Columbus’s Egg: Quality of information and quality of democracy

The birth of modern democracies is inextricably linked to the emergence of journalism and the development of communication and the media that have underpinned it over the last three centuries. So much so that it becomes difficult to discern which actually came first. It is from the paradox of this ‘Columbus’s egg’ that the discussion proposed by Estados do Tempo for episode 11 unfolds. With the help of Rui Pereira, a former investigative journalist who is now a lecturer and researcher at Lusófona University, we seek to untangle the complex knot that links the quality of information to the quality of democracy. Therefore, in this conversation, we scrutinise the role of the mass media – and its political economy – in its intersections and interactions with capitalism, populism, the rise of fascism, and disinformation.