In the Eye of the Storm. European Commission and ECB in the ‘Battle’ of Attributing Responsibility in the Eurozone Crisis

The Eurozone crisis questioned established understandings of reality. The sense making of economic and European structures had to be realigned. The attribution of responsibility is the back bone of such sense making. As interpretations which become dominant can have major impact on the acceptance of and trust in (political) actors these interpretations are highly contested. However, public acceptance is not equally important for all. While elected actors have to safeguard public support, non-elected institutions are less dependent on their public image. In the long run, however, a loss of public acceptance is likely to challenge all institutions. The Eurozone crisis has put two non-elected institutions into core roles with major impact on the crisis developments: the European Commission and the European Central Bank. The paper looks at who is publicly attributing responsibility to these two actors on what issues and to which actors these two European institutions attribute responsibility themselves. Theoretical arguments would expect them to be a typical scapegoat in the beginning of the Eurozone crisis while in later phases they should become more active themselves shifting blame to others. The paper uses data from a running joint Greek German content analysis, based on daily newspapers from both countries and Reuters press agency. First results from preliminary data suggest minor attention on these actors in Greece while, in relative terms, in Germany European actors get more coverage. Reuters reporting indicates their respective role in the attribution pattern which is filtered in specific ways by the national sources.