Global Media Journal - German Edition
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description: Global Media Journal – German Edition: open access, peer-reviewed journal (no APCs), specializing in international and transcultural media studies
publisher: Berlin Universities Publishing
language: en
publication name: Global Media Journal - German Edition
issn: 2196-4807
items: Challenging the Hegemony of the Nation State in an Age of Conflict and Crisis
items: Medien für die superdiverse Gesellschaft. Konzepte und Ergebnisse für die Medienpraxis
items: Infrastructuring the Digital Border: Surveillance, Political Subjectivization, and the Struggle against the Border-Industrial Complex
items: A Conversation about Iran in a Time of War: A Battlefield of Narratives
items: Interregional Migration and Hybrid Media: From Postnational Imaginaries to National Contestation in Latin America and the Caribbean
items: How to Communicate Cosmopolitanism? Reclaiming Global Change and Diversity in Times of Right-Wing Backlashes
items: Journalism Without Horizons: Media Power and the Erosion of Cosmopolitan Reporting in South Asia
items: Why Global Journalism Matters Amid Anti-Globalist Politics
items: Cross-border Collaboration as Modus Operandi for Arab Public Interest Journalism
items: Nadja-Christina Schneider (2025). Transkulturelle Medien und Kommunikation
items: Rethinking Journalism in Territorial Name Disputes Through Multidirectional Memory and a Rights-Centred Approach
items: Mediated Solidarities: Hyper-nationalist Indian Media and Transnational Alignment between Hindu Nationalism and the UK Far-Right
items: Norms, Power Relations and Injustices in Digitality: Global Perspectives. An Introduction to the Special Section on Content Moderation
items: A Critical Dialogue on the Cosmopolitan Turn in Communication Studies
items: Silvio Waisbord (2025). An Introduction to Journalism: Thinking Globally.
items: Reporting Web3: Challenges of Technology Journalism in Serving Informed Publics in Europe
items: "Priorities Were Chosen by Donors” - A Critical Review of International Media Assistance in Afghanistan (2001-2021)
items: Saad Mohseni with Jenna Krajeski (2024). Radio Free Afghanistan: A Twenty-Year Odyssey for an Independent Voice in Kabul
items: Carola Richter, Melanie Radue, Christine Horz-Ishak, Anna Litvinenko, Hanan Badr und Anke Fiedler (Eds.) (2025). Cosmopolitan Communication Studies – Toward Deep Internationalization
items: Freedom to Remain Silent? German Communication Studies in the Context of the Middle East Discourse
items: Václav Štětka, Sabina Mihelj (2024). The Illiberal Public Sphere: Media in Polarized Societies
items: Hossein Kermani (2025). Twitter Activism in Iran: Social Media and Democracy in Authoritarian Regimes
items: Structuring the Infosphere Online: Web Search Engines as Protagonists of Content Moderation
items: Genderwashing in Digital Platforms’ Self-Regulation: A Case Study of Decisions by the Meta Oversight Board
items: Content Moderation zwischen Anstandsdame, Schiedsrichter und Zensor? Zu Formen der Kommunikationskontrolle und ihren Folgeproblemen
items: The Journalistic Counter-Public in Poland in the Journal Krytyka Polityczna
items: Thussu, Daya Kishan. (2024). Changing Geopolitics of Global Communication
items: Constructing the 'Foreign': Stereotypes in Western Reporting on China and India
items: Jerónimo, Pedro. (Ed.). (2024). Local Journalism, Global Challenges. News Deserts, Infodemic and the Vastness in Between
items: Power Dynamics in War Reporting: Interrelations Between Local Producers and German Correspondents Covering the War in Ukraine

