The New Republic
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- ''For other uses, see the New Republic disambiguation page.
History
Early years
The New Republic was founded by Herbert Croly and Walter Lippmann through the financial backing of heiress Dorothy Payne Whitney and her husband, Willard Straight, who maintained majority ownership. The magazine's first issue was published on November 7, 1914. The magazine's politics were liberal and progressive, and as such concerned with coping with the great changes brought about by America's late-19th century industrialization. The magazine is widely considered important in changing the character of liberalism in the direction of governmental interventionism, both foreign and domestic. Among the most important of these was the emergence of the U.S. as a Great Power on the international scene, and in 1917 TNR urged America's entry into World War I on the side of the Allies.One consequence of World War I was the Russian Revolution of 1917, and during the inter-war years the magazine was generally positive in its assessment of the Soviet Union and its communist government. This changed with the start of the Cold War, though, as TNR moved towards positions more typical of mainstream American liberalism. During the 1950s it was critical of both Soviet foreign policy and domestic anti-communism, particularly McCarthyism. During the 1960s the magazine opposed the Vietnam War, but was also often critical of the New Left.
Peretz ownership
In 1975, the magazine was bought by Harvard University lecturer Martin Peretz, who transformed TNR into its current incarnation. Peretz was a veteran of the New Left who had broken with that movement over its support of various Third World liberationist movements, particularly the Palestine Liberation Organization. Under Peretz TNR has advocated both strong U.S. support for Israel and a muscular U.S. foreign policy. During the 1980s the magazine generally supported President Reagan's anti-Communist foreign policy, including provision of aid to the Contras. It has also supported both Gulf Wars and, reflecting its belief in the moral efficacy of American power, intervention in "humanitarian" crises, such as those in Bosnia and Kosovo during the Yugoslav wars.In addition to being editor-in-chief and co-owner of The New Republic, Peretz is a contributor to the Jewish World Review.
Stephen Glass scandal
In 1998, TNR faced a journalistic fraud scandal when features writer Stephen Glass was revealed in a Forbes Magazine investigation to have fabricated a story called "Hack Heaven." A TNR investigation found that most of Glass's stories had used or had been based on fabricated information. The story of Glass's fall and TNR editor Chuck Lane's handling of the scandal was dramatized in a 2003 film, titled Shattered Glass.Magazine Circulation
The magazine has seen a steady decline in circulation since 2000. According to the publisher's reports, subscriptions dropped from 85,904 in 2002 to 61,124 in 2003, a decrease of 29% in one year.Politics
Domestically, the current version of TNR supports policies first associated with the Democratic Leadership Council and "New Democrats" like former President Bill Clinton and Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman, who received the magazine's endorsement in the 2004 Democratic primary. These policies, while seeking to achieve the ends of traditional social welfare programs, often use market solutions as their means, and so are often called "business-friendly". Typical of some of the policies supported by both TNR and the DLC during the 1990s were increased funding for the Earned Income Tax Credit program and reform of the Federal welfare system.Unsigned editorials prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq expressed strong support for military action, citing the threat of WMD as well as humanitarian concerns. Since the end of major military operations, unsigned editorials, while critical of the handling of the war, have continued to justify the invasion on humanitarian grounds, but no longer maintain that Iraq's WMD facilities posed any threat to the United States.
On June 23, 2006, editor Martin Peretz, in response to criticism of TNR from the blog Daily Kos, wrote the following as a summary of TNR's stances on recent issues, "The New Republic is very much against the Bush tax programs, against Bush Social Security 'reform,' against cutting the inheritance tax, for radical health care changes, passionate about Gore-type environmentalism, for a woman's entitlement to an abortion, for gay marriage, for an increase in the minimum wage, for pursuing aggressively alternatives to our present reliance on oil and our present tax preferences for gas-guzzling automobiles. We were against the confirmation of Justice Alito."[link]
TNR also has its own blog called The Plank, which is written by Michael Crowley, Franklin Foer, Jason Zengerle, and other TNR staff. The Plank is apparently meant to be TNR's sole blog, replacing the magazine's first three blogs, &c., Iraq'd, and Easterblog.
Editors
- Walter Lippmann - (1914-1917)
- Bruce Bliven 1930-1953
- Henry A. Wallace - (1946-1948)
- Martin Peretz - (1975-1979)
- Michael Kinsley - (1979-1981; 1985-1989)
- Hendrik Hertzberg - (1981-1985; 1989-1991)
- Andrew Sullivan - (1991-1996)
- Michael Kelly - (1996-1997)
- Charles Lane - (1997-1999)
- Peter Beinart - (1999-2006)
- Franklin Foer - (2006-present)
Ownership
The magazine is owned by Martin Peretz, New York financiers Roger Hertog and Michael Steinhardt, and Canadian media conglomerate CanWest.Famous contributors
Ordered by period and within period by name:1910s-1940s
- John Dewey, essayist.
- W. E. B. DuBois, professor and sociologist.
- Otis Ferguson, film critic.
- John T. Flynn, essayist, later a New Deal critic.
- George Orwell, essayist.
- Virginia Woolf, essayist and film critic.
1950s-1960s
- Hannah Arendt, essayist.
- Reinhold Niebuhr, essayist.
- Philip Roth, film critic.
1990s-present
- Simon Blackburn, philosopher.
- Jonathan Chait, senior editor.
- Stephen Glass, reporter who was fired when it was discovered he submitted numerous false stories. Glass is the subject of the movie Shattered Glass.
- Matt Groening, illustrator and Simpsons creator.
- Tony Judt, historian
- John Judis, essayist.
- Camille Paglia, essayist.
- Dale Peck, literary reviewer
- Richard Posner, federal judge.
- Amartya Sen, economist.
- Gordon S. Wood, historian.
- James Wood, literary critic.
Trivia
- Editor Franklin Foer is the brother of novelist Jonathan Safran Foer and the author of How Soccer Explains the World : An Unlikely Theory of Globalization (Harper Collins 2004, ISBN 0066212340).
- Lisa Simpson is portrayed as a subscriber to The New Republic for Kids. This is understandable as Matt Groening, the Simpson's creator, wrote for TNR.
- On the HBO series Entourage, character Ari Gold is quoted as asking Eric Murphy: "Do you read The New Republic? Well, I do, and it says that you don't know what the fuck you're talking about."
See also
References
- Mott Frank L. A History of American Magazines. Vol. 3. Harvard University Press, 1960.
- Seideman; David. The New Republic: A Voice of Modern Liberalism 1986
- Steel Ronald. Walter Lippmann and the American Century 1980
Primary sources
- Groff Conklin, ed. New Republic Anthology: 1914-1935, 1936.
- Cowley Malcom. And I Worked at the Writer's Trade 1978.
- Wickenden, Dorothy (1994). The New Republic Reader. ISBN 0-465-09822-3
External links
Notes and references
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