The EU is particularly aware of the risks that control over the media’s freedom of speech could pose to European democracies. This has been reflected in the Communication on the European Democracy Action Plan, where one of the EU’s priorities is fighting against all kind of pressures against free journalism, be it from physical attacks and violence (e.g. Recommendation on ensuring the protection, safety and empowerment of journalists) or from economic pressures.
The incoming European Media Freedom Act will target non-violent pressures, in particular, with respect to "instances of public and private interference in the ownership, management or operation of media outlets", "lack of media pluralism safeguards, including online" and "interference in editorial and management decisions of the media, which may lead to biased media coverage, among other issues, can affect investment or market entry decisions".
Key objectives
The EU Commission impact assessment on the European Media Freedom Act, sets out the following key objectives of the initiative:
- Ensure that media companies can operate in the internal market subject to consistent regulatory standards, including as regards media freedom and pluralism;
- Ensure that EU citizens have access to a wide and varied media offer both offline and online;
- Safeguard the editorial independence and independent management of the media, which is a precondition of media freedom and of the integrity of the internal market; and
- Foster undistorted competition between media companies by ensuring a transparent and fair allocation of state resources.
Main envisaged obligations
Some of the envisaged actions to accomplish these objectives are quite ambitious, such as:
- Scrutiny of media market transactions;
- Transparency of media ownership;
- Transparency of audience measurement; and
- Independence of public service media, transparency and fair distribution of state advertising.
Besides these actions, there could be further obligations for online environments.One of the issues to be solved is that "online diffusion and amplification techniques may accentuate the problems, ultimately to the detriment of the diversity of the media offer".
Participating in the public consultation
The European Commission has launched a public consultation. The deadline of the feedback period is 21 March 2022.
Next steps
- Relevant stakeholders should be aware of this initiative and consider participating in the public consultation in order to provide their views.
- Media companies under the scope of this initiative should keep an eye on their internal procedures/policies in order to check how this initiative could affect them.
- Other interesting media initiatives should be monitored, such as the upcoming initiative to protect journalists and rights defenders from abusive litigation.
Authored by Gonzalo F. Gállego, Juan Ramón Robles and Clara Regalado.
