News
[Covid19] Austria: Radio Helsinki starts program “FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions: The daily Corona Update”
Starting Monday, 16.3, Radio Helsinki in Graz/Austria is providing daily information on the Covid19 situation in Austria. They are responding to current information from the federal government and fight against fake news (e.g. from social media), authoritarian tendencies and also panic. Radio Helsinki states: “It is our concern to counteract the effects of drastic restrictions on freedom of movement and possible isolation.” Listen to the… read more
[Covid19] UNESCO Resource Centre: Information Sharing and Countering Disinformation
Freedom of expression, access to information – notably on public health -, and quality news coverage are essential to face the unprecedented crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic. More than ever, the world needs professional journalism and reliable information to adapt its response to the spread of COVID-19, organize itself, learn from other countries’ experiences and counter the increase of rumors and… read more
Community Radios in Berlin Have a New Home
Opening of the FRBB Studio in the House of Statistics,Berlin-Alexanderplatz on 31.3.2020 from 15:00-22:00 Berlin is not one city, but many.Radio is not made by itself, but by many.And the Free Radios Berlin Brandenburg do not have one studio,but – many. So, in spite of all odds, on Tuesday, March 31st,2020 the now 15th studio of the provider community Freies Radio… read more
Grassroots Radio on Coronavirus — Report from Romania
As the Coronavirus is spreading across Europe, Grassroots Radio project partners (including AMARC Europe) are devoting their energies to arrange information initiatives to keep local populations informed about data and events connected to the health emergency. Additionally, there are members of the consortium who are also active to monitor governmental decisions regarding the organization of information about the virus. This… read more
[Covid19] Bangladesh: 41 HOURS PROGRAM ON COVID-19 PREVENTION EDUCATION
Sixteen Community Radios stations in Bangladesh have been broadcasting 41 hours Coronavirus prevention education in line with the National Preparedness and Response Plan for COVID – 19, published by Directorate General of Health Services, Health Service Division, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh. Presently, Bangladeshi Community Radio stations are broadcasting 40 hours awareness… read more
[Covid19] South Africa: NATIONAL COMMUNITY RADIO FORUM COMMEND GOVERNMENT SUPPORT TO COMMUNITY MEDIA DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC
The National Community Radio Forum (NCRF) notes with gratitude the South African government’s confidence in, and support for the community radio sector. We are particularly encouraged by the Media Development and Diversity Agency’s (MDDA) announcement of the relief fund which will cover some costs to the value of R45 000.00 (Forty-five Thousand Rands) per community broadcaster. We are happy that the MDDA adequately… read more
Digital Communication Rights for Community Media
AMARC Europe is proud to announce the beginning of a new project supported by UNESCO, “ Fostering digital communication rights for community media”. In continuation with its strategic global perspective, AMARC wishes to fulfil its role promoting participatory democracy and active citizenship through the defence and advancement of community media. In order to turn this aspiration into action, AMARC is strengthening its… read more
One step closer to justice
In November 2019 Foundation for Civil Radio filed a lawsuit against a decision by the Media Council of the National Media and Infocommunications Authority that from December 21, 2019 Civil Radio had to stop its broadcasting on the air. We knew that this legal action would not necessarily lead to a return of the frequency we used for 25 years – since… read more
Registration for Radiocamp 2020 is open! [EN/FR/GER]
[English] THE RADIOCAMP IS AN INITIATIVE FROM THE FREE RADIO FROM THE GERMANSPEAKING COUNTRIES Beside all kinds of workshops, the focus lies on the networking. At the Radiocamp you can meet radio enthusiasts of all ages and coming from all kinds of radios. You can learn about how others do it, make contacts and start cooperations. Free Radios are a place… read more
International Women’s Day 2020: I am Generation Equality – Realizing Women’s Rights
AMARC Europe is joining the International Women’s Day 2020 campaign This year marks the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action adopted in 1995 at the 4th World Conference on Women in Beijing/China. AMARC Europe supports the The Beijing Declaration’s resolutions fully in order to eliminate all forms of discrimination against women and girls, fight women’s economic independence and the structural reasons… read more
JOINT STATEMENT: The EU and Member States must create safe environment for journalists reporting on the humanitarian situation in Greece
Physical attacks, online harassment and censorship: In recent days, media freedom organisations have shed light on threats against journalists reporting on the arrival of migrants into Greece. These attacks are taking place in a context of violence against migrants and those supporting them, such as NGOs and self- organised groups. They restrict the ability of journalists to work safely… read more
Member Survey AMARC Europe: Digitalisation and Community Media in English/French/Spanish/German
[ENGLISH] Member Survey AMARC Europe: Digitalisation and the European Community Media Sector Dear AMARC Europe members,Dear friends and colleagues from the community media sector in Europe and worldwide, The current technological shift to digital communication (infra)structures, the visible effects of big internet platforms and streaming services on the way we consume and produce media and information, the shift in the participation… read more
Grassroots Radio Project celebrates World Radio Day 2020
AMARC Europe as part of the Grassroots Radio Project wants to share the statement of the project for World Radio Day 2020 and wishes all project members and partners a Happy World Radio Day\” For this occasion, the project team has produced several video clips and released a press statement. The clips are made in English, Romanian and Portuguese, in… read more
World Radio Day 2020: We are DIVERSITY
Dear AMARC Europe members, colleagues and friends,In a few days we will celebrate the World Radio Day 2020. This year’s World Radio Day topic is \”We are DIVERSITY. We are RADIO\”.The UNESCO argues in this year’s topic rational that “radio is a powerful medium for celebrating humanity in all its diversity and constitutes a platform for democratic discourse. At… read more
Article “The smartphone generation of community radio listeners: Is FM sustainable?”
