Introduction

On an annual basis, the Institute for Nonprofit News (INN) conducts an Index survey of its growing network of members to help assess the state of the nonprofit news sector. INN’s most recent survey, the 2023 Index, focused deeply on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). The data offer an updated picture of whether and how DEI is reflected in the sector’s staffing and leadership, operations, engagement with underserved communities and revenue patterns.

This report represents INN’s second in-depth study of DEI among its members. INN published its first DEI Index Report in January 2020, examining components of diversity, equity and inclusion across its membership in calendar year 2019. At that time, other industry studies examining race, ethnicity and gender representation within the journalism sector were unable to capture standardized, representative figures that would allow for year-over-year tracking. INN committed to measuring diversity as the nonprofit news sector continues to expand, using its recurring Index survey to track diversity metrics annually and undertake in-depth studies of DEI every three years.

Since INN’s first report on DEI in the nonprofit news sector was published, the conversation around what it looks like — and what it takes — to advance DEI within journalism has evolved. In May 2020, mass protests against police brutality and systemic racism erupted nationwide and globally following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. In that context, many white-led and primarily white-serving news outlets were confronted with their own “racial reckoning” regarding their staffing, internal norms and culture, and coverage of communities of color. Concurrently, new (mostly digital) startups founded and led by people of color have since entered the nonprofit news space, helping to grow the existing cohort of print, broadcast and digital outlets with a mission to serve communities of color.

In this context, INN needed to reassess how it asked about DEI, while continuing its commitment to publish comparable, year-over-year data based on a set of recurring survey questions. We convened an advisory board of researchers, INN members and partner organizations to help us navigate this balance, guide a revision of the survey instrument and frame our research focus based on the sector’s emerging questions and needs. Early in 2023, we published a blog post summarizing our approach and research goals.¹

This report aims to help answer key questions that INN’s members, partners, funders and colleagues are asking as they work towards a more diverse, equitable and inclusive nonprofit news sector:

• Diversity: What is the racial, ethnic and gender composition of nonprofit news staff, leadership and boards, and how have these demographics changed over time?
  
• DEI practices: What practices are news organizations using to advance diversity, equity and inclusion — both in how they operate and in how they serve the information needs of communities of color?
  
• Funding: Are there disparities in the level of foundation funding and individual giving reported by news outlets led by people of color and serving communities of color compared to other outlets? 

Across these three questions, we recognize that the meaning of “DEI” — and the extent to which certain questions about diversity, DEI practices and funding  — is not the same across all INN members, who vary widely in terms of their respective histories, missions and ways of working. Current conversations and efforts around DEI are grounded in the context of the 2020 racial justice protests and calls for change within historically white-dominated news organizations — a continuation of efforts across many decades to diversify a predominantly white-led and white-serving industry. These efforts focus primarily on majority-white news organizations, interrogating how power structures that privilege whiteness (and maleness) are embedded in news outlets’ practices, procedures, policies and culture. News outlets founded by and for people of color are positioned differently relative to DEI. As some outlets noted in survey responses, “DEI is baked into everything we do already” and “DEI is in the fiber of our organization.” The historical context of racism and oppression also bears differently on access to funding for these outlets compared to white-led outlets.

Our analysis aims to identify and explore these differences among INN members. For example, in examining diversity, we seek to understand how much of the nonprofit news sector is led by white people or by Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), and how many majority-white organizations have increased the diversity of their leadership and staff over time. In our analysis of DEI practices, we use data on the racial and ethnic leadership of news outlets to break out the findings for white-led outlets, while also drawing on insights from BIPOC-led outlets about how they approach DEI in their practices. Our analysis of funding patterns applies an equity lens to explore where and how foundation and individual giving dollars are being invested.

We also recognize the limitations of our study: Much remains to be explored and understood about DEI in the nonprofit news sector. For example, additional data would be needed to make demographic comparisons between outlets’ personnel and the markets or communities they aim to serve, taking into account wide variation in the missions, intended audiences, distribution platforms and geographic scopes of INN members. Future research could also apply a regional or place-based lens to measure demographic shifts over time. More broadly, our report doesn’t fully capture the longer-term and nonlinear processes through which news organizations can become more diverse, more equitable and more inclusive in how they operate and how they relate to and serve communities. 

This report aims to contribute to a much larger effort among journalists, researchers, funders and others to illuminate, discuss, innovate and challenge the way DEI is, or is not, reflected in the news industry. Our hope is that the report serves as a useful resource to the sector’s efforts to advance DEI — not simply as an end in itself, but in service of broader goals of racial, gender and social justice.

1. Susanna Dilliplane and Emily Roseman, “Exploring diversity, equity and inclusion within the nonprofit news sector: What we hope to learn in INN’s 2023 Index survey,” Medium Jan. 23, 2023.