The News Sourcing Practices of Solutions Journalists in Africa, Europe, and the U.S.

Solutions journalism is one of the newest alternative journalism strategies aimed at combating news fatigue through rigorous reporting on solutions to society's problems. One of the primary goals for the movement is increased source diversity that features more non-official and citizen voices, like those often used in other forms of alternative media. This study examined the types of sources journalists included in 555 text-based solutions journalism articles from the U.S., Europe, and Africa collected from the Solutions Journalism Network. The results indicate solutions stories are meeting the goals set forth by proponents of the movement, as they most frequently include nonprofits/groups and unaffiliated citizens. Solutions stories in American publications contained significantly more non-official sources than did their European and African counterparts, though these sources still comprised the majority of those used across all three continents. However, solutions stories included in the study contained fewer total sources than traditional news articles and still featured government and business sources regularly. This finding suggests solutions journalism practitioners may still have work to do to increase their use and variety of sources.