Diplomatic Le Monde

diplomatic Le Monde is a monthly French of information and opinion, founded in May 1954 by Hubert Beuve-Méry on the initiative of a former diplomat of Hungarian origin become journalist, François Honti. It constituted initially a supplement with the daily newspaper Le Monde intended for the “diplomatic circles and large the International organizations”.

Data on the structure and the capital

In 2006, the edition French E draws with 300  000 specimens.

Formerly simple supplement of the daily newspaper, the “ Diplo ” acquired its autonomy gradually. Following the accession with the direction of the World of Jean-Marie Colombani, it becomes about it a Filiale in which the journalists have a share from approximately 25%, joined by the readers made up in association of the Amis of the diplomatic World . Drafting and readers hold with them two 49% of the capital of the “ Diplo ”. The editorial team is present in Association Günter Holzmann, of the name of a generous giver who allowed the launching of this operation.

These shares, much higher than the Minority of blocking (33,34%), confer on the drafting a leading independence and the newspaper a relative political independence with respect to the group Le Monde . For example, the director of the publication is eligible only on a proposal from the personnel of the newspaper. Although the economic independence of the diplomatic Monde with respect to the group Le Monde is limited, this last does not intervene in the leading line of the newspaper.

The “ Diplo ” is present at the capital of the Cybermonde editions (33% of the edition in Spain) and diplomatic Le Monde Arab editions .

Property for half of the group Le Monde, it preserves its leading and financial independence vis-a-vis other great groups of media (newspapers, radios, televisions) held by private conglomerates of the armament (Dassault, Groupe Lagardere) and BTP (Bouygues). In addition, the newspaper affirms to preserve its leading line with respect to the pressures of the advertisers by limiting the share of its incomes generated by the Publicité. In fact, the of income coming from publicity is limited to 5%, figure largely lower than the other newspapers of which on average the half of the turnover comes from publicity.

The best articles of the diplomatic Monde are joined together in a review two-monthly set of themes called Manière of seeing .

A team of nine permanent journalists (in 2006) ensures the drafting of a small portion of the articles, the majority being written by Intellectuel S of varied origins (mainly of the academics French and American, but so Spanish, Mexican or Indian, such as for example by the writer Manuel Vazquez Montalban at the time of a maintenance of 1999 with the Under-commander Marcos). Writers collaborate in it in a more occasional way. As from 1989, the impression on the new rotary printing-presses of the World with Ivry and the passage to the Berliner Format made it possible to introduce the color. On the initiative of Claude Julien, the monthly magazine consequently illustrated its articles of reproductions of contemporary works of art, chosen a long time by Solange Brand.

International editions

The diplomatic Monde appears with at the end of 2006 in 25 languages, of which the Esperanto, through 60 international editions including more than 30 printed (with a total pulling of 1,9 million specimens) and 31 electronic.

As of the years 1975, two editions appeared in Portugal and in Greece, followed in the years 1980 by an edition in Spanish and an Arabic edition. At the end of the years 1990, the movement develops: German and Italian since 1995, edition southern Cone in South America, then Greek. The movement develops with Russian, Polish, the Hindi, Korean, etc With the printed versions are added new electronic editions (farsi, Japanese, Catalan, Esperanto, etc). The foreign editions take various forms: monthly magazine, monthly or weekly of another title of press, quarterly supplement, etc With the simple translation of the articles of the French edition are added up to 20% of articles written by the local edition.

The anglophone edition was born into 1999 from a partnership with The Guardian Weekly . The Arabic editions are now carried out in Paris by a partner subsidiary company of has Concept Mahfoum .

5 at the end of 1996 per 500.000 printed specimens, the total of the foreign editions passed to 6 at the end of 97,7 at the end of 98 (700 000 specimens), 10 at the end of 99,13 at the end of 2000 (1 million specimens), 16 end 2001,22 at the end of 2003,25 at the end of 2004 (1,5 million specimens), 27 at the end of 2005,33 at the end of 2006, which cover the essence of Europe, of Arab world and South America.

Leading line

The diplomatic Monde treats a large variety of subjects of planetary importance , and initially of the international relations, but also of cultural subjects (articles treating for example music Techno or Californian radio KPFA, emblem of the American Contre-culture). It is a newspaper of documentation, investigation and opinion.

Formerly holding of a leading line third-mondiste, characterized in the years 1960 by the interest carried to the new States born of the fights of Decolonization, the newspaper wants to be critical of all Impérialisme, inter alia American. Since the end of the Cold war, the newspaper approached the movement Alter-universalization, being done one of the heralds of the criticism of the néo-liberal universalization . It thus supported the fight of the Zapatistes, movement of guerilla Mexican proclaimed in 1995, the very same day of the implementation of ALENA (Agreement of Free trade of North America), inter alia by publishing articles of the Under-commander Marcos.