Challenging the Hegemony of the Nation State in an Age of Conflict and Crisis
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description: This guest editor’s introduction to the special section “Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media” describes the current global context as one where old assumptions about the world lack credibility. The idea of the nation state as the building block of a less violent and more sustainable global order is strained to breaking point. But even as the need for cooperation across borders becomes more obvious, an anti-global, xenophobic nationalism seems only to have strengthened its ideological hold. The essays in this special section explore various dimensions of nationalism and conflict as they pertain to the media. Normatively, they are grounded in the universal humanist or cosmopolitan ideal of world citizenship. This introductory essay argues that not just media but also media scholarship should challenge the hegemony of the nation state, resisting the methodological nationalism that characterises most of the work in the field.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Cherian George
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Cherian George https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/ppjbgd68

Medien für die superdiverse Gesellschaft. Konzepte und Ergebnisse für die Medienpraxis
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Liane Rothenberger
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Liane Rothenberger https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/5eh57e46

Infrastructuring the Digital Border: Surveillance, Political Subjectivization, and the Struggle against the Border-Industrial Complex
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description: Digital border infrastructures are commonly criticized for violating migrants' rights through intrusive surveillance and automated decision-making. This essay argues that such critiques remain fundamentally limited. The problem is not that border technologies are misused, but that the inherently violent and exclusionary logic of borders has become fused with techno-solutionist promises and transformed into a profitable business model. Rather than merely governing migration, digital border infrastructures produce the very conditions that legitimize their continuous expansion. Bringing together critical migration studies, science and technology studies, media and communication studies, and reflections from migrant solidarity activism, the essay conceptualizes digital border infrastructure as simultaneously material, discursive, and economic. It argues that infrastructures not only reorganize practices of bordering but also shape the production of visibility, knowledge, and political subjectivities. Securitized representations of migration are therefore not external narratives about the border; they are embedded in the infrastructures through which migration is governed and become part of a self-reinforcing cycle of border militarization. Building on this critique, the essay questions political strategies centered on human rights, counter-surveillance, or the production of visibility. Instead, it proposes shifting attention toward the digital border infrastructure itself and its material entanglements with policing and warfare. Such a perspective opens possibilities for reformulating border abolitionist politics beyond migration and toward broader struggles against militarization and surveillance. Acknowledgement This paper forms part of a broader collaborative initiative among various Global Media Journal editions. Parallel papers address a shared theme from the perspective of each national edition. ‘Media and Borders’ was selected for the Summer 2026 collaboration. A…
subject: Parallel Paper of Global Media Journal Editions
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creator: Dominik Winkler
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Dominik Winkler https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/h5sg9720

A Conversation about Iran in a Time of War: A Battlefield of Narratives
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description: In November 2025, Shahriar Khonsari was one of the scholars who responded to the call for abstracts for this journal’s special issue. His abstract was accepted, but because he lives in Tehran, Iran, following through was more complicated for him than for most contributors. On February 28, 2026, the United States and Israel launched massive strikes against his city and country. The Iranian government’s internet shutdowns temporarily cut off our communication with him. He nevertheless managed to submit a manuscript in March. Given the extraordinary circumstances, the editors decided that the standard review and revision process would be unreasonable. Furthermore, we knew that he would have valuable perspectives to offer that could not be captured in a standard academic article. Therefore, what follows is an edited interview with him by guest editor Cherian George. It is based on an email interview followed by a Zoom conversation conducted in mid-May 2026. It incorporates ideas from his submitted paper but also goes beyond, to discuss the challenges of critical scholarship in the midst of war.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Shahriar Khonsari
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Shahriar Khonsari https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/zympzk47

Interregional Migration and Hybrid Media: From Postnational Imaginaries to National Contestation in Latin America and the Caribbean
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description: Scholarship on migration and media in Latin America and the Caribbean has long emphasised how transnational connectivity sustains postnational imaginaries that unsettle the nation-state as the primary container of identity and belonging. This article argues that such frameworks now require significant revision. Contemporary migration across Latin America and the Caribbean increasingly connects South America, Central America, the Caribbean and North America through multidirectional corridors of transit, settlement and displacement. These developments are mediated through hybrid media environments that amplify xenophobic discourse, emotionally charged nationalism and the securitisation of borders. Drawing on recent empirical research, the article examines how states, commercial actors, migrant communities, and civil society organisations compete within these communicative landscapes. It shows that while solidaristic counter-narratives and practical support networks exist, digital connectivity increasingly operates alongside entrenched exclusionary mechanisms. Postnational imaginaries subsequently persist as contested possibilities within communicative environments shaped by national boundaries and struggles over belonging.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Gabriel Moreno Esparza
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Gabriel Moreno Esparza https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/wevr9q46

