Abstract
This article examines French television’s news focus on the issue of l’insécurité in the run-up to the first round of the 2002 presidential election. The central argument is that despite the focus on l’insécurité in ‘background news’, television did not set the campaign agenda around this issue. The way in which the news coverage was framed did provide objective support for the campaign themes of Chirac and Le Pen. However, there is no evidence of any partisan bias on the part of newsroom staff, with the coverage driven by news values rather than party political considerations.
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