Journalists’ Perceptions and Experiences of the Media’s Role in the Growth of Political Populism in Kosovo

This research aimed to analyze the perceptions of journalists regarding political populism and the role of the media in its growth. The lack of research on these variables has been an impetus to do such research. Also, the research aimed to examine the differences in perceptions in relation to the type of media, traditional media - online media. The methodology used in this research is mixed methodology. Both the instruments for data collection are a structured questionnaire and semi-structured individual interviews. Participants in this research were 112 journalists working in traditional media and 179 journalists working in online media. Since the research has two samples, one served for the collection of quantitative data and was selected randomly, while the other served for the collection of qualitative data and was selected purposefully. Quantitative data analysis was done using descriptive and inferential statistics (ANOVA). Whereas, the qualitative data were analyzed using thematic analysis. The findings of this research show that, according to journalists, the media plays an important role in the growth of political populism. The findings also show that journalists had different experiences and statements regarding their experiences with populist reporting. Traditional media journalists were more exposed to attacks, political sabotage, and links, while online media journalists were more exposed to internal pressure to leak information and events of a populist nature. Also from the obtained results, the type of traditional or online media was not a distinguishing factor for the perceptions of journalists regarding political populism and the role of the media in its growth. Received: 16 May 2024 / Accepted: 26 August 2024 / Published: 05 September 2024