The reduction of journalistic newsrooms due to economic crises faced by the media has been to the detriment of investigative journalism. However, some media houses maintain these teams, as they are highly valued. Many have outsourced this to production companies, and in some other cases, the work of freelancers is published. Still others dismantled their investigation units for economic reasons. An editor reflects on this reality:
We started as a medium that did a lot of investigation, but now we can’t, because it is expensive. In 2018 the last people who worked there, left. Now we have a fund to buy articles by freelancers whom we know and, in whose criteria, we trust.
Ciper Chile, the Centre for Investigative Journalism in Chile, has grown their section of opinion columns. By becoming a foundation, it uses crowdfunding from its readers to finance high-quality investigations. . A problem is that such long-form journalism with potentially high political and social impact, but independent of advertising, is also harder to monetise. But such constraints also open opportunities for non-corporate media houses to develop. An example of this is University Diego Portales, which in 2020 inaugurated a Centre for Journalistic Projects and Investigations, including books and web projects developed by both professionals and students.
