Is investigative journalism dead? No, but it’s changing.

I was recently thinking about the state of journalism and what constitutes good and bad journalism. One of the good things that came to mind was investigative journalism and its impact on society.

For a long time investigative journalism has played an important role in the media landscape. Among other subjects it has helped uncover illegal activities of companies and government corruption.

Some examples of investigative journalism are the Watergate scandal in the United States and the CDU donations scandal in Germany. These stories had both drastic effects on the political landscape and in the case of the Watergate scandal lead to the impeachment of Richard Nixon.

One of the most recent stories broken by investigative journalists is known as the Panama Papers, a leak of documents containing financial information of more than 200,000 offshore entities.The evaluation of the leaked documents was made possible with the help of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and is a great milestone of data journalism.

It has never before been as easy to access information as it is today, so shouldn’t it be also the golden age of investigative journalism, when information can be sent around the globe within seconds? In my perception investigative journalism has become a rare good and is only rarely seen in the wild.

So, is my perception right or wrong?

Looking into the topic I found an interesting article written by Meirion Jones, one of the leading British investigative journalists. In the article Jones describes the problems he faced while trying to build an investigation unit during his work for the BBC. According to Jones the main issue with investigative journalism is that it is too much of a hassle. News media outlets love predictability, everything that can be planned in advance is great for a business. Investigations aren’t. They cost money, have no guaranteed results and require staff that can’t be used otherwise. Additionally it opens the gates for attacks and lawsuits from the outside, from the people being exposed. Making enemies is not a good business practice since it is more profitable to have good relations and continuing cooperations.

It makes sense that these disadvantages deter traditional journalism outlets worldwide from conducting investigations. It does however leave a bad taste. The fact that profits and the fear of making less money become more and more important is nothing new, but it should be seen with some concern. It is a development that should be watched closely as it can become a slippery slope.

But all of this does not mean that investigative journalism is dead or close to dying. The void is more and more being filled by other organisations, mostly non-profit news organisations like the Center for Public Integrity, founder of the aforementioned ICIJ, or the Bureau of Investigative Journalism in which Meirion Jones became investigations editor after leaving the BBC.

These organisations are doing a great job of highlighting current problems and provide thorough and comprehensive reports on a great variety of topics. Investigative journalism is far from gone but sometimes you have to search off the beaten path to find good reporting.