Judging how people rate freedom of the press in their countries

Although freedom of the press seems to be suffering in various parts of the world, according to the Reporters Without Borders 2011-2012 Press Freedom Index results published earlier this year, a new Gallup poll showed that two-thirds of people worldwide say that the media are free in their countries.

Out of 1,000 people in 133 countries and areas surveyed, people’s views vary widely, ranging from a high of 97 percent in Finland to a low of 23 percent in Belarus, with a median of 65 percent of adults saying that “the media in their countries have a lot of freedom,” according to the report.

The countries with the least perceived press freedom were found in the Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa, and the former Soviet Union. “Perceived press freedom was highest in developed countries in Asia, Europe, and North America. Finland ranked the highest, with 97 percent of respondents describing the media as being free,” the Huffington Post explained.

In the Americas, Haiti had the lowest percentage (51 percent), and the United Sates had the highest percentage (87 percent). Interestingly, the U.S. fell 27 spots to number 47 on the Reporters Without Borders’ 2011-2012 Press Freedom Index mentioned above. This was due to the many arrests and problems that journalists in the U.S. have dealt with during the Occupy Wall Street protests in 2011, according to the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas. According to the independent news media organization Free Press, "70 journalists have been arrested while covering Occupy protests in 12 cities around the country."

Consequently, there are “small discrepancies between what experts who make external evaluations assume, and what the people being polled think,” WebProNews pointed out, indicating that this observation has been noted by independent research organizations such as Freedom House.