The Rest of the World
| Thu Nov. 19, 2009 10:20 AM PST
John Judis compares the coverage of Barack Obama's trip to South Korea in three different newspapers today:
Both the Post and the Times focus not on South Korea per se, but on Obama’s taking a “stern tone” toward North Korea in his discussions with the South Koreans.
The Post suggests that the two sides have agreed to a “new approach,” which will reject “endless, inconclusive disarmament negotiations” with the North. OK, pardon me if I yawn.
....Now let’s look at the Financial Times story by Christian Oliver and Edward Luce, which is about one-third the size of the other pieces....Here are the opening paragraphs:
When George Bush senior visited Seoul as US president 20 years ago, things were simple – the US was the undisputed main ally and trade partner. Astonishingly, there was only one weekly flight from South Korea to China, the communist foe. Barack Obama on Wednesday visits a South Korea where the US is no longer the only show in town. China is now the main trade partner, with 642 flights each week.
One flight versus 642 flights — that’s a small detail that tells a large story about South Korea and China....There’s more, too, about Obama making trade promises to South Korea that Congress is unlikely to let him keep. All in all, you get in one-third the length three times more interesting information than in the Times and Post articles, and it’s epitomized in the lead paragraphs comparing the number of flights that now run weekly between China and South Korea.
There are two things going on here. First, the FT writes for a more sophisticated audience that's been following this story for a while and is actually interested in learning more about it. Second, and related, the FT doesn't have to pretend that the only news that matters is whatever happens to be the current hot button in the United States. American audiences tend to believe that pretty much every international issue revolves mainly around how it affect the United States, and that's the only angle they're interested in.
At least, that's what American newspapers assume. They might find out different if they tried the FT's approach, but honestly, they probably know their audience pretty well. Even most highly educated Americans just don't care much about the rest of the world except to the extent that it affects us.
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Comments
Nothing beats foreign
Submitted by g. powell on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 10:37 AM PST.
Nothing beats foreign coverage in the U.K. media. It must be due to the imperial legacy.
It's my impression that besides the U.K, most foreign media is about the same as the U.S. in being parochial, but I could be completely wrong. Are there non-English-language newspapers that have foreign coverage on par with the FT or the Economist?
You are a little wrong, to
Submitted by James2 (not verified) on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 11:46 AM PST.
You are a little wrong, to an extent. Most of the rest of the world reports pretty extensively on what the US does precisely because what the US does affects them. If you spend any time in foreign countries, you will see daily coverage of happenings in the US, almost entirely related to foreign policy and trade (and, in the last few years, celebrities too...)
Kevin is right that we don't cover other countries to the same extent simply because it doesn't affect us. It's not that the rest of the world is so much smarter, more educated, and more cultured; if you read French newspapers they don't heavily feature Cambodian based stories either. The difference lies in the fact that when America farts, it causes ripples around the world. When France jumps in the pool, it doesn't really affect us, so we don't need to read a news story about it.
You're certainly right that
Submitted by g. powell on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 12:11 PM PST.
You're certainly right that most of the world press does cover the U.S. for obvious reasons.
But my point is that the BBC, ITN, FT etc. will routinely and extensively cover stories about small, economically unimportant nations that only get mentioned passingly in other places. I don't know of any other world media that does that.
By the same token, our
Submitted by James2 (not verified) on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 12:59 PM PST.
By the same token, our outlets routinely run human interest stories about the plights of those in far flung corners of the world. Even ESPN ran a huge article about baseball in Cambodia yesterday.
While it may be true, without a study, I think it's kind of hard to say that our media is any more self-centered than anybody else's. (And in a semi-related note, we have more philanthropic ventures helping the rest of the world than just about everybody else combined. An awful lot of information about the rest of the world is disseminated this way as well, and to those who actually care enough to do something about it.)
I'm not saying our country's
Submitted by g. powell on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 1:40 PM PST.
I'm not saying our country's media is more self-centered than anybody else's, I'm saying Britain's is less self-centered than everyone else's. The U.K. is the exception to the rule.
Besides the imperial past
Submitted by The Lounsbury (not verified) on Fri Nov. 20, 2009 1:40 AM PST.
London is perhaps the money centre for international investment, whether it is banks, or operational (never mind notional) fund headquarters, in particular for emerging markets.
It inflates the base of people interested in such news.
And quite simply the UK tradition of international reporting is a damn sight better than anyone else.
French papers, that being said, are not terrible, better than Spanish in my opinion (or other French lang. regional papers - e.g. Swiss, Belgian, etc).
