ABOUT EDITORS' WORLD
WHO WE ARE
Editors’ World is an independent, nonpartisan
membership organization for U.S. journalists. Its goal is to give desk editors in mid-sized American media markets access to global information and analysis now enjoyed by only the largest metropolitan news outlets.
Built around a website of international reports written for but not by journalists, Editors’ World seeks to identify for its members important ideas and trends shaping policy and economics across the globe. The goal is to expand editors’ understanding of the way international events affect everyday life in the United States and, then, to encourage a conversation among those whose job it is each day to report and interpret the news for viewers, readers and “surfers.” In doing so, the worldview of local media as well as their audiences should broaden.
The service provides background essays, weekly memos on the state of current affairs, cultural packages gleaned from existing global sites, links to existing coverage of global news events, and weekend briefings that will take members to the source of stories -- all designed for desk editors.
Local media franchises have been shown to have the greatest credibility with the public. More than half of the nation’s households are located outside of the 20 major media markets. By joining Editors’ World, editors, producers and news directors in smaller cities will have the resources to interpret global trends -- through a local market prism -- without having to rely as heavily on national news services to tell important stories that affect everyday life.
WHY AN EDITORS’ WORLD?
The world has come to Main Street, USA, in ways the American public could never have imagined. Outsourcing, immigration, terrorism, trade, tariffs, and multinational business practices are all tied firmly to everyday U.S. life. The local/global nexus is complete. But the system of reporting these issues has not matured.
Citizens need more information about global affairs than ever. Coverage of the school board is, in significant dimension, an international story, given the differential proficiency of young people here and abroad, where the jobs are moving.
In short, the world is changing in ways the American public does not understand. As journalists, there is a different set of questions we must begin to ask about civic affairs, questions independent of politicians’ agendas.
Many resources exist to tell these international affairs stories to audiences steeped in strategic policy analysis. Editors’ World will be tailored to tell these stories to journalists.
By doing so, Editors’ World will endeavor to serve the public interest by giving those responsible for shaping daily news a deeper intellectual well upon which to draw and better questions to ask about global trends, as they relate to life in the United States every day.
WEBSITE
Central to the success of Editors’ World is a website of original essays and other features that set out history, trends and events in different countries and regions – and by subjects that cross international borders. These articles will be written for but not by journalists so that those making editorial choices hear divergent voices of actors on the world stage. Most information will be produced exclusively for the site to give editors new and different tools to evaluate the news.
WHAT ARE OUR PRIORITIES?
Editors' World web site aims to explain how globalization affects much of American life. It reports on individual countries and regions, as they come into the news. But its focus is on its resources on the following interrelated subjects:
• Immigration and migration are currently at the center of the domestic/global policy debate in the U.S. It is affecting communities big and small, urban, suburban, rural. It is the fount of community angst in employment, health care, education, and welfare. The implications are huge, given the nation’s low birth rate, the aging of the U.S. population and the need to have a productive workforce to support future productivity and growth.
• Trade, manufacture and work, as global phenomena, will determine the socio-economic status of the American middle class. General Motors’ plan to offer buyouts to its entire manufacturing work force speaks to the decline of America’s automobile industry, one of the most generous in wages and benefits. The lead in auto manufacturing has moved to Japanese companies and may go to China, which is planning to build a $10,000 car for the international market.
• Globalization and wealth is a correlation global players use to measure benefits of a world economy. Clearly, there are winners and losers. American communities that manufactured cars and parts, textiles, steel, computers or provided service to banking or telecommunications companies describe themselves as losers. But so do workers in China, Japan, France, Russia and a host of countries trying to exploit the global market. What is becoming clear is there is a dynamic force at work that moves freely from country to country, based on wages, technical expertise and cost of production. How this affects the U.S. will determine the future quality of life here.
• China and India are growing, some say, in ways detrimental to the U.S. economy, job market, educational system and defense. President Hu of China’s current visit to the U.S. highlights the increasing competition between what are now the world’s most powerful nations. Much of the global/local story is the unfolding of our relationship with these two countries and how its effects reverberate in cities and towns across this nation in energy prices, interest rates, and outsourcing, to name a few.
• Global Mayhem: terrorism, weapons, wars, civil strife. Most news organizations have concluded that the Iraqi war is consuming most of their available resources for international coverage. But a shift to the left in South America, broader turmoil in the Middle East, including Iran, civil strife in sub-Saharan Africa, and a host of global issues are helping shape the national foreign policy agenda. Editors’ World understands that there are multiple sources of information on these subjects. It will make available to its members more contextual information tailored to meet its members’ needs. And it will provide statistical data to help tell stories more objectively.
• Oil and environmental policy are intertwined globally. The energy needs of developing countries are putting pressure on the demand for oil and raising prices for heating oil and gasoline. That demand is creating international alliances of common interests sometimes at odds with U.S. interests. And the rise in energy demand sometimes results in use of dirtier fuels, believed by scientists to boost global warming.
• Education and competitiveness will determine the future well-being of U.S. children. Rote learning versus curricula that encourage innovative and creative thinking constitute the global battleground in training. Since the late 1960s, U.S. schools made optional traditional science and math requirements. These skills are central to the technical jobs moving from this country to India and China. What is the right national education strategy for the U.S.? How will we as a nation decide what to do?
• Health care issues loom large for the world and the U.S, beginning with the currently ominous possibility of a bird flu pandemic. Also, the scourge of HIV/AIDS has global links, including treatment methods and treatment costs which differ abroad, as do drug prices generally. Nationally, the cost of health care for U.S. workers is a major factor in companies' sending operations to cheaper venues abroad. Differential standards of cost and care around the world make medicine and health care Main Street subjects.
In each of these cases, Editors' World will provide proprietary packages in text and video for members’ exclusive use. These would include original essays, online press briefings in streaming video for websites, broadcasts and cablecasts. The website will include concise Britannica background summaries of every country and significant events in those countries in the last year. It will report results of international polls measuring attitudes of the world community to United States policy and global issues. It will include U.S. census maps that identify populations from around the world resident in members’ communities. It will be encyclopedic in tracking statistics of the world scene, as it relates to everyday U.S. life, including casualties in Iraq, oil production and price, trade deficits, foreign investment in American debt. It will track federal legislation with global impacts for local communities. Some of these provisions are often attached to larger bills but not always detected by the mainstream media. In addition, Editors' World will link to the websites such as the Council on Foreign Relations; the United Nations and its broadcast packages; and New America Media, among other sites that together -- with other offerings --will give desk editors the ability to interpret global news for their communities.
Back to Top
