Category: Programmes

Paper Trail to Better Governance III

BIRN Kosovo

Exposing wrongdoings of public institutions, public or private companies, and individuals, through multimedia investigations, in-depth analysis of institutions’ openness to freedom of information requests, and the establishment of an online database.

Summary

The Paper Trail for Better Governance is a project by Balkan Investigative Reporting Network – BIRN Kosovo and BIRN HUB – to promote the rule of law, accountability, and transparency in the Balkans.

It is the continuation of the Paper Trail for Better Governance I and II.


Donor

Austrian Development Agency (ADA), the operational unit of the Austrian Development Cooperation

Main Objective

The Project is expected to contribute to better functioning of the public sector that abides by the principles of transparency and accountability to its citizens. This is expected to happen, on the one hand, by exerting direct pressure to key public institutions through exposing wrongdoings and their level of transparency practices in relation to FoI laws and on the other hand, by exerting indirect public pressure to key public institutions through raising awareness of the broader public about mismanagement of public resources and competencies.


Specific Objectives

Exposing wrongdoings of public institutions, public or private companies, and individuals, through multimedia investigations, in-depth analysis of institutions’ openness to freedom of information requests, and the establishment of an online database.


Main Activities

  1. Journalistic trainings, including on gender equality, internships for young journalists in BIRN offices.
  2. Production of 25 investigations, interviews, analysis and news pieces on cross-border and country-based issues, as well as video production.
  3. Production of Annual Regional Reviews on freedom of information.
  4. Upgrade and further development of the BIRN’s Investigative Resource Desk (BIRD)

Target Groups

The main target groups are male and female investigative journalists as well as young journalists, researchers, media outlets and the general public that will be exposed to published material resulting from investigative reporting, monitoring of public institutions compliance with legislation and annual review reports published.

Highlights

More than 200 journalists have been trained in investigative skills and given special, in-depth knowledge of the particular field they are researching. Through the extensive use of public documents, the investigations are exposing wrongdoing in government and public and private companies and among powerful individuals.

The project also addresses the transparency of public institutions in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

As part of our drive to promote open data governance, earlier this year we established BIRN’s Investigative Resource Desk (BIRD), a digital platform with tools stimulating cross-border cooperation among journalists, civil society and technology experts. The platform serves as a hub for all BIRN data gathered through investigative journalistic work. BIRD also includes BIRN Source, a database which currently has close to one million searchable public documents uploaded and available for further use.


Main Implementer

BIRN Kosovo


Partners

BIRN Hub

COVID-19 in Serbia: Information Resilience

BIRN Serbia
In the current situation, there is a great demand for punctual, accurate and objective information among citizens. The crisis disclosed the negative impact of disinformation and its influence on spreading panic among citizens.

Summary

The COVID-19 global crisis reveals the need for and essential role of independent, objective journalism. Serbian society is additionally burdened by the fact that democratic institutions are weak and independent media are marginalized. The Serbian government introduced the state of emergency in an early stage to combat the crisis coronavirus caused. Yet, as much as this measure seemed justified to stop spreading the virus and protect the healthcare system, it opened a space for potential abuses.

In the current situation, there is a great demand for punctual, accurate and objective information among citizens. The crisis disclosed the negative impact of disinformation and its influence on spreading panic among citizens. In addition, the restrictive measures of the Serbian government demand public attention and serious journalistic work in order to keep them transparent and accountable and to prevent deterioration of democratic values and institutions once the crisis is over. Thus, BIRN will go beyond daily reports in order to offer in-depth analysis and data articles that can provide the context, analyze causes and consequences, as well as trends regarding the COVID – 19 crisis and its implications on the public services, work of institutions and society at large.

While mainstream media extensively cover the Covid-19 crisis through daily informative production there is a lack of analysis of the trends, wider context, and the effects of the pandemic on different aspects of our society. Furthermore, most of the media cover the cases and updates in major cities (Belgrade, Nis, Novi Sad, etc.) while the effects of the pandemic in smaller places are even more striking and are paradigmatic of the systemic response flaws. Lack of in-depth articles and relevant analysis causes the greater negative influence of fake news and disinformation hindering efforts to mitigate the consequences of the crisis. Society is dealing, with the pandemic, but also with infodemic, and the best course of the action is to rely on fact-based, reliable, and objective journalism.

