A NEW REPUB-LOOK

At 84, The New Republic (TNR) is one of America's most venerable opinion journals, Known for actively engaging in serious intellectual debates, it has often shaped political and social debate. But recently, it has been forced to compete with a media world that has become increasingly visual--and the magazine has struggled to find its niche.

Pointing to the journal's editorial turnovers (it has gone through four editors in the last eight years) as well as a recent episode involving a freelance writer who fabricated stories, some argue the traditionally liberal weekly has lost some of its ideological focus.

"It has lost its mandate, its vision, and numerous editors," wrote Richard Blow in last December's issue of The Washington Monthly. "It has become smug and cynical--the embodiment of much that is wrong with political journalism today."

But while TNR hasn't completely lost its edge, it is clear that the magazine needs to go back to doing what it did best in order to compete with new media.

"We are trying to restore a bit more seriousness to the magazine, beefing up the intellectual content, getting more ideas into the magazine and more thought into the magazine," says Charles M. Lane '83, the magazine's current editor. "That's where our future lies".

However, this may not be an easy task. More intellectual content is certainly a noble goal, but in reality, it moves against the current trend towards visual media.

Already TNR is very content-heavy.

"This is a magazine that makes very few gestures to the cultural habits of our time," says Martin H. Peretz, who is both the magazine's chair and a lecturer in social studies at Harvard. "There are no pull quotes or lavish illustrations. The articles tend to be long and exacting."

But does long and exacting still cut it in today's information age?

Peretz certainly thinks so.

"We are survivors," says Peretz, who bought the magazine in 1974, pointing out that the magazine currently enjoys a near-high in both circulation and advertising. "It's been a stunning success. I would dare to say that there is no journal of opinion that provokes the kind of discussion and dispute which the The New Republic does."

The Changing Nature of Public Discourse

In recent years, alternative media--in the form of television, radio and the Internet--have rapidly encroached upon a domain traditionally occupied by print journalism.

"We are becoming more and more a visual culture," Peretz explain. "Pictorality is the medium through which ideas are communicated."

In attempt to appear more dynamic and hip, magazines have increasingly emphasized the visual element. One such example is Slate, an interactive Web-based magazine that was started two years ago by a former TNR editor, Michael E. Kinsley '72, also a former Crimson editor.

Under such conditions, it would seem that traditional opinion journals are a dying genre. But to the contrary, readers still turn to thought-leader magazines like the The New Republic.

"I think I take opinion journals more seriously that I use to," says Nathan Glazer, professor of education and social structure emeritus, who contributes regularly to The New Republic.

The reason, according to some, is that this trend toward the visual has lead to an impoverishment of the quality of public discourse, giving opinion journals an increased role in filling the void.

"Serious political and cultural discussion has become much less commonplace," Peretz says.

According to Peretz, one trend that exemplifies this is the use of personality profiles to cover complicated issues.

"When you reduce complicated issues to personality, you add something to the discussion but you sap its texture and tautness," he says.

"Politics on television is reduced to soundbites, shouting matches, and food fights," says Professor of Government Michael J. Sandel, another regular contributor. "There are few arenas within contemporary life for serious debate of social and political questions."

And so, while readers of younger, more "hip" weeklies often skim pages and are drawn in by fancy pages designs, readers of The New Republic approach each issue with a certain patience and thoroughness. According to demographic surveys, readers on average spend more than an hour on each issue, often referring to the same issue multiple times.

"There's sort of a difference between TNR pieces and pieces found anywhere else," Lane says. "There's so much out there that's not serious--that's 'soundbitey'--that the real original and unique thing is seriousness."

More Information, More Clutter

Inevitably, as information becomes more available, the number of talking heads also increases.

Not only have magazines like Slate taken advantage of the new digital medium, but newspaper op-ed pages have grown over the years.

"Television and the World Wide Wed can provide news more quickly than newspapers," says TNR Executive Editor Jonathan S. Cohn '91, also a former Crimson editor. "Even in newspapers there has been a trend towards news analysis instead of straight news."

For a traditional opinion journals like TNR, this influx of political an social commentary comes as a mixed blessing. One the one hand, readers are more inclined to turn to the magazine with the hope of receiving a concentrated dose of thought in an increasingly wide world of text.

"There is a lot of good material out there," Cohn says. "You just have to sift through a little more to get it."

And reading TNR requires little sifting. For example, its regular column "Hard Questions" addresses the more abstract facets of contemporary issues, something rarely found in mainstream opinion journalism.

"One thing that has remained constant about TNR is the idea of looking at serious, important issues for their own sake," Cohn says.

However, while TNR keeps its readers happy with concentrated thought, the growing market for opinion journalism also puts more pressure the magazine to compete.

"The trick of running the New Republic," Lane says, "is keeping it consistent with what went before while constantly updating and refreshing it."

Sometimes, however, this pressure to remain fresh can lead to undesired consequences. In a widely publicized incident last month, the magazine fired one of its freelance writers, Stephen Glass, after it was found that some of his stories continued facts that were completely fabricated.

Glass, 25, had written a story on software companies that hired teenage hackers, offering them lucrative amounts of money. The story turned out to be completely fictional.

Many media critics point out that the Glass incident was more a result of one writer's over-ambition rather that faulty fact-checking. But it is indicative of the appeal of young, witty writers who can deliver stories with flair.

According to Cohn, while TNR continues to devote itself to serious issues, the magazine tries to present them in an engaging and entertaining way.

"We recognize that just because issues are serious and important doesn't mean they have to be dull," he says.

Age has also helped TNR distinguish itself from fledgling journals.

"Before I came here I worked for a magazine that was five years old," Cohn says. "It's a difference of making people pay attention to you and having people's attentions already. Younger magazines sometimes feel pressured to be splashy."

Ideas, Not Ideology

When Peretz bought the magazine in 1974, he had the goal of "refocussing" American liberalism.

"At the time, it had a high-minded predictability. No one was being tested in their views," he says. "I felt that a lot of political and social propositions had to be reexamined."

According to Lane, the role of The New Republic has changed somewhat.

"It used to be that one would read TNR to see what liberals think. Now you read it to see what a thoughtful person should think," he says.

In recent years some have criticized the magazine, claiming it has drifted somewhat in its ideological views and that it has become too cynical. But its editors maintain that it still plays a "central role in defense of subtle, nuanced argument."

"The New Republic, with all its twists and turns and mistakes, is still The New Republic," says Lane. "The hallmark of a TNR article is a certain skeptical and independent interpretation."

"One of the great things about the magazine is that it has dedicated itself to not being beholden to any ideology," Cohn agrees. "The bread and butter has always been about being an unorthodox magazine with different ideas. Ideology doesn't come before reality--there's sensibility behind everything."

Perhaps this is the reason readers are continually drawn to The New Republic: it deals with ideas, not ideologies. While what it means to be "liberal" might change from time to time, the principles behind The New Republic, for the large part, haven't changed.

As mainstream media becomes slowly transformed--as quality public discourse becomes increasingly crowded out by the mundane, the extreme and the sensational--TNR acts as a reliable reservoir for thought-provoking ideas.

"The appeal of TNR," says Cohn, "is that it's not afraid to be serious."