New Project to Monitor Media Capture Across All 27 EU States

MJRC is part of a EU-financed consortium that will assess how effectively the European Media Freedom Act and other laws combat media capture across the EU

The International Press Institute (IPI), the Media and Journalism Research Center (MJRC), ActiveWatch, and the Investigative Center of Ján Kuciak (ICJK) announce the launch of a new project to defend press freedom in the European Union against media capture.

Journalism across the bloc faces sustained pressures from political forces, vested economic interests, and powerful tech platforms. That pressure undermines freedom of expression, a fundamental building block of democracy guaranteed in the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights. The new project will help media and civil society organisations monitor and counter media capture, and in doing so protect democracy.

With the EU’s landmark European Media Freedom Act (EMFA) in full effect, the project will also run a multi-annual assessment of how Member States are applying the regulation’s safeguards for press freedom and where they are falling short.

At the core of the project is a new EMFA monitoring exercise that extends the media capture monitoring IPI and MJRC already carry out to cover all 27 EU member states. The research will examine developments through the lens of EMFA and will also cover the influence of tech platforms and other EU instruments, such as the Digital Services Act (DSA).

See more on IPI’s website.