FUNDS FOR A WIDER RANGE OF VOICES - How to pay for a free press

In a media world with one eye on the bottom line and the other on the official line, it's getting harder to publish or broadcast anything that doesn't promise huge sales and attendant profits, and that doesn't say or show what is approved. But it's still possible

André Schiffrin
Le Monde Diplomatique, October 2007

Mindful of the immense influence that television coverage had
on the creation of opposition to the Vietnam war, the Bush
administration wanted to establish a system of
self-censorship in the coverage of the Iraq war and
occupation, a system that worked perfectly during the crucial
first two years, when much of the press went along with the
US government's lies. (Condoleezza Rice had long since - at
least before the war in Afghanistan - summoned the heads of
US networks to tell them that the government did not want to
see wounded civilians on screen.)

This collaboration was not only in mass media but in
publishing. None of the houses owned by the large groups (the
top five of which control 80% of general interest books)
published a single critical book about the Iraq war and
Bush's foreign policy. The many books that did all came from
small, independent firms. It is clear that the conglomerates
decided their policy on political rather than commercial
grounds, since there was a huge anti-Bush audience (Al Gore
had won many more votes than Bush). When the small firm Seven
Stories rushed out a little book by Noam Chomsky after 9/11,
it sold an unprecedented 300,000 copies in a few weeks (1).
As the political situation deteriorated, major US newspapers
and large publishers finally began to publish many critical
books that then jostled on the bestseller lists.

The importance of independent publishers and magazines is
evident, yet the way to set them up and keep them alive is
less obvious. Their number has grown impressively in the US
and in Europe. In France, dozens of small alternative
publishers of literature and poetry, and some political
houses, met recently. They all now play an important role
taking on authors and subjects that large houses dare not
risk. Among them, Agone in Marseille, and Arenes and
Amsterdam in Paris, have been crucial. Another house,
Demopolis, launches this autumn. These independent publishers
have brought out such authors as Chomsky, the US historian
Howard Zinn (Agone) and cultural critics such as Judith
Butler and Stuart Hall (Amsterdam)

It says much about French publishing that important books
used to have to be published in Belgium. Readers of Le Monde
diplomatique are familiar with the saga of Eric Hobsbawm's
history of the 20th century, The Age of Extremes, which I
published in the US in l990 and which was then translated
into dozens of foreign languages, but not French. The major
French publishers were all persuaded that there was no room
in the bookstores for the work of a former communist. It was
only after the intervention of this journal that a Belgian
editor, Complexe, took on the book, which went into the
French bestseller lists. Something similar happened with a
collection of Chomsky's lectures, Understanding Power. In
spite of having sold nearly l00,000 copies in the US, we were
not able to find a French publisher until a small independent
Belgian firm, Aden, took it on.

Bright new ventures

Two of the houses mentioned are venturing into magazines this
autumn. Amsterdam will launch La Revue Internationale des
Livres et des Idées, a French equivalent of the New York
Review of Books. Arene is preparing a book length journal
that will feature reporting by writers whose own papers no
longer give space to lengthy, analytical articles. Patrick de
Saint- Exupéry is taking leave from Le Figaro to direct this.
These journals will face the same difficulties of
distribution and financing as small publishers, but their
great advantage is that they do not need to be capital
intensive. Large conglomerates may well have access to
millions if not billions, but a good list can be built with
thousands. A small edition can be done with only a couple of
thousand euros, which with luck can be earned back quite
quickly. For centuries, publishing was artisanal and can
still succeed as such.

The same can be true of newspapers. Oslo boasts l4 papers,
major titles plus small offset papers published by different
political groups. Most of New York's papers are small outfits
for Asian immigrants. After the liberation of Paris, the city
had about 36 papers, although since there were acute
newsprint shortages all were limited to two pages.

Most small publishers underpay their staff (Agone's workers
are on the minimum wage) or don't pay their publisher or
chief editor. This is not an ideal situation and it can't
last forever. But it also means that an independent publisher
needs only modest support.

Bourdieu's example

Various models been tried around the world. The most famous
is Raisons d'Agir, which Pierre Bourdieu started after his
studies of publishing proved that the larger houses had
severely restrained their political and intellectual content.
Bourdieu started his firm in his office in the College de
France and he and his assistant were its staff. Many books he
published did extremely well, some selling hundreds of
thousands. A university space (and a professor's salary) have
been misused elsewhere with excellent results. A primary
publisher of European fiction in the US is Dalkey Archive,
based at the State University of Illinois, which has granted
a professor part time employment to run the press. When we
started The New Press we were offered free offices in a
dilapidated building at the City University of New York,
which saved hundreds of thousands in rent. There is no reason
why other universities could not share space in this way.
Small towns have handed over old school buildings to
publishers, a way in which progressive municipalities could
help even if national governments are unwilling.

