FundingIntelligence
Know what to fund.
Understand what it can change.
Independent research for organizations financing journalism and public-interest information. We identify where support can make a difference, examine who can deliver it, and turn the evidence into clear funding choices.
A research and advisory service of the Media and Journalism Research Center.
Built on MJRC’s research and funding experience
Philanthropic Funding Directed to Independent Media
Support to 15 outlets through MJRC’s funding program, as recorded in its 2025 annual report.
About the funding program ↗A €295.1 Million Funding Sample Studied
MJRC’s 2024 study mapped journalism projects funded between 2018 and 2024. These are research figures, not funds managed by MJRC.
Read the funding study ↗Comparative Research Leadership
Marius Dragomir was a lead editor of Mapping Digital Media, one of the international projects informing his work on journalism and policy.
Meet the research leadership ↓Research for the decisions
funders actually make.
Funding Intelligence serves foundations, philanthropic advisers, journalism support organizations and investors with a public-interest mandate. Each commission connects the funder’s objectives with the conditions in which journalism is produced, financed and used.
Funding Agenda
Identify the needs, places and interventions that merit attention before the next funding round.
- Country and thematic opportunity mapping
- Existing support and unmet needs
- Potential delivery partners
- Priorities with supporting evidence
Portfolio Review
Examine how existing commitments work together and where their shared vulnerabilities lie.
- Coverage, gaps and overlapping support
- Ownership and revenue dependencies
- Platform and technology exposure
- Options for renewal and reallocation
Funding Decision Brief
Resolve a specific proposal or strategic choice with a recommendation that a funding committee can examine.
- Comparative options and trade-offs
- Organizational and market assessment
- Funding conditions and milestones
- A concise committee briefing
Follow the Decision Over Time
Ongoing assignments revisit the original assumptions, assess progress and explain when the evidence supports continuation, adjustment or withdrawal. The review schedule and indicators are agreed with the funder.
Where funding meets
information power.
Our work follows the relationship between financial support, editorial independence and public access to information. These questions organize the research and help define a commission.
Core Support and Institutional Survival
Examine the reporting capacity, operating costs and organizational conditions that funding sustains. Distinguish an essential public service from a project whose value depends on continued subsidy without a clear purpose.
What would be lost if support ended?
The Additional Value of a Grant
Assess what the proposed support could change alongside other financing, existing provision and realistic alternatives. Give sustained reporting and institutional resilience appropriate weight.
What difference would this particular funding make?
Ownership, Influence and Capture
Trace control, funding relationships and institutional safeguards. Examine whether an intervention strengthens editorial autonomy or leaves its underlying vulnerabilities intact.
Who controls the organization—and who benefits?
Shared Services and Infrastructure
Compare individual grants with collective investment in technology, legal support, distribution or revenue capabilities. Assess demand, governance, maintenance and the ability to change providers.
When can a shared capability serve more journalism?
Visibility in AI and Platform Systems
Study which sources people encounter through information intermediaries, and how patterns vary across languages and markets. Connect visibility evidence with audience research and publisher needs.
Will the journalism reach the people it is meant to serve?
Revenue, Dependency and Financial Resilience
Investigate the economic conditions behind a funding request: revenue concentration, costs, market constraints and dependence on particular donors, advertisers or intermediaries.
Which financial assumptions can withstand scrutiny?
Showing all 6 research themes.
Make the evidence
and the judgment visible.
A recommendation is useful when the funder can see what supports it, what remains uncertain and what would change the assessment.
We combine documentary research, financial and ownership records, interviews, country expertise and comparative analysis. Methods and evidence requirements follow the decision being made.
Each brief separates established facts, analytical judgments and forward-looking assumptions. The final funding decision remains with the commissioning organization.
Define the Decision
Agree the objective, geography, public-interest need, available resources and time horizon. Set the criteria before comparing options.
Map the Context and the Actors
Identify existing provision and support, ownership and control, delivery capacity, relevant communities and distribution constraints. Record gaps in the evidence.
Compare Realistic Options
Assess core support, project funding, shared capabilities and other appropriate routes. Compare likely contribution, cost, feasibility and risks against the alternatives.
Recommend With Conditions
Explain whether to fund, test, investigate further or decline. Specify milestones, evidence still needed, and the circumstances that would change the recommendation.
Review What Changes
Where monitoring is commissioned, revisit the decision against agreed indicators. Distinguish observed progress from claims that the funding caused it.
Media Influence Matrix and the Global Media Finances Map
The Media Influence Matrix provides the wider framework for examining regulation, ownership, funding and technology. Its specialized Global Media Finances Map subproject supplies research on companies, financial performance and corporate relationships. Relevant records are checked for currency and coverage within each commission.