How to Communicate Cosmopolitanism? Reclaiming Global Change and Diversity in Times of Right-Wing Backlashes
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description: Against the backdrop of political backlashes, the essay poses the question of why progressive global visions of cosmopolitan realities have not wielded discursive power and even seem to have lost their cultural appeal. The discussion conceptualizes cosmopolitanism from a communication analysis and scrutinizes the fragility of cosmopolitan communication in everyday life experiences and the mediating discourses of mass media. The arguments reflect several communicative challenges of connecting existing cosmopolitan symbolic resources at a grassroots level based primarily on theoretical considerations. Additional preliminary empirical insights derived from a qualitative interview study aiming to understand the communication patterns of lived cosmopolitan experiences will further inform the discussion about challenges of translating these experiences to wider publics. The essay will end with implications for the responsibility of the mass media to help ensure that cosmopolitan realities are taken for granted.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Anne Grüne
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Anne Grüne https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/sjzcdb22

Journalism Without Horizons: Media Power and the Erosion of Cosmopolitan Reporting in South Asia
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description: This essay examines the structural barriers to cosmopolitan journalism in South Asia, arguing that the region’s journalism must contend with three overlapping geographies: colonial cartographies, post-Partition sovereignties, and civilizational continuities. Rather than translating these layered realities, journalism has become a site where borders are rhetorically hardened by political, commercial, and platform logics. Within the sub-continent, Indian journalism occupies a dual position: simultaneously subject to structural pressures yet disproportionately influential due to scale and platform dominance. By treating ultra-nationalism as a structural feature rather than episodic distortion, the essay reveals how media organizations align editorial agendas with state narratives for survival. It shifts attention from “headline wars” to the quieter erosion of journalism's humanistic function, offering an accounting of what has been lost: journalism as a tool for translation, restraint, and moral imagination across contested borders.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Shyam Tekwani
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Shyam Tekwani https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/twtsk324

Why Global Journalism Matters Amid Anti-Globalist Politics
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description: Global journalism covers the complexity of global connections as manifested in countless topics: global water supplies, extractive industries, labor conditions, climate crisis, migration routes and lives, health and disease, humanitarian crisis, conflicts and wars, social inequalities, and the political economy of global commodities (from fast fashion to food). It eschews the national pull that historically tethers journalism to the politics of cultural-geographical spaces. It offers de-centered perspectives that elude customary binary options of west-east, north-south and the rest. By revealing “how the global works,” it refuses to approach the world as fragmented territories. Global journalism is part of the disjointed knowledge institutions that help to “know the global” and interlocking global crises. It exists in a range of news media - mainstream news organizations, citizen journalism, alternative news, specialized news (science, health, environment, humanitarian), and non-profit journalism. It is not tied to breaking news or the tyranny of conventional news values – events, personalities, sensationalism, “the now;” instead, it brings up underlying structural factors, flows, and dynamics. By setting its reporting horizons on global developments, challenges, and risks, it is unmistakable form of advocacy – it is a call to thinking globally. Although it may not make big headlines on a regular basis, global journalism is particularly significant at a time of anti-globalism and turbo-charged nationalism, the persecution of critical and dissident journalism, science denialism, and the crisis of post-war global institutional architecture. Amid the noise of news and information in the attention economy, it stands for the kind of consciousness-raising news that are necessary in a world with and without borders.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Silvio Waisbord
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Silvio Waisbord https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/wfg3x888