Donors: The Balkan Trust for Democracy and USAID.

Information Sheet

Objective

Increasing the quality of media coverage and public understanding of the current COVID-19 crisis and its consequences.

Activities

1) Production (data and in-depth articles and journalistic reports on a daily basis);

2) Work with local journalists;

3) Online campaign.

Target Groups

Journalists, decision-makers, citizens

Promoting and Advancing Investigative Journalism in the Western Balkans

BIRN Kosovo

Promoting and Advancing Investigative Journalism in the Western Balkans and Strengthening the Capacity of the Organisation.

Information Sheet

Donor:

Rockefeller Brothers Fund

Main Objective:

To promote and advance independent investigative journalism and to strengthen and enable information sharing among regional partners

Specific Objective:

  • Supporting transparency, accountability, and functionality of the system for public services in Kosovo with specific focus on courts;
  • Increasing accessibility of media and the civil society to decision-making processes regarding courts, public services, public administration, and public procurement;
  • Improving transparency and accountability of public procurement and tender awarding processes at the local and central level, namely municipalities and the ministerial level;
  • Encouraging transparency, accountability, and meritocracy in the public administration process with the special aim of fighting nepotism and party clientism within the public administration;
  • Providing valuable qualitative and quantitative data and reports to all stakeholders regarding the rule of law institutions, public services, public administration and public spending;
  • Reduce Kosovo’s barriers towards EU integration by disseminating data and reporting on the results from the monitoring process;
  • Increasing transparency and accountability of the Kosovo-Serbia Agreement implementation through establishing an effective mechanism for civil oversight over the process.

Main Activities:

  • Publishing written articles of issues on public administration, public procurement, and public services from the municipal debates during elections;
  • Publishing articles with the facts on the general situation in the Kosovo’s municipalities and local governance;
  • Publishing long articles regarding the Brussels dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia;
  • Monitoring public services.

Target Groups:

  • Public institutions;
  • Media Outlets;
  • Civil Society.

Main implementer:

BIRN Kosovo

Highlights

2,100 written articles covering issues of public administration, public procurement, and public services related to municipal debates organised during the electoral campaign, covering different promises and public statements delivered by public officials, also covering issues of public services and management of public funds 364 articles with fast facts published on a general overview of the situation in the municipalities and local governance of Kosovo.

79 long articles published related to the Brussels-faciliated dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia.

Under the Spotlight: Capital Investments Projects in Serbia

BIRN Serbia
Promoting institutional transparency and accountability through investigative reporting.

Summary

BIRN continues promoting government transparency and accountability through investigative reporting. BIRN Serbia will continue operating its flagship web platform Javno (Public, www.javno.rs), which currently hosts 20 databases that monitor public spending and the work of the judiciary. The watchdog’s searchable databases contain information such as court cases on tax evasion and money laundering, public procurements approved through emergency measures, subsidies distributed to media by local governments, and travel expenses incurred by government officials.

The project will also encourage other media organizations and relevant NGOs to utilize its databases for other investigative, research, and accountability initiatives.

Donor: National Endowment for Democracy (NED)

Information Sheet

Main Objective

Promoting institutional transparency and accountability through investigative reporting.

Activities

1) Production of investigative articles;

2) Creation of two databases on reconstruction projects for health care facilities, public schools, and energy companies in Serbia;

3) Production of a series of multimedia materials, such as videos and infographics, in order to make the investigative stories more appealing and understandable to the general public.

Target Groups

Local media journalists, state representatives, local-government representatives, public at large, CSOs representatives

Where is the Place of Media in New Internet Governance Policies?

BIRN Serbia
Raising involvement of the media industry in a public debate on new development policies and internet governance issues.

