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As American Newspapers Decline,
German Newspapers Hang On
By Sabine Muscat (2007)

The blogger Paul Gillin is a busy man these days. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer was the latest victim being reported on his Web site www.newspaperdeathwatch.com. After 145 years in business, the newspaper published its last issue on March 17. The remaining staff will produce content online, with everybody reporting, editing and producing at the same time. This latest closure in the U.S. media market brought the number of discontinued print papers to 12 since the creation of the Web site that monitors the industry's demise.

Sabine Muscat (2007)

Scaling down is the formula for survival in today's mass media market--even for the newspapers that are still available in print. News organizations all across the country are shedding staff and closing offices to lower their costs. This has even hit the reporting from Washington, DC. As of this April, the Cox Newspapers group will close not only its five foreign bureaus, but also its DC office, dismissing two dozen employees. Theirs is the second new organization to shut down its office in the nation's capital in recent months, after Newhouse News Service in November 2008.

One could expect the White House briefing room to be emptier than in the past, but the opposite is the case. Foreign media organizations have more than filled the gap and are ramping up their Washington operations in these challenging times. "When the U.S. State Department first opened a Foreign Press Center for representatives of non-U.S. media in 1968, there were about 160 foreign correspondents reporting from Washington. In October 2008, there were nearly ten times as many," states the Pew Research Center's Project on Excellence in Journalism in a report issued in February.

Most of the recent growth comes from countries in Asia and the Middle East where journalism is still a booming profession and where the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have given rise to outlets such as the television channel al-Jazeera. Their English language service alone maintains 86 staff members in DC, according to the Pew report. And the European press corps has maintained its traditionally strong presence in the U.S. capital despite all odds.

With up to 130 registered reporters at the Foreign Press Center and the German embassy, Germany is particularly well represented, second only to Japan. This is all the more interesting since the media crisis has hit Germany as well. A number of publications--from Condé Nast's Vanity Fair Deutschland to Bauer's Geldidee--have gone out of business in recent months. The WAZ group in Western Germany laid off 300 people and reduced the size of its local newspapers from 48 to 32 pages. The publishing company Gruner + Jahr merged the production process of its four business publications. And the other major business daily, Handelsblatt, is cutting its workforce by 40. But apart from singular exceptions, the Washington offices of all the major news organizations have so far remained intact.

Observers in Washington explain the high number of German correspondents by pointing to a unique feature of the German media market: the publicly financed broadcasting system with its TV channels ARD and ZDF and a number of radio stations. "If you look at German journalists in DC, that's where the numbers are," says Keith Peterson, the media relations officer for European media at the Foreign Press Center. Each of the major German news publications has, on average, at least one reporter based in DC. "And I am happy to say that there has not been a downward shift in recent years," says Dr. Ulrich Sante, who heads the information section of the German embassy in Washington.

"Washington ranks very high from a German perspective, higher than Moscow or Beijing. And while media organizations have started cutting offices even in European countries such as Spain, a presence in the U.S. capital is a matter of prestige for them," says the German media analyst Horst Röper, who runs the research agency Formatt in Dortmund. Laszlo Trankovits, who heads the DC office of the news agency Deutsche Presseagentur, has corresponded from Tel Aviv and Rome. "But I have never before had a posting in which my editors at home could never get enough. If you report from the U.S., almost every topic is of interest back home."

Dr. Sante would wish for more reciprocity. "The U.S. media's small presence in Europe and in Germany in particular does not reflect the importance of the transatlantic relationship and the need for a mutual exchange of information," he complains.

The continuing strength of the German press corps in Washington does not mean there are no budget pressures, but there may be better ways to deal with them than in the past. "I think technology has made it more affordable to be here," says Peterson. "Journalists don't have to maintain an expensive office, but can work from home."

And while German media, newspapers in particular, are also cutting costs, Röper believes that they still have more economic wiggle room than their American counterparts. "In Germany, new media have not yet become an existential threat to classical news organizations as they have in the U.S.," observes Dr. Sante. Statistics show that Germans use the Internet more conservatively than Americans.

Another difference is that regional newspapers--the worst hit segment in the American market--are often the financially healthier ones in Germany. "The main difference is that regional newspapers in Germany don't have to share their advertisement revenues with local radio or TV stations which are abundant in the U.S.," says Röper. He also argues that German publishers were able to correct their over-dependence on advertisement after the media crisis in 2000 and 2001 from about two thirds in 2001 to approximately 55 percent today. And while German publications also face a shrinking circulation, their core readership has been willing to accept higher sales prices in recent years.

