This edited book examines key challenges in the digital era and their implications for journalism practice and public debate in emerging media markets. It specifically focuses on evidence from selected Southern and Eastern European countries as they represent cases where media markets face bigger technical and organizational challenges, but still share some similarities with their counterparts in central, western, and northern Europe.

In 2003, Bowman and Willis wrote that "journalism is in the process of redefining itself, adjusting to the disruptive forces surrounding it". Almost two decades later, the discussion about journalism and its future has not shifted as much as one would have expected. Between then and now, there have been massive changes in the media landscape and great technological developments - financial crises and the emergence of social media platforms, to name a few examples. It could be argued that we still share the same concerns. This book is essentially a dialogue - each chapter contributes to this dialogue, by highlighting the crisis elements and by pointing to direct proposals. The idea for the present volume emerged through a respective conference - the proposals presented in this book are the direct result of the Advanced Media Institute's Conference in Thessaloniki, Greece, entitled "Media, Polis, Agora: Journalism & Communication in the Digital Era" (AMIRetreat2018), held in September 2018. The outcome of the intensive and fruitful collaboration between academics and media professionals was the identification of seven key areas that pose obstacles to journalism's progression, but also indicate the steps we need to take to safeguard and enhance journalism. These areas vary from the current employment conditions and the dominance of "web giants" over crowdfunding, the closer collaboration of professionals and academia, the need to advance our media literacy efforts, and of course, elements of media regulation (as for example, the institution of "Media Ombudsman"). The starting point for the book is the Greek context. However, the book goes beyond Greece alone. In this context Greece is regarded as part of an international journalistic context that resides within to the crisis narrative, the new opportunities and the proposed solutions. Greece offers an interesting point of departure not only because the financial crisis was/is evidently interlinked to the journalistic one, but also because the manifestations of this crisis were/are substantial and widespread across various societal layers. Therefore, it arguably serves as an example that indicates tendencies in other countries. The book is structured into 7 proposals, and each proposal includes two parts: one that discusses the topic through the "Greek prism" and one that provides a perspective of the topic as exemplified by another European country. Each proposal also puts forward two perspectives: an academic perspective and a professional perspective. In this way, the proposals bring two country contexts into dialogue through authors that approach each topic from different angles.

Advances in digital communication have affected the relationship between society, journalism and politics within different contexts in varied ways and intensities. This volume, combining interdisciplinary academic and professional perspectives, assesses the impact of the digital media environment on citizens, journalists and politicians in diverse sociopolitical landscapes. The first part evaluates the transformative power of media literacy in the digital age and the challenges that journalism pedagogy encounters in global and fragmented environments. The second part critically examines the methods in which social media is used by politicians and activists to communicate during political campaigns and social protests. The third part analyses the impact of digitalization on professional journalism and news consumption strategies. The fourth part offers a range of case studies that illustrate the significant challenges facing online media regarding the framing and representation of communities in crisis and shifting contexts. The book is intended to introduce readers to the crucial dynamic and diverse challenges that affect our societies and communitive practices as a result of the interplay between digital media and political and societal structures.