The rise of political and popular Euroscepticism in many member states is already a fact, not merely a threat. The latest EP elections held in May 2014 confirmed the ascending trend of Eurosceptic attitudes among EU citizens, which led to the legitimation of Eurosceptic, populist and even extremist discourse across the EU. The increasing Euroscepticism among citizens seems to correlate both with the negative impact of the economic and financial crisis and with the public perception of a “selfish” Union, torn apart by private interests of the member states rather than by opposing views regarding the European project. To this add detachment and even apathy of European citizens towards EU policies and actions combined with their concern about the future of the Union and the way it influences their lives.
This paper seeks to show how politicians and media may be partially responsible for the deepening of the citizens’ distrust in the EU. Although Eurobarometers show that Romanians’ trust lies above the EU average, the popularity of the Union among Romanians has constantly dropped starting spring 2012. Drawing on a content analysis of the media coverage of 2014 EP elections in Romania, this study aims to examine the degree of Europeanization of the Romanian media discourse and to show how a low coverage of European topics by the media during EP elections may be a source of indifference towards the EU and also of increasing distrust in the EU. We use data from TV and online news portals that we have monitored one month before, during and two weeks after the 2014 EP elections in Romania.