Another interesting model was tried by Ordfront in Stockholm.
This group has built a reader cooperative of 30,000 members
paying a modest EUR
20 a year for a subscription to one of the best magazines in
Sweden, which also allows the publication of a limited number
of books a year. If only 10% of members opt for a book, its
costs are covered. This experiment has been far more
successful than authors' cooperatives in Sweden and in
Germany, which failed to overcome rivalry and jealousy.

The US and Britain have a range of university presses (over
100 in the US, though they account for a mere 1% of books
sold). In theory, these could be a vibrant alternative to
commercial presses, but they have too often reflected the
conservatism of their faculties. They are also under
profit-making pressures because universities have followed
the capitalist model.

When Pantheon Books in New York, which I directed for 30
years, was faced with the profit demands of new conglomerate
ownership, I decided that a not-for-profit publishing house
was the only way to continue with a list of uncompromising
intellectual quality. We started a university press without a
university, which meant we could address non-academic
readers. The New Press this year celebrates its l5th
anniversary, with 80 titles a year, though many had predicted
it could not succeed. But we had the exceptional support of
most of my authors over the years and substantial help from
many of the more enlightened foundations in the US, which had
long ago realised that cultural activity, music, dance,
theatre and even intelligent television could not survive in
a capitalist context and were willing to see if we could
extend their logic to publishing.

This was more possible in the US than in many other
countries. But this framework already supports many of
Europe's best newspapers. In Britain The Guardian and its
companion Sunday newspaper, The Observer, have long belonged
to a non-profit-making foundation, the Scott Trust. The
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung belongs to a foundation, as do
most of Denmark's newspapers.

Not for profit

Newspapers and book publishers that belong to independent,
not-for-profit foundations or cooperatives may be the best
way to preserve political and cultural autonomy. This
solution might have saved such major publishers as Le Seuil
and Einaudi from being sold to conglomerates whose primary
objective is profitability. For centuries publishing averaged
an annual profit of 3-4%; the conglomerates want at least
l0%, if not l5%, which changes the nature of what can be
published.

The German philosopher Jurgen Habermas recently put the case
for extending the not-for-profit idea to more newspapers (2).
Since Germany's most important left of centre paper, the
Süddeutsche Zeitung (Bavarian, but among the top three
dailies) might be sold to a conglomerate, he argued for a
government-supported foundation to take it over. His idea has
not been widely accepted in Germany, which has unhappy
memories of government control. But there have been the
successful examples of Arte and France Culture as ways of
establishing government support for the media. In France, the
film industry and many cinemas have for years enjoyed
widespread subsidies without censorship (as far as we know).

Throughout the West, radio and television were initially seen
as having an intellectual and cultural role. In the US even
the conservative Herbert Hoover decided that all radio
stations should be based in universities to avoid commercial
control. The BBC was given the benefit of an annual licence
fee, directly connected to the sale and use of all radio (and
later television) sets, that went directly to the
corporation, bypassing governmental control, and is now
around £135.50 per household. There is no reason why this
could not support independent newspapers and book publishers.
A tax on advertising revenue or other sources could assure
the economic stability of media free of advertising.

Habermas eloquently argues that a vital democratic debate
depends on governmental intervention to guarantee a plurality
of views to the public. Sarkozy's France won't have this, but
there is no reason why the left should not begin to prepare
alternatives and new ideas for elections to come. We have
seen in the US that such issues can mobilise mass support;
over 3m letters, led by NGOs of the left and right, were sent
to Congress to protest against Bush's plans for entrenching
conglomerate control.

Many small publishers and magazines are struggling bravely
against difficult economic situations, and may in the end
lose. There is no reason why their limited resources should
not be helped by legislative action. The French state helps
new enterprises by supporting up to half their start-up
loans, but this support does not extend to cooperatives or
foundations. Most publishers could thrive happily under such
not-for-profit ownership and there could be alternatives to
the decisions that were taken by the owners of Le Seuil or
will be taken by the shareholders of the Süddeutsche (both
are family owned enterprises as is common in publishing).
Conglomerate control has dangerous political and intellectual
consequences for media. There is still time to control and
reverse this global threat.
________________________________________________________

(1) Noam Chomsky, Power and Terror: Post 9/11 Talks and
Interviews (Seven Stories Press, New York, 2003).

(2) Translated in Le Monde, Paris, 22 May 2007

André Schiffrin is director of the not-for-profit publishers
The New Press, New York, and author of A Political Education
(Melville House Pub, Hoboken, NJ, 2007