Political and social actors in TV news programmes. A challenge for mexican TV channels Actores políticos y sociales de los telediarios: Una tarea pendiente de las televisoras mexicanas Academic Article in Scopus uri icon

abstract

  • © 2015, University of La Laguna. All rights reserved.Introduction: Broadcast television is the main medium of communication in Mexico, but its news programmes offer biased information regarding political issues, as they tend to privilege governmental sources of information to the detriment of non-official sources. Method: In order to prove this hypothesis, the contents of the two most-watched TV news programmes in Mexico were analysed to identify the political actors that appeared the most, the diversity of sources, and the frequency of appearance. The obtained data were subjected to the regular statistical analyses used in content analysis, while the Gini index, which is a measure of statistical dispersion, was used to establish the degree of imbalance in the representation of the different political actors in news programmes. Results: The findings indicate that the main sources of information included in the TV news programmes were members of Mexico¿s Federal Government and, to a lesser extent, the legislative power and the state governments. Furthermore, of the different political parties operating in Mexico, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), the current ruling party, is the most represented in TV news programmes. Unsurprisingly, the main issues addressed in TV news programmes were economy, security and politics, which are precisely also the main issues included in the agenda of the political actors. Conclusions: The empirical evidence confirms the lack of modernisation in Mexican journalism, which is characterised, among other aspects, by the absence of investigative journalism and its adherence to the agenda of the government, particularly the federal administration.

publication date

  • January 1, 2015