Abstract
This article presents insights about Lithuania’s media elite, gained during research carried out on the basis of a complex Europeanness model, developed by Heinrich Best (Best 2012: 208-233). Data describing Lithuania’s media elite are analyzed with reference to three dimensions or facets, identified in the original model of Europeanness: emotive, cognitive-evaluative and projective-conative. However, the list of variables examined in the study is considerably longer as compared to the initial static model offered by Best, and the analysis is much more detailed. This comparative study is aimed at identifying and describing the evolution of emotive identification of Lithuania’s media elite with Europe in terms of the objective and judging approach of the EU in the period from 2008 to 2015. Results of the research revealed a clear trend that Lithuania’s media elite have been becoming European. It was noticed that it tends to increasingly associate itself emotionally with Europe. Besides, the number of representatives of this elite group that assesses the common EU governance negatively (when the EU’s common foreign policy in respect of countries found beyond the EU borders is becoming increasingly accepted) has been consistently decreasing and the trust in the EU institutions has been enhancing. Looking to the future, the representatives of Lithuania’s media elite tend to assess the EU prospects in the medium-term and long-term (10 years) optimistically. They also hold the view that 10 years later the EU, as a geopolitical, political and economic entity will be stronger, and that both social and economic differences among the EU member states will not be so sharp. Euroscepticism is seen not only on the cultural plane. Correlation analysis has revealed that young age (people under 40) and an intensive socialization in the EU networks (constant communication with the EU partners) determine that Lithuania’s media elite have been becoming European.
Highlights
This comparative study delves into the Europeanness of the Lithuanian mass media elite and its development in the period from 2008 to 2015, which brought many changes both to Lithuania and to the European Union (EU)
At the end of 2009, the Lisbon Treaty came into force on the basis of which the European Parliament, which is elected directly by the EU citizens, acquired new powers in the process of adoption of the EU legislative acts, in the process of approval of the EU budget and in seeking for international accord; an initiative was developed by European citizens, which provided for the right of the citizens of the Member States to demand new EU legislative acts; besides, the positions of President of the European Council and High Representative of Foreign Affairs and Security Policy were established, a direct election of the President of the European Commission and the European Parliament was approved etc
The concept of Europeanness, introduced by Heinrich Best (2012) and developed in empirical research carried out in Lithuania (Matonytė, Morkevičius 2013) accentuates that the EU, as a political project, as a setup of political institutions and as a political community, can be related to different systems of attitudes, different orientation in terms of time and different reference objects (EU institutions, strategies, policy directions, values etc.)
Summary
This comparative study delves into the Europeanness of the Lithuanian mass media elite and its development in the period from 2008 to 2015, which brought many changes both to Lithuania and to the European Union (EU). The emphasis is put on the power of the national media elite, which is extraordinarily big, in Lithuania, in regard to other segments of social power elite (Matonytė 2010) These theoretical and empirical observations lead to the need to study the content, the outlines and the development of the Europeanness of media elite of new EU member states (in this case, of Lithuania’s) in more detail. This is evident especially in view of the fact that academic research show that the media outlets of the EU member states are one of the most important factors that shape the political and cultural agenda of the EU and determine the occurrence of the European public space (Koopman, Statham, 2010). This study into trends of the Europeanness of Lithuania’s media leaders and their characteristics is interesting as a certain academic “exercise,” and as a review of important factors, which may have a considerable effect on identity and policy, on levels both national and supranational
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