I Cover Cops as an Investigative Reporter. Here Are Five Ways You Can Start Holding Your Department Accountable.

Ahmed Albasheer is an Iraqi journalist who uses a combination of humor and grassroots organizing to teach youth in Iraq and across the world about their government's corruption with his show, "The Albasheer Show.” He has been compared to Jon Stewart in how his weekly series airing on YouTube and satellite television engages young people through his comedic timing and straight-forward manner of speaking. As a result, protests have erupted, and the government has killed protesters in response, but Albasheer continues to boost morale and amplify their voices in solidarity.

Strengthening the link between local journalism and civic engagement lends a voice to communities long underrepresented. Chicago’s City Bureau brings the newsroom out to neighborhoods and communities. In an effort to augment a lack of diversity in US newsrooms and a lack of understanding surrounding local issues, City Bureau empowers locals to act as “documenters” collecting, analyzing, and reporting on public meetings and issues that matter to their communities. By making journalism accessible to locals, City Bureau aims to build trust and redefine the journalistic process.

After an economic downturn, several community-based radio stations have sprung up, offering an alternative to commercial stations and allowing Argentinians, especially those in rural areas, the opportunity to come together and choose what they want to listen to and talk about. One organization called DTL! collective helps organizations set up community radio stations by providing a transmitter, antenna, and other hardware.

When New York legislators abolished a state law that had long shielded police officers’ disciplinary records from public scrutiny, they were not just responding to recent protests but also to activism over many years by reform advocates and families of victims of police violence. Long-running legal challenges had failed to pry the records loose. But activists – opposed by police unions and their allies – had used public testimony, publicity, and their families’ stories to lay the groundwork for changes that then came quickly after George Floyd’s death sparked nationwide protests of police brutality.

Crises and problems are well-covered in the media. When the media focuses instead on organizations that are doing social good, it has a better effect because then these organizations are more likely to receive support and expand their access.

In an effort to fight government corruption, an initiative called Tracka monitors public spending allocations and holds town hall meetings in communities across Nigeria to educate residents about the budgeting process. The organization has engaged 967 communities and helped hold officials accountable for projects that were funded but never completed, such as an electricity substation in Kawu.

The Justice for Magdalenes Research organization is working to spread awareness and gain justice for the survivors of Magdalene laundries in Ireland throughout the 1900s. Women and girls were sent to laundries, kept there against their will, forced to work without pay, and severely mistreated.

Based on an approach that one participant termed “what gets measured gets done,” several Canadian media watchers and news organizations are prodding journalists to quote more women in news stories by auditing sources' genders in past stories. One Montreal Gazette reporter's tally of her newsroom's stories increased how many women were quoted in stories from 29% of stories to 42%. The Gender Gap Tracker tracked Canada's seven most influential news platforms, and saw an increase in the use of female sources in stories by 4% in less than two years, nearly as big a gain as in the previous 26 years.

A nearly two-year investigation of Mexicans who had gone missing, and presumably murdered, produced a series of stories based on the database of at least 2,000 graves across Mexico. A group of independent reporters and photographers called “¿A dónde van los desaparecidos?” (where do the disappeared go?) supplied victims' families with information that previous government and private efforts had not, and that fueled demands for definitive information on their loved ones' deaths. More than 40,000 people have been reported missing in Mexico since 2006 amid drug-related violence.

Faced with abysmal customer service during a spate of incorrect, excessive usage bills from Cleveland's municipal water department, residents turned their attention to the nation's top-ranked utility, Miami-Dade Water and Sewer Department. Unlike Cleveland, the Miami department has a customer-oriented business model from top-to-bottom: not only does it provide credits in cases of underground or inexplicable leaks, but its leaders focus on supporting employees in providing responsive service, proper usag