On January 16, Central European University hosts the third of the Rector's Lecture Series, Freedom and Democracy Dialogues -The Contest Over Open Society:
Promoting the free flow of information vs. ensuring public security - how to find the right balance?
Speakers:
- Judit Bayer (Associate Lecturer, King Sigismund College, Budapest)
- Andrei Richter (Director, OSCE Office of the Representative on Freedom of the Media)
- Ethan Zuckerman (Director, Center for Civic Media at MIT)
Introduction: John Shattuck, President and Rector
Moderator: Kate Coyer, Director, Center for Media and Communication Studies
Date: Monday, January 16, 2012 Time: 5:30 p.m.
Venue: Auditorium (CEU, Nador u. 9)
Please RSVP to dialogues@ceu.hu by January 15, 2012.
Global communication channels offer greater access to information for citizens; they also provide opportunities to obtain and publicly disclose classified data kept by official authorities. While the exposure of public affairs to public scrutiny may increase transparency, the leaking of confidential information may also raise security concerns, especially if the leaked information is sensitive either in political, economic, or military terms. In addition, global telecommunication systems also serve the purposes of terrorist groups and organized crime whose activities pose severe security threats. Where to draw the boundaries between the free flow of information and monitoring and controlling telecommunication systems and the media? Stricter regulations and compromises on human rights and civil liberties for the sake of security are the usual answers to these problems. Are there alternative ways to tackle the above challenges without restricting freedoms?
Judit Bayer is associate lecturer at the King Sigismund College, Budapest. Bayer acquired her PhD in Constitutional Law from ELTE University, Budapest. She is a former senior research fellow at Victoria University in Wellington, New-Zealand, where she worked on a cross-country research project on how the liability of internet service providers could be judged if no specific laws protect them. Her research focuses on constitutional law and specific areas of freedom of expression and other constitutional rights, regulation of media and internet content, including mobile internet, and the powers and scope of competence of authorities.
Andrei Richter is director of the OSCE’s Office of the Representative on Freedom of the Media and a commissioner of the International Commission of Jurists. Richter graduated in law, earned a doctorate in journalism and served as department head at the School of Journalism, Moscow State University. He has authored numerous publications on media law, including the only standard media law textbook for journalism students of Russian colleges and universities (2002, 2009), a textbook on international and foreign media regulation (2011), and a book on censorship and freedom of the media in post-Soviet countries published by UNESCO in 2007. In the 1990s, he was a visiting professor at Belmont University, Nashville, Tennessee, and a visiting researcher at the Gannet Media Studies Center, Columbia University.
Ethan Zuckerman is director of the Center for Civic Media at MIT, and a principal research scientist at MIT's Media Lab. Zuckerman served as a research fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Harvard University for eight years. His research focuses on the distribution of attention in mainstream and new media, the use of technology for international development, and the use of new media technologies by activists. He co-founded international blogging community Global Voices, through which he promotes freedom of expression and fights censorship in online spaces. In 2000, Zuckerman founded Geekcorps, a technology volunteer corps that sends IT specialists to work on projects in developing nations, with a focus on West Africa.
The lecture will be followed by a reception in front of the auditorium.