Methodology 2017–2024
The original Media Influence Matrix framework: a comparative, country-based methodology designed to reveal how regulation, money and technology shape journalism in practice.
Looking beyond visible attacks on journalism
MIM was created to examine structural power rather than treat threats to journalism as a collection of isolated incidents. The project asked how political rules, economic dependency and technological systems can gradually reorganise the conditions under which journalism operates.
Beyond “besieged media”
The project’s early conceptual work challenged the idea that media freedom could be understood mainly through censorship, harassment or direct attacks. Those pressures matter, but they do not explain slower forms of influence: concentrated ownership, selective state advertising, captured regulators, political patronage, platform dependency or opaque technological control.
MIM therefore approached journalism as part of a wider system of institutions, markets and infrastructures whose resilience determines whether independent media can function.
Read “Beyond Besieged” →The analytical proposition
The original methodology treated the media environment as a political economy of power. Formal laws could be independent on paper while institutions remained captured in practice; commercial ownership could coexist with political dependence; technological systems could exercise regulatory power without being public regulators.
Three pillars of media influence
The original framework organised country research around Regulation, Funding and Technology. Together they allowed researchers to examine how states, markets and digital intermediaries influenced the media system.
Regulation & Policy Influence
Examined the political and legal environment governing journalism and whether regulatory institutions operated independently in practice.
- constitutional and legal protections
- broadcast and telecom regulation
- regulatory institutions and governance
- political influence and patronage
- informal pressures and self-censorship
Funding & Financial Influences
Examined ownership, revenue and funding relationships as potential sources of influence over editorial independence.
- ownership and market concentration
- commercial revenue models
- state advertising and subsidies
- philanthropic and foreign funding
- financial fragility and clientelism
Technology & the Public Sphere
Examined how platforms and digital infrastructure were reshaping news distribution, public debate and the economics of journalism.
- platform dependency
- algorithms and content visibility
- digital advertising
- misinformation and harassment
- surveillance and internet governance
Comparable structure, local expertise
The legacy methodology combined a common international template with country researchers capable of interpreting institutional practice. This was crucial in environments where the formal legal record and the real exercise of power diverged sharply.
Evidence collected
Research teams combined documentary, financial, regulatory and market evidence with interviews and case studies.
What made the method distinctive
The framework did not assume that formal independence meant real independence. It compared institutional design with actual behaviour and used qualitative evidence to identify informal power.
The common MIM research template
The shared template provided the operational backbone of the legacy programme. It specified the information country teams were expected to collect and the analytical questions used to structure country chapters.
2017 template, later refined
The original template was launched with the project in 2017 and subsequently refined as the research programme developed. It organised work around government/politics/regulation, funding and the role of technology in journalism and the public sphere.
A comparative archive of media systems
The legacy framework generated country reports and thematic analysis across several continents. The archive documents regulation and capture, ownership and funding, public-service media, changing business models and the growing power of digital platforms.
Government, Politics & Media Regulation
Country studies of laws, regulators, institutional independence, policymaking and political influence.
Funding Journalism
Country studies of ownership, financial structures, state funding, advertising, philanthropy and economic dependence.
Technology, the Public Sphere & Journalism
Country studies of platforms, digital distribution, online speech, infrastructure and technological influence.
What changed in 2025+
The current MIM framework retains the original analytical insight — that regulation, money and technology interact — but changes the research architecture from long-form country reports to structured entities, variables, relationships and time series.
Narrative country reports
Local teams worked through a shared research template and produced qualitative, evidence-rich chapters capable of explaining informal influence and national context in depth.
Browse the legacy reports →Structured, database-driven research
The new methodology standardises entities and variables, supports time-series and relational analysis, and expands the technology pillar to cover platforms, AI, cloud, telecom and other information infrastructure.
Read the current MIM methodology →Where to find the research
The methodology is preserved because the reports it produced remain an important historical and comparative evidence base. Existing URLs and original report locations are retained.
Because the archive is still part of MIM
The original reports were not superseded by the database methodology. They document specific media systems at specific moments and contain contextual, interview-based and institutional evidence that remains useful for historical comparison, longitudinal research and understanding how patterns of influence developed over time.
Legacy methodology: 2017–2024. Published MIM report archive: 2017–2025. Current methodology: MIM 2025+.