Paul Rowinski

University of Bedfordshire, Journalism and Communications, Faculty Member

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Dr Paul Rowinski
Paul has worked for the regional, national and transnational press for two decades. He first worked for various UK regional newspapers, before becoming a national newspaper reporter. Paul was a Berlin-based foreign correspondent working for The European, Scotland on Sunday and Times Educational Supplement, while also writing for other national titles, like The Independent and Financial Times.

Paul also worked as an assistant producer on the English section of Deutsche Welle TV, producing regular world news bulletins and as a guest columnist for the Berlin-based quality broadsheet, Der Tagesspiegel and occasional features writer for Die Zeit. Paul has covered stories from Germany, Austria, Poland, Italy and the former Yugoslavia. On returning to the UK he worked on the Daily Mail foreign desk.

He was previously course leader for the Masters in International Journalism at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow and prior to that delivered an undergraduate journalism degree for the University of Middlesex.

Paul's PhD looked at different perceptions of European integration in the newspapers of Rupert Murdoch in Britain and Silvio Berlusconi in Italy, analysing both the discourse over Europe – and its political communication. Paul's research also looks at the relationships between national identity and media discourse. He is currently researching the discourse over the euro and the current EU crisis. Paul was co-editor of Br(e)aking The News, Journalism, Politics and New Media, published in 2013 by Peter Lang and wrote a chapter in this book and Media/Democracy: A Comparative Study, published by Cambridge Scholars (2013). Both focused on the discursive construction of Europe in the Murdoch and Berlusconi press.

He organised the Britain in Europe, in April, 2015 and April, 2016, with politicians, journalists and academics debating the issues, as the UK hurtled towards the 2017 EU referendum. Paul has just finished one book and is working on another. Evolving Euroscepticisms in the British and Italian press. Selling the Public Short, will be published by Palgrave in October, 2017. Another text for the same publisher, regarding Euroscepticism and emotive rhetoric is in train.

Paul is fluent in German and Italian, is educated to intermediate level in Spanish and has an improving knowledge of Polish. He is a visiting lecturer at the University of Applied Social Sciences in Berlin (HMKW). Paul is a member of the Political Studies Association, Journalism Studies Section of the European Communication Research and Education Association, the Association for Journalism Education and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

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Papers by Paul Rowinski

Italy First

Post-Truth, Post-Press, Post-Europe, 2020

Newspapers and Their Discursive Construction of Europe

Evolving Euroscepticisms in the British and Italian Press, 2017

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The EU migrant: Britain's sense of place in English newspaper journalism

Britain First: A Journey into Emotive Rhetoric

Post-Truth, Post-Press, Post-Europe, 2020

English mainstream newspaper coverage was analysed, ahead of the 2016 EU membership referendum in... more English mainstream newspaper coverage was analysed, ahead of the 2016 EU membership referendum in Britain, focusing on the term EU migrant as a trope for Euroscepticism. In the run-up to the June 8, 2017 British general election, Facebook was used to filter mainstream newspaper articles mentioning Europe and Brexit. The UK’s Supreme Court ruled that the proroguing of Parliament in the Autumn of 2019, by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, was illegal. Closure had prevented further scrutiny of the Brexit process. Johnson was forced to reconvene Parliament and answer his critics on all sides. Johnson’s language that day was deemed at best divisive and at worst hate speech. For this reason, this crucial nexus in the Eurosceptic narrative of the UK was selected.

What kind of Italy? The cultural battle waged by a European populist leader against Brussels

The Routledge Companion to Political Journalism, 2021

Britain First: A Journey into Emotive Rhetoric

Post-Truth, Post-Press, Post-Europe, 2020

Euroscepticism in the Berlusconi and Murdoch press

Journalism, 2016

A comparative analysis of Euroscepticism explores what it means in two nations and what is then a... more A comparative analysis of Euroscepticism explores what it means in two nations and what is then articulated in specific newspapers. The theoretical terrain, Italy’s and Britain’s post-war relationships with the European Union, the countries’ media structures and the specific context of Il Giornale (owned by Silvio Berlusconi’s family) in Italy and The Times in the United Kingdom (owned by Rupert Murdoch) are mapped out. Some 21 interviews were conducted with relevant journalists and politicians (including reporters covering Europe for the aforementioned) offering further context. A critical discourse analysis of news stories and commentaries then spans the last decade. Although there is some Euroscepticism in Il Giornale, it has historically been localised, yet now seems to be growing in intensity. In The Times, however, the Euroscepticism conveyed is more pervasive and deeper. Its fact-based news can actually be very persuasive – ironically more akin to the commentary-laden news of...

