In the aftermath of the repressive Taliban regime’s takeover of Afghanistan, some newsrooms fully relocated abroad — but some reporters remained behind, and leak critical stories about the government to their partners in exile.
Katie McQue, a British freelance journalist that spent five years reporting from Dubai covering human rights and migration alongside her “business” beats of energy, healthcare, and finance, speaks to GIJN about her work and the best practices reporters can adopt when covering forced labor and human trafficking in the region.
Journalist Rachel Chitra used news reports to build a database on hate crimes and violence in India. Here she gives tips for reporters facing a data gap, and offers lessons learned from her research about how journalists can reliably step in to gather, clean, and publish data when the government fails to keep track of important information.
In the following curated list, we highlight eight impactful investigative stories involving past Olympic events that each hold valuable tips for journalists digging into athletic mega-events today.
Due to her tenacity in scrutinizing Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s family’s transactions, reporter Juliana Dal Piva is a constant target of attack by the president’s supporters. Here, she describes the security measures, collaboration, and persistence needed to keep the spotlight on autocrats in repressive environments.
Data reporter Melissa Lewis is interviewed about a recent podcast for Reveal, which investigated what happens when local residents call police on unhoused people in their neighborhood, analyzing arrest data across six major US West Coast cities with large homeless populations.
While there is no single service that meets all of our data privacy needs, here two experts unpack security and privacy practices for popular transcription services, weigh when journalists should use remote transcription services, and explore how to minimize risk when working with sensitive audio.
Among the most frequently used forms of legal coercion against investigative journalists are SLAPPs (“strategic litigation against public participation”), which aim to intimidate reporters into abandoning their investigations. The practice of abusing legal systems by those in power to silence critics has reached global proportions. Its damage is far-reaching and curbing it is an imperative for democracy and maintaining peace.
Journalists are increasingly using the tools of science journalism and scientific inquiry to carry out in-depth data and investigative reporting, and even to shine a spotlight on questionable scientific findings.
It’s not often that the worlds of investigative reporting and Barbies collide. But the latest doll to be released by the American toy giant Mattel is none other than African-American trailblazer Ida B. Wells, dubbed by The New York Times as “one of the nation’s most influential journalists.”
Investigative journalists face extraordinary challenges, with legal and physical threats, growing surveillance, online trolls, and a financial model that’s all but collapsed. Now add to that a global pandemic and a backlash against democracy and independent media, and you can see our field is under tremendous pressure.
In this second excerpt from a report on the state of sustainability of journalism, the author discusses the African press, how the coronavirus pandemic impacted reporting in the region, and the proposals to ensure the media not only survives, but thrives, in the future.
In this excerpt from Anya Schiffrin’s latest report on the state of sustainability of journalism, the author discusses how government funding can throw the profession a lifeline in an era where philanthropic efforts to support the press are struggling and Big Tech is increasingly seen as a competitor instead of a platform for news organizations.
Investigative journalists went all out last year in covering surveillance issues. From a deep-dive into the dark side of pandemic tech in Singapore’s techno-utopia to an in-depth look at how schools are spending thousands on unreliable “aggression detectors” in the name of student safety, global reporters have been holding Big Tech accountable for its role in fueling authoritarianism worldwide.
Despite myriad challenges, 2021 saw a number of remarkable investigations by German-language media. They uncovered scandals linked to the COVID-19 pandemic, investigations linked to big money and tax fraud, while others touched on morals and ethics. Other stories that made our list dug into the EU, working conditions at top restaurants, migration, and terrorism.
Throughout 2021, reporters from around the Arab world produced excellent investigative work, some as part of transnational reporting collaborations on human rights, financial investigations, and phone hacking. With a salute to our colleagues who work in this very tough neighborhood, we are proud to highlight some of the best investigative journalism from the past year.
Over the last 12 months investigative journalists in Bangladesh uncovered cases of corruption, abuse of power, money laundering, and institutional negligence. The biggest topic last year, as in previous years, was corruption. But in picking the top stories of 2021, we also considered significance and novelty, the diversity of issues covered, impact, and a focus on the vulnerable and marginalized sectors of society as much as the depth and techniques used in any investigation.
This was a tough year for Chinese journalists, who continue to work in a repressive press landscape. Yet several outstanding investigations were produced by courageous newsrooms in 2021. In this curated roundup, we list eight fine examples from China and Taiwan.
In 2021, as the mainstream Indian media continued to transform into the propaganda arm of the ruling party, intrepid digital platforms, mainly from the English-language press, have published some groundbreaking investigative stories and forced the rest of the legacy media to follow their lead.
Despite worsening legal and physical attacks on the press, solidarity among journalists in Russia and the Eastern European region is growing. Our list of the eight best investigations of the year reveals that more and more cross-border, joint investigations are being carried out, and illustrate continuing reporting courage in the region that should inspire the entire journalism community.
Attacks on reporters and a downward trend in transparency in Pakistan in recent years have had a notable impact on the press climate, but despite this, journalists are using the resources available to them to continue investigating. Using traditional shoe-leather reporting and relying on communities to access information and even, at times, for data, this year journalists have dug into rape statistics, alleged police brutality, and human smuggling, alongside other stories.
DOSSIER, an Austrian outlet that is a member center of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, has been able to offset the financial challenges experienced by many media outlets in Austria — and combat a series of vexatious lawsuits — thanks to its membership program.
The Turkish press is enduring a period when the most basic journalism practices are hindered due to the state of emergency, the pandemic, and other issues. Despite this, GIJN Turkish found several praiseworthy stories produced by independent journalists this past year. Here we highlight eight stories chosen for their significance, public interest, their use of investigative tools, data sources and techniques, and their commitment to social accountability.
GIJN’s latest membership class includes its first two members from Francophone Africa and three new members in the Middle East/North Africa. They range from investigative newsrooms and media development groups to university-based centers and cross-border networks. GIJN also welcomed members from six previously unrepresented countries: Cameroon, Malta, Paraguay, Palestine, Senegal, and the Slovak Republic.
One of our core missions at GIJN is providing journalists in the field with the latest tools and techniques. To do that, we work hard to find original stories that will be of immediate, practical help for watchdog reporters around the world. Here is a curated list of 10 of the notable stories we’ve published this year, reflecting our most popular articles, groundbreaking discoveries, topical issues, and stories you just shouldn’t miss.
In his acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize, Dmitry Muratov, editor-in-chief of Russia’s leading independent media outlet, Novaya Gazeta, said: “The award today goes to the entire community of investigative journalists.” Four days later — in a webinar interview with GIJN — Muratov set out the true stakes for investigative journalists who now share that high honor.
COLPIN is the most prestigious investigative journalism gathering in Latin America, and is organized by the Institute for Press and Society. On December 4 the winners of the Javier Valdez Latin American Prize for Investigative Journalism, named in honor of the Mexican journalist killed in 2017, were announced.
