Republishing: Pushing journalism beyond the language barriers

One of the biggest challenges for European journalists is probably language. Important pieces of journalism are published throughout the continent, but they often can’t transcend a single state’s borders, because a change of landscape, in Europe, often means a change of language.

That is why, at the European Press Prize, we rely on – and encourage – republishing.

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Quality journalism speaks every language

Sometimes the European Press Prize is compared to the Pulitzer Prize. By this comparison, we are deeply flattered, because it tells us we are doing our job well, in growing a respected organization that stands for excellence in the field of journalism.

But there is one fundamental difference between us and the Pulitzer: we deal with hundreds of submissions from 48 countries (the whole Council of Europe, with the addition of Russia and Belarus) and the pieces we receive are more often than not written, rather than in English, in one of the European languages. This makes sense, because journalism is a fundamental service to a population, and it will be written in the main language spoken in a specific country.

So, we translate all the entries that are longlisted into English.

This is necessary first of all for our Preparatory Committee to be able to evaluate them, and pass them to our Panel of Judges for a final decision.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, the shortlisted pieces, our Nominees, are then published on our website in English, to maximize their reach, extending their influence beyond borders and contributing to showing Europe for what it truly is: a union made by its stories.

But is this enough, to provide new audiences for these articles?

Republishing steps up the game

There is one thing that is better than our blog and our website’s space, to host the dwell of feature articles, investigations, and opinion pieces we select every year: highly reputable print or digital publications.

The power of republishing an article, maybe written in Polish, Hungarian or Portugiese, into a French, Spanish, or Croatian newspaper, is truly magical. How many stories, investigations, and interviews, can resonate with readers that live thousands of kilometers from where they were originally written!

Whereas being born locally, many of the articles we award can easily become relevant in other European countries.

Many of the stories we select and award have a truly international vocation and it is easy to imagine that they can trascend borders and become an interesting read for different European audiences. Articles about corruption, investigations into scandals, and opinion pieces about climate or human rights, when translated and republished, can be relevant to new audiences. They can, first of all, help readers better understand the Europe they live in, and secondly, they can show them how different but similar, distinct and yet related, all the European cultures are.

Republished versions of our 2023 Nominees and Winners

Visit our European Press Review for the list of articles that were republished in other European media outlets.