Caption
A US flag flies off the stern of a tour boat at the Port of Los Angele in California on July 31, 2025. (Getty Images)
Caption
(Swell Media/Getty Images)
Is It Time to Rein in Kleptocrats Who Seek to Dominate the World's Information?
It’s an increasingly prevalent phenomenon across the globe: media companies are being taken over by business tycoons and kleptocrats less concerned with honest journalism than with their own political and financial self-interest. Their wealth itself isn’t necessarily a problem. There are genuine philanthropists now sustaining serious news publications and opinion outlets, and serious investors seeking new revenue streams to pay for high-quality news. But the overall trend is disturbing.
What to do? Are there safeguards that governments can put in place? Does that even make sense in a digital age? How might governmental responses be squared with Western faith in free economic competition? Does that still offer a path forward, or is the global erosion of media freedom best described as a market failure?
On Thursday, December 1, Hudson Institute’s Kleptocracy Initiative hosted the first in a series of debates on kleptocracy and democracy. Featuring Hudson Visiting Fellow Martha Bayles of Boston College and Megan McArdle of Bloomberg View, this event was held at the 5th & K Busboys and Poets.
Related Events
07
October 2025
In-Person Event | Hudson Institute
Understanding China’s Political and Institutional Foundations: A Conversation with Chenggang Xu
Featured Speakers:
Professor Chenggang Xu
07
October 2025
In-Person Event | Hudson Institute
Understanding China’s Political and Institutional Foundations: A Conversation with Chenggang Xu
Join Dr. Miles Yu, senior fellow and director of Hudson’s China Center, for a conversation with Professor Xu on why misunderstanding China’s political order may create critical strategic risks for the US amid intensifying geopolitical rivalry.
Featured Speakers:
Professor Chenggang Xu
08
October 2025
In-Person Event | Hudson Institute
Relearning Great Power Diplomacy: A Conversation with Wess Mitchell
Featured Speakers:
Wess Mitchell
15
October 2025
In-Person Event | Hudson Institute
Vanguard of Manufacturing: Fortifying US National Security
Featured Speakers:
John Maslin
Austin Grey
Hon. Peter J. F. Meijer
Patrick Hunt
Julius Krein
Moderator:
16
October 2025
In-Person Event | Hudson Institute
CCP Committee Chairman John Moolenaar on the State of US-China Relations
Featured Speakers:
Congressman John Moolenaar
16
October 2025
In-Person Event | Hudson Institute
CCP Committee Chairman John Moolenaar on the State of US-China Relations
Congressman John Moolenaar (R-MI), chairman of the House Select Committee on the CCP, will join Hudson Senior Fellow David Feith to discuss how Washington should approach the US-China relationship in an era of rising geopolitical competition.
Featured Speakers:
Congressman John Moolenaar
Related Research
Caption
Outside view of the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France, on September 27, 2023. (Getty Images)
Caption
(Screenshot via YouTube)
Caption
A prison van carrying Jimmy Lai arrives at the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts for the closing arguments in his national security trial in Hong Kong on August 18, 2025. (Man Hei Leung via Getty Images)