Greek and French Media Coverage of the European Economic Crisis - Literature review Example

Greek and French Media Coverage of the European Economic Crisis Five years ago, the economic prospects in the eurozone were quite promising. This saw the economic issues and policies receive positive media coverage from the countries in the eurozone and the world at large. The media in both France and Greece gave an optimistic coverage of the economic situation in the eurozone with occasional criticism of policies undertaken by some countries within the European Union (Romero 123). Comparatively, the French media was more critical about economic policies of countries such as Italy, Spain, and Greece while Greek media was more concerned about the issues affecting the Greek economy and the possible benefits that Greece as a country would derive from the economic collaboration in the eurozone (Schulmeister 21).

As the global economic crisis hit the eurozone in 2008 and subsequently the European crisis that followed, the media in the two countries took divergent trends in the way they covered the crisis (POV news). Particularly, the French media created euphoria with negative rhetoric about the crisis which is believed to have caused public panic, especially in France with most of the citizens developing negative perceptions of countries such as Greece and Italy, which the media had overly blamed for the escalating crisis.

The echoing of the French president’s sentiments about Greece by the French media heightened the perceptions of French citizens (Picard 59). On the other hand, the media in Greece concentrated more on the position of Greece as a nation in the crisis and especially the measures that the European Union expected the country to undertake in order to avert the crisis (Hope 653). In essence, the media focused more on the expected impact of the measures on the Greek economy and citizenry as a whole.