Croatian Public Television – Lost in Transformation

This study examined the influence of government, politicians and advertisers on the content of Croatian Public Television (HTV) news. This research examined whether HTV has remained state TV and under as strong government influence as it was in the former Yugoslavia? Or has it transformed into public TV, which has been the goal since Croatia gained independence in 1991? Or has it become commercial TV?

The data were gathered through 10 semi-structured in-depth interviews with journalists and producers in the HTV news department and through a content analysis of HTV’s main newscast, Dnevnik.

The major findings suggest there is still a lot of coverage of politics in Dnevnik, but not as much as in the past. The political influence has been stronger again in the last three years; however, self-censorship is a bigger problem at HTV today than actual censorship.

The results indicate the big advertisers like the phone company Croatian Telecom or the gas company Ina influence the news programming at HTV, especially Dnevnik. The conclusion is that HTV today is state TV with commercial influences.