Press freedom and democracy in Africa and around the world

The World Press Freedom Index, which is issued by Reporters without Borders, measures the health of press freedom around the world. They do so along a number of axes, including the economic health of independent media, legal protections for the press and the physical security of journalists. In 2025, the global score on the index was the lowest it’s ever been. On this episode, Dan Richards talks with three journalists and media thinkers who work in a part of the world where press freedom is, at times, a matter of life and death. Chernoh Bah is a Sierra Leonean journalist, historian and postdoctoral research fellow at the Watson Institute. Sadibou Marong is a journalist and Sub-Saharan Africa bureau chief for Reporters Without Borders, based in Sénégal. Zubaida Ismail is a freelance journalist and Ghana's correspondent for Reporters Without Borders. They discuss the state of press freedom in countries across Africa, what the struggle for independent journalism in countries in Africa can teach the rest of the world, and the broader relationship between independent media and democratic health. These guests, along with many others, gathered at the Watson Institute this Spring as part of the Media and Democracy Conference hosted by Watson’s Africa Initiative. You can watch more conversations and presentations from the conference here.