Drawing from local examples, a new report entitled Soft Censorship: How Governments around the Globe Use Money to Manipulate Media provides a global perspective on a transparency issue that is likely to continue despite changes in the media industry. Globally, the traditional print media industry is declining. With the rise of new forms of media,…
The BBC reports on the murder of Sri Lankan journalist Lasantha Wickramatunga. The editor of the Sunday Leader was shot in the head while driving to work. As disturbing as Wickramatunga’s death is in it’s own right, he is only one in a line of journalists killed recently, marking a larger trend of brutal media…
In a methodology reminiscent of the Failed States Index, rating firm Covalence SA assigns scores on corporate ethics, based on coding stories from a battery of news tickers. Their results appear to be real, but limited. Covalence is measuring a consensus opinion — perceptions — as played out in newspapers reachable by Google News and…
Lest you worry that the corrupting influence of money in American politics would fall by the wayside with the new administration, Brian Ross’ investigative team at ABC News reminds us that Barack Obama did, in fact, raise lots of money from the usual suspects. Justin Rood’s story is a sobering reminder that despite the campaign’s…
A post on merinews.com, an Indian citizen journalism site, serves as a textbook example of how the Global Integrity Report can provide deep context to the news of the day. Satish Singh, reporting for Merinews, is able to draw a quick, evidence based snapshot of governance in India from our scorecard: India’s anti-corruption laws get…
Two articles from the December 23 New York Times merit a bit of unpacking. The articles — one on Ghana’s upcoming elections, the other on the rise of Islamic movements in Jordan — tout two widely-held but rarely proven theories of corruption: that corruption inhibits growth, and that corruption is a motivator for radical, Islamic…