Challenges to Media Freedom in the EU and US

Associate Professor Miklós Sükösd
Abstract

According to standard theories of democracy, the media serve as a key component in the system of checks and balances, and provide a public sphere for the development of meaningful agendas and public debate. However, this concept has been undermined by several recent challenges to media freedom, pluralism, and the democratic performance of media in the European Union as well as the United states. This talk attempts to present a systematic framework for the analysis of these challenges.

One problem is that social media may create echo chambers for partisan audiences and offer opportunities for political actors to bypass professional media institutions when they address their constituencies. In this way, the chances for meaningful, democratic debate are lessened. Another set of challenges is presented by the media structure within the EU. A pan-European public sphere is fragmented into 28 national media systems, and there is a tension between the two levels. We also see a gradual erosion of the European institution of public service media (PSM) in relation to state aid regulation of the EC that restrict the expansion of PSM to social media and various online platforms.

Transnational challenges include Russian disinformation efforts, the Chinese acquisition of international media companies, and the threat of Islamic terrorism for journalists that inhibits free expression (e.g. the massacre 12 editors and cartoonists of Charlie Hebdo in Paris 2015; or killing film director Finn Nørgaard in Copenhagen 2015). In the EU, add that US tech companies (e.g., Google and Facebook) siphon off growing proportions of advertising revenues from national media markets, which also pose long-term structural challenges to media pluralism in Europe. At the same time, we witness direct political attacks on media freedom in Central and Eastern Europe (even the establishment of a non-democratic, hybrid political and media regime in an EU member state, Hungary). What could be the policy and advocacy responses to these challenges by different stakeholders? If we see a synergy of problems, could we also envisage a synergy of responses?