Calling for Coalitions: A Look at Successful Media and Advocacy Partnerships

"...the role of donor-provided funding is growing as news organizations, particularly civic-minded ones, look to outside groups for cash that they can no longer provide for on their own."

This report explores the dynamics of successful collaborations between the media and advocacy groups in order to support effective partnerships in a world in which civil society and public interest journalism may need to increasingly rely on each other and on donors to support their work. The report draws on case study research conducted on collaborative projects in Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, and Peru to provide recommendations for foundations, nonprofit organisations, and media organisations on building partnerships that can maximise their collaborative impact, while respecting their differing roles in society. The report was published by the School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) at Columbia University in collaboration with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's Global Media Partnerships.

As stated in the report, "Journalism is being hit hard globally, and some even predict the end of independent journalism in the global south, especially in Africa. It's time to look at what may survive. Philanthropic funding will become more essential, and donors will be eager to expand partnerships between journalism and advocacy groups." The research on which this report is based consisted of dozens of interviews with journalists, members of civil society organisations, donor organisations, academics, and government officials from around the world. The primary questions driving the research concerned the partnerships themselves and included: how each partnership began, how it functions, what its successes and challenges were, the impact those partnerships have had, and how each organisation defines impact. Finally, it looks at how the answers to these questions could inform and provide some best practices for any future partnerships between advocacy groups and the news media.

The four case studies highlight the different kinds of relationships that can exist between civil society groups and the news media, as well as the range of project objectives and focus areas:

1. Tackling the rise of health misinformation: Africa Check in Nigeria is pioneering new collaborative structures in Nigeria in order to scale up their fact-checking work in the area of health misinformation.
2. Highlighting gender in the media: This case study showcases a partnership between the Fuller Project and Nation Media Group in Kenya, examining whether introducing a dedicated gender desk, with reporters seconded from partner organisations, can increase the representation of women - both in media and in the newsroom.
3. Advocating for better mining practices: Oxpeckers in South Africa launched #MineAlert to create data-informed environmental journalism that could be used by activists and journalists fighting for better mining practices in the extractive industries in South Africa.
4. Combating governmental corruption: IDL Reporteros in Peru brought together journalists and civil society organisations to uncover the Lava Jato scandal in Peru and combat corruption. These partnerships resulted in significant political and judicial reform.

Each case study offers background information on the partnership initiative, including information on annual revenue, when the initiative was founded, staff size, activities, social media following, and funding sources. It explores how the partnership works, outcomes and impact of activities, the general landscape that the project is operating in, and how COVID-19 has impacted on the project. Each case study concludes with a set of recommendations.

The following are some of the key findings:

• There is no one rule or model for partnerships between media and advocacy groups, but they are almost always built on preexisting familiarity and/or trust between the organisations involved.
• Training and capacity-building is a natural area to establish more formal partnerships. Not only is this type of collaboration easy to define and work together on, but it also provides the best return on investment, as the tools provided by training remain if funding is cut, and meetings in something like a workshop format can create a starting point for new relationships down the road.
• The most common areas of informal collaboration were the sharing of information and amplification of media outlets' reach through cross-publishing of content.
• Journalists' ideas of impact are hard to quantify and are sometimes at odds with that of donors and civil society organisations. For example, the gender desk in Kenya was successful in increasing the numbers of stories featuring women and women sources, but equality of representation is more than sheer numbers, and the stories themselves still suffered from problems related to gender bias.
• Journalists and their outlets are quick to make clear they are not advocates themselves, but the line between journalism and advocacy is as blurry as ever. Advocacy cannot happen in isolation, and advocacy groups rely on journalists for the work they do.

The report offers a list of recommendations on creating effective partnerships, as well as recommendations specifically for journalists and advocates. These include, but are not limited to:

• In any partnership, no matter how informal, there should be a full understanding of roles and boundaries between all parties.
• Training and capacity-building should be emphasised as an area for more formal partnerships, but there are also more indirect ways for advocacy groups and donors to support journalists. One example is working to improve access to information and reliable data in countries where that access and data are limited. The research found this to be an obstacle to investigative journalism that relies on this kind of information.
• While the role of media and advocacy often overlap, advocacy groups should do what journalists cannot. A primary role of the media is to uncover issues facing society and inform the public. Advocacy's role should centre on finding and arguing for solutions to these problems and mobilising the public to take action.