ABSTRACT
Poland had long been considered a country with high rates of migration before opening its borders in 1989 and the country’s accession to the EU in 2004. Poland’s media landscape can be described as being in transition. Two main components of this transition merit particular attention: The privatisation of the mass media system and the stronger plurality of media outlets on the one side, and the growing influence of the Polish government on journalism and news coverage, with decreasing degrees of tolerance towards dissent and diversity. In fact, Polish debates reported within the newspapers were balanced in so far as foreign actors were given a voice to express solidarity with refugees against the dominant views of domestic actors. Poland remains the country in the sample with the lowest inflow of asylum seekers, which means that refugees from Syria were highly visible virtually, but physically absent.