The famous leading article of Ignacio Ramonet, published in 1995, thus put in circulation the term of “Doctrinaire approach” to criticize the dogma néolibéral. Thus, Ignacio Ramonet could write in a leading article:

“In this respect, the China constitutes an academic case and pre-empts the question which will arise tomorrow in connection with the India, of the Brésil, the Russia or the South Africa: how to tear off billion people to the distress of the Underdevelopment without plunging them in a model productivist and consumption “to the Occident ale”, harmful for planet and mortal for the whole of humanity? ”

Anxious to maintain its independence with respect to any political organization (partisane, trade-union, associative or religious) until the end of the years 1990, the drafting took an active share in emergence, in France, of nebula Altermondialiste. Thus, it is following the publication of a leading article written by Ignacio Ramonet in December 1997 that association ATTAC was created. The fight of ATTAC against the Tax shelters and the Bank secrecy was partially relayed in the newspaper. The newspaper is also on the initiative and founding member of the French Observatoire of the media, created following the Worldwide social forum of Porto Alegre in 2002.

critical Le Monde diplo thus today, by the means of rigorous and detailed articles, which the philosopher Toni Negri calls néolibéral “the Empire”, concept which includes not only the United States or the Triade (the USA, European Union, Japan) but also the whole of the International institutions (the IMF, the World Bank, OMC, etc). It publishes articles also regularly criticizing the French Oligarchie or the “hyperbourgeoisy” world. Some are not deprived to underline the little of eagerness of COB (Securities and Exchange Commission) to announce to justice the doubtful operations) to avoid paying the Income tax.

He wants to be also a defender of the Individual freedoms, criticizing the “sedentary drift” following the Attentats of September 11th, 2001.

The monthly magazine is also engaged in the fight against the historical Révisionnisme, as well with regard to the Génocide of the European Jews as the colonial massacres or dependant on colonialism (Massacre of October 17th, 1961, critical of the human Zoos or the way whose Republic manages the Archives, etc) the newspaper is shown nevertheless open to the debate, as this critic of the work of Pascal Blanchard shows it on the “human zoos” by Claude Liauzu within the pages of Diplo, which was worth a right of reply on behalf of Blanchard.

DEBATEs around the diplomatic World

Criticisms of the leading line

Charges of kindness with Fidel Castro

Philippe Val, editor association of Charlie Hebdo and cofounder of ATTAC, showed the drafting of the diplomatic Monde , and Ignacio Ramonet in particular, of a friendship with the leaders Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez. Bernard-Henri Levy denounces to him also a position which would be according to him moderate with respect to the Communist regime of Fidel Castro with Cuba. The newspaper does not hesitate however to evoke the authoritarian abuses of the mode castrist: “At the beginning of the month of April 2003, the world taught to the marked unacceptable sorrows with Havana against opponents not violent one. ”

About these charges, Ignacio Ramonet denounces a “primary education anticastrism” and answers in April 2002:

“On the plan of freedoms Cuba , the things are far from being satisfactory, as diplomatic Le Monde did not fail to announce it. And the last report/ratio of Amnesty International on Cuba notes that “at least thirteen people considered by Amnesty International as of the prisoners of opinion were behind the bars with the end of the year 2000”. It is serious but it is far from being the “announced Gulag”. The report/ratio announces neither Torture, neither “disappearance”, nor Assassinat. Not a case. Whereas in very close “democracies” - Guatemala, Honduras, Haiti, even with the Mexico or the Brazil - trade unionists, opponents, Journalist S, priest S, Maire S continue to be assassinated…”

On the treatment of the israélo-Palestinian conflict

About the israélo-Palestinian Conflict, the diplomatic Monde adopted a very critical line with regard to the policy of the State of Israel. In particular, the newspaper reproaches this last for not having respected the various resolutions of the Safety advice and the General meeting of UNO since 1947 like its policy of settlement of the occupied Palestinian Territoires.

This position is seen by certain as a charge with regard to Israel to be “the single person in charge of the problems of a peace which is long in coming”. The reproach is made with the newspaper share the pro-Palestinian sights of a certain number of personalities which intervene regularly in its columns, like the journalist Michel Warschawski, the scenario writer Simone Bitton, the doctor and former president of Doctors without borders Rony Brauman, the journalist Uri Avnery and the historian post-Zionist Ilan Pappé.

A study of Samuel Ghiles-Meilhac, appeared in 2006, recalls the history of the Monde diplo and its standpoint, in particular with regard to the Middle East. Samuel Ghiles-Meilhac points out that in 1954 the “Newspaper of the consular and diplomatic circles”, monthly magazine with the service of the diplomats, was favorable to Israel, just as the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. But just like the Ministry for Foreign Affairs after the War of the Six-Jours, the newspaper changed after 1967. Under the direction of Claude Julien, it became, according to Samuel Ghiles-Meilhac, a newspaper of the radical left, “asserting itself engaged and militant, intellectual guarantee of the left third-mondiste, central element of the French movement of solidarity with the Palestinians”.

