Interviews with Nico Carpentier and Jeffrey Wimmer: KIM Podcast Communication & Media Days
Nico Carpentier and Jeffrey Wimmer were guests on two episodes of the KIM Podcast. In the podcast, they discuss the conditions of European democracies and the media’s roles in shaping and maintaining them.
Nico Carpentier and Jeffrey Wimmer led the seminar “Democracy and Media in Europe” as part of the CFP conference “The Role of Journalism in Endangered Democracy.” The seminar formed part of an international discussion series previously held in Germany, Estonia, Pakistan, Cyprus, Portugal, and other countries. It was based on the recently published open-access book Democracy and Media in Europe: A Discursive-Material Approach (Routledge, 2025), which examines contemporary challenges to democracy and the role of the media in safeguarding democratic values and fostering citizen participation.
Through invited presentations and discussion, the seminar addressed issues of political polarization, threats to democracy, media responsibility, tolerance, and the future of democratic communication in Europe and beyond.
Antonija Čuvalo and Krešimir Krolo participated in the seminar as respondents.
The conference also featured a screening of the film essay AGON: Constructions of Democracy. Agon is a film essay that reflects about the meaning of democracy, and how it is contested. The film combines the aesthetics of the Czech capital Prague with an intercultural dialogue with the Indonesian community (and other communities) living in this city, thus opening up further spaces for democratic inquiry. Inspired by the book “Democracy and Media in Europe”, by Nico Carpentier and Jeffrey Wimmer, the essay merges political and cultural theory with fiction and dance. As an experiment in the reconciliation of academic and artistic approaches, Agon is an invitation to consider what democracy is and what it can be, how it is linked to space, how it is always a location of political struggle, and how it is threatened and always in need of active protection.
Nico Carpentier is an academic, curator, and artist who currently serves as an Associate Professor at Charles University in Prague and is also affiliated with Vilnius Gediminas Technical University in Lithuania. From 2020 to 2024, he served as President of the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR), having previously held the position of Vice President of the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA) from 2008 to 2012. His theoretical work focuses on discourse theory, while his research explores the intersections of communication, politics, and culture, particularly in relation to war and conflict, ideology, participation, and democracy. Carpentier is the author or co-author of eight books, 65 book chapters, and more than 100 scholarly articles. His most recent monograph, Democracy and Media in Europe: A Discursive-Material Approach (Routledge, 2025), was co-authored with Jeffrey Wimmer.
Jeffrey Wimmer is Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Augsburg, where his research focuses on media realities, the public sphere, participation, and transformations in the media landscape. His teaching and research encompass the sociology of media communication, processes of mediatization, digital games and virtual worlds, and the relationship between media and democracy. From 2008 to 2014, he served as spokesperson for the “Communication and Democracy” section of the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA), and from 2009 to 2015 as spokesperson for the “Sociology of Media Communication” section of the German Communication Association (DGPuK). He is the author or co-author of six books, numerous book chapters, and scholarly articles. His most recent book, Democracy and Media in Europe: A Discursive-Material Approach (Routledge, 2025), was co-authored with Nico Carpentier.