Why a European model?
US-centric bias raters fail on European media in predictable ways: they compress politics onto a single left–right axis, place the “centre” where the US centre lies, and lump public-service broadcasters together with state media.
Meridian therefore separates the economic question (redistribution ↔ market) from the cultural one (GAL ↔ TAN) and treats the EU stance as its own line of conflict. The calibration anchors are the party positions of the Chapel Hill Expert Survey (CHES).
The three axes
Each axis runs from −3 to +3 and is displayed in five bands. What is rated is the editorial line (opinion section, framing) — not individual articles and not factual quality.
| −3 … −1,75 | −1,75 … −0,5 | −0,5 … +0,5 | +0,5 … +1,75 | +1,75 … +3 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Economic axis | left | centre-left | centre | centre-right | right |
| GAL–TAN axis | progressive (GAL) | leaning progressive | culturally centrist | leaning traditional | national-conservative (TAN) |
| EU stance | eurosceptic | leaning eurosceptic | EU-neutral | pro-European | federalist |
Further dimensions
Reliability (1–5) measures factual quality independent of political position: sourcing, corrections practice, documented blind spots. A source with a clear stance can score 5; a documented blind spot (e.g. a funder the outlet cannot report on) caps the score at 3.
State influence distinguishes four levels — deliberately: “public service” (independent council oversight, e.g. Deutschlandfunk) is not a milder form of “state-affiliated” (state-funded without independence guarantees, e.g. Al Jazeera) but a different category.
Every classification carries a confidence level (low/medium/high) and must cite reasoned evidence from medium confidence upwards. Disagreement is resolved through better evidence, not through averaging.
How the daily edition is built
Articles from the last 48 hours (specialist sources: up to two weeks) are assigned to nine focus topics (language-aware keywords; specialist sources count towards their focus topic). Near-identical headlines from different sources are merged.
Compact mode selects at most 12 articles: every populated topic first receives a fair base quota, then remaining slots are distributed round-robin (at most 4 per topic, each source once per topic). Selection favours whatever widens coverage most: perspectives first (Global South!), then economic range, then cultural; reliability breaks ties.
Ratings never exclude by political position — they are shown in full on every article. Full mode lists every assigned article of the time window, as a finite list without feed mechanics.
Limits
Keyword detection sees no context; known edge cases are documented and guarded by regression tests. The classifications are editorial judgements with stated uncertainty — the dataset is open and designed for dissent.
Glossary
- GAL
- Green / Alternative / Libertarian — one pole of the cultural axis: ecological, socially open, liberty-minded.
- TAN
- Traditional / Authoritarian / Nationalist — the opposite pole: value-conservative, order-oriented, national.
- GAL–TAN axis
- The cultural axis of European comparative politics. It is independent of the economic axis: a source can be market-liberal and culturally progressive — the US scheme cannot express that.
- Economic axis
- Redistribution, strong welfare state, public services (left, −3) ↔ market liberalism, privatisation, deregulation (right, +3). “Centre” here means: the European centre.
- EU stance
- A separate axis from eurosceptic (−3) to federalist (+3), because the integration question cuts across left–right.
- CHES
- Chapel Hill Expert Survey — a recurring expert survey on the positions of European parties. Meridian uses it as calibration anchor: a source whose line tracks a party should sit near that party’s CHES position.
- Party family
- Coarse placement at the nearest European party family (e.g. social democracy, Christian democracy). “Nonpartisan” means: the line follows no party — not: the source is “neutral”.
- Perspective
- The geographic vantage point of the newsroom and its correspondent network — not the registered HQ. Mongabay (US HQ) counts as Global South because of its network across the tropics.
- DACH
- Germany, Austria, Switzerland — the German-speaking region.
- Global South
- Umbrella term for regions outside the Western industrialised states. Making their voices visible is the core of Meridian — they are systematically missing from DACH and US media.
- Reliability
- Factual quality (1–5), independent of political position: sourcing, corrections practice, separation of news and opinion, documented blind spots.
- Transparency
- Does the source disclose ownership, funding and responsibility? (low / medium / high) — independent of what the disclosure reveals.
- State influence
- Four levels: independent · public service (independent council oversight) · state-affiliated (state-funded without independence guarantees) · state-controlled (the government sets the line).
- Confidence
- How well grounded the classification itself is (low / medium / high). From “medium” upwards, evidence is mandatory.
- Evidence
- Links with a reasoning note that make a classification traceable — including the uncomfortable parts (e.g. Al Jazeera’s Qatar blind spot).
- Compact / Full
- The two reading modes: Compact is the curated daily edition (max. 12 articles, default). Full shows every assigned article of the window (48 hours, specialist sources up to two weeks) — finite, without a feed.
- Doom-scrolling protection
- Design principle: no infinite feed, no notifications, hard caps. Reach is deliberately traded for psychological hygiene.