The Centre for Freedom of the Media (CFOM) at the University of Sheffield (UK) is an interdisciplinary research centre with global outreach on issues of media freedom, journalism safety, editorial standards and impunity. During the 2022 Academic Consultation on the UN Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists and the Issue of Impunity, CFOM conducted a literature stocktake to scope out academic literature published in the area of media freedom, journalism safety and impunity. CFOM collated this information and produced a literature database organised by themes or countries for accessibility.  The collection is especially strong on country- and region-specific safety issues and on surveys of emotional wellbeing of journalists. This special collection is curated by gemma.horton@sheffield.ac.uk.

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"Journalists continue to face imprisonment for practicing their profession in ways that antagonize regimes, militaries, oligarchs, and other powerful interests. What do journalists do after their release from prison? Do they resume their professional work in their home country or in exile? How do th ... more

A Story Bigger than Your Life? The safety challenges of journalists reporting on democratization conflicts

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 289-302
"This chapter investigates safety challenges journalists face when reporting on democratization conflicts and their impact on journalistic work. It builds on a comparative case study within the EU-funded project “Media, Conflict and Democratisation” (MeCoDEM), which explores journalistic work pr ... more
"Both long-standing and innovative partnership models suggest that collaborative newsgathering by international and local journalists has been an invaluable practice to get the news in unsafe environments and out to global audiences. As violence, often deadly and nearly always unpunished, multiplies ... more
"Introduction: journalists in Latin America continue to face numerous threats in the exercise of their journalistic profession, which has increased the concern of the international community over its protection in recent years. Methodology: The objective of this research is to analyse nearly 500 cas ... more

The Psychological Wellbeing of Iranian Journalists

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 185-190
"Objectives: To determine the emotional wellbeing of journalists who work in Iran. Methods: A website was established and journalists in newsrooms in Iran and the Diaspora were given information to access the site. Responses were received from 114 journalists (76 per per cent cent). The mean age was ... more

What’s Wrong with War Journalism? Why and how legal aspects of conflicts need better reporting

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 241-254
"This chapter deals with whether war journalism in mainstream media is fit to take a fourth estate role in reporting the new wars, from the end of the Cold War in 1989 to the present war against the so-called Islamic State. In particular, it is a critical study of shortcomings when it comes to provi ... more
"We have noted profound transformations in the field of media freedom, which is making progress in certain areas, but losing ground in others. Media freedom is limited in particular by many legal restrictions on the right to impart information and ideas, although progress is being made with regard t ... more

Setting a New Research Agenda: The establishment of a journalism safety research network

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 109-112
"At a UNESCO research conference on the safety of journalists during the celebrations of World Press Freedom Day in Helsinki, Finland on 3 and 4 May 2016, UNESCO declared “that the Safety of Journalists paved the way for academic research cooperation”. To advance such cooperation the Centre for ... more
"Journalists in many countries work in contexts of continuous risk, but few empirical studies identify how these conditions influence practice or measure the relative influence of different kinds of risk. This study asks a national sample of Mexican journalists to report use of several measures to a ... more

Safety concerns in the Nigerian media: What gender dynamics?

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 171-184
"This chapter focuses on gender dynamics in media safety in Nigeria. It critically examines the safety challenges journalists in Nigeria face in executing their duties in a country that has experienced different forms of conflicts, ranging from political instability, organized crime, terrorism, and ... more

Australian News Photographers, Safety and Trauma

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 231-234
"This chapter illuminates new understanding about the dangers experienced by Australian news photographers on international and domestic assignments. Using oral history methodology, the interviews with 60 present and former Australian newspaper photographers revealed a litany of psychologically and ... more

Gendering War and Peace Journalism: New challenges for media research

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 61-70
"The article addresses in what way gender matters when dealing with war – and peace journalism. Issues discussed are to what extent the experiences of male and female reporters differ when they cover stories from the front line, especially regarding safety and working conditions. One important que ... more
"The relationship between journalists and political sources has been characterized by a tug of war between reporters and officials where top politicians have the upper hand in the coproduction of news through their ability to provide critical information subsidies that most news media rely on. The d ... more

UNESCO’s Research Agenda on the Safety of Journalists: Call for new academic research initiatives

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 103-108
"Within this global context, UNESCO is the UN agency with the mandate to advance “the mutual knowledge and understanding of peoples, through all means of mass communication” and to promote “the free flow of ideas by word and image”. UNESCO has defined press freedom as designating the conditi ... more
"More and more countries are deciding the answer to a bad press is to imprison journalists who dare to report anything that is critical." (Abstract)
"The structural conditions of journalism are shaped by legacies of the past (marked by non-democratic regimes and sometimes colonial rule) and persisting power structures. The state and powerful political actors are perceived to play an important role in the media sector, mirrored in different forms ... more
"It was 16 June 2016, during the fasting month of Ramadhan. Inside the Kompas newsroom, tens of uninvited guests, mostly wearing white, were visiting the office of the media group. They were members of Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), a hardline Islamic group well known for its sporadic sweeping of In ... more

Collaboration is the future: Doing research in the network era

In: The Assault on Journalism. Building Knowledge to Protect Freedom of Expression
Göteborg: Nordicom (2017), pp. 71-80
"The study of journalists’ safety around the world is one of the areas that clearly require international collaboration. This chapter highlights three distinct models of scientific collaboration: the centralized, the correspondent, and the coordinated cooperation model. The Worlds of Journalism St ... more
"Violence against journalists has emerged as a global human rights issue as the number of those killed in the profession has steadily risen in the new millennium. This research utilized a collective action framework, applying an adapted qualitative network model to examine organizational mobilizatio ... more