Freedom of expression has long been regarded as the cornerstone of democratic theory, communication law, and human rights. Yet many of the rights that shape contemporary communication, including the right to receive information, the right to be heard, privacy, anonymity, memory, and the governance of digital platforms, sit uneasily within an expression-centred framework. The Rights of Communication: Beyond Free Speech argues that a Right to Communication should instead serve as the normative foundation for rights that sustain communication.

Drawing on philosophy, communication theory, legal scholarship, and media policy, Amit M. Schejter develops a theory of a foundational Right to Communication from which a coherent family of Communication Rights emerges. Rather than treating these rights as isolated doctrines or as extensions of free speech, the book shows how they protect the people, institutions, and conditions that make meaningful human communication possible.

The book examines rights associated with senders, receivers, media and platforms, the integrity of communication, information, privacy, non-communication, and memory, arguing that together they constitute a coherent architecture of Communication Rights. Combining normative theory with constitutional analysis and comparative perspectives from the United States, Europe, and international human rights law, it offers a new way of thinking about the relationship between communication and human rights. 

The Rights of Communication: Beyond Free Speech will be of interest to scholars and students of communication, media, law, political science, and human rights, as well as policymakers and legal practitioners concerned with the future of democratic communication.
 

Amit M. Schejter is a scholar of communication whose career has been characterised by a sustained concern with the conditions that enable meaningful participation in public life. His scholarship explores the relationships between communication, law, policy, democracy, and human rights, with particular attention to communication rights, minority rights, the public interest, and inequalities in access to communication. He has spent most of his academic career at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and Penn State University while also holding senior positions over the years in government, public broadcasting, and the telecommunications industry. He has chaired the Association for Civil Rights in Israel and the Israel Communication Association, has served on the board of the Jaffa Theatre – Center for Arab and Hebrew Culture, and is the founding editor of the Journal of Information Policy.

List of Figures

List of Abbreviations

Preface and Acknowledgements

Introduction

PART I – GROUNDING THE RIGHT TO COMMUNICATION

Chapter 1: On Communication

Chapter 2: On Human Rights

Chapter 3: On Freedom of Expression

Chapter 4: The ‘Right to Communicate’ and Communication Rights

PART II – RIGHTS SUSTAINING THE COMMUNICATION PROCESS

Chapter 5: Sender rights

Chapter 6: Receiver rights

Chapter 7: Media rights

Chapter 8: Noise and the Integrity of Communication

PART III – RIGHTS PRESERVING HUMAN COMMUNICATIVE INTERESTS

Chapter 9: The Right to Information

Chapter 10: The Right Not to Communicate

Chapter 11: Privacy and the Right to Communicate Anonymously

Chapter 12: The Right to Store Information: The Right to Memory

Concluding Thoughts

Works cited