Ordinary, Cheap, Crystal Clear? “Gazeta Wyborcza” and “Rzeczpospolita” as Sources of Knowledge about Populism

The goal of the paper is to present the results of studies on the quality and reliability of information provided by the mass media based on the example of the issue of populism. The debate on the role of the media as an information provider and an instrument of shaping public opinion is spreading wider and wider. There appear diverse opinions and reflections on the matter. Similarly, we can encounter different viewpoints on the standards of the information being provided. The analysis covered the texts published in “Gazeta Wyborcza” and “Rzeczpospolita” dailies. The problem of populism was chosen for several reasons. First, I have been interested chiefly in the phenomenon of populism on a global scale for years. Second, this phenomenon, together with transformations begun in 1989, became one of the most controversial not only in Polish socio-political space. The analysis of articles that refer the concept of populism in the “Gazeta Wyborcza” and “Rzeczpospolita” prompts several reflections. Here only one of them: when compared with other mass media, for example television or the Internet, the role of the two newspapers as providers of information and knowledge about populism is considerable. The information provided is of course at different levels, which stems, inter alia, from the nature of the texts (a reprinting of a scientific article, an interview, in which the problem of populism appears, or correspondence). We should emphasize that in ”Gazeta Wyborcza” there is more in-depth knowledge about populism as compared with the “Rzeczpospolita”. This is mainly because of the interviews with eminent scholars or the texts authored by experts on the subject of populism, e.g. O. Ianni, N. Popov, or A. Walicki.