Solutions Journalism in CEE

At Transitions, we seek to raise awareness about Solutions Journalism and provide training, mentoring, and support for journalists in Central and Eastern Europe who want to get involved. To date, we have helped to include a solutions-oriented perspective in the reporting practices of journalists in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Romania, Moldova, Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, and Turkey. We see a need for Solutions Journalism in this region where traditional reporting and news are often met with apathy and distrust. We believe solutions-oriented stories can serve as a catalyst for promoting accountability for regional problems and can better inform communities.

In addition to supporting local solutions stories we focus on collaboration with journalism schools and universities to integrate Solutions Journalism into their curricula. We provide capacity building and training for educators as well as lectures for journalism students from around the region.

So whether you are an educator, a news organization, or a freelance journalist looking to get involved with Solutions Journalism there is something we can do for you!

Transitions and Solutions Journalism

Transitions first became involved with Solutions Journalism in 2016 when Ashoka Czech Republic introduced the Special Award for Solutions Journalism to the Czech Journalism Awards. A year later in 2017, Ashoka Fellow and co-founder of the Solutions Journalism Network, David Bornstein, visited Prague to present this innovative approach. Soon after Transitions began closely cooperating with Ashoka CEE on promoting Solutions Journalism in the region of Central and Eastern Europe. In 2018 several guest speakers visited the region to present Solutions Journalism to local audiences, including Pulitzer Prize winners David Boardman and Tina Rosenberg. As of 2019 Transitions has taken over the full coordination of regional activities in this field and provides local journalists with training mentoring, and support when bringing solutions perspective into their reporting practice.

Examples of solutions journalism from Central & Eastern Europe

Czech Republic

Slovakia

Belarus

Hungary

Poland

Romania

  • In Search of the Lost Pulse (Adina Florea, DoR) 
    • A private healthcare facility in Romania is helping to bring specialty surgeries to the region’s children by arranging for doctors from other parts of the nation and world to convene on a rotating, but regular, basis. The surgeons, many of whom specialize in pediatric corrective surgery for congenital heart defects, perform hundreds of surgeries per year financed by the Polisano Foundation.
    • this story has been added to the Solutions Story Tracker

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