The Four Qualities of Solutions Journalism

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Solutions journalism is looking at and covering how people are trying to solve problems. It's a tool you would use for feature or enterprise stories about issues that are widely shared. One of my favorite examples is from the cleveland plain dealer, now defunct, unfortunately. They had done several series on the problem of lead paint among children in cleveland. And they did a big story on what rochester was doing - but also took little bites of the subject.

What is the goal of our digital information environment? Is it simply to inform us, or also to empower us to act?

The Solutions Journalism Network (SJN) understands that simply reporting on social problems rarely leads to change. What they’ve discovered is that rigorously reporting on responses to social problems is more likely to give activists and concerned citizens the hope and information they need to take effective action. For this reason, SJN trains journalists to report on “solutions angles.” More broadly, the organization seeks to rebalance the news, so that people are exposed to stories that help them understand the challenges we face as well as potential ways to respond.

In this episode, Tina Rosenberg, co-founder of SJN, and Hélène Biandudi Hofer, former manager of SJN’s Complicating the Narratives initiative, walk us through the origin of solutions journalism, how to practice it, and what impact it has had. Tristan Harris and Aza Raskin reflect on how humane technology, much like solutions journalism, should also be designed to create an empowering relationship with reality — enabling us to shift from learned helplessness to what we might call learned hopefulness.