Eric Karstens

Category: Media Policy

  • More than meets the eye: The EU as a funding source for journalism

    The European Union is entangled with journalism in so many ways that it can be hard to see the forest for the trees. That’s because journalism only appears on the label of very few programmes, but can well be an ingredient or theme of many others.

  • Innovation and social purpose: Public and philanthropic support for European journalism

    The three general-purpose news outlets with the greatest agenda-setting power over European politics – the Financial Times, The Economist, and the BBC – will very soon be based outside the European Union. What could the EU and European philanthropies do to nurture a supranational journalism landscape that might replace them?

  • Open, but not for free: Perspectives for non-profit newsrooms

    A great part of the current debate about future business models for journalism implies that news organisations need a strategy to remain commercially successful – or to become profitable in the first place. But what if news went non-profit from the get-go?

  • Philanthropy-funded journalism and public value

    Philanthropic donors big and small tend to invest with their eye on values rather than products: democracy, an informed society, better public health, the thriving of art, improved education, and so on – the idea of public value. Private individuals or foundations step up to provide the public with a good they deem necessary on…

  • How donors can enable quality journalism

    Most journalists chose their profession because they wanted to make an impact on society, but the news business, as it were, conspired against their good intentions. Yet with constructive approaches, a renewed focus on communities and audiences, and foundation support, journalism could break free from legacy structures.

  • Bridging the journalism-philanthropy gap

    It is an illusion to think that charity can bring systematic and lasting change to society without extending support to media. Considering the benefits to be gained by all involved – charities, journalism, and society – the key obstacles, as identified at Journalism Funders Forum London, are not insurmountable.

  • Communicating Europe: The State of Play

    Europe is making headlines. In the current decade, there has in fact been a surge in media attention for EU-related topics. What previously appeared next to impossible in most Member States, front-page stories involving the European Union in mainstream news outlets, has almost become a matter of course. Unfortunately, this phenomenon is not unequivocally favourable.

  • Eine kurze Geschichte des Privatfernsehens in Deutschland

    Aktualisierte Fassung zum 30jährigen Bestehen des Privatfernsehens: Aus Wurzeln, die bis in die 1950er Jahre zurückreichen, entstand das Privatfernsehen in Deutschland in den 1980er Jahren aus einer historisch gewachsenen Mischung wirtschaftlicher Interessen mit politischen Wunschvorstellungen.

  • How the EU can help journalism

    Why is the European Union so ineffective when it comes to supporting press freedom and media pluralism? And what could it do within the limits of its current competences to foster journalism? It all boils down to one word: CONNECT.

  • Vordenkerrolle: Zum Innovationsbedarf der Medienanstalten

    Die Landesmedienanstalten beharren auf liebgewonnenen Denkfiguren und rufen nach strengeren Vorschriften, wenn die Welt sich ändert. Doch ihrer Sinn- und Identitätskrise könnten sie mit dem begegnen, was Odo Marquardt einst “Inkompetenzkompensations-kompetenz” nannte. Artikel aus epd Medien, Heft 69/2010.