The Battle for Truth in the Digital Age In late 2016, Oxford Dictionaries crowned “post-truth” as its word of the year, defining an unsettling new reality where objective facts carry less weight than raw emotion and personal conviction. This wasn’t merely academic observation—the Brexit vote and the tumultuous American presidential election had just demonstrated how thoroughly the digital revolution had transformed our relationship with information. Social media platforms, designed to connect us, had become echo chambers where people sought confirmation rather than truth. A staggering study of 376 million Facebook users revealed our instinctive tendency to consume content that validates…

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…