But the global crisis is not over and advertisement revenue in the German media market dropped by 20 percent in the first quarter of 2009. "If it stays at that level, not much will happen," believes Röper. "But if it gets worse, we will start seeing major shifts."

Sabine Muscat was a Burns fellow in 2007 and was posted at the San Francisco Chronicle, which is now threatened by closure. She has worked as the Washington correspondent for Financial Times Deutschland since December 2007.

Journalism's New Frontier: The Christian Science Monitor Moves to a "Web-First" Strategy
By Christa Case Bryant (2006)

Now I know what it must have felt like to be a sailor on the Nina, the Pinta, or the Santa Maria. At least a little. More than six centuries after Christopher Columbus set out to prove the world wasn't flat, journalists have been foisted onto the seas of the 21st century with an aim some see as equally impossible.

Fortunately, I work at a place where the captain expects to reach the New World of financially viable journalism. Perhaps that's only fitting for The Christian Science Monitor, whose mission relies not on what the world is giving to it, but on what it can give to the world.

Case Bryant in her newsroom.

Founded by Mary Baker Eddy amid an era of yellow journalism, the international daily newspaper launched in 1908 with a simple but profound mandate: "To injure no man, but to bless all mankind." As we celebrate our centennial year, we remain deeply convinced of the value of journalism as a catalyst for advancing humanity's progress. But the practical demands of the business world are forcing us to prove it.

And that's a great challenge--not just for the Monitor, which is launching a Web-first strategy in April, but for the whole industry. Many people, with far more business savvy than I, have analyzed whether and how a financially viable model for journalism can be developed in the Internet era.

The Monitor's plan--already well-documented by U.S. media--is to augment online revenues by putting our editorial focus on producing timely stories for the Web. Meanwhile, we'll preserve our trademark, in-depth analysis with a weekly subscription-based print product that is just as meaty but more economical to print and deliver.

A new model for the industry?
Judging by the number of TV crews that have hovered over our newsroom in recent months, many seem to be watching the Monitor closely to see whether its strategy proves to be a viable model for the industry. I sincerely hope it will.

But I see a contribution that could be potentially greater than solving the very pressing problem of how to make good journalism financially feasible. And that is redefining the Wild West of information that exploded into the public sphere after Al Gore (or whoever) struck Internet gold.

In this world, we have all kinds of characters galloping to and fro with the latest dispatch--many borne by flashy steeds. We have cyber saloons billowing with smoky facts--and I mean that in the most liberal sense of the word. We have an incredibly entrepreneurial spirit, and a wonderful freedom and drive to explore new frontiers. But to make the most of this new territory, we need more order, civility, and higher standards.

Just as the Monitor set a new tone in the scandal-filled press of the early 1900s--establishing a standard of objectivity that has become the norm of America's highly-respected journalism--so, too, it is striving to lift up a standard in the New World of online journalism. And the central tension in this world is how to take advantage of news opportunities in real time without sacrificing the integrity, insight, and fairness for which we've long been known.

The Monitor's transition
The weekly--an enhanced version of the daily with more graphics, photos, and additional features--will be a mainstay, a rudder for the online operation as it finds its way through the cross-currents of today's information society.

For example, if writers or editors begin using social media such as Twitter or Facebook to communicate with readers, do such dispatches need an edit or proofreading? Should comments be moderated, by whom, how often, and using what standard? How do we preserve our mission if we're inviting readers to give more input on what we should be doing? Does our mission then become relative, or does it maintain some objective principle? To what extent can writers loosen up on blogs without compromising their journalistic objectivity?

These are the questions our newsroom is wrestling with as we prepare for the shift to Web-first journalism. And we're experimenting with possible solutions. For example, we recently started a Global News blog, which aims to redefine "blog" to mean a tool rather than a style. Instead of being a personality-focused place to opine, it was envisioned as a conduit for rapidly disseminating breaking news and additionally linking readers with stories that go deeper. So far, we've seen modest success in terms of traffic, but perhaps the larger impact so far is in getting writers and editors to think in two new ways: 1) Being more agile in responding to the news and 2) Developing an awareness of which stories people want to read--i.e. how much traffic they draw.

