By Rym Momtaz, ed. The battle over free speech has taken center stage since U.S. Vice President JD Vance accused Europe of censorship. From travel bans to social media regulation, especially around the Israel-Palestine conflict, are liberal democratic governments weaponizing free speech? [ . . . ] Natalie Alkiviadou Senior Research Fellow, The Future of […]
By Dr. Natalie Alkiviadou and Katia Pau Recent controversies in Bangkok, Cyprus, and the United Kingdom demonstrate that disputes surrounding artistic expression remain deeply embedded in contemporary political, religious, and social life. In Bangkok, criticism and public backlash emerged following the display of artworks considered offensive to religious and cultural sensibilities, triggering debates about the limits of artistic freedom […]
By Jacob Mchangama and Jeff Kosseff On March 4, 2022, two days after the European Union banned the Russian state media outlets Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik, Russia blocked access to Western media such as the BBC, Deutsche Welle, and Voice of America. The Russian government declared this was “only the beginning of retaliatory measures in an […]
By César Antonio Molina In 1975, the Helsinki Final Act was signed . Its main purpose was to ease Cold War tensions. The Soviets proposed the inviolability of borders, as well as non-interference in internal affairs. The West reiterated its commitment to human rights and freedoms of thought, conscience, opinion, expression, religion, ideas, and beliefs. Solzhenitsyn said […]
By Katrina Gulliver Last week, I had the great pleasure of welcoming to Atlanta Jacob Mchangama, who came to talk to me about his book. We had a standing-room-only crowd of Freeman readers as I asked him what he thought about the past—and future—of free speech. (The conversation below has been edited for length.) One […]
By Jacob Mchangama In 1977, the Danish film director Jens Jørgen Thorsen was turned away at Heathrow on the orders of Home Secretary Merlyn Rees, after a campaign by the Christian campaigner Mary Whitehouse. Thorsen was carrying the script for a long-planned film about the sex life of Jesus — a project that had already […]
By Jacob Mchangama and Jeff Kosseff This essay is adapted from The Future of Free Speech: Reversing the Global Decline of Democracy’s Most Essential Freedom (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2026) European democracies hold free and fair elections, ensure peaceful transfers of power, and maintain a vibrant media landscape. Their independent judiciaries hold governments accountable if they […]
By Peggy Sastre There is censorship that is obvious: it hits, locks up, banned, cuts the Internet, throws journalists in jail and does not bother with big words to make you understand that it prefers silence to freedom. And then there is the sweetest in her manners, cleaner on her, more satisfied with her reasons, […]
Interview by Emmanuel Tellier This Danish lawyer, based in the United States, hosts the think tank The Future of Free Speech. In his book “Free Speech: A History from Socrates to Social Media” (2022), Jacob Mchangama, a strong supporter of the right to tell the truth, draws up a gallery of portraits of defenders of […]
By Jacob Mchangama Three days after securing a landslide victory in Hungary’s parliamentary election, incoming prime minister Peter Magyar appeared on the country’s state broadcaster for the first time in 18 months and labeled it a “factory of lies” peddling “propaganda” worthy of North Korea and Goebbels. Magyar’s hostility reflects the well-documented media capture that […]