Open Democracy has appointed Huffpost deputy executive editor Aman Sethi as editor-in-chief.
It comes after Peter Geoghegan, formerly editor-in-chief and chief executive, stepped down last summer. He has since joined The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project as an investigative journalist.
Geoghegan was replaced as chief executive by Open Democracy’s former managing director Satbir Singh.
Now Sethi will join the independent outlet after “an extensive global search”. He will be responsible for all its editorial output and oversee all its editors, producers and contributors.
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Sethi said: “I’ve long been a fan of Open Democracy‘s global footprint and editorial commitment to rigorous investigations and incisive coverage of the biggest stories of our time.
“As newsrooms around the world are threatened by censorship, intimidation and economic disruption, the cause of independent media has never been more urgent.”
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He has been deputy executive editor at Huffpost in London since May last year and was previously a tech reporter and executive editor of strategy at Buzzfeed News. In 2018 to 2020 he was editor-in-chief of Huffpost in India and he was previously associate editor at the Hindustan Times and foreign correspondent for The Hindu.
CEO Singh said: “I first read Aman’s work more than a decade ago when, as Chhattisgarh correspondent for The Hindu, he covered India’s Maoist insurgency and the state’s brutal counter-insurgency, bringing vivid, hard-hitting stories and analysis from the depths of the forest to a global audience.
“Since then his remarkable career, both as a reporter and an editor, has built on this commitment to seek out the issues and stories that matter, to cover the news inclusively and impactfully and to champion innovation.
“I’m confident that, under Aman’s leadership, our small but mighty team will see its reach, impact and ambition grow. There’s never been a more important time for bold, independent media and I’m thrilled to welcome Aman to the team.”
Open Democracy’s Adam Bychawski was a finalist in the Health & Life Sciences category in the British Journalism Awards 2023 while the outlet was the only independent publisher to be shortlisted as News Provider of the Year, while the previous year the outlet won Campaign of the Year for its work on transparency in public life and freedom of information.
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