Pascal Guénée elected President of the World Journalism Education Council
Pascal Guénée, director of the School of Journalism at Université Paris Dauphine–PSL has been elected President of the World Journalism Education Council (WJEC) for the period 2025-2028. The election took place in San Francisco this past August, and his term of office officially began on October 1, 2025.
The WJEC is comprised of academic networks and institutions devoted to journalism worldwide; Mr. Guénée is its first director to hail from France.
« I am fully mindful of my responsibility. My mission will be to represent journalism schools in all their diversity and foster dialogue among them », said Mr. Guénée upon assuming his new role. « The WJEC needs to be a forum for global exchange and cooperation among journalism schools at an especially critical time for higher education and training in journalism. »
His goal is to build more inclusive and responsible journalism degree programs, with each institution benefiting from the experiences, innovations, and contributions of its peers. By virtue of its history and international standing, France has a unique role to play globally, particularly in defending press freedom and combating disinformation.
The role of the WJEC
The World Journalism Education Council is guided by a founding charter that affirms the importance of independence in journalism education, as embodied in particular by the Paris Declaration on Freedom of Journalism Education, for which Pascal Guénée helped secure UNESCO recognition in November 2020.
Every three years, the WJEC convenes the World Journalism Education Congress, which promotes international dialogue between academic and professional communities. The first Congress was held in Singapore in 2007; the next Congress – the eighth – will take place in Berlin in 2028.
About Pascal Guénée
After studying political science, Mr. Guénée became a journalist in the 1980s. In 2000 he joined Dauphine–PSL’s School of Journalism and became its director in 2001. Under his leadership, the School of Journalism has become a flagship of journalism education in France.
He helped to draft the new Code of Ethics in Journalism for French journalists (2009) and has served on the board of the Agence Universitaire de la Francophonie, a network of research and higher education institutions in the French-speaking world. He has also chaired the Global Network of Francophone Journalism Schools and France’s Conference of Journalism Schools (2020-2025).
In addition, Mr. Guénée is conducting research into the impact of trauma on journalists, and is a member of the Journalism Education and Trauma Research Group (JETREG). He played a central role in organizing the Fifth World Journalism Education Congress in Paris in 2019.
