Lietuvoje 2008-aisiais metais įsigaliojo Lietuvos Respublikos susirinkimų įstatymo 8 straipsnio 5 punktas bei Lietuvos Respublikos administracinių teisės pažeidimų kodekso 18818 straipsnis. Šios įstatyminės normos draudžia naudoti nacistinius ir komunistinius simbolius susirinkimuose, masiniuose renginiuose bei kitaip demonstruoti. Tokiu būdu siekiama apsaugoti demokratinės visuomenės narius nuo nacistinių ir komunistinių okupacinių režimų propagandos, užkirsti kelią kurtis antidemokratines idėjas propaguojančioms organizacijoms. Tačiau kai kurie draudžiami simboliai gali būti suprantami ne vien tik kaip nacistiniai ar komunistiniai, todėl ne visais atvejais jų demonstravimas ar naudojimas pažeis svarbias kitų asmenų teises ir laisves. Šio darbo tikslas yra įvertinti, ar šie draudimai neprieštarauja Lietuvos Respublikos Konstitucijos 25 straipsnyje įtvirtintai saviraiškos laisvei. Saviraiškos laisvė – viena iš pagrindinių žmogaus teisių, įtvirtinta daugumos demokratinių valstybių konstitucijose bei įvairiose konvencijose, tačiau ji nėra absoliuti. Siekiant įvertinti, ar draudimas demonstruoti nacistinius bei komunistinius simbolius neprieštarauja saviraiškos laisvei, analizuojami principai, kuriais remiantis galima riboti saviraiškos laisvę, taip pat vertybės, kurias siekiama apsaugoti nustatant saviraiškos laisvės apribojimus. Analizuojant principus bei saugomas vertybes, daugiausia remiamasi Lietuvos Respublikos Konstitucijos bei Europos žmogaus teisių ir pagrindinių... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / In 2008 Lithuanian Parliament enacted new laws prohibiting use of Nazi and Communist symbols during meetings and other mass events or other kinds of demonstration (Article 8(5) of Law on Meetings of Republic of Lithuania and Article 18818 of Administrative Violations Code of Republic of Lithuania). The purpose of this prohibition is to protect members of democratic society from propaganda of Nazi and Communist occupation regimes and to prevent the establishment of organizations that propagates antidemocratic ideas. However, some of the prohibited symbols may be understood not only as of Nazis or Communists, therefore they would not breach fundamental rights and freedoms of other members of the society. Freedom of expression is one of the fundamental human rights. It is mentioned in most constitutions of most democratic states and international conventions. However, freedom of expression is not absolute. In order to be restricted it has to meet some requirements. The requirements are being analyzed in this master project according to provisions of the Constitution of Lithuanian Republic and the European Convention on Human Rights and case-law regarding freedom of expression of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania and the European Court of Human Rights. Laws prohibiting demonstration of Nazi and Communist symbols are being compared to some other European states’ laws of the same function. The purpose of this master project is to evaluate whether the... [to full text]

This bachelor's thesis is based on a Minor Field Study (MFS) conducted in Rabat and Casablanca, Morocco, April and May 2015. The aim is to study Moroccan journalists' attitudes towards citizen journalism and its impact on the role of the journalist: 1) With what claims do they define citizen journalists and journalists respectively? and 2) In what ways do these claims relate to the impact citizen journalists can be expected to have on the role of the journalist and freedom of expression in Morocco? In the discussion, theories on discourse, professionalism, journalistic ideals, and development journalism are applied. Semi-structured interviews in French were conducted with five journalists working within five different print and online publications. The material was analyzed according to a model of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). The interviewed journalists give accounts of how they are "condemned to be connected" to the vox populi that citizen journalists constitute. There is a prevalence of professionalism discourse where verification and objectivity are described as what characterizes a journalist. But respondents also emphasize "teamwork", and that "all journalists are citizen journalists", and these themes are interpreted as characteristic of development journalism. Within professional discourse in a development journalism context, the reliability of citizen journalists is downplayed. At the same time, citizen journalists are described as freer than professional journalists. In conclusion, it is considered likely that development journalist discourse sets an obstacle to the liberalizing impact of citizen journalism.