That last point has raised concerns in our newsroom about letting traffic drive our editorial agenda. And that's certainly an ongoing debate. But it's crucial for today's journalists to have an interest in making journalism practical, relevant, and valuable--not merely an art form that indulges intellectual luxury with no thought of those whom they serve. And that new focus on practicality, I think, may be one of the best things that comes from this tumultuous voyage to the New World of online journalism.

But it should be stressed that being forced to consider the value of one's work, its motive and aim, is an opportunity--not a hardship, however uncomfortable it may seem. The inevitable result of this turmoil is that the dross will be purged from journalism and it will emerge more thoughtful and insightful, and more helpful to individuals and society as a whole.

Christa Case Bryant was a 2006 Burns fellow during her
three-year stint as Europe editor for The Christian Science Monitor. For the past six months, she has been serving as online news editor.

Robert Zoellick Encourages Media to Shed Light on Economic Crisis
by Joi-Marie McKenzie

Washington, DC - The Honorable Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank and former trustee of the Arthur F. Burns Fellowship, recently spoke about the state of the world economy to alumni, trustees and friends of the fellowship. The Goldman Sachs Group hosted the sixth annual alumni dinner at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Washington, DC, on Feb. 19.

World Bank President Robert Zoellick (left) and German Ambassador Klaus Scharioth

In an off-the-record speech about the global economic crisis, Robert Zoellick urged journalists and media organizations to bring greater attention to the issues.

"The global financial meltdown is clearly the most important story of the day, and Burns alumni got a deep insight from Zoellick on how the World Bank is coping with the crisis," said ICFJ president and Burns trustee Joyce Barnathan.

Zoellick explained that in order to understand the state of the U.S. economy, we must look at it in context and consider the broader global implications, even suggesting a future cooperation with China.

Brendan McGarry (2004), Anke Wienand (1988), and Amanda Bensen (2007)

Among the approximately 100 distinguished guests, between 30 and 40 were alumni. In addition, ten alumni worldwide followed the evening's activity through the first-ever live video stream.

"We're trying to enable a broader segment of our alumni base to take part in these kinds of activities and thus strengthen the alumni network," said Mario Scherhaufer, ICFJ's director for the Burns program. "New technology such as streaming video of our dinner events, our interactive alumni portal and the Burns page on Facebook, will hopefully enable us to bring more alumni back into the Burns family."

Burns alumni will also gather for the German alumni dinner in Berlin on Thursday, June 4. Dr. Josef Ackermann, CEO of Deutsche Bank AG, will be the keynote speaker.

The Arthur F. Burns Fellowship News is published four times a year by the International Center for Journalists.

Burns Program Staff:

Frank-Dieter Freiling, Director, IJP
Mario Scherhaufer, Program Director, ICFJ
Maia Curtis, ICFJ Consultant
Michelle Mathew, Program Officer, ICFJ

Named in honor of the late former U.S. ambassador to the Federal Republic of Germany and former Federal Reserve Board chairman, the Arthur F. Burns Fellowship Program fosters greater understanding of German–U.S. relations among future leaders of the news media.

The Burns program was established in 1988 in Germany by the Internationale Journalisten-Programme (formerly the Initiative Jugendpresse) and was originally designed for young German journalists. In 1990, the fellowship expanded to include American journalists, making it a true exchange.

Each year 20 outstanding journalists from the United States and Germany are awarded an opportunity to report from and travel in each other's countries. The program offers 10 young print and broadcast journalists from each country the opportunity to share professional expertise with their colleagues across the Atlantic while working as "foreign correspondents" for their hometown news organizations.

Fellows work as part-time staff members at host newspapers, magazines and radio and television stations. In addition to covering local news, fellows report on events for their employers back home, while learning more about their host country and its media.

This competitive program is open to U.S. and German journalists who are employed by a newspaper, news magazine, broadcast station or news agency, and to freelancers. Applicants must have demonstrated journalistic talent and a strong interest in U.S. - European affairs. German language proficiency is not required, but is encouraged.

The Burns Fellowship program
is administered jointly by:

March 2009 | Vol. 18, No. 1

Dr. Frank-Dieter Freiling

Dear Friends,

As the winter snow is melting, a new administration has settled into Washington. German elections are coming up this September and will provide an exciting background for this year's fellows, as will the European Parliament elections this June. A renewed interest in the United States has brought record application numbers on the German side. And many lay-offs and readjustments in U.S. media have allowed American applicants to put forward their interest in going to Germany to widen their international experience. So we hope to pick yet another exciting group of new fellows this month.

