The Future of Journalism and Youth: An Interview with Journalist Edward Girardet

This article is the second part of my interview with Edward Girardet on the state of journalism today. You can read the first part, which focuses on the pursuit of transparent journalism, here. In this portion of the interview, we turned our attention to the future of journalism and the importance of empowering youth and securing sustainable funding. Girardet’s latest project, Save The Med, is a non-profit multimedia and educational initiative that aims to inform and inspire audiences worldwide to protect and sustainably develop the Mediterranean region. Much of his current work focuses on mentoring young people and defending press freedom.

Editor’s Note: This interview took place on February 25, 2025. It has been edited for length and clarity since.

Maisie Wynd Smith
Much of your recent work, particularly Save the Med, has focused on the power of multimedia sources and youth engagement in education. How crucial do you believe youth education and awareness are in shaping the future of government leadership?

Edward Girardet
I’ve always felt strongly that we, the editors and journalists, miss the boat by not working with schools. What really struck me is that most of the students who come to the talks I have done with schools, who were all 16 and 17, don’t know how journalism functions. I found this very, very shocking. Although it was also my fault because I didn’t realize it, it seemed so natural to me. I mean, when I was 16 or 17, I was a fanatic about reading newspapers and magazines. Ironically, looking back, I would even say that I was probably better informed before the Internet. When I was young, you would open up a newspaper, and you would have all these different stories. In a way, a newspaper was and should still be, whether it’s online or not, a sort of way of opening a treasure box of information.

I also hadn’t thought about it, but three- to four-year-old kids are also so curious. In my work with Save the Med Foundation, they were so interested in the problems of the sea and asked so many great questions. It sort of made me realize we cannot neglect this age group. We must engage young people and get them to understand and be aware of the world. I also think our role as journalists is to act as mentors, to get them thinking about how credible the information is that they are receiving. At the end of one of my school talks in Geneva, several 16- to 17-year-olds asked me, “What should we read?” I told them, “That’s a very good question. You should talk with your teachers, fellow students, and your family.” My recommendation is to read four or five different news sources from credible organizations, and once you’ve decided you’re going to give them your trust, try to read them every day. The most important idea is to try different sources.

I often bring up a particular story during my talks with schools. When I was in school, we had a South African teacher who was Jewish, and had been banned by South Africa — this was during the apartheid era. He taught a class called 2 Cheers for Democracy, and his goal was to teach us that democracy is not the best — but it’s the best we’ve got, so we need to nurture it. In order to do so, we need to understand the information we are being given. He would split up the class, and every week, two of us had to present a specific issue taking place in the world at the time, but according to our languages. I spoke English, French and German, so I would do the English, French, and German press. The other students would maybe do Spanish and Portuguese, or Spanish and Italian. We would then go down to the railway station and buy all the local news and the newspapers. So my classmates might buy Corriere della Sera of Italy or El País of Spain, while I would get two big German papers, two big French papers, and two big English papers. We would then see how they all covered the same issue, and every country had a different perspective. The professor would say, “You have to understand that there is no one perspective, and there’s no correct perspective”. And, it’s true. There is no one opinion, and I think that’s the problem.

Northwestern University came out with a third report of what they called the American News Desert. It is amazing how many parts of the United States today have no more local press. Where do they get their information? They get it mainly from Fox News, or they just get it from religious radio stations. When my wife and I were travelling in Oregon, we were listening to a very right-wing religious station, and they were interviewing this guy about the UN. He came across as extremely plausible and very intelligent, but was explaining how the UN was planning to invade the northwestern United States. There was this whole myth being perpetuated, with listeners phoning in saying, “This is amazing, this is why Trump is going to do this — he is going to stop the UN from invading us!” You come to realize that there’s so much manipulation of the truth. So, again, in many ways, nowadays people are far less informed today than they were 20 years ago. I think this is affecting massively and negatively people’s understanding of what’s going on. They don’t know how to discern anymore what is credible and what is not. This is why we need to work in schools. Although I think in a lot of countries, that’s the last thing they want.

Maisie Wynd Smith
On that note, with the growing issue of defunding major public news networks around the world, how would you say we can better preserve the freedom of the press? For example, given that the Trump administration wants to defund the Department of Education and networks, how does one preserve the right to accurate information and reliable sources? As you mentioned, we need multiple perspectives to gather our opinions, form a well-rounded understanding, and put the puzzle pieces together. How would you say in the next four years or so, we can (continue to) do that?

Edward Girardet
They tend to be largely funded by foundations. Some of the funding comes from Congress — but I don’t think it’s that much. A newly established committee from the Trump administration is having to investigate NPR and PBS. Obviously, they hate NPR and PBS. They’re saying they are illegal because they are advertising. Now, if you listen to your NPR station, particularly during funding time they will thank local foundations for funding. For example, thanking a local mattress store for funding and describing it is seen as an advertisement.

This could be a huge problem for public broadcasting. Personally, I think NPR and PBS are two of the best sources of information in the United States. It’s actually the biggest radio and television network, which people often don’t realize. If they lose funding, it’s terrible. But this is the same in Canada with CBC, or BBC in the United Kingdom as well. In March, they are cutting 120 of its news posts. These cuts include Hardtalk, which for me is one of the best programs on the BBC and the World Service. The Swiss actually just had a campaign, and they voted not to cut the broadcasting licences because they said we need diverse radio or broadcasting in Switzerland — including the fact that they have 4 languages. So, in the UK, both governments — the Tories and the Labour — have always tried to whittle away at public broadcasting.

I think there actually must be a campaign to preserve the press. Public radio and television are our responsibilities for democracy. There must be a huge program or campaign to get people to understand that society needs independent public radio. As for the United States, I think there needs to be a big push now for the private sector to get involved. The government is cutting funding, but these resources are needed for everyone — both the public and the government. Foundations and corporations must cough up. Specifically, if you look at the mandates and the clauses of, say NPR, they will say, “We are independently run, and no sponsor has the right to influence our content”. So basically, they’re saying give us your money, but we don’t care what you think, because that’s what public radio’s all about.

The Trump government has now cancelled all subscriptions to the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Christian Science Monitor, etc. They’re now denying civil servants access to these information sources. There is this huge campaign by not just Trump, but also Putin and others against independent media. For me, independent journalism is more vital than ever right now. In fact, I am writing a piece right now describing how I went to Germany when I was 13 and went to junior high school and high school. We’d come from Canada, moved to Germany, and went straight into a German school. At the time, I was fascinated by the fact that World War II had only ended 20 years earlier, which was virtually nothing. I was amazed by the fact that my teachers had all been in the Wehrmacht or the Hitler Youth. I thought at the time, why didn’t the Germans do something about stopping Hitler? I thought, if I was one generation younger, I’d be fighting my friends. It was very strange to me because I thought, “What would I have done?” I think we have to ask the same question today. What are we doing today? I think we are very much facing a very, very serious situation whereby people, through voting, are allowing a dictatorship to emerge, and I think there’s no other word you can use to describe it. I think a lot of the news organizations are going to have to go to the private sector — to foundations. This is going to require a big push — a big campaign — and that’s something which students should be doing as well. They should push for access to credible information and for it to be made a civil right.

Edited by Parham Haghnegahdar

Feature photo: Courtesy of Edward Girardet Archives