Across the Commonwealth, journalists, bloggers and others are facing official and de facto restrictions on freedom of expression and communication. The Institute has established a project to examine the challenges faced across the Commonwealth, looking at local factors as well as international pressures affecting journalistic freedom. The project started with a conference on The Commonwealth and Challenges to Media Freedom held in April 2017.
Since then, the project has convened a Working Group on Media and Good Governance which includes representatives from a number of Commonwealth partner organisations, including the Commonwealth Journalists Association, the Commonwealth Lawyers Association, and the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative. In March 2018, the Working Group agreed the Commonwealth principles on freedom of expression and the role of the media in good governance, proposing them for consideration by the Commonwealth Heads of Government at the April 2018 Commonwealth Summit.