Foundation support for international news: Mapping the landscape
By Martin Scott, Kate Wright and Mel Bunce. In this short report, we describe the key features of the landscape of private foundation support for international non-profit journalism. Our findings are based on interviews with representatives of a range of relevant foundations, intermediaries and non-profit news outlets in 2017. See here for the full report: […]
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Attitudes towards humanitarian news within the aid sector: Survey results
By Martin Scott (@martinscott2010). How do those involved with or interested in the aid sector view media coverage of humanitarian issues globally? What are their main sources of news and information and how useful do they find them? What impact, if any, does news coverage have on their work? We worked with IRIN News to […]
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Who are the intermediaries for international news? Five key questions answered
By Martin Scott (@martinscott2010). The role of non-profit intermediaries in supporting international news has been the subject of growing discussion recently. In January, the International Reporting Project (IRP) announced that it would be closing after 20 years. In an article for Columbia Journalism Review, IRP’s deputy director Glendora Meikle described this as a consequence of […]
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Combining humanitarian and solutions journalism: Q&A with BRIGHT Magazine’s founder
By Tom Murphy (@viewfromthecave) A humanitarian-focused online magazine launched in late 2017 and may prove that there is a model for an independent news organization to thrive in a shrinking media landscape. Bright Magazine got its start as two news verticals for the blogging platform Medium. Founder Sarika Bansal helmed The Development Set, focused on […]
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Does the Daily Mail’s criticism of aid matter?
By Martin Scott (@martinscott2010). Originally published on: the Guardian. In the wake of the UK General election result, the assumption that British newspapers have a significant influence over their reader’s voting behaviours is being challenged. The results of a recent YouGov poll found that a majority (52%) of Sun readers didn’t vote last week and […]
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The BBC World Service’s coverage of humanitarian crises
By Max Slaughter (@maxslaughter). Mainstream news organisations are regularly criticised for either under-reporting or completely omitting humanitarian crises from their coverage. Research recently published by Care International showed that 1/3 of people in need of aid in 2017 received only 2.5% of media coverage. In order to investigate these criticisms further, we have been analysing […]
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Book Review: Caring in Crisis? Humanitarianism, the Public and NGOs
By Martin Scott (@martinscott2010). According to United Nations, the world is currently experiencing the largest humanitarian crisis since the end of the Second World War, with more than 20 million people facing starvation and famine. Given this, how do non-affected publics respond to images and information about such suffering and what shapes these responses? Whilst […]
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Why Humanosphere’s hibernation matters – and what we can do about it
By Martin Scott (@martinscott2010). Originally published on: www.humanosphere.org. On 1st July, Humanosphere is taking a break – possibly never to return. Since 2010, they have been reporting daily on global health, aid and development issues for both mainstream and ‘insider’ audiences. In recent years, Humanosphere had expanded its staff and scope, in part, to demonstrate […]
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How does donor funding influence humanitarian journalism?
By Jon Eilenberg. Humanitarian reporting has never been lucrative, and with the ongoing decline in budgets and the squeezing of newsrooms resources, news organisations have had to explore new sources of funding. One way of addressing this issue is through foundation funding, but with this comes discussions regarding donor influence. However, this is an under-researched […]
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What makes news humanitarian?
By Martin Scott (@martinscott2010). Originally published on: elpais.com. The dilemmas of reporting on suffering On April 4, horrible pictures of the suffering of victims of a chemical gas attack in Syria’s Idlib province seemingly moved US President Donald Trump to dramatically change his policy on Syria. Donald Trump himself claimed that, ‘the attack on children […]
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Martin Scott
September 5, 2018
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