Duty to inform, the right to know

“An acknowledgment to those who have researched and told, over an entire career, his own truth through the means of mass communication. A prize for Ischia that has always represents a crossroads of different cultures, a bridge between the cultural European and Mediterranean tradition”. So wrote Giuseppe Valentino when thirty-four years ago gave birth to the first edition of the Ischia International Journalism Award.

The intuition of the founder of the Ischia International Journalism Award has meant that the Green Island has become since 1980 a meeting for discussion and debate on the issues of information and Italian and international communication. Scrolling through the names of the winners, emerges strongly as the Prize represents a litmus test of the different ways of providing information over the last thirty years.
In the ‘80s the greatest specific weight was represented by newspapers and news agencies and to be rewarded are the most prestigious names in journalism as: Indro Montanelli, Giorgio Bocca, Enzo Biagi, Alberto Ronchey and Piero Angela.
In the 1990s the television suddenly changes the way of information, with live reportage on the war changes the role of the journalist and the spectacle of the news enters into the debate of the Ischia prize. These are the years of Wakter Cronkite, historic American anchorman Peter Arnett of CNN, awarded for the live reportage on the Gulf War, of Navarro Valls. Great space to the directors of Italian newspapers and television characters of journalism: Arrigo Levi, Enrico Mentana, Bruno Vespa, Vittorio Feltri, Paolo Mieli, Eugenio Scalfari, Ferruccio De Bortoli, Ezio Mauro.
The new millennium brings the world of information to deal with the growing globalization of news and issues and arrive at Ischia Jean-Marie Colombani, Julio Ceberio, Giovanni Di Lorenzo, Peter Sthotard, Timothy Garton Ash, Jean Daniel, John Simpson and Martin Wolf. Since 2008, the Premio Ischia internationalizes more and more clutching a partnership with the RFK Foundation and by setting up the Ischia Award for Journalism for human rights. Are rewarded Armando Valladares, Cuban exile, Caribbean prisoner for 22 years, David Grossman, an Israeli writer, Rim Brahimi Hussein and Yelena Milashina, a journalist for Novaya Gazeta (the newspaper of Anna Politkovskaya). In recent years, the prize plays an important role in the social media introducing the sections blogs and social networks that bring to the fore the new trends of the media.
The 2013 edition, held on the green island from July 4 to 6, changes format to be even more the crossroads of different ways of informing, in three days over 30 events taken from TV, radio, news agencies and newspapers (free admission), more than 100 accredited journalists, bloggers and freelance.
Three days on the Italian and international themes with a “dedicated focus” on the “journalism of human rights” where journalists and bloggers for a “new” risk their lives. This year the “focus” of the Prize is on Mexico, where more than 70 media workers have been killed in a few years. The Prize for Human Rights was awarded to Lydia Cacho, threatened with death after the publication of the various investigations in which she denounced a circuit of child pornography, covered by politicians and Mexican businessmen and various unsolved cases of murder and abuse of women in Ciudad Juárez.
The theme of the 34th edition of the Ischia Prize for Journalism is: “Duty to inform, the right to know”.
A group of his communication experts, will confront the limitations and opportunities offered by the new channels of communication,  a completely-fully information from the  print to 2.0, from live TV on the radio that today have an epochal upheaval, where news sources are increasingly numerous and varied but often difficult to verify.
The Premio Ischia also celebrates the communicative power of images, and thus comes a space dedicated to photojournalist with three exhibitions, simultaneously: from the ‘Photo of the Year’ by Alessandro Di Meo who immortalized the lightning that strikes St. Peter’s Basilica after Pope’s resignation, to the tribute to the Italian periodical press of Giuseppe Di Piazza, concluding with a preview of the exhibition on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the battle for human rights in America: the march of the assassination of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, in collaboration with the RFK Europe. The show, first preview in Italy, will be inaugurated by the American consul in Naples, Donald L. Moore.
In recent years the award has created a “community” that is involved with the content throughout the year. Thanks to the generosity of sponsors and media partners to the involvement of the Ischia Prize in recent years has changed and has continuously innovated its formula. This year the scholarships up for grabs to aspiring journalists have seen the involvement of all the Italian schools of journalism, with courses and internships in Ischia for the winners. The final evening of the award ceremony will be transformed into a talk on journalism and the events of 2013 divided into 5 “special editions” about the politics, economics, innovation, the reportage and the Italian and international journalism. Radio Kiss Kiss follows the live concert by Eduardo Bennato. The artistic director of the event is George Verdelli, while the author of the program is Gino Aveta. The Premio Ischia is held under the patronage of the President of the Republic, the Campania Region and the Chamber of Commerce of Naples and has as Media partner Skytg24, Rai Education, Canale 5, Radio Kiss Kiss and Radio Rai Web. Apart from a special on Canale 5 is also provided a special section of the TG1, TG sette.