Facts and transformations in European minority language media systems amid digitalization and economic crisis

Abstract

This article investigates the reality and variations of the European minority language media systems between 2009 and 2016, a period of serious economic crisis and accelerated digitalization process. To that aim, several parameters were measured: structure of the media systems and changes during that period along the variables of media type, ownership and reach; presence and relevance of major media in each of the communities; number and variation of full-time journalists; and the density or relative weight of the media systems with regard to the speaking population. The 10 minority languages under analysis (Basque, Catalan, Galician, Corsican, Breton, Frisian, Irish, Welsh, Scottish-Gaelic and Sámi) represent a wide range of communities. The relevance of the study lies in its direct comparative nature and in the fact that it thoroughly updates previous scholarly literature, measuring the changes which occurred within the 10 media systems.

Economy and funding of European minority language media: Reality and impact of digitalization and economic crisis

“…Economic volume or weight is operationally defined as the total annual income of a media outlet and economic density as the amount of annual media revenue per speaker; both expressed in Euros (Zabaleta et al, 2019).…”

“…Considering that the total number of media outlets in the nine communities amounted to 313 news organisations in 2016 and 317 in 2009 (Zabaleta et al, 2014(Zabaleta et al, , 2019 and that differences among communities in terms of media system size were important, both censuses and stratified samples were employed in this study.…”

“…Authors. N = 154 outlets (Zabaleta et al, 2019). (1) Bilingual broadcasting outlets of the Sámi, Breton and Corsican communities were excluded.…”

“…As for the size of the nine minority language media systems (Zabaleta et al, 2019), updated to 2016, the Basque, Welsh and Galician communities have a noteworthy number of news organisations, between 60 and 125 outlets, and a varied range of major media of general content and diffusion.…”

Economía y financiación de medios en lenguas minoritarias celtas de Irlanda y Reino Unido: el modelo público como referencia

“…Con respecto a las tres comunidades lingüísticas analizadas, los rasgos fundamentales de su lengua y sus sistemas de medios son los siguientes: el número aproximado de hablantes iii es de 0,6 millones (21% de la población) en Gales; 0,8 millones (12%) en Irlanda, incluyendo la República de Irlanda e Irlanda del Norte; y 60.000 hablantes en Escocia (1%). Por otro lado, la estructura de medios monolingües (Zabaleta et al, 2019) se puede resumir en los siguientes datos (Tabla 1):…”