Media Against Polarisation.
The Transatlantic Best Practises
By Nataliya Gumenyuk
June-December 2021
In the digital age when the audiences are able to hide in their echo-chambers, confirming their own biases, the idea that the reader will vote for "the best information" with their money (i.e. clicks) has become obsolete. Disinformation, manipulations sell better. While high-quality media are held hostage by a loyal audience, and therefore risk only increasing the polarization in society.

In Western Europe, the responsibility for establishing public dialogue between people with different views lies with the public broadcasters that dominate the market. Whereas the Eastern European media environment today is more similar to the American one.

These are the results of a research by Natalia Gumenyuk, co-founder of the Public Interest Journalism Lab, which tests the best practices of quality journalism in the digital age.

As The German Marshall Memorial Fellow she travelled the United States and interacted with America's most innovative media organizations, which are redesigning public interest media models in the digital age to share their best practises with Central and European media.

The Laboratory also held several webinars for Eastern European media, where participants talked about engagement journalism, different approaches of regaining trust between media and the audience, and tools newsrooms can develop to listen and hear their readers.
Best Practises
Webinars
How to reach alienated audiences
Even the most well-meaning media often end up trapped in their bubbles, struggling to reach beyond a narrow audience. This webinar explores how public service media can connect with alienated audiences, whether these are people doubting vaccines or voting for political parties that label independent media ‘enemies of the state’. How can we tackle today’s challenges in the media, thrown up by developments in technology and 21st century propaganda?

The Media Against Polarization: Success Stories Across the Atlantic project is implemented with the support of the German Marshall Fund's Alumni Leadership Action Projects Program. The views of the authors do not necessarily reflect the views of the Foundation.

MediaLab by Lviv Media Forum is the media partner of the project. Illustrations for articles created by MediaLab.