Legal guarantees of journalism activity

Abstract

Nowadays, media freedom is one of the foundations of society's development. A variety of political rights, including the right to participate in elections, holding rallies, etc., are inextricably linked with it. It promotes effective ways of implementing national politics searching, forms stable conditions for the creation and consolidation of democracy and the rule of law, and is the core of journalism foundation in modern society. Media freedom should firstly be perceived as a means of ensuring freedom of speech and other citizens' rights. Only the fact that those norms are included in the constitutional right of our state, testifies to the fundamental nature of these rights and freedoms: they have a higher legal force in comparison with other legislation.

Nowadays, Ukraine established a system of legal safeguards for journalistic activities embodied in the Constitution of Ukraine and other legislative acts which guarantee adherence to generally accepted civil rights and freedoms to journalists. The law also contains several norms which, in view of the specifics of the professional activities of journalists, determine their professional rights. The legislation provides criminal and administrative liability for interfering with journalistic activities. 

At the same time, the wide legislative consolidation of the guarantees of journalistic activity freedom does not mean that all the established legal norms are properly implemented in practice. That is why further research and law enforcement practice should be aimed at improving the mechanism for the legal norms regulation that guarantees the effective implementation of journalistic activities.