But surely that attitude is
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Nov. 20, 2009 3:27 PM PST.
But surely that attitude is the very problem Drum is talking about - 'when France jumps in the pool it doesnt cause a ripple'. China is rapidly becoming a global superpower, the US is in freefall as an economic hegemon, but nobody knows it because the news keeps telling us that it has no effect on the US. Next time you jump in the pool, you're going to realise it's gotten very crowded (also North Korea peed in there).
Sorry for the offtopic post,
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 11:08 AM PST.
Sorry for the offtopic post, but wow. I grew up knowing that a B average would guarantee me admission into the University of California. The NY Times has announced they are shuttering their doors:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/20/education/20tuition.html
"The University of California Board of Regents was expected to approve a plan on Thursday to raise undergraduate fees — the equivalent of tuition — 32 percent by next fall, to help make up for steep cuts in state funding."
Can someone tell me why Brad DeLong, free trader, never upsets the apple cart needs tenure? How does giving professors like DeLong tenure who never say anything remotely risky to the powers that be do anything but raise costs?
And it's not DeLong that I'm talking about just the enormous waste of tenure that most professors take for granted, making it just a glossy benefits package and a dick measuring tool.
I don't share the fear of
Submitted by trotsky (not verified) on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 11:11 AM PST.
I don't share the fear of North Korea, but do understand that crazy latter-day Stalinists with nuclear weapons make some people nervous.
That said, the FT is a business newspaper focusing on the business angle -- and the growth of China-S.Korea trade is indeed a bigger story for that audience than that nuclear nonsense.
American audiences tend to
Submitted by marcel (not verified) on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 12:58 PM PST.
American audiences tend to believe that pretty much every international issue revolves mainly around how it affect the United States, and that's the only angle they're interested in.
I see this as part of the judaizing of America.
Why? See here or here (and search on 'elephant').
Is this good for the Jews? Who can say?
I, for one, appreciate the
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 1:57 PM PST.
I, for one, appreciate the FT's global perspective, but they failed to answer a critical question: What percentage of those 642 flights are operated by US flag carriers?
I prefer the BBC for most of
Submitted by Ranger Jay (not verified) on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 2:39 PM PST.
I prefer the BBC for most of my "TV news," and cannot stand most of the US coverage anymore. The BBC web news is pretty good as well.
But then, I use a passport. Once you get out of the USA for a few weeks, and spend time in other parts of the world, it tends to change your perspective.
I once was convinced that the good, old USA was "the best" at everything. Those days are LONG gone.
Long live...
Submitted by jhm on Fri Nov. 20, 2009 6:49 AM PST.
I agree that the BBC is superior to most other domestic news, but then again, there's the (for them) obligatory royal family coverage, and the inevitable 'brit on the street' opinion that, while sometimes interesting, most time is about as useful as 'yank on the street,' but less topical (for an American).
I suggest World Focus (worldfocus.org). which has much of the benefits of the BBC, without the UK interest stories, and also includes al Jazeera English, which is at the very least a fresh perspective.
News Knows?
Submitted by Dum Luks on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 3:49 PM PST.
40 years ago the Asahi Shimbun, just one of Tokyo's English language dailies, featured its lede story from the perspective of three wire services: AP, UP and Reuters. The reiteration was cut to show the variances. The result was a sort of holographic story with greater texture and depth than the same story in the Japan Times. As often as not it appeared the three services covered three entirely unrelated events. But then papers were where one got news.
Publishers decided to homogenize their coverage and dumb it down because they thought that is what their readers want. How's that working out for them?
No, Kevin, Newspapers lost track of their purpose (and their readers) about thirty years ago, about the same time the political parties and the government did.
--ml
Dum Luks
And this is why
Submitted by Brian O on Thu Nov. 19, 2009 7:25 PM PST.
the FT is the only newspaper to which I have a subscription. The "What to Spend It On" inserts are pretty cool, too.
You could turn your argument
Submitted by petty boozswha (not verified) on Fri Nov. 20, 2009 4:31 AM PST.
You could turn your argument upside down, though. Maybe the template FT readers want followed is the decline and fall of the American Empire storyline that European sophisticates have been yearning for since 1945.
Get to the point.
Submitted by jhm on Fri Nov. 20, 2009 6:53 AM PST.
I don't know if it's the proximate cause or just a welcome facet of their coverage, but the FT does not have 'jump' articles. The page one piece ends on page one (and lists related articles with their locations). This makes for some repeated information in the various articles, but the need to present a complete thought on one page, might be an incentive to getting real information on the first paragraph or two.
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