Roberto Mastroianni – författare

Drawing on expertise from across the worlds of the judiciary, the bar, and legal academia, this book provides fascinating insights into the role of a key Member State and how its legal influence informs the wider Union’s development.This collection sheds light on the Italian influence on European law by examining the judicial biographies of Italian judges and advocates general during almost five decades of the European Union. It explores the national ties of judges and advocates general to their Member States, to better understand the continuous relationship between the members of the EU judiciary and their Member States’ governments and how they practise the principle of judicial independence, a central pillar of the ECJ’s rule of law jurisprudence.

Drawing on expertise from across the worlds of the judiciary, the bar, and legal academia, this book provides fascinating insights into the role of a key Member State and how its legal influence informs the wider Union’s development.This collection sheds light on the Italian influence on European law by examining the judicial biographies of Italian judges and advocates general during almost five decades of the European Union. It explores the national ties of judges and advocates general to their Member States, to better understand the continuous relationship between the members of the EU judiciary and their Member States’ governments and how they practise the principle of judicial independence, a central pillar of the ECJ’s rule of law jurisprudence.

The volume examines, from a legal point of view, various regulatory, political, technological and democratic issues related to the disinformation phenomenon in both "old media" (newspapers and broadcasting) and "new media" (digital platforms, social media and artificial intelligence) in two different scenarios: elections and war.Disinformation is in fact relevant, inter alia, in light of two very significant events of recent years. First, 2024 marks a year of general elections in numerous regions globally, involving 76 countries (including, within our continent, the elections for the European Parliament as well as parliamentary and presidential elections in several EU Member States such as Portugal, Belgium, Austria, and, on the other side of the Atlantic, the Presidential elections in the United States). Second, 2025 is the fourth year of the Russia/Ukraine military conflict. The common thread that binds these two situations is clear: disinformation may significantly impact the formation of public opinion, thereby prompting public decisions that risk being based on false or seriously distorted news. Starting from the two-abovementioned scenarios, the chapters of the volume concern the current "state of health" of freedom of expression in both "old media" and "new media", and they contribute to answer three main questions. First, are governmental repressive, corrective or even preventive actions against "false" information in the two scenarios discussed here the right solution? Could any prohibition of disinformation rather lead, paradoxically, to the opposing result of producing a "chilling effect", in itself harmful to the free circulation of ideas, including those who "shock or disturb"? Second, is it still valid that the best antidote to disinformation and hate speech is more speech? Is this conclusion still correct in case of absence of pluralism in the media, when the main sources of information are controlled by one or few media companies? Third, is propaganda of war a specific situation that merits being distinguished from any other form of disinformation?