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PN 259

Pen Against Hammer and Sickle: The International Federation of Free Journalists (IFFJ)

M. Nekola

University of Tampere, School of Communication- Media and Theatre, Tampere, Finland

Independent scholar, Prague, Czech Republic

In the first decade of the Cold War, democratic émigrés in the West from countries behind the Iron Curtain founded, as part of their ideological struggle

against the Soviet bloc, a number of supranational organizations – internationals where Czechs, Poles, Hungarians, Romanians and members of other

nations of Central and Eastern Europe could coordinate their anti-communist efforts. It remains a challenge for researchers to track all the periodicals and

various exile projects of a humanitarian, cultural, educational and, above all, political character which were intended to defeat the Red totalitarianism and

to liberate the“captive”European nations. In addition to these ideological internationals (International Peasant Union, Socialist Union of Central and Eastern

Europe, Christian Democratic Union of Central Europe et alia), a number of professional international associations of exiled writers, lawyers, academics,

and journalists were organized. The modern international cooperation of “press people”had its beginnings in the 1920s and the exile after World War Two

was intended to follow up on this connection by creating a counterpoint to the International Organizations of Journalists. The project mainly evolved from

the ideas of the editor of Czechoslovak BBC broadcasting, Rudolf Kopecký, and a Polish journalist Bolesław Wierzbiański. This background of the newly

formed organization ensured an exile syndicate of Polish journalists. The establishing congress of the International Federation of Free Journalists of Central

and Eastern Europe and Baltic and Balkan Countries (IFFJ) was held in November 1948 in Paris with more than one hundred and twenty delegates in

attendance. Membership in the IFFJ quickly rose to 1300 people. It established its headquarters in London in a building which had served the Polish gov‑

ernment-in-exile during the SecondWorldWar. The founders had several main objectives: to warn theWestern public of the restricted information coming

from behind the Iron Curtain, of the expulsion of foreign correspondents, of restrictions on freedom of speech and of the trials of independent journalists,

of the control of all information by state surveillance, of indoctrination and Sovietisation, and of the attacks and destruction of national cultures. The IFFJ

founded its own press agency (Free European Press Service), opened regional offices in New York, Paris, Munich and Stockholm and began to publish

periodicals in different languages (IFFJ News, Le journaliste libre, Freie Korrespondenz, Se Upp!). It sent delegates to international conferences and to

the United Nations, specifically to the Sub-Commission on Freedom of Press and Information of the UN Economic and Social Council. In addition, the group

cooperated with Radio Free Europe and press unions in Great Britain and the USA. In spite of all these achievements, however, after 1952 the IFFJ found

itself in the shadow of its“bigger sister”, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) based in Brussels. Exile journalists moved the core of their activities

to the USA, but the importance of the IFFJ gradually declined.

PN 260

The Rise and Fall of an Empire: The Story of the International Organization of Journalists (IOJ)

K. Nordenstreng

, M. Sevcikova

University of Tampere, School of Communication- Media and Theatre, Tampere, Finland

Independent scholar, Dvouletky 1924/4, 100 00 Prague, Czech Republic

Journalists (IOJ) The IOJ was founded in 1946 to carry on the legacy of the pre-war FIJ. The political blow of the rising Cold War in 1948–49 led to a split

of the movement, whereby the IOJ brought together journalist associations from the new socialist countries in Central and Eastern Europe and increasingly

from the developing countries including China, while the Western associations established in 1952 the IFJ to serve journalist associations from the “free

world”. Both the Prague-based IOJ and the Brussels-based IFJ consolidated their membership, but the IOJ remained larger of the two, mainly due to expand‑

ing membership in the global South and thanks to growing activities especially in publishing and training. The IOJ expansion was boosted by political sup‑

port from the Soviet Union through its Union of Journalists, but an increasing factor were financial resources generated by commercial companies operating

as branches of the IOJ in Czechoslovakia and also in Hungary. By the end of the 1980s the IOJ had grown to cover through its national affiliates altogether

300,000 journalists – over twice the size of the IFJ and about half of all organized journalists in the world. Counting by its membership reach and activities

in Prague, Budapest, Berlin and several regional centres, it was the biggest non-governmental organization the media field at large. However, the empire

was doomed to fall after the “collapse of communism” in the 1990s. First the “velvet revolution” in Czechoslovakia in 1989 released a vocal opposition to

the IOJ, which was seen by the new forces as partner of the old repressive rulers. The IOJ lost its member union in the host country and the post-communist

government ordered the headquarters to be expelled. The expulsion was negotiated and processed by courts for years, but finally there was a natural end

of the IOJ in Czech Republic after the financial base of the IOJ collapsed and the once flourishing activities throughout the world faded away. By the late

1990s the bulk of membership had moved to the IFJ and all that was left of the old empire was a small legal entity in Prague and a pro forma office of the last

President in Amman. Accordingly, formally speaking the IOJ remains in existence even in 2016; at the age of 70 it is totally out of operation but is still waiting

to be declared dead. Its active life lasted for 50 years (1947–97), which is an unusually long age in the history of international associations of journalists –

IUPA’s real life beforeWorldWar I lasted for about 20 years, and the FIJ lived less than 15 years.The paper reviews the rise and fall of IOJ, which for most of its

history was“embroiled in ColdWar politics”, as it is characterized in the book A History of the International Movement of Journalists. Its story offers several

lessons to media scholars, political scientists as well as journalism professionals.