Image of foreigners in Swiss media prepared the ground for SVP initiative

Media climate on foreigners on Swiss TV

Zurich, February 7, 2014 - “The Swiss referendum on the SVP initiative is similar to the minaret initiative and the rip-off initiative”, observes Roland Schatz , founder and CEO of Media Tenor International, on the current media data in advance of the referendum in Switzerland. “As long as foreigners are presented primarily as a problem to the sovereign in the media, such as the main news program of the SRG, any decision in favor of foreigners would be a surprise,” states Schatz.

Media Tenor International has analyzed the presence of foreigners in Swiss TV news and the SRG since January 2006. Here, foreigners are primarily presented as a problem. More than 80% of reports in which foreigners were covered at all, focused on the right of asylum or pure immigration issues. Since 2006, this media misrepresentation has scarcely given voters a chance to inform themselves on the challenges Switzerland would face without immigration: Nearly every hospital in Switzerland is now dependent on nurses and doctors not born in Switzerland​​. Research and teaching would be unthinkable between St. Gallen and Geneva, if scientists from Europe, America, Africa and Asia would not make their contribution in universities, colleges and technical colleges — not to mention the contributions paid by foreigners into Swiss social security system.

Similar to the minaret referendum and the rip-off initiative 11 months ago, this vote is again jeopardized by the stereotypes broadcast by the media. The minaret initiative was approved contrary to all surveys, because the media did not show to the electorate what — in view of a share of only 2% of Muslims in the country — Islam in Switzerland really means or could mean. And thus, the Swiss people were only casting votes based on clichés. In reporting about the Minder initiative, the media conveyed the impression that all entrepreneurs would act like Daniel Vasella, since his case was the only one visible above the threshold of perception and therefore had the most profound impact on opinion.

For this study Media Tenor has analyzed all 33,833 news stories on Swiss TV main evening news from January 1, 2006 to January 31, 2014 and analyzed all reports about foreigners. For the period from January 2012 to January 2014 the SF Eco, SF Börse and SF Rundschau programs have been analyzed as well. The average inter-coder reliability in the 4th quarter of 2013 was 86.38 %.