ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the relationship between the print media and policymaking in Bulgaria at the time of the Kosovo conflict. It analyzes the print media coverage of the Kosovo conflict during the two time periods-24 February-25 March 1999 and 15 April-15 May 1999. The chapter investigates and analyses consecutively the press attention and the press framing and draws conclusions regarding possible press influence. The assumptions made about the possibility of an impediment, potential and/or accelerant media effect become less convincing however if they are assessed in the context of the policy-making process in Bulgaria. Their validity depends on the presence and effective functioning of a democratic responsiveness mechanism in the foreign policy-making. The chapter concludes that questions the effectiveness of the general use of models like the policy-media interaction one which might be helpful but apparently only in certain contexts.
