Amid escalating global clampdowns on civic space and ruthless legal attacks on journalists and the media, Trust Conference 2025 asked a pressing question: Is it too late to save democracy, which stands on free and independent media that hold the powerful to account and enable...
The Internet is the world’s digital lifeline. For the approximately 5.6 billion people connected to the Internet (some 70% of the global population), access is essential. The entire Internet cannot be switched off, but governments and other actors can temporarily disrupt or restrict access by shutting...
Politics-informed developments in the United States of America this year so far confirm that rights and entitlements can be rolled back with the stroke of a pen. And there is a significant segment of society that is happy to cheer on a blanket erasure of constitutional...
The right to freedom of expression alone is not enough to protect democratic communication and public debate, which are the cornerstones of society. This right, while essential, does not create avenues to address power imbalances in how people communicate and shape public opinion. A tech mogul...
Football (soccer), the world’s most popular—and we would argue most beautiful—sport, has become a multi-million-dollar industry marked by astronomical salaries, stadiums that look like spaceships, and billion-dollar sponsorship and television deals. The sport is regulated by FIFA at the global level and groups like CONMEBOL and...
What do we mean by “communication rights”? In the most recent Media Development, contributors unpack their understanding of the term and in doing so underline the necessity of a rights-based approach to communication, regardless of the language used. “‘Communication rights’ … expands freedom of opinion and...
The WSIS+20 Forum High-Level Event to be held in Geneva 27-31 May 2024 will mark twenty years of progress made in the implementation of the outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society, which took place in two phases – Geneva in 2003 and...
In 2016, widespread misinformation fueled hate-filled public debate in the United Kingdon and was a major contributor to the outcome of the Brexit referendum. Since then, the country’s decision to leave the European Union has had very negative economic consequences, resulting in lower productivity, less...
Two contemporary “utopias” come under communication rights scrutiny in the latest Media Development, WACC’s quarterly journal. The issue “Utopia or Bust: In Search of Inclusion” examines the Metaverse, which seeks to combine multiple sources of information on one digital platform, and Latin America’s Pink Tide 2.0,...
Communication rights activists are calling for greater accountability from Big Tech and social media platforms. They also want a seat at the table when it comes to devising ways of regulating and monitoring social media content and use of personal data. Alternatively, Web3 may be what...