Following the presentation of its work programme for the year 2020, the European Commission gave some indications on the direction it intends to take in its ‘Democracy Action Plan’, scheduled for the end of the year. According to Věra Jourová, it will have to tackle platforms, media freedom, access to data for researchers, public awareness, and foreign interference.
“The European Democracy Action Plan will be the response to numerous challenges to our democracy; but it should be broader than fighting disinformation alone. I want it to achieve clear goals: strengthen the media sector, make platforms more accountable and protect our democratic process”, said the Vice-President for Values and Transparency at a conference on future threats on Thursday 30 January. According to her, this approach will require “some degree of regulation”.
In particular, she mentioned the problem of political advertising, about which Europe lacks “clarity and legal certainty”. For while Facebook intends to disable certain ad targeting tools in the United States in the run-up to the US presidential elections, the social network recently hinted that it would not apply this measure within Europe.
With regard to the fight against disinformation per se, she reiterated her intention to make disinformation campaigns much more costly. "Follow-the-money has always been a successful approach, and I think we should do the same when we tackle organised and malicious manipulation”, she said.
In the Commission’s work programme for 2020, the democracy plan is scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2020, on the basis of articles 224 (status and financing of political parties) and 114 (internal market). “I want to take time and gather evidence. We are assessing the Code of Practice, we are preparing the election report and they will inform my further steps”. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)