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MARCH 25, 2021 DATA NEWS Press Gazette Media Freedom Health Check: 70% of world's population has little media freedom
By Aisha Majid
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A Press Gazette analysis of media freedom around POST A JOB ON the world has uncovered PRESS GAZETTE 71 countries – over a third of the places we looked at – where there are critical issues around media freedom. These countries account for 70% of the world’s population. MOST POPULAR And working with colleagues on Investment Monitor we have found that an absence of media freedom appears to be little deterrent when it comes to foreign investment from democracies like the US and UK. 1 GB News brie ng: Kirsty Gallacher and other latest appointments, launch This is despite the fact the world’s worst economic shock in modern times, the plans and where to watch coronavirus crisis, was exacerbated by media secrecy around the outbreak when it rst emerged in Wuhan, China, more than a year ago. 2 Liz Gerard investigates press bigotry and the claim Meghan Markle coverage was racist
UK media minister John Whittingdale quizzed about Press Gazette Ex-BBC journalist Kurt ndings 3 Barling 'bigotry' and Critical media freedom issues no deterrent to investment media: Racism exists Telegraph’s Sophia Yan on being tracked, intimidated and assaulted by everywhere, even in Chinese state newsrooms
4 Sun chief reporter John Kay: In 50-year As the publication last month of a US intelligence report concluding that Saudi journalism career he had Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approved the 2018 murder of Jamal no idea paying public Khashoggi has highlighted, press freedom is under threat around the world – o cials illegal and not just in places, such as Saudi Arabia, known for having poor track records on democracy. 5UK news News publishers increase media furlough claims: Al Jazeera and Tortoise join The rise of populism in several liberal democracies has put pressure on furlough claims those needing UK gov independent media with the result that journalists now face an increasingly support
Privacy - Terms hostile environment in some European countries. Press freedom in the United States was also increasingly undermined during Trump’s tenure.
In light of the growing assault on press freedom, we aggregated 18 indicators to assess the health of the media in 166 countries across the world, bringing LATEST JOBS together data from NGOs, government bodies and research institutions.
New Statesman podcast The global state of press freedom producer Press Gazette Media Freedom Health Check
Critical issues Some areas of concern Good performance No data
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Senior Data Journalist/Data Journalist, Capital.com
Based on the data we have assigned each country a media freedom health rating based Related on a traf c-light system. Countries with a good Stories track record on media freedom by international standards are awarded a green; countries Full 2015 UK magazines where performance on media freedom raises ABC circulation cause for concern are given an amber, whereas breakdown: 60 out of 442 countries where there are critical issues when titles grow sales it comes to the ability of the press to operate freely are labelled red.
Regional ABCs: Only 13 As well as an overall health rating, we have also out of 373 paid-for given each country a colour based on how well weeklies put on they score in three sub-categories: circulation year on year
independence and pluralism Regional ABCs: Paid-for safety for media professionals local press circulation And their rating in major press freedom indices. drops by 6.4 per cent Our analysis identi ed 41 countries where media freedom is relatively good. Of these Mag ABCs: 137 out 516 countries, 27 received a green in each of the consumer mags put on three sub-categories. circ year on year, full breakdown Eight countries – Norway, Finland, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, New Zealand, Germany and Canada – did exceptionally well, receiving a green light for each of the 18 indicators
At the bottom of our table are 71 countries that received a red. They run the gamut from smaller, highly repressive countries such as Eritrea to large economies such as China and Turkey which, while they have made huge strides economically, continue to lag when it comes to their democratic environment. Press Gazette Media Freedom Health Check Country ratings for each of the three subcategories and overall
Search in table Page 1 of 9
Press OVERALL Independence freedom PG Country Safety & Pluralism Indices RATING
Australia ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Austria ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Barbados ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Belgium ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Canada ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Cape Verde ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Costa Rica ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Cyprus ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Czech Republic ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Denmark ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Estonia ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Finland ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ France ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Germany ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Ghana ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Iceland ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Ireland ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Italy ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Jamaica ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ Japan ⬤ ⬤ ⬤ ⬤
Table: Press Gazette • Source: Press Gazette
Of the countries we labelled red overall, ten – Bahrain, Burundi, China, Eritrea, Saudi Arabia, South Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkey and Vietnam received a red in each of the three sub-categories. Of these, Turkmenistan, Cuba and Eritrea scored particularly poorly, receiving a red on almost every indicator.
Any ranking or rating of press freedom inevitably sparks much debate.
While a data-based approach that brings together different sources to evaluate the health of the media in a country has advantages, there are some limitations. For example, it is often dif cult to collect data on every journalist killed, imprisoned or missing in con ict zones or highly closed regimes. For this reason, some countries may have scored better in our safety category than they might have done had it been possible to ensure that every case of a journalist whose physical safety was threatened could be accounted for in the data.
