For two days this week, the Palais de l’Europe in Strasbourg felt less like a formal diplomatic stage and more like a gathering of people who genuinely believe that democracy must be lived, not just defended. Monaco has opened its two-day conference at the Council of Europe under the banner “Youth Facing Disinformation: Why Journalists Matter,” and the title tells you almost everything you need to know about the scope of the challenge. Journalists, young people and European institutions have come together to talk about disinformation, press freedom and the health of democratic societies, but the mood is not one of doom. It is unusually alive, because the conversation is not being held over their heads. As Isabelle Berro-Amadeï, Monaco’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation and Chair of the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers, reminded the room, young people are not waiting somewhere in the future to inherit democracy; they are already shaping it in the present. That simple reframing gives the whole conference its energy. This is one of the final initiatives of Monaco’s presidency of the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers, and it forms part of the Council’s “Journalists Matter” campaign, which is built around a deceptively simple idea: without safe, independent and credible journalism, democracy simply cannot breathe. But the conference goes further, asking what that means when the people consuming news are younger, more digital-first and more skeptical of institutions than any generation before them.
The urgency of that question is hard to overstate. Journalists across Europe are facing threats that would have been almost unthinkable a generation ago: coordinated online harassment, the weaponization of privacy complaints, public officials who dismiss critical reporting as “fake news,” and an information ecosystem in which a viral lie can travel around the world before the truth has put its shoes on. At the same time, artificial intelligence is making it easier to produce convincing synthetic content, and younger audiences increasingly encounter news through social media platforms where algorithms reward outrage over accuracy. The conference in Strasbourg is designed not just to wring hands over these problems but to ask practical and difficult questions. What happens to democracy when a teenager’s main source of information is a TikTok video with no source? How can journalists compete with the emotional pull of disinformation when facts are often less dramatic, more complicated and harder to summarise? What does press freedom mean in a world where the greatest threat to a journalist may not be a government censorship order but a pile of anonymous death threats and a platform that refuses to act? These are not abstract concerns. They are the daily reality of working journalists, and they are increasingly the reality of ordinary citizens who simply want to understand what is happening in the world. The Strasbourg conference is an attempt to make sure that those citizens, especially the youngest ones, have better tools than the manipulators do.
Berro-Amadeï set the tone with a phrase that many in the room wrote down: “Youth is not merely a promise for the future; it is already a force in the present.” It sounds almost like a slogan, but it carries real weight when you think about how most democratic institutions actually treat young people. They are invited to attend, to observe, sometimes to ask a question, but rarely to take part in shaping the decisions that will affect their lives. The minister’s message was that this has to change. Protecting democracy, she argued, does not mean making decisions for young people; it means making decisions with them. That means taking their concerns seriously, listening to their ambitions, and accepting that they may have different ideas about how democratic participation should work. It also means giving them the intellectual foundations they need to distinguish reliable information from manipulation. Education and critical thinking are not optional extras; they are the basic survival tools of a functioning democracy. Without them, no amount of fact-checking or media regulation will save us from the slow corrosion of public truth. What was striking about Berro-Amadeï’s address is that she did not frame young people as fragile victims who need to be protected from bad information. She framed them as active agents who can help rebuild trust in journalism and democratic institutions, if only those institutions are willing to meet them halfway. The conference itself is structured to reflect that belief: high-level speeches and debates on the first day, but then workshops on the second day, designed to let young participants develop practical responses to the challenges facing journalism and democratic debate. It is a rare example of an international institution not just talking about participation but actually making space for it.
Mattias Guyomar, President of the European Court of Human Rights, brought the conversation back to law and to the difficult balancing act at the heart of freedom of expression. He acknowledged that the internet has given individuals an unprecedented tool for self-expression, but he was quick to add that this tool is “unprecedented, but not without limits.” The Court has already confronted cases that ask how far online speech can go before it collides with other fundamental rights, such as privacy, personal image and reputation. In a digital world where a throwaway comment can be screenshot, shared and amplified in seconds, the old legal frameworks are being stretched to breaking point. Guyomar warned that the same technologies that have made democratic participation easier for millions of people are also being exploited by those who want to attack the democratic model itself. Social media can connect citizens to their governments, but it can also spread lies, incite hatred and undermine confidence in public institutions. What made his speech particularly powerful was not the dire warning but the quiet determination behind it. He told the audience that the Court has been adapting its own communication strategies to reach younger audiences, even consulting students on how to engage them without losing institutional credibility. There was a human moment in that admission: a distinguished judge asking teenagers for advice is exactly the kind of humility that democratic institutions need to rediscover. He ended with a firm commitment that seemed to speak for everyone in the room: “You can count on us. The Court will stand firm.” It was a reminder that defending fundamental rights requires more than legal reasoning; it requires institutions to make themselves understood, trusted and relevant to the generations who will carry those rights forward.
The central theme of the conference, of course, is why journalists matter, and that question deserves an answer that goes beyond the usual defense of press freedom. Journalism matters because it is the bridge between power and the people. It matters because reporters ask the questions that others are afraid to ask, and because they shine light into places where abuse and corruption prefer to stay hidden. It matters because democracy requires informed citizens, and informed citizens require information that is accurate, independent and available to everyone, not just those who can afford to pay for it. In the digital age, that mission has become more complicated. Benedict Townsend of Global’s Scroll Deep brought a perspective from digital media, offering insight into how younger audiences actually encounter news and why they tune out. The challenge is not simply to counter false information; it is to ensure that independent journalism remains accessible, credible and relevant to the people who will shape Europe’s democratic future. That means experimenting with new formats, meeting young people on the platforms where they already live, and finding ways to tell stories that are both engaging and honest. It also means recognizing that trust cannot be demanded; it has to be earned, story by story, correction by correction. Journalists are not perfect, and journalism is a messy, human process, but it is one of the few remaining checks on the abuse of power. When a journalist is silenced, threatened or discredited, it is not just the journalist who loses. It is every citizen who needs someone to ask hard questions in their name. And when disinformation fills the vacuum, it is the democratic project itself that suffers.
As the conference moves into its second day, the emphasis shifts from diagnosis to action. The workshops for young participants are not just exercises in good citizenship; they are attempts to turn frustration into strategy, to give the next generation the tools and confidence to respond to disinformation in their own communities. For Monaco, the timing is meaningful. The presidency of the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers is ending, and it concludes with a focus on democratic resilience, which is perhaps the most honest way to describe the challenge ahead. No single conference can fix the information crisis or guarantee the safety of journalists, and no one in Strasbourg pretends otherwise. But there is something valuable in bringing together people who are willing to think seriously about how to defend democracy in an age of radical skepticism and poisoned discourse. Riviera Radio has been reporting from the conference, and as the discussions continue, the connections being made here may prove more important than any single speech. There is a phrase repeated throughout the event: “Protecting our democracies does not mean making decisions for young people, but making them with young people.” If that phrase is taken seriously beyond the walls of the Palais de l’Europe, then this meeting will have done its job. Democracy is never finished. It is a living, breathing project that depends on every generation, not merely to preserve it but to reimagine it. Seeing so many young people in those halls, leaning forward, asking questions and demanding better, is a reminder that the story is not over. The future is uncertain, but the conversation is underway, and that is exactly where hope begins.