An introduction to the methodology of the Political Independence area of the Media Pluralism Monitor, and its evolution after EMFA
 
Since the first implementation of the Media Pluralism Monitor (MPM), the Political Independence area has been a central part of the CMPF-led assessment on the risks to media pluralism and freedom. In consistency with the logic of the whole instrument, this area combined the regulatory analysis with a real-world withstand of risk, offering a cross-cutting understanding of the key mechanisms for political capture at the pan-European and country-specific level.
 
A core focus of the area has traditionally been the analysis on direct and indirect political control throughover commercial media ownership means, which the indicator Political independence of the media continues to detect as a persisting risk, both at the national and the local level. Besides, political influence is analysed through the lens of state resource allocation, as these can be used selectively to reward loyalty or punish critical voices. This is mirrored by the indicator State regulation of resources and support to the media sector, where the distribution of state advertising emerges as a particularly concerning occurrence in many Member States. The latest results of the Editorial autonomy indicator show that the combined effects of these and other corruptive dynamics (e.g. external pressures, regulatory distortions, endemic clientelism) severely hinder internal or external self-regulatory frameworks in protecting journalistic independence from political interference.
 
In parallel, the growing complexity of political communication brings attention to the availability and quality of safeguards that ensure balanced and fair political discourse during electoral periods, especially in online platforms and social media. In addition to broadcast media, a specific layer of inquiry is on the spending and techniques used by political actors for online electoral campaigning. This is detected by the indicator Integrity of political information during elections, which reports high levels of concerns. Finally, the area dedicates specific attention to the Independence of public service media, examining whether their governance and funding mechanisms are insulated from political interference, or conversely, vulnerable to government control. 
 
Such a complex analytical framework is the result of a constant fine-tuning that mirrored the ever changing dynamics of media ecosystems and, in particular, the manners through which political power can shape, distort, or support media pluralism. A major methodological innovation, in this regard, occurred in 2019 to capture at best the challenges posed by digitisation. On the one hand, an assessment on direct and indirect control over digital native media was integrated under the indicator Political independence of the media, so as to evaluate whether political capture via ownership means was replicating in the digital space either. Besides, the 2019 refinement enabled a specific investigation over the buyout of political advertising space in online media and platforms, the quality of the oversight of national Data Protection Authorities, as well as the risks in terms of market distortion enabled by the online activity of PSM.
 
EMFA and the new structure of the Political Independence area
 
Based on the new set of regulatory instruments aimed at addressing the challenges to media pluralism and media freedom in Europe, the 2025 questionnaire was subjected again to relevant modifications. In the Political Independence area, these especially regarded the indicators Editorial autonomy and Audiovisual media, online platforms, and elections –the latter renamed this year to Integrity of political information during elections. This permitted to align at best the area with the EMFA framework, but also to introduce important elements from the Regulation on the Targeting and Transparency of Political Advertising. Moreover, the methodological innovation was aimed at upgrading definitions, reconsidering particularly sensitive variables, and improving the indicators’ balance.
 
The most significant integration was implemented in the indicator Editorial autonomy. In addition to rebalancing the number of variables, these changes were mainly due to embedding the Recommendations on internal safeguards for editorial independence and ownership transparency in the media sector (2022/1634) attached to the EMFA. More precisely, the sub indicator Effectiveness of self-regulation has been reformulated into 2 new sub indicators: External safeguards (investigating the effectiveness of cross-sectorial codes of conduct and self-regulatory bodies); and Internal safeguards (focussed on internal documents and bodies protecting from political interference). This way the 2025 assessment was able to return a narrower picture of the impact of several dynamics of control over editorial content, passing through the assessment on the effectiveness of self-regulation.
 
A second major integration was implemented under the indicator State regulation of resources and support to the media sector, and was based on the requirements of Article 25 EMFA (Allocation of public funds for state advertising and supply or service contracts). While the MPM sub indicator Distribution of State advertising has long indicated the distribution of State advertising as a major concern for EU media systems, the requirements and definitions of Article 25 prompted the addition of two new socio-political variables. More specifically, these new questions were designed to track the fairness and transparency of the distribution of institutional communication on online platforms, as well as the presence and quality of the activity of competent National Regulatory Authorities in taking account, monitoring, and reporting annually on such allocation.  
 
