Models of Muckraking: Supporting Investigative Journalism Around the World from CIMA on Vimeo.
Featuring:
Sheila Coronel, @SheilaCoronel
Columbia University
David E. Kaplan, @gijn
Global Investigative Journalism Network
Drew Sullivan, @DrewOCCRP
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project
About the event
Investigative journalism has spread rapidly around the world in the past decade. As noted in a forthcoming CIMA report, Investigative Reporting in Emerging Democracies: Models, Challenges, and Lessons Learned, the practice has helped hold corrupt leaders accountable, documented human rights violations, and exposed systematic abuses in developing and transitioning countries. Despite onerous laws and legal and physical attacks on reporters, investigative journalism has found a footing even in repressive countries.
The field’s emphasis on public accountability and adherence to high standards have attracted the attention of international donors, who see it as an important force in promoting the rule of law and democratization. In spite of this attention, investigative reporting receives inadequate support—only 2 percent of global media development funding by major donors, according to Global Investigative Journalism: Strategies for Support, a newly revised and expanded report from CIMA.
Speakers examined the field’s key drivers and actors and discussed ways to professionalize the practice in developing and transitioning countries.
About the speakers
Sheila Coronel is the director of the Stabile Center for Investigative journalism and professor of Professional Practice at Columbia University. She began her reporting career in the Philippines in 1982, when she joined the staff of Philippine Panorama. Coronel reported on human rights abuses, the growing democratic movement, and the election of President Corazon Aquino. She later joined the staff of the Manila Times as a political reporter, wrote special reports for the Manila Chronicle, and was a stringer for the New York Times and the Guardian. In 1989, Coronel and her colleagues founded the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism to promote investigative reporting. Under her leadership, the Center became the premier investigative reporting institution in the Philippines and Asia. She is the author and editor of more than a dozen books and has received numerous awards and widespread recognition of her work. She received an undergraduate degree in political science from the University of the Philippines and a master’s degree in political sociology from the London School of Economics.
David E. Kaplan is director of the Global Investigative Journalism Network, an association of more than 70 organizations in 35 countries dedicated to the support of investigative reporting. During the 1980s and early ’90s, at the Center for Investigative Reporting in San Francisco, Kaplan helped develop the model of a nonprofit investigative news organization. In 2008 he became editorial director of the Washington, DC-based Center for Public Integrity, where he oversaw its global reporting network, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. Prior to that, Kaplan served as chief investigative correspondent at U.S. News & World Report, where his stories included exposés of racketeering by North Korean diplomats, Saudi funding of terrorist groups, and the looting of Russia. Kaplan has reported from two dozen countries and his stories have won or shared more than 20 awards. He is a four-time winner of the Investigative Reporters and Editors Award, including three medals, IRE’s highest honor. His work has also been honored four times by the Overseas Press Club. Kaplan served as editor of Empowering Independent Media in 2008 and 2012, published by CIMA.
Drew Sullivan is a journalist, editor, and media development specialist who has spent the last decade working with news media in emerging democracies. He is the founder of the non-profit Journalism Development Network. He designed, built, and directed the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIN) in Bosnia-Herzegovina, an independent, regional investigative news organization, where he still serves as an advisor. With CIN and other leading regional investigative centers, Sullivan helped found the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Program, served as its first director, and is now the editor. He has taught on several continents and has run management training projects in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Tajikistan. He is the former print media advisor for the International Research & Exchanges Board (IREX) and has consulted and trained for Internews, the International Center for Journalists, and the Center for War, Peace, and the News Media. He is the author of a 2010 CIMA report, Libel Tourism: Silencing the Press through Transnational Legal Threats, as well as the upcoming report, Investigative Reporting in Emerging Democracies: Models, Challenges, and Lessons Learned.