Cross-border Collaboration as Modus Operandi for Arab Public Interest Journalism
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description: Despite laws, ownership structures and intimidation of media practitioners in Arab countries that render independent reporting extremely risky, digital media initiatives have sprung up across the region aimed at providing crucial insights into matters of public interest that are suppressed by state-controlled media. Blocked online and harassed offline by government forces, these initiatives survive against the odds, often working with cross-border support networks. Reflecting a range of innovative transnational interactions, such solidarity networks emerge when media practitioners pursue national concerns through regional and global alliances. This essay reviews noteworthy features of these interactions in light of an existing tradition of intra-regional cross-border exchange facilitated through shared language and history. It compares the pan-Arabism of independent public interest media with that of the mainstream in terms of its driving values and compatibility with a sense of pride in inclusive and pluralistic nationhood that rejects the sectarianism fuelling civil conflict. By reviewing examples of a multiplicity of different types of cross-border collaboration within the region and beyond, the essay concludes that the diversity of these connections and relationships strengthens a public interest media ecosystem that is otherwise quite fragile.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Naomi Sakr
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Naomi Sakr https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/4svmt729

Nadja-Christina Schneider (2025). Transkulturelle Medien und Kommunikation
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Christine Horz-Ishak
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Christine Horz-Ishak https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.364

Rethinking Journalism in Territorial Name Disputes Through Multidirectional Memory and a Rights-Centred Approach
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description: Toponyms (territorial names) can mobilize people by shaping captivating nationalist narratives. They can thus be a source of controversial policies that could erode democratic values. Drawing on the study of the Macedonian Name Dispute (MND) over the past six years, the paper argues that journalism must rethink its coverage of these conflicts, as media often amplify domestic nationalist narratives and escalate tensions between nation-states, with measurable effects on bilateral relations and regional diplomacy. I focus here on public communication, as its practices have imposed a dogmatic view that shapes online communication, including social media content, especially in the case of the MND. Crucially, in symbolic name disputes over territories, the media do not merely mirror a pre‑existing national interest; they are active agents, since the dispute’s political reality is constructed and amplified through communication and cultural practices. In a globalized world, when the media uncritically rally behind national flags, they not only reinforce inequality and restrict people’s rights domestically but also harden interstate positions, complicate diplomacy, and undermine multilateral conflict‑resolution mechanisms. This essay argues for a normative approach to media coverage, focusing on facts, pluralism, and more inclusive perspectives in coverage of territorial name disputes. This normative approach draws on Rothberg’s notion of multidirectional memory to encourage reporting that recognizes overlapping memories and comparative claims rather than treating histories as exclusive competitions.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Minos-Athanasios Karyotakis
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Minos-Athanasios Karyotakis https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/z0swjy33

Mediated Solidarities: Hyper-nationalist Indian Media and Transnational Alignment between Hindu Nationalism and the UK Far-Right
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description: Contra-flows of communication mediated by diaspora groups are often viewed as anti-hegemonic, and diaspora media spheres have long been considered integral to Western democracies. However, the asymmetrical, multidirectional, and deregulated nature of today’s internet-based communication requires a more critical approach to diaspora mediascapes. Social media platforms have transformed diasporic media networks into transnational political actors capable of influencing policies and public opinion in host countries. These flows can transmit polarising ideologies from homelands and mobilise diaspora communities through affect. Situated within scholarship on transnational communication networks, affective polarisation, and ethnic nationalism, the paper examines the role of Indian media in fostering transnational alignment between White and Hindu nationalist projects based on anti-Muslim sentiment. It argues that this partnership is intended to mobilise the Hindu diaspora and shape their perceptions of and connections with far-right movements across the Atlantic. Through a reflective thematic analysis of British far-right activist Tommy Robinson’s interviews with Indian media outlets, the paper investigates the performance of victimhood and outrage intended to influence and incite the Hindu community and to cultivate support for Robinson’s far-right project within the Indian diaspora in the UK. It also explores how India’s hyper-nationalist media, through the enactment of reciprocal legitimacy with the far-right, contribute to and have the potential to affect intercommunal relations within the UK.
subject: Special Section: Essays on Nationalism, Conflict and Media
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creator: Shumaila Jaffery
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Shumaila Jaffery https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/skxbd479