A Voyage Through Emotive Rhetoric—And the Challenge to Truth

Post-Truth, Post-Press, Post-Europe, 2020

The chapter explores political rhetoric, its evolution and the threat posed to rational discourse... more The chapter explores political rhetoric, its evolution and the threat posed to rational discourse in our democracies. The investigation turns to the erosion of trust in the mainstream media, from the disenfranchised and disaffected, turning to populist Eurosceptics for solutions. For them Post-Truth resonates. It is all about how (angry) they feel, not facts. A full exposition of Post-Truth and its emotive rhetoric is undertaken. Today people huddle. They reaffirm and amplify their beliefs. Now in seconds, views go viral in the filter bubble. There the populist politicians wait: reaffirming what audiences want to hear. Sometimes that discourse becomes coarser still, developing into hate speech. Finally, how the Italian and British press have historically reflected and occasionally challenged nationalism and its Euroscepticism is investigated.

European integration in Italian and British newspaper discourse

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Evolving Euroscepticisms in the British and Italian Press

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Britain First

Post-Truth, Post-Press, Post-Europe, 2020

Methodology

Post-Truth, Post-Press, Post-Europe, 2020

Conceptualising Europe

Post-Truth, Post-Press, Post-Europe

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The press, persuasion and prejudice: the challenging and re-enforcing of mechanisms of cultural inclusion and exclusion of migrants in Italy and Britain in recent newspaper coverage

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Overarching Academic Themes

The theories help to unravel how and why newspapers have gone about constructing the EU for gener... more The theories help to unravel how and why newspapers have gone about constructing the EU for general consumption. The EU is understood through the prism of nation—and national newspapers. The press (including online versions) are causally significant in persuading national publics over Europe, often feeding national Eurosceptic presuppositions and taking them to new heights. Newspaper discourse is more than just a reflection of national(ist) perspectives over the EU. Instead, at times it is the very basis for the discursive construction of Europe for national publics. To that end the book systematically challenges and unpicks the notion of an impartial British fact-centred press covering Europe, as well as deepening our understanding of how partisan papers in Italy cover the continent.

British Interviews: Representing and Challenging the National Interest

Evolving Euroscepticisms in the British and Italian Press, 2017

This chapter unravels the positions of British politicians and journalists engaged with Europe. T... more This chapter unravels the positions of British politicians and journalists engaged with Europe. They challenge how other UK politicians and journalists perceive and write about Europe as a threat to the national interest. The interviews serve to reveal to what extent Euroscepticism has become mainstream in politics, journalism and the wider society. The positioning of UKIP was once peripheral, but is now only a part of a more pervasive Euroscepticism. The interviews will explore the trajectory, from protestation tempered by pragmatism, hence keeping the UK in the tent until the moment withdrawal became realisable. The interviewees (from across the political spectrum) rarely talk about Europe but rather take issue with the UK press’s portrayal of it.

Mind the gap: the language of prejudice and the press omissions that led a people to the precipice

A pervasive Euroscepticism has now reached its zenith, drawing on a collective memory, borne of t... more A pervasive Euroscepticism has now reached its zenith, drawing on a collective memory, borne of the moment we chose to be a good friend of post-war Europe – but not part of it. As the UK eventually joined, unable to influence the project’s direction, we have never fully understood what the pooling of sovereignty nor belonging to the club mean. The projection of Europe in the collective memory, reinforced by seldom articulated facts (by either politicians or press) has resulted in an ‘other’, based less on a grasp of the reality and more a common-sense understanding. Neither the political class nor the mainstream press has ever confronted the cultural presuppositions of a British past never really harnessed to a European future

The Architecture for Analysing Interviews and Text

Evolving Euroscepticisms in the British and Italian Press, 2017

This chapter maps out the methodology and criteria for political communications analyses of inter... more This chapter maps out the methodology and criteria for political communications analyses of interviews, utilising both field and comparative theories, and critical discourse analyses of newspaper texts. The subsequent interviews serve as further evidence, corroborating and sometimes revising and reconfiguring the historical terrain in the preceding chapters. The interviews act as the last layers of context before newspaper analysis. Wodak and Weiss (2004) argue that context is an inherent, significant part of discourse. In investigating complex social problems it is necessary to draw on multiple theoretical approaches to the contexts relating these to texts. The discourse historical approach transcends the purely linguistic dimension, to systematically include the historical, political, sociological and psychological, in interpreting newspaper discourses. The preceding chapters explored this terrain.

The Post-war European Project: A Topography Divorced from Nationhood

Britain and Italy have developed very different post-war trajectories, understanding Europe in di... more Britain and Italy have developed very different post-war trajectories, understanding Europe in divergent ways. Those collective memories resurface in newspaper articles, which often reaffirm a sense of nationhood—while quietly sidelining some Europe-related elements that do not suit the national narrative. That last draft of history, in newspapers, often reaffirms an understanding of the EU that the readership already hears—while other soundings grow muted. The post-war European project has never reconciled fully the competing positions on how to develop. Britain supports inter-governmentalism and co-operation—while Italy, traditionally at least federalist, seeks much closer union. And so competing notions of that Europe vie for attention in newspaper copy.