The Hungarian media conglomerate (KESMA): a risk assessment based on the Media Pluralism Monitor
The Media Pluralism Monitor (MPM) is a research tool that was designed to identify potential risks to media pluralism in the European Union’s Member States. The Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom (CMPF) regularly carries out an annual implementation of the MPM in all the EU’s Member States and in selected candidate countries. Please find the MPM 2017 here.
This report has been drawn up by the CMPF at the request of the European Commission by way of update to the report on risks to media pluralism in Hungary, published in the framework of the second EU-wide implementation of the MPM (Bognar et al. 2018). In particular, the CMPF was asked to assess whether the establishment of the Central European Press and Media Foundation (Közép-Európai Sajtó és Média Alapítvány, or KESMA) in Autumn 2018 amounts to an element of additional risk for media pluralism in the country and whether this additional risk is quantifiable.
CMPF’s assessment builds on the context of the last MPM report for Hungary which was based on 2017 data. The new assessment is limited to the analysis of the establishment of KESMA and does not take into account other developments in the Hungarian media landscape which occurred in 2018. The assessment is based on verified information published by national and international media and by NGOs as well as on interviews with experts in the field conducted by the CMPF team.