Der Spiegel Details, Meaning Der Spiegel Article and Explanation Guide

Der Spiegel Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description

Der Spiegel (German for "The Mirror") is Germany's biggest and most influential weekly magazine, located in Hamburg, with a circulation of around one million per week.

Table of contents

1 Overview
2 Affairs and Scandals
3 Der Spiegel under criticism
4 Development
5 Chronology
6 Spiegel Online
7 Editors-in-chief of Der Spiegel
8 References
9 External links

Overview

Der Spiegel (German for “The Mirror”) is one of the most well known of Germany's weekly magazines. It describes itself as “Germany's most significant and Europe's highest-circulating news magazine”. On average, roughly 1.1 million copies are sold every week. The first edition of the Der Spiegel magazine came out in Hannover on January 4, 1947, a Saturday, as the successor to the Diese Woche (“This Week”). The magazine followed the model of American and British news magazines.

Some young German editors, headed by Rudolf Augstein, tried to fulfil the demands for critical and serious journalism and spared even the allies no criticism. The London Administration and the three other occupying powers protested against this form of criticism and got rid of the magazine by handing over Diese Woche to the Germans.

Rudolf Augstein received a publisher's licence and renamed the magazine “DER SPIEGEL”. From the first edition in January 1947 he was editor - a position he retained right up until his death on 7. November 2002 - and editor-in-chief. The current editor-in-chief is Stefan Aust.

Spiegel-Verlag (“Spiegel Publishers”) has its headquarters in Brandstwiete Street (resident to many other newspapers and magazines and Germany's equivalent to London's Fleet Street), in Hamburg.

Der Spiegel was owned by John Jahr and Augstein after 1950; the Jahr's share was taken by Richard Gruner in 1962. In 1969, Augstein bought out Gruner for 42 million Deutschmarks and became the sole owner; in 1971, Gruner & Jahr got back a 25% share. In 1973, Augstein restructured the company to make all employees shareholders, sharing in the profits, of a new "SPIEGEL Verlag Rudolf Augstein GmbH & Co. KG" company. [1]

Der Spiegel is similar in style and presentation to American newsmagazines such as Newsweek, but its long, in-depth articles are more comparable to the British Economist.

Affairs and Scandals

For the uncovering of Federal German scandals in the 1950s and 1960s Der Spiegel got the name of Sturmgeschütz der Demokratie ("assault gun of democracy"). Such scandals which brought the magazine to prominence were: - the “Kilb” case, 1959 - the Fibag affair, 1961 - the Spiegel affair, 1962, triggered by the contribution Bedingt abwehrbereit ("conditionally ready for defence"). It led to the resignation of the then defence minister Franz Josef Strauß. - the Traube eavesdropping affair, 1977 - the scandal in the trade-union business “Neue Heimat”, February 8, 1982 - the political party donation affair (Flick affair), 1982 - the Barschel affair, 1987 (see also Uwe Barschel)

Der Spiegel under criticism

In 1957 the author Hans Magnus Enzensberger published his essay Die Sprache des Spiegel (“The Language of Der Spiegel”), in which he subjected what he called the Scheinobjektivität (pretended objectivity) to enormous criticism. In 1987, the journalist and author Erich Kuby published a critical analysis of the weekly under the title of Der Spiegel im Spiegel (“Der Spiegel in the Mirror”). The eminent journalist Wolf Schneider, known as the "Pope of Language" called Der Spiegel "the biggest mangler of the German language" and as drew on quotations from the magazine as examples of bad German for his style guides. In the Spiegel Online column “Zwiebelfisch” there is some attempt made to atone for the damages to language which have arisen.

Development

The magazine was controversial from the beginning, even in the foundation phase there were conflicts with the British licensing authority. In 1956/7, around ten years after the foundation of Der Spiegel, Magnus Enzensberger wrote his analysis Die Sprache des Spiegel in which he laid down a series of theses: - The language of Der Spiegel obscures what it is talking about - The German Newsmagazine is not a newsmagazine - Der Spiegel does not practise criticism, but its opposite - The reader of Der Spiegel is not orientated, but disorientated - Der Spiegel is indispensable in the Federal Republic of Germany so long as there is no critical organ which can replace it Even after the “Spiegel Affair” (1962) Enzensberger does not revise his view and continues to see the magazine as a potential danger for German democracy.

Der Spiegel had a relatively large influence in the early and constitutional phase (the period when the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) was being established and its new constitution, the Grundgesetz, was introduced), however still not a monopoly on opinion. After the “Spiegel Affair” the influence broadened; through the massively increased circulation its economic power increased (with its monopoly on advertising) and with that the publishing power and political influence also rose. The Spiegel Affair of 1962 led to broad circles, in particular members of the young generation and critical intelligentsia, supported the weekly magazine and with that freedom of the press and opinion. (Peter Glaser)

In the era of Christian Schulz-Gerstein the culture section of Der Spiegel had its peak.

After the appearance of the rival magazine Focus in 1993 noticeable changes were made. However, since then power and influence have not decisively diminished. Focus was designed to be a contrast and alternative to Der Spiegel; this is evident especially in the political view and the comparatively diplomatic way of dealing with advertisers. Uli Bauer, third editor-in-chief of Focus, clearly summarised the editorial position of Focus with reference to the most famous motto of Rudolf Augstein (...if in doubt, Left): If in doubt Der Spiegel is Left, we are in doubt Right.