A new article on the usage of smartphones amongst community radio listeners was published in the Journal of Alternative and Community Media Vol4/4 (2019) by Janey Gordon with the title \”The smartphone generation of community radio listeners: Is FM sustainable?\” Abstract of the article \”This article examines the current environment of audio transmission services in the UK with particular regard to… read more
AMARC Europe launches new website
We are happy to announce the launch of the new AMARC Europe website and to introduce you to some of the new features on the website. The main idea behind the relaunch of the website was to simplify and update the complete structure of the website and make it easier for you find the relevant content for you and access information from the… read more
Documentation of Lecture “The Alternative Economies of Community Media”
Nico Carpentier held a lecture with the title \”The Alternative Economies of Community Media\” at the E-Com Lab 2019 at the UAB (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona) in Barcelona on 11 December 2019. \”The lecture first discussed the nature of community media, using the four approaches model (see Carpentier, Lie & Servaes, 2003; Carpentier, 2017) to community media as starting… read more
Nominations for UNESCO World Press Freedom Prize 2020
UNESCO is seeking nominations for UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize 2020. This Prize was established by UNESCO’s Executive Board, in 1997, in honour of Guillermo Cano, a Colombian journalist who died in the exercise of his profession. Its purpose is to reward each year a person, organization or institution that has made a notable contribution to the defence and/or… read more
Topic for World Radio Day 2020 announced
The UNESCO has announced this year\’s topic for the World Radio Day: Diversity. \”Radio is a powerful medium for celebrating humanity in all its diversity and constitutes a platform for democratic discourse. At the global level, radio remains the most widely consumed medium. This unique ability to reach out the widest audience means radio can shape a society’s experience of… read more
AMARC Europe part of SoundRoutes Project
AMARC Europe is part of the second phase of the SoundRoutes project. The SoundRoutes initiative provides an opportunity for international musicians, who emigrated to Europe to perform within local communities and in collaboration with local artists. Several musical concepts were designed with the objective of supporting their integration into the social and professional environment of the host community. The Creative Europe… read more
Budpaest based Community Radio Civil Radio takes Media Council’s decision to court
In our last newsletter we reported on the decision of the Hungarian Media Council to not re-issue the licence for the Community Radio Civil Radio in Budapest. Find here the full statement of Civil Radio on the decision of the Media Council.Civil Radio will challenge the decision! Read here the new statement on the next steps:\”We take our case to the… read more
Feminist Radio Day 2019
On 21.10.2019 the Day of Feminist Radio took place for the second time in a row. Following the international radio conference Claim The Waves in Zurich, Switzerland 2018, this radio- and editorial-spanning day of action was jointly celebrated by 8 free radio stations in German-speaking countries. This year, already 16 radio stations have broadcast the Feministischer Radiotag in whole… read more
Grassroots Radio at the Ethnographies of Collaborative Economi(es) Conference
Grassroots Radio has been presented at the Ethnographies of Collaborative Economi(es) Conference, which took place in Edinburgh (UK) on October 25, 2019. Mariacristina Sciannamblo (AMARC Europe) discussed the paper titled “Co-designing collaborative care work through ethnography”, co-authored with Roberto Cibin (M-ITI), Petra Žišt (M-ITI), Chris Csíkszentmíhalyi (M-ITI), and Maurizio Teli (Aalborg University). The paper addresses a number of issues –… read more
CIVIL RADIO WON’T STAY SILENT!