Norms, Power Relations and Injustices in Digitality: Global Perspectives. An Introduction to the Special Section on Content Moderation
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description: This introduction to the Global Media Journal – German Edition’s Special Section on content moderation critically examines the governance challenges of regulating online content in the digital age. It argues that the removal of content deemed illicit, detrimental or otherwise unacceptable by established standards is often framed as neutral gatekeeping even though it operates within contested power dynamics that lack rigorous and sound frameworks to assess its real-world impacts on freedom of expression, safety, and social justice. The authors highlight historical parallels to pre-modern censorship struggles following the invention of the printing press, emphasising that digital public spheres require forms of robust civility, not mere technical fixes. Current practices of content moderation reveal deep tensions: platforms increasingly employ automated systems for this endeavour, yet this risks amplifying harmful content and creating ethical dilemmas, while low-wage, high-stress labour conditions for human moderators (“clickworkers”) expose systemic exploitation. The Special Section addresses these gaps through four case studies.
subject: Special Section: Norms, Power Relations and Injustices in Digitality
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creator: Christoph Böhm
creator: Oliver Zöllner
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Christoph Böhm, Prof. Dr. phil. Oliver Zöllner https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.360

A Critical Dialogue on the Cosmopolitan Turn in Communication Studies
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description: This discussion engages with the collective volume Cosmopolitan Communication Studies: Toward Deep Internationalization. The editors and contributors call for a cosmopolitan reorientation of communication studies that transcends enduring Eurocentric biases. The proposed cosmopolitan approach advocates for inclusivity, context sensitivity, and the recognition of non-Western knowledge production as intellectually generative rather than derivative. By foregrounding comparative and interdisciplinary perspectives, the volume seeks to make deep internationalization a practical and ethical academic endeavor. The dialogue with scholars from around the world underscores cosmopolitanism not merely as methodology but as a mindset—aiming to reduce epistemic violence, resist authoritarian instrumentalization, and foster genuine global interconnectedness in the production of communication scholarship.
subject: Debate
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creator: Anke Fiedler
creator: Cherian George
creator: Winston Mano
creator: Melanie Radue
creator: Carola Richter
creator: Ylva Rodny-Gumede
creator: Michael Yao Wodui Serwornoo
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Anke Fiedler, Cherian George, Winston Mano, Melanie Radue, Carola Richter, Ylva Rodny-Gumede, Michael Yao Wodui Serwornoo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.359

Silvio Waisbord (2025). An Introduction to Journalism: Thinking Globally.
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Mira Keßler
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Mira Keßler https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.358

Reporting Web3: Challenges of Technology Journalism in Serving Informed Publics in Europe
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description: This article presents a quality assessment of Web3 coverage in mainstream media across four European countries—Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom—as a starting point for discussing the standards of technology journalism that can meaningfully support an informed public. It begins with an overview of existing research on technology journalism and its role in fostering informed citizenry. This is followed by a mixed-methods content analysis, combining quantitative and qualitative approaches, to examine how the complex topic of Web3 is reported in the four European countries. Insights from journalists and editors contextualize the analysis. The findings highlight three key challenges across all countries: an event-driven rather than process-oriented focus, a narrow thematic scope on the financial applications of Web3 technology (cryptocurrencies), and a relatively limited diversity of sources. The article concludes by exploring how these challenges—and the broader trends in Web3 reporting—shed light on the potential and pitfalls of technology journalism in contemporary societies.
subject: Peer-Reviewed Articles
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creator: Katja Leifheit
creator: Judith Pies
creator: Hilde Van den Bulck
creator: Alessandro D’Arma
creator: Marius Dragomir
creator: Minna Horowitz
creator: Marta Rodríguez-Castro
creator: Martín Vaz-Álvarez
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Katja Leifheit, Judith Pies, Hilde Van den Bulck, Alessandro D’Arma, Marius Dragomir, Minna Horowitz, Marta Rodríguez-Castro, Martín Vaz-Álvarez https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2026-07-14
publication date: 2026-07-14
doi: 10.60678/chxj7t92