Chronology

1946 - November: The Der Spiegel forerunner, Diese Woche, comes out under British licence and sells very well; circulation: 1,500

1947 - January 4: DER SPIEGEL, issue one, comes out in Hannover. Again it sells like hotcakes, sales are limited by British paper rationing; circulation: 15,000

1948 - Current circulation: about 65,000

1949 - Spiegel law

1950 - Spiegel inquiry: Der Spiegel uncovers bribery of members of parliament; Voting for Bonn instead of Frankfurt am Main as the federal capital; Augstein testifies as a witness; he cites a journalist's duty to stay silent about reliable sources of information

1952 - Schmeißer affair: Hans Konrad Schmeißer, a former agent in the French secret service, had claimed that Federal Chancellor Adenauer, Government Department head Blankenhorn and General Consul Reifferscheid have been acting for the French secret service and had provided a French agent with secret information.

1956/57 - Hans Magnus Enzensberger: analysis on the language of Der Spiegel

1958 - Beginning of the debate about the state of emergency laws, from which later (1960, 1963, 1965) the various law proposals of interior minister Gerhard Schröder (CDU [Christian Democratic Union, the main right-of-centre political party in Germany]) originated.

1961 - Currently distributed circulation: 437,000 copies

1962 - October 10: "Conditionally ready for defence" article (Fallex) appears in Der Spiegel number 41. - October 26: Search of Der Spiegel publishers in Hamburg and editorial offices in Bonn: warrants for arrest; allegation: suspicion of treachery to state and active bribery. Augstein is jailed for 103 days. Augstein wrote over 150 mostly furious commentaries against Konrad Adenauer's Germany, until 1967 under the pseudonym “Jens Daniel”. - November 7: "Abyss of betrayal of state in the country" (?) (Adenauer in the Federal Parliament) - November 9: Federal Constitutional Court, judgment: not a temporary arrangement

1963 - Franz-Josef Strauß: They are the Gestapo in Germany of our time...I was forced to deal with them. 1966 - Karl Jaspers , Where the Federal Republic is going; Jaspers expresses harsh criticism about the state of emergency laws, which gave the population in the case of an external threat no choice to reject violence and power. According to Jaspers, an internal state of emergency cannot occur because this runs counter to the idea of a democratic state: The state of emergency law robs the people of the remaining legitimate, then however no longer legal means of opposition. - The National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD) enters the State Parliaments of Hessen and Bavaria. - August 5: Spiegel decision of the federal constitutional court: constitutional complaint of Der Spiegel fails.

1968 - The state of emergency laws become part of the Grundgesetz ("Basic Law", Germany's post-World War Two constitution). - Circulation: 953,000 copies

1970s - Der Spiegel employs 900 employees at the beginning of the 1970s, of those around 400 in the editorial section, 100 in the research division and almost 400 in the sales and technical departments.

1971 - Total number of Spiegel readers: about six million - this corresponds to about twelve percent of the population aged over fourteen years in the Federal Republic and West Berlin. - Share of copies sold outside of Germany of the total circulation: ten to fifteen per cent - Der Spiegel is a publication with a strong following abroad. - Circulation: 923,000 copies

1974 - Willy Brandt calls Der Spiegel "ein Scheißblatt", a "shit magazine".

1975 - Expulsion of a Der Spiegel correspondent from East Germany for "malicious breaches of the lawful regulations of the German Democratic Republic".

1978 - Closure of the Der Spiegel office in East Germany after critical coverage about forced adoptions, which is seen as meddling in the domestic affairs of the GDR.

1980s - High points of the Der Spiegel investigative magazine.

1982 - "Flick affair"

198? - “Neue Heimat” trade union scandal

1987 - Barschel affair ("Waterkantgate"): The Republic owes Der Spiegel its thanks for this discovery (Theo Sommer in the Die Zeit weekly newspaper). The magazine revealed that Uwe Barschel, then minister president of Schleswig-Holstein, had spied on his political opponent during his reelection campaign; the scandal was dubbed Waterkantgate, after Watergate and the Low German word for “water shore”, Waterkant. Afterwards, Barschel was found dead in a hotel room in Geneva under circumstances not entirely clear even today.

1988 - Coop affair - “Spiegel TV” begins on the private RTL and SAT.1 television stations. It continues to air today.

1990 - Circulation exceeds the one million barrier with 1,050,000 copies.

1992 - Antje Vollmer: At the end of the Augstein era Der Spiegel has lost meaning and gained power.

1993 - January 18: The first edition of Focus comes out from Focus Publishers, a wholly owned subsidiary of Burda; Competition, not opposition to Der Spiegel (Helmut Markwort). Der Spiegel suffers under a drop in circulation of over ten per cent and a decrease of sold advertising pages of over twelve per cent. The two would however eventually find a way of coexistence, and Spiegel has continued to be the leading investigative magazine in Germany

1995 - Total number of readers of Der Spiegel: over seven million - Diversification: Spiegel-TV, Manager Magazin, Spiegel Special (one-fifth of the turnover of 1996, DM542 million).

1996 - Der Spiegel was in the first half of 1996 the German magazine with the highest takings from retail sales and advertising; net takings of DM330.74 million were reached, almost one million more than Stern (second place) could reach and even more than Bild am Sonntag (“Bild on Sunday” - the weekly edition of Germany's biggest selling tabloid, Bild) and Focus (source: Kress Report).

1997 - January: fiftieth birthday of Der Spiegel (after 2,649 issues). - Update of layout: Der Spiegel comes out mostly in colour

2002 - November 7: death of editor Rudolf Augstein

2004 - August 6: together with Axel Springer AG Spiegel Publishing returns to the classical German spelling, rejecting the German spelling reform agreed upon by Germany, Austria and Switzerland in 1996. - August 9: For the first time an edition of the magazine comes out with different covers. On each cover is a photo of a die, but there are eight different versions of this cover, each with a different number displayed on the die. The random covers go together with the cover story "The Principle of Chance" of the issue (33/2004).