The Arthur F. Burns Dinner in Washington on Feb. 19 was a welcome chance to see some of you again and listen to our guest of honor, the Hon. Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank Group. Many trustees and sponsors were also in attendance and expressed continued support to our organization in difficult financial times.

I hope that you have joined our online alumni portal, which enables you to keep in touch with your fellow alumni--a valuable list of media contacts on both sides of the Atlantic. New alumni trips--most likely to Norway later this year and to Germany and Denmark in early January 2010--to study developments in climate control will also be posted there first. So stay in touch and let's maintain a strong and involved alumni network, which has always been a great asset of this program. I look forward to seeing many of you at the German Burns Dinner on June 4 in Berlin or at the reception for this year's fellows at the German Ambassador's residence in DC on July 22.

Frank-Dieter Freiling

1991
Bernd Riegert returned from Brussels to Bonn to become head of programming for Deutsche Welle's shows about Europe.

1994
Ina Ruck left the U.S. to become the new bureau chief for German television ARD in Moscow. She spent nearly eight years there earlier in her career before most recently working as a correspondent in DC.

1995
Andreas Eck rejoined the national broadcaster ZDF in Berlin as managing editor for the "Morgenmagazin," the daily breakfast show.

1998
Michael Streck currently commutes between his home in Brussels and his new employer in Washington, the World Bank, where he works at the External Communications office for the Carbon Finance Unit.

1999
Guy Raz's son, Henry Aviv Raz, was born February 19th in Boston where Guy is currently finishing up a year at Harvard as a Nieman Journalism Fellow. He will return to NPR in the summer of 2009.

2000
Oliver Becker's documentary "Kick the Lion--Witchcraft and Football in Africa" has been selected for a screening at the Desmond Lee Africa World Film Festival in St. Louis, Missouri, in March 2009. Silvia Feist returned from New York to Munich for a year as senior editor for Gruner+Jahr's new magazine Emotion. Her first book as publisher, Weltmacht Wasser, was published in February.

2002
Adrian Feuerbacher left Berlin for his hometown of Lüneburg since becoming the senior assistant to the NDR radio program director in Hamburg. James Hagengruber (above, right, with 2002 alumna Megan Mulligan) is now the Europe editor at The Christian Science Monitor. Hans Nichols, a White House correspondent for Bloomberg News, wed Jessica Holzer on February 15 in Bend, Oregon.

2004
Robin Mishra, capital bureau chief of the weekly Rheinischer Merkur, published his latest book Wie ich lernte, die Politiker zu lieben (Herder). Sebastian Rudolph finished his doctorate at the Free University of Berlin in political science. His thesis titled Ist Berlin noch zu retten? [Can Berlin still be saved?] was published by Cuvillier. Currently he is a Fellow at Duke University in the United States, through a grant given by the RIAS Berlin Kommission.

2005
Ulrich Boser has a new book detailing the biggest art heist in history entitled The Gardner Heist. Benno-Falk Fuchs now heads "AKTE 09 - Reporter kämpfen für Sie!," the investigative reporting show on SAT.1. In the competitive world of primetime television where any show that attracts a significant audience for four years is a success, AKTE , which is entering its 15th season, is a phenomenon. In April, AKTE will start a second weekly show. In October 2008, Fabian Mohr became a member of the editorial team for Zeit Online, responsible for development and multi-media.

2006
Florian Gathmann joined Der Spiegel's capital bureau in Berlin in January.

2008
Tony Ganzer received a Bosch Fellowship and will be returning to Germany this year. He and his wife, Katie, had a baby boy, Alexander, in February.

Thursday, June 4: German Dinner: Atrium, Deutsche Bank, Berlin. Speaker: Dr. Josef Ackermann, CEO Deutsche Bank AG

Wednesday, July 22: Reception for 2009 Fellows, Washington, DC. Residence of German Ambassador Klaus Scharioth

2009 Program Dates
July 21-26: Group orientation in Washington, DC
July 27-Oct. 2: Fellowship at host media organizations

Click here to log into the Alumni Portal. To register, please fill out this short form.

Did you know we're also on Facebook? Join the Burns Alumni group today.

