Giving Compass' Take:

• Elizabeth Arnold shares how she came to be involved in climate change solutions journalism and why she thinks highlighting success stories is important. 

• How can philanthropy amplify and act on success stories? What additional support is needed to bring solutions journalism to more fields? 

• Find out how solutions journalism led to real change in Seattle schools. 

You make an argument in your recent research paper for being a proponent of solutions journalism. Why?
EA: It’s pretty simple. I don’t think “shining the light,” or “bearing witness” or every other cliché about journalism is enough, especially when most of today’s reporting centers on complex problems. We need to “shine the light” on ways out of problems too. Otherwise, what’s the point?

As someone that has seen the impacts of climate change, oftentimes through the eyes of impacted communities, what drives you to stick around to find the people working on the solutions?
To me, the story of how a community is converting to wind-diesel energy, or moving to higher ground, or figuring out new ways to fish; that’s more interesting than the latest sea ice measurements. It’s also a much more useful story to tell someone in New Jersey for example, who has no clue about the Arctic, but just might be inspired by what’s happening here.

Is there a danger in not practicing solutions journalism?

Without any semblance of possibility, the whole story is not being told, and that’s the journalist’s job…to tell the complete story, even if it doesn’t fit the prevailing narrative. Mitigation and adaptation are underreported. People areresponding…here is how they are responding. Here’s what’s working.

Read the full interview with Elizabeth Arnold about climate change solutions journalism by Leslie Danielle Cory at The Whole Story.