Similarly, factors like the legislative environment for media might be better evaluated through a consensus of expert opinion rather than a data-based approach that awards points to countries that have some kind of freedom of information law in place without consideration of how well it is implemented in practice. For this reason, we have not considered legislation and regulation as a separate category.
Below you can explore the data that we have in each of the three categories for each country in our health check.
Also included are 27 additional countries for which we felt there was not enough data to give them an overall media freedom health rating. But you can see the data that we do have on them below. Explore how each country fares in our media freedom rankings Search for a country to see a breakdown of its indicators What our ratings mean: Good performance on media freedom by international standards Some areas for concern Critical issues around media freedom
Show United Kingdom . Overall rating • Pluralism and independence rating • United Kingdom scores well by international standards when it comes to independence and plurality of media. Thirty of the 166 countries we analysed were awarded green; 113 were rated amber and 23 were rated red in this category.
Breadth of political perspectives in media Access to cable/satellite How often major media criticises government
Access to foreign newspapers Government censorship of media
Freedom of opinion and expression Self-censorship by journalists
Level of media pluralism Media freedom to criticise government
Media restrictions during COVID Media bias against the political opposition
Safety • In 2020, 0 journalists were killed, 0 journalists were in prison and 0 journalists went missing in United Kingdom. Worldwide, last year 32 journalists were killed, 274 were imprisoned and 65 went missing according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Press freedom indices • According to the 2020 World Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders, United Kingdom was ranked 35 out of the 180 countries covered in the index. In 2020 Freedom House’s Freedom in the World scored United Kingdom’s media as 4 for freedom and independence. Scores range from 0 (least free) to 4 (most free).
Source: Press Gazette analysis of various sources, see methodology for details
How we developed the Media Freedom Health Check Our media health freedom health check is based on country-level indicators in three categories: pluralism and independence (12 indicators), safety of journalists (four indicators) and other press freedom indices (two indicators).
For each country and indicator, we took the raw score given by the organisation that produced the data and converted this into a green, amber or red rating. In some cases, this rating was based on the distribution of scores, while in other cases our rating was based on applying thresholds where numbers above a certain threshold received a particular colour.
These individual indicator ratings were then aggregated into an overall colour rating for each of the three categories based on the same traf c light system.
The colour of the majority of indicators within a category determined each country’s overall rating in that group of measures. So for example, if a country received amber for the majority of indicators related to safety, that country would be awarded an amber in the safety category. However, to avoid labelling green a country that had even one serious (i.e. red) violation in a category, the presence of just one red indicator meant that a country could not score higher than amber in that category. Similarly, when it came to independence and pluralism, of the 12 indicators, no more than four could be amber to be awarded a green overall to try and account for countries falling in this regard on many fronts.
The overall health of the media in each country was then determined by tallying up how well each country did in the three categories. Each country was given a nal assessment of health corresponding to the majority colour it received in the three categories. However, a red in even one category meant that the country was classi ed red for its nal health check rating.
The table below shows the indicators we used and the data sources.
We have tried to source up-to-date and comprehensive data that helps paint a picture of the health of the world’s media but if there are other sources of data that you think would help us improve future iterations of the project we would be happy to hear from you. Please email: [email protected]
Sources used in the Press Gazette Media Freedom Health Check
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Category Indicator name Source
Independence and pluralism
Level of restrictions on the media during V-Dem Institute Pandemic Violations of COVID Democratic Standards Index (2020)
Extent to which media accept payments to International IDEA Global State of alter coverage Democracy (2019)
International IDEA Global State of Government censorship of media Democracy (2019)
Self-censorship among journalists on issues International IDEA Global State of the government considers politically Democracy (2019) sensitive
Extent of freedom of opinion and expression International IDEA Global State of in society Democracy (2019)
The number of major media outlets that International IDEA Global State of routinely criticize the government Democracy (2019)
Media bias against opposition parties or International IDEA Global State of candidates Democracy (2019)
How common and normal critcism of International IDEA Global State of government is as part of public political Democracy (2019) dialogue
AFD, CEPII and MEF.Institutional The level of media pluralism Profiles Database (2016)
Extent to which major media represent a International IDEA Global State of wide range of political perspectives Democracy (2019)
AFD, CEPII and MEF.Institutional Freedom of access to cable/satellite Profiles Database (2016)
AFD, CEPII and MEF.Institutional Freedom of access to foreign newspapers Profiles Database (2016) Safety
The number of journalists killed in 2020 Committee to Protect Journalists
Table: Press Gazette
Image STR/Getty Images.
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