conservatives were given very little attention, which also increases the notion of insecurity to the public opinion. After the elections, there is also some insecurity pointed in the articles examined. The election of the new government does not seem to be “celebrated” but rather creates more uncertainty for the next steps that it will make. However, by pointing out that there is really no other way than to keep the agreements and implement the reforms for the new government, the authors manage to give a hopeful message to the international public opinion. In the elections of 2019, one can observe that the articles put the blame on these same measures that were expected to be implemented, for the possibility of a Syriza defeat. It is interesting that the main problems of the past government seems to be the disappointment and exhaustion of the Greek people after the implementation of the austerity measures, whereas before the same measures were praised for the salvation of the Greek economy. Also, there is no mention on the failure of the Tsipras’ government to deal with the disaster on Mati, which was one of the main critics against the governments’ abilities during the pre- electoral period. After the elections, it can be argued that gradually the newspaper is friendly towards the new government, an approach that is attributed to the plans of reaching prosperity and development in the country. Criticism to the previous government is exerted after its loss, after the elections all the articles try to point out the positive aims of the new government, while this was not observed in the articles before the elections. However, it seems that this doesn’t constitute a biased approach, but it is based on the statements of the new Prime Minister. However, its approach cannot be compared to the coverage of the Greek crisis, as far as bias and campaigns against a country is concerned. Zeit’s approach is simple and short. It does not deal adequately with the Greek elections, while mostly indirect references are found. The newspaper Die Welt also has [54] very few articles regarding the 2019 elections in Greece, although it appears to have a whole category of news under the title “Elections in Greece”. The articles seem to stop after the elections of 2015 and the win of Syriza. Finally, the same applies to FAZ, not due to the absence of relevant content but to the limited access to it without subscription. One may imply that the news regarding the Greek elections are offered to a very limited reading audience and not to the majority of German public. In any case the coverage of the Greek elections by the four media is not adequate and does not point out the most important aspects. Many repeats are observed, and the coverage may not be biased, like in the case of the Greek crisis, but it seems superficial. Furthermore, there is no presentation of the political programs and proposals from each part, there is no deep analysis of what will mean for the Greek people the implementation of each one of these proposals. The articles are limited to citing other peoples’ statements and more focused on the impact that the result might have on EU, but also on a superficial level. Since Greece is a member of the EU, it is apparent that its elections are related to the rest of them and should have been presented more thoroughly. Moreover, it is important that the access to those articles was not easy but limited; meaning that any person who desires to read those German articles would find many difficulties in doing so, like the present researcher. Finally, it has to be mentioned that those articles do not seem to contribute to the creation of the German public opinion for Greece since they offer a very limited coverage and analysis of the events that take place before and after the elections. The news media play a crucial role in the context of international affairs and affect international relations. But the present research asserts that the European issues are under-addressed and inadequately dealt with. In that context, the language barriers seem to not facilitate the above. Finally, it shall be stated that the examined media create a positive approach towards the new government of Greece after the elections.

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