The Solutions Desk is where LiveTrue News World puts its central idea into practice: a story about a problem should also be a story about what people are doing about it. This page explains what that means and how to read a solutions story critically. Below it you will find the launch-edition stories most closely tied to responses and remedies.
What solution journalism is
It is rigorous reporting on responses to social and environmental problems, including how those responses work, the evidence of results and the limits. It is neither advocacy nor good news for its own sake. The test of a good solutions story is whether a skeptical reader would finish it knowing more about both the promise and the problems of a response.
The four test questions
- What is the response? Describe it in concrete terms: who does what, with what resources.
- What is the evidence? Look for results, comparisons and the source of any figure. Numbers supplied by the people running a project are not independent proof.
- What are the limits? Cost, scale, side effects, places it would not work and what has failed.
- Who is affected? Who gains, who bears costs and who is left out.
How to read the stories below
Every story in this launch edition is an illustrative scenario. The projects, organizers and figures are fictional, and the stories are written to model the four questions rather than to report results. When you read one, notice where the figures are attributed to the people running the project, how the limits are stated, and what the closing section says to watch for next.
Stage matters
Responses are at different points in their life. An idea, a pilot and a program operating at scale deserve different levels of confidence. The Impact Radar page places each launch story in a stage so that readers can match their expectations to the evidence available.
Signs of a weak solutions story
- It describes a promising idea as though it were proven.
- It includes no costs, trade-offs or failures.
- It relies on a single source with an interest in the outcome.
- It assumes that what works in one place works everywhere.
If you think one of our stories falls into those traps, tell us at [email protected].