Abstract

Investigative journalism in Montreal is healthy and robust, despite a North
American media landscape in flux, where newspapers across the continent have closed or
significantly reduced staff. Newsroom budgets have shrunk across the continent, and the
migration of print content to the web has not brought with it a comparative level of
advertising. This thesis is a case study that researched how Montreal’s investigative
journalism environment has fared in light of the perceived newspaper crisis.
The case study consists of a quantitative analysis of Montreal’s La Presse and The
Gazette newspapers, which revealed that since 2009, investigative journalism articles
increased in both papers. Additionally, through interviews with eight of Montreal’s mostprominent
investigative journalists, I discovered three main reasons why the city has
become a welcoming environment for one of the most costly and time-consuming
journalistic projects: the rise of Radio-Canada’s Enquête program, which created a
successful model for an investigative unit; a surge in whistleblowers coming forward and
willing to risk their well-being; and finally, strong market competition and an adversarial
newsroom culture. Investigative journalists in Montreal have uncovered severe cases of
scandal and moral transgressions committed by Quebec’s elected officials and business
leaders. Montreal’s investigative reporting has led to the resignations of big-city mayors
and the arrests of prominent businessmen and members of criminal organizations. I
demonstrate in this case study that there is a measurable increase of investigative work in
the recent past and my interviews suggest that there is a perception among journalism
stakeholders that investigative journalism is working well in Montreal.