Jensen, C and Lee, S (2019) 'Mass media attention to welfare state reforms: evidence from Britain, 1996–2014.' West European Politics, 42 (1). 113 - 132. ISSN 0140-2382

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Abstract

© 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. One of the core questions facing political scientists is how politicians are able to implement cutbacks without suffering electoral backlash. A possible explanation might be that the mass media refrain from reporting on welfare state reforms in a consistent way. In order to explore this, two unique datasets have been collected: one contains information on all policy reforms of British old age pensions and unemployment protection from 1996 to 2014, and the other contains hand-coded media articles that allow the tracking on a monthly basis of what reforms are picked up. It is found that the mass media report on cutbacks, but not on expansions, and that they prioritise easy-to-understand cutbacks over cutbacks that are more technical in nature.

Item Type:	Article
Subjects:	J Political Science > JA Political science (General)
Divisions:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Government, Department of
Depositing User:	Elements
Date Deposited:	06 Aug 2018 09:29
Last Modified:	10 Nov 2019 02:00
URI:	http://repository.essex.ac.uk/id/eprint/22784

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