This dissertation explores the role of Internet censorship and circumvention in the Arab world as well as Arabs’ views on the limits to free speech on the Internet. The project involves the creation of an Internet censorship circumvention tool named Alkasir that allows users to report and access certain types of censored websites. The study covers the Arab world at large with special focus on Egypt, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen. This work is of interdisciplinary nature and draws on the disciplines of media and communication studies and computer science. It uses a pioneering experimental approach by placing Alkasir in the hands of willing users who automatically feed a server with data about usage patterns without storing any of their personal information. In addition to the analysis of Alkasir usage data, Web surveys were used to learn about any technical and nontechnical Internet censorship practices that Arab users and content producers may have been exposed to. The study also aims at learning about users’ experiences with circumvention tools and how such tools could be improved. The study found that users have successfully reported and accessed hundreds of censored social networking, news, dissident, multimedia and other websites. The survey results show that while most Arab informants disapprove censoring online anti-government political content, the majority support the censoring of other types of content such as pornography, hate speech, and anti-religion material. Most informants indicated that circumvention tools should be free of charge, fast and reliable. An increase in awareness among survey respondents of the need for privacy and anonymity features in circumvention solutions was observed.

Hundreds of journalists took to the streets in different parts of Guatemala to protest attacks against their colleagues and infringements on their freedom of expression in the country, during the second week of March in 2015. The larger protests were held in Guatemala City and in Mazatenango, Suchitepéquez, where earlier that week at slightly past noon three reporters were gunned down at a park in front of a municipality building; one survived the attack. Three days later a cameraman was shot dead by men on motorcycles, in front of the television station he worked for in Chicacao, Suchitepéquez. This is the perpetual cycle of violence that has been inculcated into the daily lives of the people in the country - it's a cultural construct that's oozed into the depths of society and sadly into the profession of journalism. This thesis is a study that investigates how Guatemalan journalists live and work in the country under a constant threat of violence, fighting for their space as a respected profession in a society that could benefit from a functioning media system. The in-depth interviews with reporters in the country will allow for a first-hand interpretation to support the research already conducted in the literature review. The study is a furthered analysis of literature and interviews to better understand why the state of journalism in Guatemala is complex, and why it is imperative for journalists to continue fighting for their space.

La Thaïlande est un pays sous régime de monarchie constitutionnelle mais il subit souvent les interventions militaires. Malgré l’installation de la démocratie en 1932 et le développement des textes juridiques, la liberté d’expression et le droit de la communication sont limités. Le marché audiovisuel est préoccupé par les opérateurs ayant obtenu les contrats de concession de l’État pour une durée excessive. La solution proposée par la Constitution de 1997 est de créer une autorité de régulation indépendante de communication audiovisuelle pour, d’une part, renforcer l’exercice de la liberté d’expression et le droit de la communication ainsi que la mise en place des principes fondamentaux de la communication audiovisuelle, et, d’autre part, attribuer à nouveaux les fréquences pour l’ouverture totale du marché audiovisuel afin d’offrir une variété de choix aux téléspectateurs ou aux auditeurs. La création de l’autorité de régulation de communication audiovisuelle a été interrompue plusieurs fois par les décisions du Tribunal administratif, du fait de conflit d’intérêts, et a finalement été annulée par le coup d’État en 2006, abrogeant la Constitution de 1997. La Constitution actuelle de 2007 impose de créer une seule autorité de régulation chargée de l’audiovisuel et des télécommunications pour faire face au développement des technologies qui convergent. Aujourd’hui, cette autorité n’est pas encore mise en place. La lacune dans la régulation des deux domaines de communication s’agrandit. Depuis la suppression du monopole étatique de l’audiovisuel, la France a connu trois autorités de régulation. L’exercice des droits et libertés de la communication se développe progressivement. L’étude sur la comparaison avec le système français pourrait orienter la Thaïlande vers le chemin de la démocratie et du développement. / Although Thailand is a constitutional monarchy country with the establishment of democracy and the development of legal texts, it is often subject to military intervention which creates the limitation of freedom of expression and the rights to communicate. The audiovisual market is dominated by the operators who obtain the concession contracts of the State for too long. The solution of the mentioned problem is proposed by the 1997 Constitution, which is to create an independent regulatory authority for audiovisual communication to improve the exercise of freedom of expression on communication law and to implement the basic principles of audiovisual communication. Moreover an allotment of new frequencies is also important for the full opening of the audiovisual market in order to vary the choices for viewers and listeners. The creation of the regulatory authority of audiovisual communication has been interrupted several times by the committee’s conflict of interest. In 2006, it was unfortunately withdrawn by the coup by repealing the 1997 Constitution. After that in The 2007 Constitution, it is required the establishment of a single regulatory authority for broadcasting and telecommunications to meet the development of converging technologies however the authority has not been implemented yet. So the gaps in regulation between two areas of communications are growing.In France, there are three of regulatory authorities of audiovisual communication which have been formed after the abolition of state monopoly of broadcasting. The study of French’s basic principles of audiovisual communication could guide Thailand in several ways since the rights and the freedoms of communication in Thailand have been democratically developing gradually

