thanks. The demise of the broadsheets which you say has happened in the US has been commented on a lot. One easy ‘explanation’ for that is all this blogging: people reading blogger’s analyses and reading the same stories as in the newspapers for free on the internet (a mild form of stealing) in stead of buying a broadsheet. Both effects of the internet reduce the extent to which people are interested in and prepared to pay the analyses in broadsheets. Whether the net effect is a dumbing down of mainstream public debate depends on whether one believes that the greater availability of top-tier analyses on the internet compensates for the lowering of content in the tv and newspapers. My hunch is that it doesnt but I havent seen any solid evidence on the matter.

i’ll second disinterested observer on financial times, though it scores appallingly on proximity & availability outside hotel chains & airport lounges. the weekend edition is staggeringly good. diverse, and top shelf writing – journalism, and other genres.

the lazy notion that “us papers are the best” is unfortuantely being dismantled week on week. ownership changes, panics of the web economies have seen staff and skillsets spiralling, and while the LA Times can still lay claim to being “very good”, it’s sadly slipped from “great”, and the future ain’t as bright as one would hope.

oh, weekend australian is a very good read. puts the fairfax broads into a ditch. don’t know why it’s so hysterical and nonsensical through the business week though.

I think the SMH is close to the bottom of the barrel – but the Fin is pretty good. I actually get it delivered.

Patrick, I really don’t think that American newspapers are any better or worse than other newspapers in other countries – there’s a lot more of them, to be sure, but most of them are shite. magazines, on the other hand, and they have some real crackers, but we’re not including mags, right? Otherwise I would second Jimmy and say The Economist isn’t the evil it’s sometimes painted as, and would add Foreign Policy, New Yorker, etc. etc.

the criterion ‘quality of analysis’ is an interesting one. The first thing one then thinks about is whether there are some truly professional newspapers providing high-level analysis of something. Again, chess papers or specialised magazines on, say, computers or car maintenance come to mind. In terms of depths of expertise and IQ of the writers it will be hard to beat outlets along those lines. Indeed, if quality of analysis is indeed all that counts perhaps we should include some scientific publications that provide almost daily updates as ‘the best’. Clearly hence again, analysis alone is not enough to earn the accolade ‘the best’. What is covered also matters, as well as whether it is read and whether it makes a difference.

All in all, if we’re allowed to count online publications as newspapers (and I think in this modern age that’s not too bad since many people only read online newspapers anyway), my vote would be for the BBC. Sure the BBC is known for television but I would count their website as a newspaper. It covers the whole world, it has in-depth analysis of many areas, and they have day-to-day information on events on every continent. And of course they have far more resources than other ‘newspapers’. They’d hence make a good showing on nearly all the criteria raised. But I’d certainly not say they are ‘unquestionably’ the best.

I think it is almost universally thought that American newspapers provide greater depth and quality of analysis and resources than any other – at least amongst people I know!

I think the Australian is clearly the best Aussie. At least they try and be investigative and write analysis, which is an improvement on the SMAge.

French newspapers are incomparable, for better or for worse. They are almost wholly government funded and are read by miniscule minorities. They have some strengths (feature length articles, philosophy, coverage of French Presidents and coverage of the Catholic church most prominently). They have a lot of weaknesses such as economics (apparently irrelevant) and current affairs (ie, no French mainstream paper would have told you that Mitterand was a sleazy amoral unprincipled dog until five years ago – I think that’s a newspapers major job, so I consider that a major weakness).

I think that a newspaper that needs to rely on being as accurate as possible if it is to sell – like the FT – has the best incentives to be a good newspaper, and as we all know incentives matter.

While sentimentally I am in the Guardian camp, I wouldn’t rely on it for accuracy. Indeed, with most newspapers now I feel that they write some of their stories to satisfy their perceived readership – this is what has dragged the Guardian and the Independent downhill – i’ll read them if I feel I want my prejudices confirmed, but if I want to know what actually happened (wie est eigentlich gewesen?), its the FT.

the phrase ‘more objectively’ here is meant in the sense of being open about the criteria under which to judge. By explicitly saying ‘lets take criterion X as the measure of good’ one allows an outside observer to judge whether the newspaper under review is indeed the best one under criterion X. It does not require that observer to agree with criterion X. There is still of course a moral judgment involved in choosing the criterion but one has reduced the scope for subjectivity in the application of that criterion by making it open to outside scrutiny.

one could more objectively judge what the best newspapers were and hence which papers would be suitable contenders for the title best newspaper in the world.

What does “objective” mean here? Don’t think it means much.

Yeah, and I’m waiting to see what happens post-Murdoch.

The Guardian,
Der Speigel,
NY Times
LA Weekly (used to be, less so now).
Le Monde (specifically Le Monde Diplomatic)

In Australia, the SMH wins by a cruddy default. I wouldn’t put it with the others in terms of quality.

In AsiaPac, it’s a bit harder, I don’t read a lot, and there’s not a lot of english available, I guess Taipei Times, but don’t really have the experience to make the call.