The third integration concerned public service media. This was mainly based on methodological innovations and updates based on the specifics provided by Article 5 EMFA (Safeguards for the independent functioning of public service media providers). As introduced above, the MPM has for years traced the dynamics of political control and influence in the public sphere through the indicator Independence of public service media. This year, a new sub indicator, “Plurality of PSM coverage”, was added to the indicator in question; it consists of 3 already existing variables formerly located in the indicator Audiovisual media, online platforms and elections. This way, the MPM enabled a more specific investigation of risks over proportional and unbiased representation of political actors and viewpoints in the non-electoral period in PSM. Not least, a change was made so as to capture at best the extent of political control in PSM governance, up to the level of editors-in-chief.
 
Finally, as anticipated, the indicator Audiovisual media, online platforms and elections has been renamed to Integrity of political information during elections, now counting 13 variables –against the 17 of the previous MPM. In addition to the numerical rebalance of the variables, the reason for such adjustments is twofold: first, to focus the indicator on the electoral period only; second, to dedicate a sub indicator to the buyout of political advertising on online platforms, and adding a variable on the requirements of the recently adopted Regulation on the targeting and transparency of political advertising.
 
Conclusion
As evidenced, the Political Independence area of the MPM has long investigated a wide set of tools for political control and influence in Europe, returning major trends of risk at the EU and country-specific levels. While the questionnaire was refined on a yearly basis so as to integrate the assessment over new dynamics of control triggered by technological and socio-political challenges, the CMPF team worked in a way so as to ensure consistency and, as far as possible, comparability of the results. 
This enabled the possibility to carry out a longitudinal analysis along several dimensions, as it was done in 2023 through a lateral assessment ultimately published in the 2024 book “Media Pluralism in the Digital Era: Legal, Economic, Social, and Political Lessons Learnt from Europe”. More specifically, the chapter “Tool and strategies for political capture in Europe” investigated the evolution of the media capture phenomenon relying on the relevant data from the MPM collected over a six-year time span (2017-2023), demonstrating average risk increases in terms of ownership control, biased distribution of state advertising, and effectiveness of safeguards to editorial autonomy (Trevisan, Štětka, and Milosavljević, 2024).
In conclusion, the changes introduced in the Political Independence area are just a  part of a much larger work that has been carried out throughout the whole MPM instrument, so as to capture at best the developments enabled by EMFA, the Digital Services Act, and other legal innovations. Overall, this has perfected the sensitivity of the tool in tracking the evolution of several interrelated phenomena, making the MPM an unique resource for evaluating the health of media freedom and media pluralism vis-a-vis technological and socio-political innovations.
 
REFERENCES
BLAGOJEV, Tijana, BLEYER-SIMON, Konrad, BROGI, Elda, CARLINI, Roberta, DA COSTA LEITE BORGES, Danielle, KERMER, Jan Erik, NENADIC, Iva, PALMER, Marie, PARCU, Pier Luigi, REVIGLIO, Urbano, TREVISAN, Matteo, VERZA, Sofia, Monitoring media pluralism in the European Union : results of the MPM2025, EUI, RSC, Research Project Report, Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom (CMPF), 2025, Country Reports – https://hdl.handle.net/1814/92916
 
TREVISAN, Matteo, ŠTĚTKA, Václav, MILOSAVLJEVIĆ, Marko, Tools and strategies of political capture of the media in Europe, in Elda BROGI, Iva NENADIĆ and Pier Luigi PARCU (eds), Media pluralism in the digital era : legal, economic, social, and political lessons learnt from Europe, New York ; Abingdon : Routledge, 2024, [OnlineFirst], pp. 116-132, [Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom (CMPF)] – https://hdl.handle.net/1814/77464
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