Wahl ohne Wissen?

A well-informed voter is a normative prerequisite for a democratic election. But do voters still get the information needed via the mass media – the most important source of information? Or does the mass media present the election as a show, a horse race with politicians as celebrities? This study offers answers to these questions based on a qualitative content analysis of national elections coverage in German print media from 1953 until 2013. The extraordinary set of empirical data of over 4,700 articles selected from the quality, regional and tabloid press allows complex analyses of election coverage in Germany. They revealed some surprising findings, which relativize criticism about the declining quality of media coverage and thus help to challenge preconceptions about it.