This thesis explores the intersection of freedom of expression (as protected in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (Charter)) and copyright in Canada. In this thesis, I argue that both lower Canadian courts and the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) should reconsider their approaches to this intersection. Lower Canadian courts have consistently rejected arguments that provisions of Canada's Copyright Act unjustifiably infringe the Charter right to freedom of expression. The SCC, on the other hand, has consistently interpreted provisions of the Copyright Act in such a manner as to result in expanded protection for the expression interests of non-copyright owning parties. It has done so not by relying explicitly on the Charter right to freedom of expression, but through a process of statutory interpretation. I argue that both approaches merit reconsideration. Specifically, I argue that the approaches adopted by lower Canadian courts to the intersection of the Charter right to freedom of expression and copyright are based on now-invalidated approaches to both copyright and to freedom of expression, and are thus themselves invalid; that to the extent to which the SCC's approach to this intersection assumes that the Charter right to freedom of expression can be protected, in the context of copyright, through statutory interpretation alone, that it fails to adequately protect the Charter right to freedom of expression; that other leading national courts from which the SCC has previously sought assistance have explicitly engaged with this intersection, and that the SCC should follow suit; and that the SCC's own copyright and freedom of expression jurisprudence suggests that provisions of the Copyright Act may unjustifiably infringe the Charter right to freedom of expression. These four arguments, taken together, suggest that the time is ripe for reconsideration of this intersection.

Limits of freedom of expression in the light of case-law of the European Court of Human Rights This diploma thesis deals with the freedom of expression and its permissible limits as those declared in Article 10 od the European Convention on Human Rights (hereinafter referred as "Convention"). Freedom of expression is guaranteed to everyone. However freedom of expression is not absolute, restrictions on freedom of expression by the intervention of the national authorities to individual freedoms is permissable in case of existence any justifiable targets pursuant to paragraph 2 of Article 10. We named this procedure by test legality, legitimacy and proportionality. So, in other words, the measures used against a person must be established legal standards, must pursue achieving a legitimate aim and be necessary in a democratic society. European Court of Human Rights (hereinafter "the Court") applies this test whenever it finds existing interference with freedom of expression. It focuses on case law precedents, set by the European Court's of Human Rights (hereinafter referred as "Court"), in cases of complaints for violation of the freedom of expression concerning the admissibility of the use of legitimate aim clauses by national authorities applying law. The structure of the contents of this thesis...

The thesis addresses primarily the conflict between the protection of personality and another constitutionally guaranteed fundamental right - the freedom of expression. These rights, that happen to be often in a conflict, are rights of an equal legal protection, one does not have a priority over the other one and so it is a challenge for the courts to decide which one to prefer in particular cases while taking the specific circumstances of the each case into account. The thesis aims to examine this conflict in detail and to analyse it. The first chapter focuses on general questions related to personality rights, addresses the term "personality", the historic development of the personality rights regulation within the area of the Czech Republic and its presence in the current legal system with the accent to the recodification of the civil law, which has taken place hand in hand with the act no. 89/2012 Coll., Civil code, entering into force, while an assessment of the changes that the new regulation of the civil law has brought is one of the partial aims of the thesis. In the second chapter is discussed the unlawful interference with the personality rights that constitutes a private law tort. In the same time this chapter addresses the circumstances excluding the unlawfulness and deals with the...