Summary

During 2020, new legal and strategic documents are expected to be adopted in Serbia reshaping media landscape in a digital environment.
Internet and new technologies are the principal transformers of the media sector that bring important change to the ways of informing citizens. Development is based not only on new technologies that are accelerated by the innovation in IT industry (programmes for creation of databases, virtual reality, video, podcast, video 360) but also on new policies focused on internet governance that have a strong impact on the media industry. Only on the European level new directives on copyright, personal data protection were adopted, the directive on AVMSD is in the process of being amended. At the global forums, regulation of internet and internet governance are the most important topics the media industry is dealing with. This issue is especially important for developing countries (or those in transition, as it is the case with Serbia) and which stayed marginalised so far. Above-mentioned issues, BIRN intends to explore and put in a local context, thus counterbalancing the lack of meaningful debate in Serbia.
Media Strategy and other national initiatives, such as Digital Serbia, do not recognize the liaison between media development and internet governance. In such an environment, internet governance policies could be considered as an additional responsibility which has been imposed on media, but as well as an opportunity to overcome or bypass the current deficiency of media regulation.
BIRN will conduct research in order to formulate policy position and strengthen role of media in upcoming processes. With this project, we are aiming to contribute to a new rethinking of media policies and media development.

Donor: Open Society Foundation, Serbia

Information Sheet

Main Objective

Raising involvement of the media industry in a public debate on new development policies and internet governance issues.

Specific Objectives

The initiative is intended to support CSOs in Serbia to test, evaluate and scale their advocacy initiatives in a more strategic way.

Target Groups

Media professionals, decision-makers, state institutions representatives, media managers, journalists, CSOs, IT and telecommunication organisations and institutions

Main implementer

BIRN Serbia

Raising Critical Awareness on Internet Governance in Albania

BIRN Albania

This initiative is a part of the project “Towards Improved Labour Relations and Professionalism in the Albanian Media”, funded by the European Commission, represented by Delegation of the European Union to Albania and implemented by the partnership of the Albanian Media Institute (AMI) and the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ).

Summary

Through this project, BIRN Albania aims to involve the media stakeholders in the public debate on the place of the media in new Internet governance policies. Digitization and the Internet have a strong influence on the media because, on the one hand, they are powerful drivers of development, on the other hand, social networks and similar platforms endanger their survival, making them less socially relevant and endangering their business model and economic survival. Nevertheless, these substantive changes are little discussed in professional media circles, and in particular lack systematic data and thorough research to trigger debate. This initiative is part of the project “Towards improved labour relations and professionalism in the Albanian media”, funded by the European Commission, represented by Delegation of the European Union to Albania and implemented by the partnership of the Albanian Media Institute (AMI) and the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ).

Information Sheet

Main Objective:

Through this project, BIRN Albania objective is to contribute to a new reflection on media policies and media development related to internet governance in the country.

Specific Objective:

Reviewing the current landscape of Internet governance in Albania, including various existing legal, technical, corporate, and human rights initiatives relevant to journalism and media, and explore the primary issues and processes that overlap between media development and Internet governance;

Increasing critical understanding and public debate on how internet governance related policies and practices can influence media professionalism and development.

Donor:

European Commission/ Delegation of the European Union to Albania

Investigative Journalism on EnvironMEntal Issues, with Citizens’ Engagement

BIRN Hub

The project aims to strengthen investigative reporting capacities and public interest in topics related to environmental protection in Montenegro.

Summary

The project aims to strengthen investigative reporting capacities and public interest in topics related to environmental protection in Montenegro, while increasing the amount of quality media content related to relevant EU negotiation chapters (Chapter 27, as well as 23 and 24).


Donor

EU Delegation in Montenegro

Main Objective

Project’s goal is to strengthen participatory democracy and the EU integration process in Montenegro by empowering and stimulating an enabling professional and financial environment for pluralistic media.


Specific Objectives

It also aims to foster independent and investigative journalism in order to generate quality media content, both for national and local media, in areas related to Montenegro’s European integration process.


