Media and Communications as the Vehicle of the Open Society

Abstract

The terrorist attack against the United States presented the global community with a new crisis of gigantic proportions, with a new threat to the open society and human civilization. Sir Karl Popper developed the concept of the `open society' after the defeat of Fascist totalitarianism. Mikhail Gorbachev's concept of glasnost has became a major factor in the defeat of one of the main enemies of the open society — Stalinist totalitarianism and authoritarianism at the end of the 20th century. Now it is the turn to fight terrorism, extremism, fanaticism, intolerance, fundamentalism and totalitarianism in the framework of a global, interdependent conglomerate of nations. And this poses new challenges to the open society, which can be solved only in a global context.