"Priorities Were Chosen by Donors” - A Critical Review of International Media Assistance in Afghanistan (2001-2021)
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description: This study presents findings from research on international media development strategies and practices in Afghanistan between 2001 and 2021. Based on qualitative interviews with 35 Afghan journalists in Afghanistan, the research offers a retroactive assessment of key patterns in International Media Assistance. The findings indicate that prevailing media assistance strategies, as perceived by interviewees, were largely aimed at changing attitudes and behaviors through media programs. This reflects a media-centric paradigm in which people are viewed as passive recipients of information rather than active agents of change. Interviewees also noted that the international community underestimated the divide between liberal urban communities and conservative rural communities. Media programs often targeted liberal, urban youth, further jeopardizing social cohesion in Afghanistan. Future programs should prioritize citizen engagement in public affairs through the media to help counter the widespread perception that decisions are made elsewhere. Participatory approaches should also include conservative communities, as a sole focus on liberal urban elites has been seen as deepening social divisions.
subject: Media Practice & Research Reports
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creator: Hazrat Bahar
creator: Anja Wollenberg
rights: Copyright (c) 2025 Hazrat Bahar, Anja Wollenberg https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-10-07
publication date: 2025-10-07
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i1.353

Saad Mohseni with Jenna Krajeski (2024). Radio Free Afghanistan: A Twenty-Year Odyssey for an Independent Voice in Kabul
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Hazrat Bahar
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Hazrat Bahar https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.350

Carola Richter, Melanie Radue, Christine Horz-Ishak, Anna Litvinenko, Hanan Badr und Anke Fiedler (Eds.) (2025). Cosmopolitan Communication Studies – Toward Deep Internationalization
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Jeffrey Wimmer
rights: Copyright (c) 2025 Jeffrey Wimmer https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-07-25
publication date: 2025-07-25
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i1.345

Freedom to Remain Silent? German Communication Studies in the Context of the Middle East Discourse
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description: Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and the widespread bombing and invasion of the Gaza Strip by the Israeli military, Germany’s political public sphere has been in a concerning state. Recent reports show a sharp rise in antisemitic, anti-Muslim, and other racist incidents. Civil society actors have increasingly complained about repression against critics of Israeli warfare and German arms deliveries. German media have also faced fierce criticism for their Gaza coverage. Although communication studies’ central topics are affected, and universities have become prominent sites of public controversy, the German communication studies community has hardly contributed to the discussion with either empirical research or normative statements. This discussion, held as part of the 70th annual conference of the German Communication Association (DGPuK) in Berlin, explores how this reluctance can be explained. The main reasons identified during the discussion were a lack of regional expertise regarding the Middle East, weaknesses in research infrastructure, personal knowledge gaps and biases, and a fear of accusations of anti-Semitism and repression, particularly among precariously employed academics.
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creator: Christian Strippel
creator: Kai Hafez
creator: Carsten Reinemann
creator: Mandy Tröger
rights: Copyright (c) 2025 Christian Strippel, Kai Hafez, Carsten Reinemann, Mandy Tröger https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-07-15
publication date: 2025-07-15
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i1.344

Václav Štětka, Sabina Mihelj (2024). The Illiberal Public Sphere: Media in Polarized Societies
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Karolína Bieliková
rights: Copyright (c) 2025 Karolína Bieliková https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-07-15
publication date: 2025-07-15
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i1.339

Hossein Kermani (2025). Twitter Activism in Iran: Social Media and Democracy in Authoritarian Regimes
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Mitra Shamsi
rights: Copyright (c) 2025 Mitra Shamsi https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-07-15
publication date: 2025-07-15
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i1.338

