Without facts, you can’t have truth. Without truth, you can’t have trust. Without trust, we have no shared reality, no democracy, and it becomes impossible to deal with our world’s existential problems.

- Maria Ressa, Nobel Peace Prize Lecture, 2021

 

Ressa’s call for action in her 2021 Nobel Lecture seems ever more acute. Since then, attacks on independent journalism and the free press have proliferated across the globe. On a structural level, a growing number of governments and authorities are failing to fulfil their role as guarantors of the public’s right to reliable, independent and diverse news and information. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 2024 marked the deadliest year ever for journalists. Reporters Without Borders identifies a worrying increase in state and political pressure on the media, and in 2025, the global state of press freedom is classified as a “difficult situation” for the first time in the history of the Index. AI undermines trust in information in new and challenging ways. This is a downward cycle, exacerbated by cuts in foreign aid which are expected to have enormous consequences for disinformation around the globe; from Ukraine to Afghanistan, media organizations are being forced to lay off staff or shut down. 

 

Ressa has been described as fighting a war “where the written word is her weapon, where truth is her goal and every exposure of misuse of power is a victory”. What can democratic leaders, civil society, and media organizations do to ensure the survival of independent journalism and uphold a realistic hope of a future where truth will persevere?

 

Round table discussion: 

How do we defend information integrity and access to a free, independent press going forward?

  • What could be the role of open democracies? More specifically, what should be the role of a country like Norway?
  • What are the prospects for building effective coalitions – between those championing press freedom and freedom of speech – in order to safeguard independent journalism worldwide?