Economic Strangulation, Attacks, and AI Put Latin American Journalism Against the Ropes; Reports Warn of Historical Crisis

Journalism in Latin America and the Caribbean is navigating one of the most precarious and uncertain periods in its contemporary history. The press faces a convergence of threats, including economic hardship, direct attacks, and the disruptive influence of artificial intelligence, creating what is described as a "perfect storm."

Daniel Dessein, president of the Freedom of Press and Information Commission of the Argentine Periodical Entities Association (Adepa), noted the global challenge of developing new digital revenue streams to compensate for declining traditional income. He observed that while digital revenues rise slowly, traditional ones fall rapidly. The emergence of AI further complicates the digital landscape, while an aggressive discourse actively seeks to delegitimize journalism.

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The journalistic industry globally is going through a perfect storm. For 25 years, there has been a hurdles race to develop new revenues, revenues that come from the digital sphere, which compensate or attempt to reduce the gap with the fall in traditional revenues. But the former rise slowly up a staircase and the latter fall rapidly in an elevator. With the irruption of artificial intelligence, digital revenues are also falling. And to this is added the expansion of an extraordinarily aggressive discourse that seeks to delegitimize journalism.

This grim assessment is supported by prominent global studies. The Reuters Institute's Digital News Report 2026 indicates a shift towards the "platformization" of news consumption, with social media and video platforms now surpassing news sites and apps as primary information sources for 54% of users. The DW Akademie's State of Media Development 2025 report and the Red Voces del Sur's alarming 2025 Shadow Report on Press Freedom in Latin America also underscore the deepening crisis.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) paints a particularly bleak picture in its 2026 World Press Freedom Index, stating that for the first time in its 25-year history, over half the world's countries are in a "difficult" or "very serious" situation, with the average score reaching an all-time low. The Shadow Report corroborates this regional deterioration, documenting 2,484 alerts affecting 3,230 victims across 17 Latin American countries in 2025. Significantly, the report identifies state actors as the primary aggressors, responsible for over 50% of identified attacks against journalists in the region, indicating a structural rollback of press freedom where governments have shifted from guarantors to perpetrators.

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For the first time in the history of the World Press Freedom Index of Reporters Without Borders (RSF), more than half of the world's countries are in a 'difficult' or 'very serious' situation. In the 25 years of the ranking's history, the average score of all analyzed countries has never been so low.