U.S. Trustees

Patron: The Honorable Klaus Scharioth
German Ambassador to the United States
Joyce Barnathan
President, International Center for Journalists (ICFJ)
Elizabeth Becker
Contributor to the International Herald Tribune and German Marshall Fellow
The Honorable J.D. Bindenagel
Vice President, Community, Government & International Relations, DePaul University
Dr. Kurt Bock
Chairman and CEO, BASF USA
Marcus W. Brauchli
Executive Editor, The Washington Post
The Honorable Richard Burt
Senior Advisor, McLarty and Associates (Honorary Chairman)
Dr. Martin Bussmann
Mannheim LLC
Nikhil Deogun
International Editor and Deputy Managing Editor, The Wall Street Journal
David W. Detjen
Partner, Alston & Bird, LLP
Dr. Frank-Dieter Freiling
Director, Internationale Journalisten-Programme (IJP)
Prof. Dr. Ronald Frohne
President and CEO,
GWFF USA, Inc.
Rick Goings
Chairman and CEO, Tupperware Brands Corporation
James F. Hoge, Jr.
Editor, Foreign Affairs (Honorary Chairman)
Fred Kempe
President and CEO, The Atlantic Council of the United States
The Honorable Henry A. Kissinger
Chairman, Kissinger Associates
The Honorable Frank E. Loy
Former Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs (Chairman)
Senator Richard G. Lugar
United States Senator (R-Ind.)
Wolfgang Pordzik
Executive Vice President, Corporate Public Policy, DHL North America
Garrick Utley
President, Levin Institute, SUNY
Stanford S. Warshawsky
Chairman, Bismarck Capital, LLC
Legal Advisor:
Phillip C. Zane
Attorney at Law, Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz

German Trustees

Patron: The Honorable William R. Timken, Jr.
U.S. Ambassador to Germany
Erik Bettermann
Director-General, Deutsche Welle
Prof. Dr. Reinhard Bettzuege
German Ambassador to Brussels
Dr. Martin Blessing
CEO, Commerzbank AG
Maria Böhmer
State Minister, Member of Parliament, CDU/CSU
Tom Buhrow
Anchorman, ARD
Sabine Christiansen
Journalist, TV21 Media
Dr. Mathias Döpfner
CEO, Axel Springer AG
Thomas Ellerbeck
Chairman, Vodafone Foundation
Gernot Erler
State Minister, Foreign Office
Leonhard F. Fischer
Partner, RHJI Swiss Management
Rüdiger Frohn
Chairman, Stiftung Mercator
Emilio Galli-Zugaro
Head Group Communications, Allianz Group
Tessen von Heydebreck
Former Member of the Board, Deutsche Bank AG (Chairman)
Luc Jochimsen
Member of Parliament, Die Linke
Lars G. Josefsson
CEO, Vattenfall
Hans-Werner Kilz
Editor-in-Chief, Süddeutsche Zeitung
Dr. Torsten-Jörn Klein
Board member, Gruner + Jahr AG
Carsten Maschmeyer
Chairman, AWD Holding
Prof. Bascha Mika
Editor-in-Chief, Die Tageszeitung
Kerstin Müller
Former State Minister, Member of Parliament, Buendnis 90/Die Grünen
Prof. Markus Schächter
Director-General, ZDF German TV
Helmut Schäfer
Former State Minister, Foreign Office (Honorary Chairman)
Monika Schaller
Senior Vice President, Goldman, Sachs & Co.
Friede Springer
Publisher, Axel Springer AG
Franz Thönnes
State Secretary and Member of Parliament, Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands (SPD)
Tobias Trevisan
CEO, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
Lord George Weidenfeld
Former CEO, Weidenfeld & Nicolson
Dr. Guido Westerwelle
Member of Parliament and Chairman of the Freie Demokratische Partei (FDP)
Ulrich Wilhelm
Government Spokesman

The Arthur F. Burns Board of Trustees in the United States and Germany acknowledges with gratitude the support of the following organizations and individuals who have made the 2009 Arthur F. Burns program possible.

Sponsors in the U.S.
Alston & Bird, LLP
Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz PC
BASF
The Capital Group Companies Charitable Foundation
Continental Airlines
Deloitte & Touche
DHL North America
The Ford Foundation
The German Marshall Fund of the United States
Goldman, Sachs & Co.
GWFF USA, Inc.
The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
The Ladenburg Foundation
Mars Incorporated

Individual Contributions
John and Gina Despres
David Detjen
The Hon. Frank E. Loy
Stanford S. Warshawsky

Sponsors in Germany
Allianz AG
Auswärtiges Amt.
Bundesministerium für Familie, Senioren, Frauen und Jugend
Deutsche Bank AG
Goldman, Sachs & Co.
Gruner+Jahr AG
Ruhrgas AG
Siemens AG