Explore MIM and its financial researchState Media Monitor
Research on the financing, governance and editorial independence of state and public media helps place a potential intervention within its institutional environment. Public funding, public ownership and political control are examined as distinct questions.
Explore State Media MonitorAI Information Map
The AI Information Map records the sources AI systems cite, link, recommend or otherwise surface. For funding research, it supplies evidence about visibility and attribution across products and languages. Visibility alone does not establish a source’s quality or its eligibility for support.
Explore the AI Information MapMPMONITOR’s Provenance Research
MPMONITOR contributes research on the organizations, relationships and channels behind public information. Its accumulated work helps trace ownership, financial connections and distribution dependencies. The public directory provides an entry point to this wider research practice.
About the provenance researchResearching funding.
Putting it into practice.
MJRC’s funding expertise comes from studying financial support and working with independent media facing political and economic pressure.
Direct Support for Independent Media
MJRC’s financial support work continues a program that began in 2020. It combines philanthropic sub-grants with research on financial resilience, organizational capacity and audience development. The center’s 2025 annual report records more than US$1.5 million allocated to 15 independent outlets.
The program brings researchers into contact with the operational choices behind a grant: staffing, income, audience relationships and the conditions needed to preserve editorial independence.
Read about the funding programFunding Research and Evaluation
MJRC’s work includes mapping journalism funding, examining donor priorities and developing grant assessment methods. Its published Grant Value Index, developed by Marius Dragomir with the center’s experts, forms part of this methodological experience.
Funding Intelligence defines the outcomes and evidence needed for each assignment. Any numerical assessment is interpreted alongside the context, limitations and underlying evidence.
Read the 2024 funding studyMarius
Dragomir
Director
Media and Journalism Research Center
Marius Dragomir brings experience inside journalism philanthropy, comparative media research and practical support for independent outlets. He worked at the Open Society Foundations for more than a decade, managing the research and policy portfolio of its Program on Independent Journalism from 2007.
He was a lead editor of Mapping Digital Media, covering 56 countries, and the main writer and editor of Television Across Europe, covering 20 countries. He subsequently directed the Center for Media, Data and Society at Central European University before founding MJRC in 2022.
His work connects media ownership, financial structures and editorial independence with the changing technology of public information. He leads MJRC’s research practice and brings that comparative perspective to the design and assessment of funding strategies.
View Marius’s profile in the expert directoryA Community of Specialist Expertise
Selected colleagues in MJRC’s wider expert community bring complementary knowledge of journalism, law, public media and technology. The team for each commission is agreed according to its geography and research needs.
Minna Aslama Horowitz
Public Media & Digital Rights
Research on public media policy, digital rights and media activism; a coauthor with Dragomir on media capture and digital authoritarianism.
Éva Bognár
Independent Media & Institutions
Sociologist and media researcher working with independent Hungarian outlets through Mediaforum and media programs at the CEU Democracy Institute.
Zsuzsa Detrekői
Media Law & Copyright
Legal expertise in online content, copyright and media regulation, with experience inside the digital publishing sector.
Zoltán Sipos
Newsroom Sustainability
Editor and manager of Átlátszó Erdély, with practical experience in fundraising, audience relationships and independent newsroom management.
Simran Agarwal
Platforms & Media Policy
Research on state and platform governance in India, including work on MJRC’s Media Influence Matrix.
Martín Vaz-Álvarez
AI & Media Innovation
Research on artificial intelligence, journalistic values, co-creation and innovation in public service media.
The Work Behind the Service
Published research and program documentation provide a public view of the experience informing our advice.
- Read the Study
EU Funding in the Media
Nikolas Schäfer and Marius Dragomir examine the scale, recipients and purposes of journalism funding in a documented sample of 94 projects.
- Read the Method
MJRC Financial Support Program
The research-led sub-granting model and the Grant Value Index connect funding practice with questions about resilience and impact.
- Read the Article
AI Pluralism Matters
An introduction to the AI Information Map and the changing visibility of journalism across AI systems, countries and languages.
Independent Judgment.
Explicit Responsibilities.
Evidence and Uncertainty
Recommendations identify their sources, assumptions and limits. Missing financial data or incomplete market coverage remain visible. Findings are subject to human review and correction.
Conflicts of Interest
Relevant funding and working relationships are disclosed. Assessments involving MJRC’s own funding interests require separate review. Applicants cannot purchase favorable recommendations.
Confidentiality and Use
The use of confidential proposals, interviews and financial records is agreed at the start. Publication, access and delivery terms are specified in the commission.
What funding decision
are you facing?
Tell us the question, the countries or themes involved, and your decision timetable. We will propose the research scope, team, deliverables and fee.
Discuss a Funding Review mjrc@journalismresearch.orgAvailable as a focused commission or an ongoing research relationship. Work proceeds under an agreed scope and contract.