logo
    • Magazine
    • Membership
    • Donate
  • Racial Justice
  • Economic Justice
    • Collections
  • Climate Justice
  • Health Justice
  • Leadership
  • CONTENT TYPES
  • Subscribe
  • Webinars
    • Upcoming Webinars
    • Complimentary Webinars
    • Premium On-Demand Webinars
  • Membership
  • Submissions

Nonprofit Journalism: The Marshall Project Launches to Cover Criminal Justice

Ruth McCambridge
November 19, 2014
Share
Tweet
Share
Email
Print

Prison Reform

November 18, 2014; FastCompany, “FastCoexist”

Back in August, NPQ reported that a new nonprofit journalism site had been capitalized by hedge fund manager Neil Barsky. That site, The Marshall Project, went live this past weekend. (You can read our impressions of its investigative feature on death row inmates and the ways neglectful attorneys can cost them their final appeals here.)

The Marshall Project is intensely focused on criminal justice issues and is headed up by former New York Times executive editor Bill Keller. “Our aim is to move public opinion, not towards a particular agenda, but towards a state of urgency,” says Keller.

Keller says that the Marshall Project’s coverage will focus on the chronic problem of mass incarceration in the United States, but its implications are far reaching: “You start looking at how people get into the system, at things like juvenile justice, the criminalization of mental illness, the drug war. Then you look at the 95 percent of people in prison who get out. […] What happens when people who are locked up for years, who are possibly brutalized, get back into the community? What does that mean for public safety?”

Sign up for our free newsletters

Subscribe to NPQ's newsletters to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

By signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from NPQ and our partners.

Beyond public safety, however, are questions of how we treat people who are mentally ill, how well and effectively we use public resources, how accessible is civil and criminal justice representation for the poor, and many other issues.

Keller said that the approach the project will take is not necessarily to cover breaking stories, but to push at and inform the framing of those stories—a very powerful approach.

“We just came out of a meeting,” says Keller, “where we’re discussing how we’re going to react to the grand jury reaction to the Ferguson shooting. We are not going to join all the networks and newspapers who are going to send correspondents to Ferguson to tell you about the public reaction. Maybe we can nudge the curve. That’s the advantage to having a newsroom that’s immersed in the subject. People can see past the first day story, the second day story.”

We encourage our readers to visit the project’s striking new website and subscribe to its feed.—Ruth McCambridge

Share
Tweet
Share
Email
Print
About the author
Ruth McCambridge

Ruth is Editor Emerita of the Nonprofit Quarterly. Her background includes forty-five years of experience in nonprofits, primarily in organizations that mix grassroots community work with policy change. Beginning in the mid-1980s, Ruth spent a decade at the Boston Foundation, developing and implementing capacity building programs and advocating for grantmaking attention to constituent involvement.

More about: nonprofit journalismHuman ServicesInequalityJournalismNonprofit NewsPolicy

Become a member

Support independent journalism and knowledge creation for civil society. Become a member of Nonprofit Quarterly.

Members receive unlimited access to our archived and upcoming digital content. NPQ is the leading journal in the nonprofit sector written by social change experts. Gain access to our exclusive library of online courses led by thought leaders and educators providing contextualized information to help nonprofit practitioners make sense of changing conditions and improve infra-structure in their organizations.

Join Today
logo logo logo logo logo
See comments

Spring-2023-sidebar-subscribe
You might also like
Linking Our Fights to Win: On Combatting Elite Capture
Kitana Ananda and Olúfemi O. Táíwò
Cancelling Student Debt Is Necessary for Racial Justice
Kitana Ananda
To Save Legal Aid, Expand Public Service Loan Forgiveness
Zoë Polk
No Justice, No Peace of Mind and Body: The Health Impacts of Housing Insecurity for Black Women
Jhumpa Bhattacharya, Maile Chand and Andrea Flynn
Black Women’s Pay Inequity Starts in the School System
Toni A. Wilson
The Human Impact of the Global Refugee Crisis Must Be Understood—And Acted Upon
Anmol Irfan

NPQ Webinars

April 27th, 2 pm ET

Liberatory Decision-Making

How to Facilitate and Engage in Healthy Decision-making Processes

Register Now
You might also like
Linking Our Fights to Win: On Combatting Elite Capture
Kitana Ananda and Olúfemi O. Táíwò
Cancelling Student Debt Is Necessary for Racial Justice
Kitana Ananda
To Save Legal Aid, Expand Public Service Loan Forgiveness
Zoë Polk

Like what you see?

Subscribe to the NPQ newsletter to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

See our newsletters

By signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from NPQ and our partners.

NPQ-Spring-2023-cover

Independent & in your mailbox.

Subscribe today and get a full year of NPQ for just $59.

subscribe
  • About
  • Contact
  • Advertise
  • Copyright
  • Careers

We are using cookies to give you the best experience on our website.

 

Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly
Powered by  GDPR Cookie Compliance
Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.