Media, Technology & Human Rights

Media play a key role in democratic societies in how they respond to the challenges and problems thrown up by our digital age. Our lives are increasingly impacted by new technologies and digitalisation, a process accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. We can now not only appreciate the benefits, but also see the negative impact on people’s rights, especially for vulnerable social groups.

Media workers need to recognise, expose and respond actively to the human rights abuses which result from the indiscriminate application of digital technologies.

With this in mind, Prague Centre for Media Skills has joined a unique project  Promoting Human Rights in the Digital Era: Raising awareness and professional standards in journalism about the impact of modern technologies on human rights.

The 2-year project launched in January 2022 with funding from Norway Funds (No. LP-HRMGSA-017). PCMS is working with 4 other partner organisations to introduce the first long-term educational programme in the Czech Republic focused on fighting discrimination and human rights abuses. It will encourage the production and distribution of content created by specialist journalists who cover modern technologies and their application as part of their beat.

The programme will generate a series of online multimedia training manuals  and the publication of professional guidelines. These will be intended both for student journalists and for professionals working in both Czech and Norwegian media, as part of the lifelong training experience.