Foundation-Funded Journalism

This paper looks at examples of journalistic institutions that receive prior funding (as opposed to post facto reward) from charitable foundations. It examines ProPublica in the United States (financed by the Sandler Family Supporting Foundation), Transitions Online in Eastern Europe (financed initially by the Open Society Institute) and the Centre for Public Inquiry in Ireland (closed down by its sole funder, Atlantic Philanthropies, after a government and press campaign against its executive director). Drawing on the sociological literature about foundations, it raises questions about the purposes of philanthropy, about the transparency of media that use philanthropically funded material, and about the assumption of a unitary “public interest” common to both philanthropy and to traditional journalism. It concludes that both a critical understanding of foundations themselves and a consideration of the case-studies presented should encourage wariness about philanthropic funding as an unproblematic model for the future of journalism.