From Denouncing to Defunding: The Post-Truth Populist Challenge to Public-Service Media

In the context of the broader phenomenon of post-truth politics, the aim of this chapter is to discuss populist challenges to public-service media and critical journalism more broadly. The literature on post-truth politics has already established a clear link—in the form of an “elective affinity”—between populism and post-truth politics. However, more attention needs to be paid to the connection between such a post-truth populism and challenges to professional journalism, in particular as regards claims to defund public-service journalism. Attempts to discredit critical journalism as fake news have featured prominently in post-truth populism and need to be discussed as part and parcel of a (possibly deliberate) strategy to undermine the credibility and legitimacy of the institution of journalism, in particular public-service journalism. This chapter explores the link between post-truth populism and the challenge to public-service journalism by analysing efforts to denounce public-service media in the context of the COVID pandemic in Germany, where resistance to COVID-related restrictions as well as to COVID vaccinations have been closely linked to hostility to mainstream media. Although the empirical illustrations are drawn exclusively from the German case, it is plausible that similar patterns can also be beyond Germany.