FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 27, 2023 

CONTACT: Ashley Woolheater, woolheater@openmarketsinstitute.org

WASHINGTON - The Open Markets Institute and Center for Journalism & Liberty are pleased to announce Courtney C. Radsch, PhD, has joined our team as the new director of the Center for Journalism & Liberty.

“Open Markets founded the Center for Journalism & Liberty to take on one of the most important missions in the fight to protect democracy: to ensure that the news media of the United States and our democratic allies is fully independent and robustly funded in the 21st century’s digital economy,” said Open Markets Executive Director Barry Lynn. “Dr. Radsch is a leading thinker and researcher on the health and future of journalism worldwide and we are deeply honored she is joining us to lead this critical work as the new director of the Center for Journalism & Liberty.”

As director of the Center for Journalism & Liberty, Dr. Radsch will produce and oversee cutting-edge research into news media market structures and help design smart policy solutions to protect and bolster journalism’s financial and editorial independence. 

"The importance of independent journalism to democracy has never been more evident and I am excited to join the Open Markets team, which has played such a pivotal role in detailing the threats posed by platform monopolies. I look forward to ensuring that the Center for Journalism and Liberty is an essential resource for policymakers around the world who are trying to rebalance power asymmetries between big tech and the news industry and understand how advances in AI will impact sustainable journalism,” said Dr. Radsch in a statement.

Courtney C. Radsch Biography: 

Courtney C. Radsch, PhD, is journalist, scholar and advocate focused on the intersection of technology, media, and rights. Currently, she is a fellow at UCLA’s Institute for Technology, Law & Policy where her research focuses on media sustainability and the platformatization of journalism; AI governance and information ecosystems; and the evolving socioeconomic and technopolitical effects of media and technology. She is the author of Cyberactivism and Citizen Journalism in Egypt: Digital Dissidence and Political Change (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2016) and has published in top media outlets The New York Times, Forbes, Newsweek, Al Jazeera, Columbia Journalism Review, and Project Syndicate, among others, as well as peer-reviewed journals. Radsch is a frequent public speaker and regularly provides expert commentary in the media, including CNN, Al Jazeera, NPR, and other global media outlets. She has led media assessment and advocacy missions to more than a dozen countries and has provided expert testimony to Congress, the EU, OSCE, OECD, and the United Nations. Her scholarship and work are informed by a commitment to human rights and ensuring the sustainability of independent media, and as a member of the responsible tech movement she serves on the boards of several organizations working on technology policy and human rights including Tech Policy Press, Ranking Digital Rights, and the Dangerous Speech Project. 

Dr. Radsch specializes in transforming research and ideas into action while building cross-functional organizational strategies and alliances to advance policy objectives and knowledge. She is a strategic advisor to leading human rights and media freedom organizations and previously led advocacy and communications at the Committee to Protect Journalists, freedom of expression work in the Arab region at UNESCO, and worked as journalist in the U.S. and Middle East. She holds a Ph.D. in international relations from American University, a M.S. from Georgetown University and a B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley. 

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The Open Markets Institute is a team of journalists, researchers, lawyers, economists, and advocates working together to expose and reverse the stranglehold that corporate monopolies have on our country.  Learn more at www.openmarketsinstitute.org.