MEDAR Research & Analysis

Media Research Association (MEDAR) conducts field research on media as part of Turkey’s social, economic and political structure, to understand its qualities and within this framework to determine media’s transformation and how this transformation is based on social, economic and political developments and what kind of authentic qualities and impact it has.

MEDAR conducts active field research to reveal historical and contemporary developments in media. In these research studies, it effectively uses face-to-face interviews, in-depth interviews, online surveys, etc.

Media Research Association (MEDAR), in cooperation with ETKİNİZ EU; conducted quantitative research called ‘Impact of Social Media Law on Media Freedom in Turkey Monitoring Report’, which sought to monitor the effects of ‘The Law on the Regulation of Broadcasts via Internet and Prevention of Crimes Committed through Such Broadcasts’ which was adopted on July 29, 2020 and came into force in October 2020.

In this context, 658 news were listed in 35 institutions between October 2020 to April 2021. A four-pillar methodology was developed to classify the news articles by subject, by the position of the actors/complainants mentioned in the news article, by the justifications cited in removal requests and by the organizations receiving the request. Thus, it was opened to see the quantitative weight of the removal request between the scanned dates in various titles and compositions.

With this report, MEDAR aims to measure the impact of the law on the scope of content removal within the framework of press freedom and citizens’ right to access news and information.

Within the scope of the local media research project, MEDAR has conducted a qualitative research providing the situation analysis and needs assessment of women journalists working at local media organizations in Turkey. The research supported by ETKİNİZ EU Programme, has taken place between July and September 2020. During the qualitative field research, in-depth interviews have been conducted with 30 women journalists who are actively working at local media organizations in various cities of Turkey. Within the framework of collected data, a monitoring and evaluation report have been provided that includes the vocational situation analysis (current working conditions, journalistic capacity and vocational development opportunities of local women journalists), the need assessment (gender-based discriminations and gender-related vocational obstacles that female journalist are facing during work) and policy proposals for the solution of these detected problems.

With this report, by providing exhaustive data on gender-based vocational obstacles and needs of local women journalists, MEDAR aims at increasing the representation and public recognition of women journalists in Turkey.

In 2016, Social Research & Training Center TAREM has conducted a research on “Alternative Media & Citizen Journalism Platform’s Active Followers’ Perception Research”. MEDAR has conducted a follow up research with support from The Guardian Foundation and Social Sciences Association in Norway. Initial results of this study have been released in July 2018 with the headline “Journalists’ Perception of Citizen Journalism”. This study had been conducted through face-to-face and telephone interviews with 306 journalists from Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Antalya, Adana and Diyarbakır.

Social Research & Training Center TAREM had conducted an online poll between April-May 2016 with 1299 people and announced findings of the research on July 13, 2016 on Alternative Media & Citizen Journalism Platform’s Active Followers’ Perception Research.

In this research conducted by TAREM, the Research Coordinator Yunus Erduran, TAREM General Coordinator Gökhan Biçici have led the team of Gizem Alpakgir Cevheri as research assistant, and academic consultants Dr. Bora Ataman, Dr. Barış Çoban, Dr. Gülüm Şener and Dr. Serap Altekin who also designed the questionnaire.

TAREM’s first official research had been supported by German Rosa Luxemburg Foundation RLS in 2007 on “Workers and Mass Communication Tools Research” which was announced with a symposium at Istanbul Bilgi University in February 2008. TAREM Research Coordinator Yunus Erduran, TAREM General Coordinator Gökhan Biçici have led the interviews in 10 provinces in the sectors of construction, metal casting, textile, municipalities, office, trade, food, entertainment & tourism, petro-chemical, education, health, communications and transportation. 583 unionised workers, 316 non-unionised insured workers, 102 non-unionised and uninsured workers with a total of 1.001 workers have participated in this research study and interviews have been published as a book by TAREM.