Almanac of law. Issue 15 (2024), pages 506–514.

DOI: 10.33663/2524-017X-2024-15-506-514

Vihirinskyi A. V.
Ensuring Freedom of Speech and Countering Propaganda in the Context of a Legal Regime of Martial Law

The aim of this article was to analyze and assess the coherence and adequacy of measures taken by Ukraine, as a democratic country under the state of martial law due to armed aggression by the Russian Federation, in the field of upholding freedom of speech. This task has its objective premises as the state is compelled to counter the threat to national security in the informational sphere, including the destructive influence of propaganda.

The article covers: Organizational measures regarding the establishment of a unified news channel «Unified News»; Legislative and law enforcement measures concerning the criminalization of acts aimed at justifying armed aggression, glorifying armed aggression, and disseminating materials containing such information; Instances of influencing the activities of media representatives and civil society using state apparatus; The methodology of functioning of the Disinformation Counteraction Center as a working body under the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine.

A militant democracy must exert efforts to defend itself against those who threaten it sufficient to ensure the stability of the democratic system. Accordingly, restrictive measures within a militant democracy have certain limits that cannot be disregarded, otherwise there are risks of authoritarianization of power. These criteria include the rule of law, democracy, human rights, human dignity, and freedom.

Depending on the type of restrictive measures analyzed during the study, it has been established that there are facts that can be qualified as encroachments on the criteria of democracy, which should remain inviolable, including the principles of the rule of law, legality, legal certainty, presumption of innocence, and censorship. The motives behind some of these abuses lie beyond objective necessity and could have been avoided. However, the fact of their existence seems to be more indicative of a desire to maintain concentration of power beyond the limits of the values of the system of checks and balances, as an element of the principle of separation of powers, including through concealing or seeking to limit the ability of the media and civil society to expose the self-serving actions of holders of power.

Key words: militant democracy, propaganda, freedom of speech, system of checks and balances, martial law, state of emergency legal regime.

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Andriy Valeriyovych Vigirinsky,
Postgraduate Student, Educational and Scientific Institute of Law,
Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv
ORCID: 0009-0008-6122-4717