Structuring the Infosphere Online: Web Search Engines as Protagonists of Content Moderation
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description: The World Wide Web (WWW) is an open data space on the Internet. The number of websites accessible on the WWW is so vast that web search engines are essential as structuring and orientation tools for its use. However, content moderation does not occur only within social media; it has also long been practised in the context of web search engines, above all by Google as the dominant provider. This article analyses the process behind the creation of web search engine results pages—from the crawling of the WWW to the presentation of search results to the user—and identifies where automatic-algorithmic and manual content moderation are employed to improve the user experience. It emphasises that this not only creates technical biases but also deliberately influences the results of web searches from a political and corporate perspectives. Web search engines also play a special role due to their gatekeeping function with respect to the WWW, as they represent key nodes in the infosphere.
subject: Special Section: Norms, Power Relations and Injustices in Digitality
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creator: Jonathan D. Geiger
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Jonathan D. Geiger https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.337

Genderwashing in Digital Platforms’ Self-Regulation: A Case Study of Decisions by the Meta Oversight Board
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description: Online gender‑based violence curbs women’s rights while generating profit for digital platforms due to the high engagement generated by such content. This dynamic exemplifies the gender-related legal issues raised by digital platform business models. These harmful practices are scrutinised by legal and social science scholarship and addressed within a broad regulatory discourse encompassing both soft and hard law measures and social media self-regulating initiatives. The latter is especially representative of the development of terms and conditions and the creation of “quasi-judicial” boards, which operate as regulatory intermediaries. One such body is Meta’s Oversight Board—an independent board that reviews Meta’s decisions about Facebook, Instagram, and Threads content. This research analyses two gender-related binding decisions by the Board to assess: (i) the legal values, norms, and principles applied in gender-sensitive rulings and (ii) whether these decisions led to effective protection, remediation, and infrastructural changes within Meta’s services. The article argues that Meta’s responses remain largely superficial, using human rights discourse to legitimise actions without addressing the core issue—its infrastructure. These measures often serve as symbolic gestures rather than substantive reforms and may amount to forms of genderwashing, ultimately exacerbating rather than mitigating harms experienced by women, girls, and LGBTQIA+ users online.
subject: Special Section: Norms, Power Relations and Injustices in Digitality
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creator: Mariana Magalhães Avelar
creator: Luana Mathias Souto
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Mariana Magalhães Avelar, Luana Mathias Souto https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.335

Content Moderation zwischen Anstandsdame, Schiedsrichter und Zensor? Zu Formen der Kommunikationskontrolle und ihren Folgeproblemen
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description: This article examines content moderation (CM) from a systems theoretical perspective as a form of communication control. Rather than pursuing normative or legal classifications, CM is understood as a practical problem within communicative systems. Three historical social figures – “chaperone”, “referee”, and “censor” – serve as heuristic reference points to illustrate different modes and problems of communication control: from interactive monitoring to organizational rule enforcement to societal regulation of what may be said. It becomes apparent that communication control always encounters conflicts of interest that mirror the frequently observed problems of content moderation: between visibility and invisibility, norm setting and norm enforcement, and inclusion and exclusion. The logic of digital communication (asynchrony, anonymity, and range) further intensifies these conflicts. The study concludes that CM must be understood as a practice whose conflicting goals cannot be conclusively resolved, but whose management itself becomes a persistent societal task.
subject: Special Section: Norms, Power Relations and Injustices in Digitality
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creator: Lukas Beckmann
creator: Sebastian Suttner
creator: Björn Wiegärtner
rights: Copyright (c) 2026 Lukas Beckmann, Sebastian Suttner, Björn Wiegärtner https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-12-30
publication date: 2025-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i2.331