Last week the Budapest based community radio CIVIL RÁDIÓ – FM 98 received the negative decision of the Hungarian Media Council on their re-application for their broadcasting licence. In a first statement Civil Radio reacts to the decision of the Media Council with the words . “Our voice is the same, and we do not want to be silenced. We will be expelled… read more
AMARC takes part in SMART co-ordination meeting in Aarau (CH)
SMART (Specific Methodologies And Resources for Radio Trainers) is addressed to radio trainers in community media and offers selected and valid training exercises and methods even to specific target groups to create radio trainings. It was about producing a training tool that would prevail over time, and no disappear at the end of the project. SMART on-line tool brings together the training… read more
International Feminist Radioday 2019
Today is International Feminist Radioday! The International Feminist Radioday today will feature over 24 hours of feminist content from over 12 editorial teams in 3 german-speaking countries. The broadcasts will include content against the patriarchy with feminist music, interviews, stories, features, shows and discussions. Why do we need a feminist radioday? According to a study by the ZHAW less than 39% of the… read more
AMARC Europe hosts EMAC meeting
On 7 and 8 October 2019 AMARC Europe hosted the last meeting of the Ethical Media for Active Citizenship (EMAC) project in its office in Brussels. The project will conclude on 31 October 2019, and currently partners are uploading the activities and the rest of the materials on the online training tool. All documents and resources will be available in German… read more
Bavarian Community Radio Association founded – Community Media are organising
End of August the bavarian Community Radios formed the Verband Community Media Bayern (VCMB ) to better represent the concept of Community Media in public. For this representatives of Radio Z from Nuremberg, LORA from Munich and Radio Free FM of Ulm and Neu Ulm, all organized in the Bundesverband Freier Radios (BFR), met at LORA in Munich. These… read more
AMARC at the ECREA Radio Research Conference 2019
AMARC joined the 6th Conference of the Radio Research Section of the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA), which was held in the lovely setting of the University of Siena (Italy), on September 19-21. Several interesting keynote speeches and pieces of research have been presented, highlighting the variety and vivacity of the radio sector across and beyond Europe. The first keynote… read more
GRASSROOTS RADIO THIRD GENERAL ASSEMBLY: IT’S A WRAP!
On Thursday 5th and Friday 6th of September 2019, the Grassroots Radio consortium celebrated the third general assembly of the project, hosted in the friendly building of 11.11.11. – the coalition of NGOs, unions, movements and various solidarity groups in Flanders (Dutch speaking Northern part of Belgium) – in Brussels. The meeting has seen participation of all the members of the… read more
The AMARC Community Radio Charter for Europe
Recognising that community radio is an ideal means of fostering freedom of expression and information, the development of culture, the freedom of form and confront opinions and active participation in local life; noting that different cultures and traditions lead to diversity of forms of community radio; this Charter identifies objectives which community radio stations share and should strive… read more
SMART Pilot Training in Budapest
From 4 – 7 June 2019 the team around the SMART Erasmus+ project held its first training of trainer pilot training in Budapest, Hungary. The training workshop hosted 10 participants from Hungary, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, Ireland and the Bask country to test and assess the developed training and gain important feedback on the next steps… read more
AMARC Argentina: “Without Community Media there is not democracy”
AMARC Argentina members meeting in Bahía Blanca AMARC Argentina members gathered in the middle of June to share knowledge, practices and realities, and participate in intense debates in around the right to communication and current Argentina. The meeting ended on Monday, June 17, 2019 in Bahía Blanca, where FM De la Calle is located, a station that is about to celebrate its… read more
Community Media and Disaster Risk Reduction: Amarc at the UN Global Platform on Disaster Risk Reduction
The Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction is a biennial multi-stakeholder forum established by the UN General Assembly to review progress, share knowledge and discuss the latest developments and trends in reducing disaster risk. The sixth session of the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction (GP2019) took place in Geneva, Switzerland from 13 to 17 May, 2019, convened and organized… read more
AMARC Europe statement on Increase of the Private Broadcasting Fund in Austria
AMARC Europe reacted to the amendment of the Austrian private broadcasting fund with a statement. Read the full statement in English below or download the statement in English or German To Austrian Federal Ministry European Union, Art, Culture and Media Ballhausplatz 2 1010 Vienna Austria Brussels, 23rd May 2019 Increase of the Private Broadcasting Fund and Amendment of the KommAustria Act of 6 May 2019 Dear Mr Blümel, Dear Federal Government… read more
More money for Austrian private broadcasters. However, why only for commercial broadcasters?
In May 2019 the Austrian government increased the funding for the private media sector by € 5 million. However, this substantial increase will solely benefit the commercial private media sector – the funding for the community media sector remains the same. AMARC Europe invited Josef Seethaler to discuss the impact of these changes on the Austrian Community… read more
Radio Art Residency – an international fellowship program for radio art
In 2018, Radio CORAX and the Goethe-Institut have launched an international fellowship program for radio art. Being the first artist residence program of its kind throughout Europe, the Radio Art Residency invites artists from non-German speaking countries two times a year for a period of three months to reside in the non-commercial local Radio CORAX in Halle (Saale), Germany…. read more
Ethical and Responsible journalism: the EMAC project
The proliferation of mass media and new technologies has brought about decisive changes in and challenges to human communication processes and behaviour. The change in the media landscape has also impacted the role and social, professional and ethical responsibilities of journalists. These changes in the role that the media plays in the life of citizens have highlighted the importance… read more
Radio Študent celebrates 50 Years!
Radio Študent is a non-profit, urban community radio station, established by the Student Organisation of the University of Ljubljana on the 9th of May in 1969, as a direct result of the student movements in the 60s. As such, it is one of the oldest and strongest community radio stations in Europe, with over 200 regular student and non-student… read more