Investigative journalism

Investigative journalism is a kind of journalism where the reporters try to cover a single topic in detail. Example topics include serious crimes, racial injustice, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend months or years researching and preparing a report. Practitioners sometimes use the terms "watchdog reporting" or "accountability reporting".

Most investigative journalism has traditionally been conducted by newspapers, wire services, and freelance journalists. With the decline in income through advertising, many traditional news services have struggled to fund investigative journalism, due to it being very time-consuming and expensive. Journalistic investigations are increasingly carried out by news organizations working together, even internationally (as in the case of the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers), or by nonprofit outlets such as ProPublica, which rely on the support of the public and benefactors to fund their work.

Other examples are Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein of Washington Post, who  uncovered the Watergate scandal, or Seymour Hersh who wrote about the My Lay Massacre,in 1968,  where U.S. soldiers had killed over 500 people in a village in Vietnam. In 2004, Hearsh published a report on the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse, in Iraq.

Category:Journalism