The Journalistic Counter-Public in Poland in the Journal Krytyka Polityczna
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description: Established in 2002, the Krytyka Polityczna constitutes an important example of journalistic counter-public in post-socialist Poland. The journal's self-conception illustrates how both the experience of underground publishing in the Polish People's Republic and the sweeping restructuring of the Polish media system after 1989 have lasting effects on today's media landscape. Their context-based understanding of counter-public was reconstructed in a content analysis of selected issues from the years 2007 to 2016. The findings show that the journal strives for a pluralistic and discursive public sphere wherein Krytyka Polityczna speaks on behalf of the Polish left, who – according to them – is lacking their own narratives in the struggle for interpretive authority. To this end, essayistic and artistic content plays a central role. The journal is also closely connected to the group's other projects, increasingly professionalised and informed by international (theory) discourses, which are translated into the Polish context.
subject: Graduate Section
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creator: Kira Welker
rights: Copyright (c) 2025 Kira Welker https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2025-07-15
publication date: 2025-07-15
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v15i1.325

Thussu, Daya Kishan. (2024). Changing Geopolitics of Global Communication
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Kai Hafez
rights: Copyright (c) 2024 Kai Hafez https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2024-12-30
publication date: 2024-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v14i2.322

Constructing the 'Foreign': Stereotypes in Western Reporting on China and India
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description: Foreign reporting plays a significant role in shaping our perspectives on other countries. However, reporting on non-Western countries is still heavily influenced by Western perspectives, which can lead to distortions, one-sided portrayals, and stereotyping. This study aims to analyze the emergence of stereotypes in U.S. and German reporting on China and India. To this end, two leading national daily newspapers from the USA (Washington Post and New York Times) and Germany (Süddeutsche Zeitung and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) were examined for their coverage of China and India. The results reveal that stereotypes are more prevalent in the reporting on India across all newspapers. Both countries used political stereotypes to a similar extent, with economic stereotypes being the second most common in coverage of China, while stereotypes about the population dominated the articles on India.
subject: Special Graduate Section: Foreign and War Reporting
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creator: Gianna Albrecht
creator: Judith Gayler
creator: Marla Hanenberg
creator: Steven Hermanutz
creator: Susanne Ködel
rights: Copyright (c) 2024 Gianna Albrecht, Judith Gayler, Marla Hanenberg, Steven Hermanutz, Susanne Ködel https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2024-12-30
publication date: 2024-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v14i2.321

Jerónimo, Pedro. (Ed.). (2024). Local Journalism, Global Challenges. News Deserts, Infodemic and the Vastness in Between
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subject: Book Reviews
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subject: Book Reviews
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creator: Matthias Künzler
rights: Copyright (c) 2024 Matthias Künzler https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2024-12-30
publication date: 2024-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v14i2.320

Power Dynamics in War Reporting: Interrelations Between Local Producers and German Correspondents Covering the War in Ukraine
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description: Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine underscores the crucial role of local producers in war reporting. This study examines the power dynamics between local producers and German foreign correspondents covering the war in Ukraine. Drawing on ten qualitative, semi-structured interviews with members from both groups, this article employs a field-theoretical approach to analyse mutual expectations, power asymmetries, and their reflection. It particularly focuses on how role perceptions, professional identities, and journalistic practices are negotiated under wartime conditions. The findings reveal a complex network of relationships: while foreign correspondents retain ultimate editorial authority, they simultaneously rely on the cultural capital and expertise of local producers. This interdependency creates a tension between professional collaboration and structural inequality. Foreign correspondents rarely engage in critical reflection on these hierarchies, whereas some local producers actively seek to improve their professional standing – whether through individual professionalisation efforts or collective initiatives such as unionisation. This study highlights the often-overlooked role of local producers in international war reporting and calls for a critical reassessment of existing power structures.
subject: Special Graduate Section: Foreign and War Reporting
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creator: Hanna Blume
creator: Leonie Götz
creator: Pauline Hille
creator: Anna Kushnir
creator: Luca Lang
creator: Lene Rügamer
rights: Copyright (c) 2024 Hanna Blume, Leonie Götz, Pauline Hille, Anna Kushnir, Luca Lang, Lene Rügamer https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
date: 2024-12-30
publication date: 2024-12-30
doi: 10.60678/gmj-de.v14i2.319