Thought Leader: J. Carl Ganter

J. Carl Ganter is director and co-founder of Circle of Blue, the international news, science and data organization focused on global water issues. He is a photojournalist, writer and broadcast reporter.

From the dawn of the Internet, Carl's been at the forefront of digital news, from reporting and consulting to large-scale projects. With an early start (ninth grade writing obituaries for the local newspaper), his work in one form or another has appeared in most major magazines, newspapers and major television and radio networks. He's had rare opportunities to directly impact lives and policy, from the front lines of AIDS in Southeast Asia for Time Magazine to the exoneration of a wrongfully convicted father (and revelation of the real murderer) in Illinois. He's also advised some of the nation's largest news outlets, helping merge traditional and interactive newsrooms.



Since reporting water as an "axis issue" at the core of global crises while covering the World Summit on Sustainable Development for MSNBC.com, by default he's become one of the few journalists consistently at the heart of the global freshwater crisis.
 He is a member of the World Economic Forum's Global Agenda Council and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars water working group, "Navigating Peace." He earned his MSJ in investigative reporting and magazine writing at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism after graduating with honors from the University's American Studies Program.

Carl has written the essay, The Value of Bearing Witness as part of the IVOH Voices & Values of Journalism Project - listen to and read the entire collection of essays here.

Carl's recent work and related links:

• Circle of Blue

• Navigating Peace Initiative, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
  

• Poynter Institute for Media Studies

• Energy Economy Brings Change to Shepherd Life: Modernization Comes to the Dry Grasslands of Inner Mongolia