Electronic media in European Parliament election campaigns in Poland

Abstract

The main research concern of this paper is the marketing tools used in the electronic media by political entities for the purpose of winning social support. The author refers to the two election campaigns preceding the European Parliament elections in 2004 and 2009. The theoretical foundation for the research was provided by the concept offraming of media messages. On account of the abundance of the material collected, the paper presents observations made with reference to audiovisual commercials and the content of the websites belonging to the political entities that won EP mandates in those elections. The analysis evidences the attachment of political entities to the dissemination of their promotional materials via television, on the one hand, and their consistently increasing interest in Internet campaigns on the other. A clear trend of the presidentialization of politics can be noted, as the key role in election campaigns and persuasive message dissemination is played by party leaders.