Main Activities

The project will help inform the public about the most important issues related to Montenegro’s further EU integration, but also allow people to get directly involved through a newly-designed web platform that will enable them to become active citizens and amateur journalists (citizen reporters) by reporting on local environmental issues.

Target Groups

Media and journalists from Montenegro, CSOs, state institutions, EU representatives, public.


Main Implementer

Center for Investigative Journalism Montenegro, CIN CG


Partners

BIRN, Weekly Monitor

Reporting Democracy

BIRN Hub

Reporting Democracy is a cross-border journalistic platform dedicated to exploring where democracy is headed across large parts of Europe.

Summary

In addition to generating a steady stream of features, analysis and interviews by our own correspondents, we support local journalists by commissioning stories and providing grants for in-depth features and investigations.


Donor

ERSTE Foundation


Main Objective

The overall goal is to establish an international journalism network and distribution platform aimed at strengthening the capacity of media to report systemically on populist, authoritarian and other illiberal trends in V4 and WB countries, thus contributing to public understanding of these trends and their consequences.


Specific Objectives

  • Create a networking and granting scheme for journalists from the V4 and WB regions.
  • Set up a journalistic network that will enable them to explore populist and authoritarian phenomena in depth, locally or through cross-border collaboration, and to communicate their findings to as wide a section of the public as possible through multiple channels.


Main Activities

RD Launch Event – Reporting Democracy Conference in Budapest

Around 100 journalists, academics and activists gathered for the May 31 Reporting Democracy Conference, held to mark the launch of the initiative.

  • Correspondents’ Network:

For the project, BIRN has recruited one correspondent/coordinator in each V4 country: the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. This model is based on BIRN’s experience and lessons learned from developing the network in the Balkans. It ensures a consistent local media presence and helps guarantee the visibility, quality and relevance of journalistic production.

Correspondents/coordinators are accomplished early-to-mid-career journalists engaged on a part-time basis, delivering articles in various genres – interview, analysis, feature, multimedia, et cetera. Articles are published by BIRN on a special page created for this project. They are made available for republication by the ERSTE Foundation and are offered for syndication to media partners in the V4, Balkans and beyond. (BIRN has over 100 established media partnerships in the WB region and internationally.)

BIRN will later expand the network from the core group of journalists.

  • Story grants:

Three open calls are planned for journalists interested in reporting on illiberal tendencies and becoming members of the network.

Reporting Democracy offers a limited number of reporting grants to journalists in Central, Eastern and Southeast Europe to pursue in-depth features or investigations on issues affecting democracy in Visegrad Four countries and the Balkans.

Grants are available for individual journalists or teams with ideas for in-depth features or investigations with a substantial cross-border element.

  • Annual round-up report and public debate:

The editorial team will prepare an annual round-up report marking key trends, actors and events in the targeted countries. The annual round-up will give a comparative overview of key trends and developments throughout the targeted countries, all related to illiberal tendencies, and serve as a basis for cross-regional debate. The debate will feature advisory board members, project partners and journalists that have participated in the programme in the past year.

Target Groups

Journalists, media professionals, editors, the expert community.

Main Implementer

BIRN

Highlights

Opening Conference in Budapest

Mapping Digital Freedom Violations

BIRN Hub

The project aims to provide accurate information about digital threats, monitor changes, raise awareness and issue policy recommendations.

Summary

In cooperation with the SHARE Foundation, BIRN will determine who the key players are when it comes to disinformation and propaganda in Southern and Eastern Europe (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Hungary, North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia) through establishment of a Digital Monitoring database, continuous monitoring of digital threats and reporting on digital freedom violations.


Donor

Civitates


Main Objective

  • Monitoring

Organisation of training to boost the skills of 15 people who will conduct online monitoring of violations of digital rights and freedoms  (1 – 3 months).

The creation of comprehensive/result-oriented methodology and procedures for monitoring will be created, ensuring a successful monitoring process (3 – 5 months).

The newly-trained monitors will monitor the biggest violations of digital rights in Southern and Eastern Europe (6 – 18 months).

