Back in 1994 the internet existed but wasn’t exactly widespread. This meant that access to international information meant access to print media. One of the publications you could find every 15 days was The Nation.
The Nation is a historical magazine. It was founded in 1865 and in its first form was built by people who were supporters of the abolition of work. In the intervening years, and especially from the New Deal era onwards, the Nation managed to establish itself as a publication that represented a progressive and, in some cases, leftist position. It has had somewhat of a parallel history with The New Republic, although the latter has gradually shifted further to the right, closer to the views of the “center” line of the Democratic Party, while the Nation has always been somewhere between the left of the Democratic Party and the rest of the Left.
Viktor Navasky at the helm of The Nation
Navaski, who passed away on January 23, 2023, at the age of 90, was the one who made the Nation gain significant appeal, which it maintains to this day. He opened the magazine to the left, secured very good quality pieces, and ensured that some of the best minds in American (and beyond) journalism would have columns in the magazine. Just think that in the 1990s you could read columns by Alexander Cockburn, Christopher Hitchens, Patricia Williams, Catha Pollitt, Joan Wipijewski later and Naomi Klein and others. You could also (and still can) read Calvin Trillin, the magazine’s Deadline Poet.
And all this along with excellent articles, very well written and well documented. The Nation essentially opened a window to “progressive” America, the one that discussed the problems of prisons and the need to stop practices such as the treatment of minors as adults by the penal system, the persistent maintenance of inequalities, the role of multinationals, the problems of American foreign policy. And all this with exemplary texts from a journalistic point of view.
Navasky played an important role in all this. After all, he too had an important journalistic and writing career and a special column. He was also the one who ensured that the magazine had viable ownership structures (which included, among others, the staunchly progressive Paul Newman). And he who defended the value of having “magazines of opinion” of all political shades.
The Nation later moved into the digital age as well, although it relies heavily on the significant number of print subscribers it has. But it still maintains a particularly high profile and offers high-quality journalism and opinion. In a move to meet new traditions in journalism, Baskar Sunkara, the young creator of the Jacobin magazine, now participates in a top position.
The internet is shaping a new relationship between readers and texts, with a much greater supply of material, but also without all the ritual involved in reading a magazine or newspaper, including waiting for the issue to arrive.
However, it does not reduce the need for good journalism, nor, unfortunately, the difficulty of finding its rightful place despite the objective expansion of the “journalistic product”. Because good journalism never just provides “information”. It’s never just about the update. Good journalism offers ways of thinking, ways of seeing and understanding the world, and that is why it ultimately also has a deeply pedagogical role, shaping the very perception, reflection and practice of readers. And this is, admittedly, a particularly profound responsibility. Viktor Navasky belonged to a generation of journalists who decided to take on this responsibility.
