2015-02-09

OXFORD – The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism published a study on global database investigations. The study looks at three important cases, two of which were realised in cooperation with or with support of Journalismfund.eu.

With globalisation, politics and crime have gone global as well, and that calls for a journalistic response. French data journalist Alexandre Léchenet, who is finalising a fellowship project at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, illustrates that cross-border investigations can offer a solution.

Léchenet analysed three important cross-border journalism projects of the past few years to see what made them successful and what the role of the data journalists involved was. The projects analysed are Offshore Leaks, The Migrants Files and the Farmsubsidy.org project. The analysis has been published as a research paper by the Reuters Institute.

The Offshore Leaks investigation, run by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, showed that when well planned, an international investigation can be very powerful. Over one hundred journalists worked their way through 2.5 million data files on tax benefits in secret and published their results at the same time in different media outlets in different countries. They were assisted by a team of fifteen people working on the data and managing the project.

The Migrants Files project proved that when a database doesn't exist, it can be built. Looking at all the migrants who have died on their way to Europe, the team of data-savvy journalists used open-source intelligence to analyse the routes where most migrants had died. The database, which was the first of to combine all the different data on migrant casualties in Europe, is regularly updated and is now used as a source by NGOs and international organisations. The project was supported by Journalismfund.eu.

Finally, for the Farmsubsidy.org project, several journalists from all over Europe used national Freedom of Information legislation to access lists of the benefactors of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy. They were able to create and maintain a database of these "farm subsidies". Farmsubsidy.org was also an opportunity to build a network promoting cross-border investigations and public information access out of which the Dataharvest European Investigative Journalism Conference (the conference of Journalismfund.eu) grew. At this conference, data journalists, investigative journalists, programmers and coders get together to exchange inspiration, skills and story ideas.

The 2015 edition of the Dataharvest takes place on 8-10 May 2015 in Brussels. Alexandre Léchenet is planning to attend.

Download the research paper here.

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