According to Samuel Ghiles-Meilhac, much of collaborators of the newspaper are engaged in the support of the Palestinian cause: Amnon Kapeliouk, Joseph Algazy, Michel Warchawski, Samir Kassir, Eric Roller, Edward Saïd, Etienne Balibar, Alain Gresh, Dominique Vidal and Serge Halimi.

The diplomatic Monde also calls on several tendencies of the Israeli left  : Amram Mitzna or Yossi Beilin of the Israeli Workers party but also with Palestinian intellectuals of various tendencies  : Edward Saïd, Mahmoud Darwich or Fayçal Husseini.

About the Zionism

In the weekly magazine the Point of the October 3rd 2003, Alain Finkielkraut said in connection with the diplomatic Monde  : “For diplomatic Le Monde and Télérama , all the Zionists are dogs, almost all the Jews are Zionists and thus dogs, except Rony Brauman, this Jew which saves the honor. ”

In a leading article published on the site of the newspaper, Dominique Vidal defines clearly the position of the diplomatic Monde with regard to the Sionisme  : “ diplomatic Le Monde right to the existence and safety of Israel like one of the conditions sine qua non of a peace fair and lasting in the Middle East. ”

However, in March 2007, the newspaper publishes a fascinating article position in favor of a State Bi-national. What consequently would involve the end of the State of Israel.

Polemics on the anti-semitism

The magazine the Arch denounces the attitude of the association of the Friends of the diplomatic Monde for its support for the book of Alain Ménargues, the Wall of Sharon , whom he judges anti-semite. The editor association of the Arch , Méir Waïntrater, reproached the silence of Dominique Vidal from the exit of the book. Dominique Vidal finally denounced in July 2005, in the columns of the diplomatic Monde , the passages of the book taking again of the judged topics anti-semites by the Arch . He writes: " Characteristics of propaganda anti-semite, these theses essentialists - that us kids being the Islam as of Christianity - are as absurd as dangereuses." (http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/2005/07/VIDAL/12442).

Alain Ménargues denounces what he regards as “the traditional technique of the amalgam and the hazardous syllogism, used by the Arch in his case as for all those which criticize the Israeli policy of Édgar Morin while passing through Pascal Boniface and Daniel Mermet. A technique - described by the lawyer Guillaume Weil-Raynal in his book an imaginary Hatred (editions Armand Colin, 2005) - which consists with the systematic use of the Antisémitisme to stop very critical real and serious of the Israeli policy. ” He says to be astonished that a monthly magazine which wants to be opened with the debate as the “ Diplo ” yields so that he judges being of the " pressures injustifiées".

These charges taken again by the drafting are such that they involve the resignation in block of the jury of the literary prize of the Friends of the diplomatic Monde (placed under the sponsorship of the Nobel Prize Dario Fo and Jose Saramago as well as scenario writer Costa Gavras and of the writer Jose Luis Sampedro) who had retained the Wall of Sharon among the 29 selected for his price 2005, and an internal crisis which is at the origin of one change to the head of the drafting.

Polemics on publicity

Criticisms as for the appearance of advertisements in the newspaper emanate sometimes from part of the readers. Generally, the reproaches relate to Publicité S for activities of which the newspaper, in addition, critical operating process. For example complementary health, banking services or medicinal products. They estimate that these advertisements could affect the leading Ligne and, in particular, to limit the Freedom of expression on the topics in question.

In particular, two publicity campaigns met an important flood of criticisms. In November and December 2003, advertisements for IBM and a make of car occupied two complete pages. In the editions of February and March 2004 appeared advertisements of Microsoft, destroyer of the Free software, while at the same time monthly magazine had published articles favorable to the free software and than it uses them for his Internet site.

In answer to these criticisms, the leading team brings two answers:

  • it affirms not to control the contents of the advertisements, which are decided by a Advertizing agency;
  • especially, it points out that the newspaper leaves only the strict minimum like places at the Publicité (as well in the pages as in its finances) and made its possible to decrease it further.

The newspaper also published critical articles on publicity.

Dissensions within the drafting

At the end of 2005, of the dissensions appear within association ATTAC, recutting those within the diplomatic Monde . The divergences between Bernard Cassen, Jacques Nikonoff, Ignacio Ramonet and Maurice Lemoine on the one hand, Dominique Vidal and Alain Gresh on the other hand, lead the latter to resign in January 2006 of their position of director of drafting of the diplomatic Monde , remaining members of the drafting as journalists.

The daily newspaper Libération estimates that “Alain Gresh and Dominique Vidal are located in a current of “left internationalist” which is opposed to a mobility Chevènement ist or “main road-republican”, where one finds, with nuances, Bernard Cassen and new editor association, Maurice Lemoine. ” Always according to the daily newspaper, the tensions come in particular from divergences on the question of the Laïcité and the veil, the position of Ignacio Ramonet about the cuban mode and of dissensions about the Colombian FARCS.

Composition of the drafting

The directory will be renewed with effect at January 1st, 2008.

References

External bonds

The site of the newspaper was one of the first to use SPIP.

  • Internet site of the newspaper

  • the list of the international editions
  • friends of the diplomatic World

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