April 5, 2018
A new report by the Sofia-based Open Society Institute, the organization supported by George Soros, puts Slovenia in 11th place with regard to media literacy, and thus resilience to “fake news”, out of 35 European countries, with a score of 60 out of 100, the same as the UK, Austria and Spain. This is two places lower than last year, although with the same score. The study looked at freedom of the press, reading literacy, scientific literacy, mathematical literacy, percentage of the population with a university degree, trust in others, and “e-participation”.
The headline conclusions are that countries in northwestern Europe are the healthiest in this regard, with the list headed by Finland (scoring 76), Denmark (71), and the Netherlands (70). In contrast, the Balkan states are the most vulnerable to what the report terms “post-truth” phenomena, with Macedonia in 35th place, having a score of just 10. With regard to other members of the ex-Yugoslavia club, Croatia is ranked 24th, with a score of 44, Serbia 29th (31), Montenegro 31st (28), and Bosnia & Herzegovina 32nd (25).
The poor performance of some countries is blamed on a less free media environment and lower levels of both general and media literacy education, and the full report can be read here.
