By Karolína Šimková (Charles University)
Community media play a pivotal role in the democratic media landscape, serving as platforms that not only deliver content tailored for community members but also promote their engagement and participation (Carpentier, Doudaki, 2014). This key function underlines the importance of these media in promoting a healthy democracy. In line with this view, the Council of Europe’s 2022 report highlighted the essential role of community media, praising their “unique contributions in terms of diversity and inclusiveness in media” (p. 10). This acknowledgment points to the vital presence community media have in enriching the media ecosystem with diverse voices and perspectives.
But while in some parts of Europe, Germany and France as examples, community media have a strong presence and support from local organisations, in others, such as the Czech Republic, there is very little formal support for community media. This, of course, complicates the situation for existing media and hinders the creation of new ones.
Credits; Pexels
The long wait for legal recognition
The Czech Republic operates under a legally established dual media system that differentiates between public and private media sectors. Despite this, community media, often referred to as the third sector, lacks formal recognition within the Czech legal framework. This situation persists, although the possibility of its formal recognition has been discussed in the past (Carpentier et al., 2012). However, as the aforementioned council’s report states, “for community media to be sustainable, the sector needs to be formally recognised by law” (p. 2). This lack of formal status was identified as a problem of the Czech media environment in the Media Plurality Monitor 2023, where the indicator “Access to media for local/regional communities and community media” is rated as high risk (75%).
This is currently the biggest obstacle to the development of community media in the Czech Republic. Other problems are the lack of state funding or the (often related) lack of content creators and contributors. Nevertheless, there are several such media in this landscape. These existing media can be divided into three main categories: Christian media, minority media, and student media. In addition, other interest organisations and associations, such as Junák – Czech Scout or the Association of Firefighters of Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia, publish their own community magazines. But these are rather individual cases. Therefore, we will now focus on examples from the three main categories that we identified:
Christian community media
Czechs are not considered a very religious nation – just under 19 percent of Czech citizens reported belonging to a church or religious society in the 2021 census. Most of those who declared belonging to a particular church are affiliated with the Catholic Church (ČSÚ, 2021). However, there are several Christian non-profit media outlets. Among them are Radio Proglas which is based in Brno and is unique in that it holds a broadcasting licence, while other community radio stations operate on the internet. Another example is Radio 7 which is created by Trans World Radio and broadcasts from Brno.
Minority community media
The Czech Republic has a large number of community media outlets designed for and produced by minorities. According to Czech law (Act No. 273/2001 Coll.), these media are financially supported by the state, in particular by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, which announces an annual call for grants to support minority media (MK ČR, 2023). The biggest minorities in the Czech Republic are currently Romas, Slovaks, and Ukrainians whose number in the Czech Republic increased rapidly since the 2022 phase of the Russian invasion of Ukraine began (MV ČR, 2023).
The fact that community media for minorities are by law supported by the state is clearly a relief for these media, whose daily existence is less precarious than that of others. To name some of these media: Listy for the Slovak minority, Porohy or Ukrajinskij žurnal for the Ukrainian minority, and the Romano Voďi magazine, news website Romea.cz, both published by the Romea association and Romano hangos for Roma minority.
Student community media
A significant category is media founded and/or run by students. There are also several student radio stations in the Czech Republic. These are traditionally created at universities in media departments, but primary and secondary schools also have their own community radios. Here we are mainly talking about student radios, but a separate article would be about school magazines, which are sometimes the product of media education in primary and secondary schools.
As an example, we can mention the student-run Radio R, which broadcasts at Masaryk University in Brno, or Radio Kolej which broadcasts at UTB-TU Ostrava. That student radios are not just the preserve of universities is proven by WebRádio Epigon, a student radio station run by the Primary and Secondary School in Vimperk, South Bohemia. The problem of staff shortages and inconsistency is perhaps even more pronounced in student community radio. The creators of WebRádio Epigon describe the challenge of finding volunteers to run the station on their website. That is why several established student radios, such as the UP AIR radio of Palacký University in Olomouc, have ceased their activities in recent years.
Conclusion
Community media in the Czech Republic are in a difficult position today because, unlike in other European countries, they are still not legally recognised. Yet more than a decade ago, there were already serious discussions that this step should be taken. The necessity of this step for the stability of community media is evidenced by the fact that several established editorial offices have closed down in recent years. Consequently, a law on community media would also address the funding of these entities, as financial instability is one of the main reasons why these media outlets are closing down nowadays. Despite this, there are currently several community media in the Czech Republic, which can be divided into three main categories: Christian media, minority media, and student media and we have listed some examples of these categories. However, this is not a state of affairs that Czech society should be happy with, nor is it healthy for the Czech media landscape.
References
Carpentier, N. et al. (2012). Komunitní média. https://www.rrtv.cz/files/pracovni-skupiny/komunitni_media.pdf
Carpentier, N. and Doudaki, V. (2014), Community Media for Reconciliation: A Cypriot Case Study. https://doi.org/10.1111/cccr.12017
Council of Europe (2022). COMMUNITY MEDIA contributions to citizens’ participation. https://rm.coe.int/community-media-contributions-to-citizens-participation-en/1680a94cd5
ČSÚ (2021). Náboženská víra. https://vdb.czso.cz/vdbvo2/faces/cs/index.jsf?page=statistiky#katalog=33525
ČSÚ (2023). Obyvatelstvo. https://www.czso.cz/csu/czso/obyvatelstvo_lide
MK ČR (2024). I. Program podpory rozšiřování a přijímání informací v jazycích národnostních menšin. https://mk.gov.cz/i-program-podpory-rozsirovani-a-prijimani-informaci-v-jazycich-narodnostnich-mensin-cs-469
MV ČR (2023). Čtvrtletní zpráva o migraci za II. Čtvrtletí 2023. https://www.mvcr.cz/clanek/ctvrtletni-zprava-o-migraci-za-ii-ctvrtleti-2023.aspx
Štětka, V., Adamčíková, J., and Sybera, A. (2023). Media Pluralism Monitor 2023: Czech Republic. https://cadmus.eui.eu/handle/1814/75741
WebRádio Epigon (2022). Epigoňácká krize.https://www.epigon.info/novinky-krize2022.html