Het journaal en de Haagse politiek. Van angstige volger tot actieve hoofdrolspeler

In the first 25 years of its existence Dutch public television news was limited by many restrictions when it endeavoured to cover national politics. It was only expected to inform the public about the facts. Interviews interpretation and explanation were the prerogative of the current affairs programmes that were broadcast by the different broadcasting organisations these being remnants of pillarization. For a long time public television news more or less ignored the election campaigns. In 1986 this came to an end. Following in the footsteps of the BBC News the editors set up a news block which included daily reports of the election campaigns. Over the last ten years the media landscape has changed from being a supply market to becoming a highly competitive demand market. Campaign reporting by NOS-Journaal and its commercial competitor RTL-Nieuws has changed into a Dutch variant of interpretative journalism. Journalists no longer just describe politics they now play active and dominant roles by giving daily explanations for and making judgements on the behaviour of parties and politicians. Nevertheless public television news has remained predominantly substantive in the way it reports.