  • Design and Creation of Digital Monitoring Database (2 – 6 months).

The Digital Monitoring database will contain cases of violations of digital rights and freedoms, with descriptions of cases and corresponding sources. Monitors will map digital threats, identifying trends and assessing whether there are legal consequences to the threats. The database will be part of the broader BIRN Investigative Resource Desk, which is an online resource platform for investigative journalists.

  • Publishing (1 – 18 months)

One cross-regional report will be published, using the collected data to identify trends in digital violations and freedoms. Five regional investigative stories will be produced by BIRN journalists on digital rights and information warfare in a regional context.

  • Promotion Event (18 months)

The project envisages organisation of an event for the promotion of the cross-regional report, and an open debate where representatives of regional stakeholders will participate.


Specific Objectives

A key goal is to use the experience of producing the monitoring database, along with SHARE Foundation’s standardised rules for categorising violations of digital rights and freedoms, in other countries. This will be useful to target groups for emphasising the importance of the use of technology to highlight social issues, especially in countries and regions without a good human rights record.

Finally, the initiative aims to inform broader society about real digital threats and the ways in which digital rights can be violated, contributing to the overall fight against disinformation.

Target Groups

The project will target the general public in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Hungary, North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia.


Main Implementer

BIRN


Highlights

BIRN and SHARE Join Efforts to Counter Digital Freedom Violations

Outputs:

  • 15 monitors trained to track and report on digital freedom violations in the targeted countries
  • 1 digital database created and launched
  • 1 cross-regional report produced and published
  • 5 investigations produced and published

1 closing event for the presentation of the cross-regional report and overall project impact

Partners

BIRN and SHARE Join Efforts to Counter Digital Freedom Violations

Outputs:

  • 15 monitors trained to track and report on digital freedom violations in the targeted countries
  • 1 digital database created and launched
  • 1 cross-regional report produced and published
  • 5 investigations produced and published

1 closing event for the presentation of the cross-regional report and overall project impact

Civil Society Advocates: Through Partnership Towards Democratic Development in Serbia

BIRN Serbia
The project aims to strengthen a participatory culture in Serbia and empower civil society groups to get people more involved in advocacy work.

Summary

The project is designed to address the lack of capacities in civil society organizations, CSOs, to undertake successful advocacy efforts, their lack of cooperation with public authorities at all levels, and citizens’ lack of motivation to join and trust CSO advocacy actions.

Donor: USAID

Information Sheet

Main Objective

By building skills, encouraging citizens’ engagement and improving advocacy programs, the project hopes to contribute to the strengthening of a democratic society.

Specific Objectives

The initiative is intended to support CSOs in Serbia to test, evaluate and scale their advocacy initiatives in a more strategic way.

Main Activities

Capacity Boost for Advocacy

Mapping, stakeholder and needs analysis

Advocacy training programs for CSOs

CSOs’ Advocacy Actions

Re–granting scheme

Support to local advocacy initiatives

National advocacy initiative toward participatory environment for CSOs

Web Platform for Advanced Reflection and Learning

Development and maintaining of the web Platform

Help Desk–Advocacy Clinic

Communication and Community Outreach

Local and social media outreach and branding and marking activities

Annual Advocacy Award

Target Groups

  • Local CSOs implementing advocacy initiatives;
  • Citizens

Highlights

Report on CSOs’ needs, policy environment possibilities in implementation of innovative advocacy practices;

  1. Delivered capacity building programs and raised level of knowledge and skills;
  2. At least 50 CSOs in Serbia directly involved in capacity building program;
  3. Advocated recommendations for participatory environment for CSOs in decision making;
  4. Produced set of recommendations on innovative advocacy approaches but tailored on community needs;
  5. Created web Platform for advanced reflection and learning;
  6. At least 15 case studies of successful advocacy campaign produced;
  7. 3 successful advocacy initiative awarded

Main implementer

Belgrade Open School (BOS)

Partners

Belgrade Fund for Political Excellence (BFPE) and the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN).