언론사 간 명예훼손 소송에서 나타난 법원의 언론비평 및 언론사의 지위와 표현의 자유에 대한인식 연구

초록

It is believed that the press performs a public role as a watchdog in monitoringthe abuse of political power and the corruption of a society. However, as thepress itself emerges as a huge power, it is said that there must be an apparatusto watch the press. One of desirable ways to keep an eye on the press has beenrealized the ‘media critic’. Problem is that the media critic often brings libel suits. This study examined how Korean courts understand about media critic, statusof the media, and freedom of the press in libel suits raised by media critics. Itwas found out that media critic is mostly decided as defamatory based on thecontext of the writings and perception of the readers. In the cases where theplaintiffs failed to win, the courts thought of the press as public figure and saidthat mutual critics between media should be encouraged. However, when theplaintiffs won, not many, the courts found that extremely malicious andaggressive expressions cannot be exempt from the responsibility of defamation.

키워드