The book discusses freedom of expression as a universal human right, and analyses its philosophical foundations. It raises legal questions arising from the tension between basic rights, and between national and international law. It considers to what extent freedom of expression thrives or withers in an increasingly gobalized world of new technology. It discusses the Danish cartoons from a principled perspective, and it draws the lines of today’s controversies back to the twenty-year-old fatwa against Salman Rushdie. Freedom of Speech Abridged? is written by scholars and journalists in the Nordic countries, and represents a principled and spirited defence of freedom of expression.