2023-05-25 20:00:33
Dhe news magazine “Der Spiegel” gets a new editor-in-chief. It is not a freshly flown-in young star with digital merits, but a so-called noble feather from our own ranks. Dirk Kurbjuweit60, will take over the post from the editor-in-chief who has been in office since 2019 Steffen Klusmann take over. The decision for a proven print man needs explanation.
Because although Kurbjuweit has some management experience, he was head of the capital city office and deputy editor-in-chief of the magazine. But the author, who has won several journalism awards, stands above all for the classic “Spiegel” culture and less for new beginnings and digital innovation. This is of course not to be underestimated as a signal to the advocates of print magazines – but for the role of editor-in-chief of one of the most important news offers in the republic in 2023 it is already a malus.
Unless, of course, the part-time novelist Kurbjuweit (“The Excursion” was last published in 2022) is actually primarily or exclusively responsible for the printed edition of “Spiegel”, which sold around 700,000 copies a week in the first quarter of the year. In a 2014 essay, “The principle of printKurbjuweit wrote: “Call me a fat cat if you like, but don’t be so ignorant of print. Because then you are ignorant of the time and the miracle of the letters.” Kurbjuweit, meanwhile, emphasizes the Spiegel publishing house, should not only take over the print business, but also take care of the digital strategy.
Kurbjuweit’s predecessor, Klusmann, 57, who held back as an author, has worked intensively since he took over the dovetailing of the print and online editorial offices, which had previously operated separately. There are different opinions as to whether he pushed ahead with this merger, which means an unparalleled internal effort, well, satisfactorily or too slowly – but it is clear that he actually got the project implemented, which had failed under previous editors-in-chief. It almost goes without saying, however, that such a process, for example when filling department head positions, also creates resentment among those who lose their jobs.
After the Fall Relotius
A plus point in Klusmann’s testimony is that he handled the scandal surrounding the story creator Claas Relotius surprisingly well. The forgeries became public at the end of 2018, i.e. almost at the same time as he took office. A hastily convened commission researched on its own behalf and submitted one final report before. The editorial processes and the fact checks should finally have been adjusted. Economically, the scandal never really seems to have harmed the magazine.
Has been editor-in-chief of “Spiegel” since 2019: Steffen Klusmann
Source: dpa/Marcus Brandt
It is interesting, however, that Dirk Kurbjuweit also appears in the Relotius final report. Once by name, once without naming. Kurbjuweit, who was a member of the editor-in-chief of “Spiegel” at the time, is named because he had “quiet doubts” about a story: “Kurbjuweit was surprised at the poor quality of a text by Relotius, which he himself wrote to him in commissioned.” He was only informed about the forgeries themselves two days before the public disclosure of the scandal.
Kurbjuweit is not named in the report as the author of the text “snakes and ghosts‘ from 2004. It’s about a ‘local appointment’ at the Frankfurt Book Fair. In the part of the Relotius report, “further cases” and “manipulations for dramaturgical reasons” are mentioned. “Some authors,” it says, “develop great artistry in the design of the dramaturgy.” The opening of Kurbjuweit’s text is then quoted: “When Martin Walser hears the rumor that he has not won the Nobel Prize for Literature, he freezes a long moment. His face turns to marble, smooth, motionless, impenetrable. He’s silent, then it looks like he’s addressing a few words to himself. He nods. Elfriede Jelinek won, an Austrian, a woman who writes German.”
According to the report, Martin Walser wrote an “indignant” letter to the editor of “Spiegel”. Kurbjuweit was therefore not at or with Walser at the moment described: “These tragic facial expressions, which the Spiegel colleague stages in my good-natured face, seem to me to be invented,” Walser wrote in the letter.
According to the report, when asked by the investigative commission, Kurbjuweit replied that he had not written in the text that Walser had heard about Jelinek’s profit from himself: “The first paragraph only and correctly describes how Walser reacted to the rumor that someone else had won.” Nevertheless, a different impression is given, to which the author replied: “It’s a bit complicated, maybe a bit crooked, but there’s nothing wrong here.”
Power struggle behind the scenes
The fact that there is a change at the top of the “Spiegel” is due to a power struggle that is taking place behind the scenes at the publishing house. In the past few months, there have been increasing arguments between Steffen Klusmann and Stefan Ottlitz, one of the publisher’s two managing directors. The management was able to announce a good balance sheet for the past year on Wednesday, with a profit of over 40 million euros, combined with thanks to the editor-in-chief.
In fact, the question is who sets the direction for the implementation of the digital transformation in the company – the management or the editor-in-chief. Employees KG, which owns 50.5 percent and thus a majority in the publishing house, has apparently sided with the management and thus opposed the current editor-in-chief.
Steffen Klusmann, it was said on Thursday evening, was leaving the publisher “by mutual agreement”. Co-Managing Director Thomas Hass says: “We owe Steffen Klusmann a great deal of thanks for his groundbreaking work over the past five years, above all for merging the print and online editorial departments and the success of our digital subscription strategy.”
And further: “We could not have imagined anyone better in the past few years and very much regret that in the end we were not able to continue our always very good cooperation for the future. We wish Steffen only the best.”
Klusmann himself is quoted in the statement as follows: “It has been a great honor for me to have worked for the Spiegel editorial team for the past five years. We have achieved a great deal together. Recently, however, the management and I have all too often failed to reach agreement on crucial strategic issues – which has now resulted in my resignation.”
Stefan Ottlitz says about the new editor-in-chief Dirk Kurbjuweit: “Dirk Kurbjuweit has a clear picture of how our journalism, both digital and print, needs to be further developed between speed and depth, and he has shown, both as an author and in managerial positions, how to create the profile of the Spiegel.” Kurbjuweit himself is quoted as follows: “Especially in these turbulent times, the claim of the Spiegel must be to deliver the best possible journalistic quality on the Internet every day and at the kiosk every week and thus do justice to the trust of our readers .”
Lots of warm words after a very chilly time.
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