Bilden av "Balkan"
Krigen i forna Jugoslavien på svenska ledarsidor 1995
This paper examines the existence of two different discourses on the causes of the wars in former Yugoslavia 1991-1995 in the editorial pages in Swedish newspapers. One discourse is titled "ancient hatreds" and explains the wars as a result of old historical ethnic conflicts typical of the "Balkans" and the second discourse, "poor political leadership," explains the wars as a result of deliberately conducted nationalistic policies by political leaders.Parallel to this discourse analysis is a media theory perspective of how news is selected and processed in the newspaper's editorial texts.The paper also examines the link between each discourse and a specific view on the necessity of foreign military intervention in former Yugoslavia.The starting point of the investigation are two high-profile events in 1995 and the impact they made in the 29 editorial texts in the metropolitan newspapers that were studied.The paper shows that none of the discourses clearly dominated in these editorial texts and that a clear link between a certain discourse and the advocated measure in the form of foreign intervention couldn´t be established in the material as a whole. However, the four texts that clearly belonged to the "ancient hatreds" discourse were all in favour of foreign military intervention.The essay concludes that there is evidence of a medial feedback which means that the news to a high degree influences what is discussed in the editorials and that the evaluation and selection of news, is similar in all the studied newspapers.