As the title suggests, this thesis is about the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and about development of its interpretation from its inception to present day. Over the years, the interpretation of the First Amendment has drastically changed, causing a shift from restrictive views on free expression towards almost absolute freedom. Today, freedom of expression and religious freedom, both of which are included in the First Amendment, play a significant role in preserving democracy while strengthening its core pillars not only in the United States, but in other modern nations as well. The inclusion of the First Amendment into the world's oldest written constitution has influenced the concept of free expression and religious freedom in the laws of many foreign countries. According to some scholars, the current level of constitutional protection guaranteed for free expression in United States is too high and does not correlate with what the framers of the constitution had intended on upon drafting the First Amendment. However, it comes as no surprise that higher standards of protection from governmental intervention regarding guaranteed freedom in the First Amendment consequently results in the betterment of society. Throughout the text, I will aim to answer every major question...

Esta pesquisa investiga os sentidos, valores e discursos circulantes que emergem nas páginas da imprensa em torno da categoria \"politicamente correto\", observando suas relações com a liberdade de expressão e formas de controle da produção discursiva. A partir de matérias da Folha de S. Paulo, no período de 1991 a 2014, pesquisamos as transformações do politicamente correto no Brasil e as regulações por ele estabelecidas. Embasamo-nos, nesse percurso, nas proposições de Michel Foucault sobre a arqueologia dos discursos, de modo que as matérias jornalísticas devem ser tomadas como acontecimentos discursivos, isto é, como vestígios materiais que servem de base à \"escavação\" de plataformas culturais, saberes e regras sócio-históricas que condicionam a emergência de enunciados e discursos. Nossos resultados apontam para a emergência do politicamente correto como categoria em disputa no debate público, inserida em um contexto de reposicionamentos dos saberes sobre liberdade de expressão, e para o papel decisivo do jornalismo na introdução dessa expressão nas discussões que se travam na esfera pública brasileira. O posicionamento assumido pelo jornalismo remete a um imaginário discursivo sobre a democracia, o que também tem seu papel na consolidação da legitimidade e do lugar de fala da imprensa. De modo correlato, a discussão pública sobre o politicamente correto no Brasil mostra-se profundamente polarizada. Por fim, a emergência da categoria \"politicamente correto\" como forma de denominar processos de regulação sobre a linguagem reflete - e também determina - a centralidade e a visibilidade adquiridas por esse fenômeno em nossa cultura: centralidade da linguagem, de modo amplo, como mediadora das relações sociais; centralidade do individual na condução de ações políticas; centralidade do paradigma de circulação de ideias - e, por conseguinte, visibilidade das formas de controle da expressão, entendidas cada vez mais como intoleráveis. / This research investigates the senses, values and circulating discourses that emerge in the pages of the press around the category \"political correctness\". Our goal is to understand the relationship between such category, freedom of expression and forms of control of discursive production. From journalistic texts published by Folha de S. Paulo, in the period from 1991 to 2014, we researched the transformation of political correctness in Brazil and the regulations laid down by it. In this journey, we base ourselves on Michel Foucault\'s propositions on the archeology of speeches; so that the newspaper articles should be taken as discursive events, as material evidence underpinning the excavation of cultural platforms, knowledge and socio-historical rules that constrain the emergence of statements and speeches. Our results show the emergence of political correctness as a category in dispute in the public debate, set on a repositioning context of knowledge on freedom of expression, as well as the decisive role of journalism in the introduction of the expression \"political correctness\" in the discussions which take place in Brazilian public sphere. The position assumed by journalism refers to an imaginary discourse on democracy, which also plays a role in the consolidation of legitimacy and place of speech of the press. At the same time, the public discussion of political correctness in Brazil shows up deeply polarized. Finally, the emergence of the category \"political correctness \" as a way of giving a name to processes of language regulation reflects - and also determines - the centrality and visibility acquired by this phenomenon in our culture: the centrality of language, broadly, mediating social relationships; centrality of the individual in the conduct of policy actions; centrality of the circulation of ideas - and therefore visibility of control strategies of expression, increasingly understood as intolerable.