Populist Propaganda in a Context of Social Solitude
Populist Propaganda in a Context of Social Solitude

Summary/Abstract: This paper draws on thirteen semi-structured interviews with journalists from Bulgarian print media and news websites to outline their perceptions of their professional world. The interviews were conducted between March and June 2016, within the framework of the study on anti-democratic propaganda in Bulgaria. Without exaggeration, both the analysis of media and the interviews with journalists have shown the disintegration of the field of journalism as a differentiated field in Bulgaria. What is this due to? Our interviewees explained it with the commercialization and shift in focus from winning trust to securing higher ratings – the media have come to be understood as entertainment and journalism is trying to adjust to this ‘commercial’ requirement. But this is not the main (or at least not the sufficient) reason. The market, in turn, is changing under pressure from free online media, the reorientation of television towards new formats (of entertainment), and the subsequent fragmentation of audiences. What differentiates print media and news websites, however, is the drastic merger of entertainment and direct politics through omerta on certain topics and persons, through advertorials that are not properly (if at all) indicated as such, and all of this – in the absence of information about who owns the media. Our interviewees share a common practical dilemma: you either do journalism, or work for a media corporation. If one wants to do proper journalism, one has to shy away from the topics of the day and withdraw to the safer territories of marginal topics.

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