About CLAD

The world of the 21st century is overloaded with information. To be able to spot fake from fact is important for every decision we make – at work, at home, at school, among friends and family members, as well as in your local library or community centre. Having access to trusted and reliable information is mission-critical nowadays.

That is why librarians from both Portugal and Slovakia, from two corners and borderlands of Europe, are uniting in the years 2024 and 2025 to create more cohesive, stable, resilient and tolerant literary communities. The Goethe-Institutes in both countries together with other partners are joining forces for the CLAD project – Citizens and Libraries against Desinformation.

We are natural allies – in both our regions we experienced the explosion of unverified, unsourced, and often false news about the pandemic, politics or climate change in recent years. Most adults in both our countries are receiving their news in real time from their social media feeds, which are mostly noncurated spaces where falsehoods thrive. It is ever more challenging to identify fake news in the digital age, as it mimics the style and appearance of legitimate news sources.

We as librarians seek to ensure that patrons who ask for help get accurate information. Critical thinking, fact-checking, and verifying information from multiple reliable sources are essential to combat the spread of fake news in central and southern Europe.

We feel a strong need to develop and broaden information literacy strategies and methods, as well as to seek other ways of fighting against fake news together and learn from each other’s experiences. We believe our libraries should be at the forefront in educating the public about this dangerous phenomenon. We want to seek out new and more effective ways of helping our patrons apply information literacy principles in their daily lives. We dream of becoming a citizen's guide to separating facts from lies and stopping fake news in its tracks. We work hard to improve our libraries and community centres as safe and brave spaces where people feed their imaginations, rebuild their lives, find direction, upskill themselves, and put growth, understanding and tolerance into practice.

The truth matters. That is why we CLAD. Check us out.

The CLAD project is funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are, however, those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union. Neither the European Union nor the funding authority can be held responsible for them.