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  2. Current: European Journalism - The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly?
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas

European Journalism – The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly?

Photo Story
Shared by: Tabea Grzeszyk
February 1st, 2017
  1. Tandem Europe 2015-17
  2. Democracy & Open society
  3. Freedom of expression
  4. Social cohesion

Elina Makri and Tabea Grzeszyk have joined their efforts to work as a Tandem on Collaboration instead of Competition: hostwriter + oikomedia. In this report, they share insights and reflections from "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly - Reporting Europe in Times of Crisis" event they co-organised in Athens in September 2016.

Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas

Being journalists with Greek and German origins, Elina and Tabea both witnessed the rise of populism and broader proliferation of stereotypes in national media. Headlines such as “Lazy Greeks” or “Hitler Merkel” unfortunately aren’t isolated cases anymore.

How can we improve European news coverage? How does cross-border collaboration lead to better reporting and which role does social media and news digitalisation play in the process?

Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas

These were the questions raised and discussed at our panel discussion “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly – Reporting Europe in Times of Crisis” that we co-organised in Athens on 13 September 2016. It was the highlight of our Tandem collaboration and became the opening panel of the prestigious New York Times Athens Democracy Forum.

Speakers included Serge Schmemann (member of the editorial board, The New York Times and Pulitzer Prize winner), Simon Wilson (BBC Europe bureau chief), Mathias Müller von Blumencron (editor-in-chief, digital media, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung), Brigitte Alfter (director of Journalismfund) and Pavlos Tsimas (journalist, SΚΑΙ Radio & TV).

Around 200 young journalists and interested locals joined the packed panel at Impact Hub Athens.

Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas

You can’t impose a European media from above, it has to come from the streets up.

Simon Wilson, BBC Europe Bureau Chief

Next to the engaging panel discussion, the speakers each gave short individual lightning talks on subjects ranging from the rise of populism in European media, advocating for more cross-border collaboration to raise the quality of journalism, to discussing the challenges and opportunities of social media for the industry.

Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
Photo by Meneloas Myrillas

BBC Europe Bureau Chief, Simon Wilson addressed the question of why none of the attempts to create a pan-European medium really succeeded. He shared his belief that motivation and organisation had to come from below. “You can’t impose a European media from above, it has to come from the streets up,” Wilson said. In the course of our live coverage, he added that he was happy to share his knowledge and experience, but that he had also come to the event to learn.

For us, it was an amazing experience and we will definitely continue our collaboration in the future….!

You can read a more detailed account of this panel discussion, including further thoughts, tweets and videos (the debate was fully recorded) on the Hostwriter blog.

This story has been shared by Tabea Grzeszyk, who currently works on the project Collaboration instead of Competition: hostwriter + oikomedia as a participant in Tandem Europe 2015-17.

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  • Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
    Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
  • Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
    Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
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    Photo by Meneloas Myrillas
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