Whenever someone speaks about threats to journalism, we tend to imagine physical violence or flagrant restrictions to free speech. Those are, for sure, the most concerning menaces that journalism now faces and the ones that need more attention since colleagues are risking their lives every day to guarantee the right of information. Nothing is more important than preserving them and amplifying their reporting. Many of the stories in this book are related to that kind of censorship and, as I am going to tell you later on, I have also suffered from it. However, a more common version of censorship is harder to identify, and that’s the reason why it spreads easily all over the world. Academics and communication theorists tend to refer to it as soft censorship or indirect censorship. Even when they don’t imply risk for life, their effects prevent both journalists from reporting freely according to public interest and the audience from enjoying their right of information and communication.

Since this kind of censorship is less noticeable, I will mention here a few examples from different countries to show that these kinds of restrictions to journalism are present all over the world. I hope that this will help contribute to finding possible ways to defend our societies from it.

This selection of cases was arbitrary. I learned about them from personal or professional experience. These are not the only countries in which this kind of censorship is taking place (because it happens in most of the countries of the world). These are also not the worst versions of what is occurring in those countries. But my own practice as a reporter taught me that it is better to avoid generalizations. If you can describe some events thoroughly in their context, you might help your audience not only to understand what is happening there, but also to reflect on other situations in which similar things are happening.