'One of those snooty British things'

By Rebecca Finkel

     It's terrible when the British have words.
     In June, The New Republic ran a story by noted British writer Andrew Sullivan bashing, of all things, The Economist. Sullivan, a witty writer on so many topics, calls the British newsweekly "a kind of Reader’s Digest for the overclass."
By overclass he means America’s corporate elite.
     "It’s written in the kind of Oxbridge prose that rips felicitously into one ear and out the other, and it subtly flatters some Americans into feeling that they are sitting in on a combination of an English senior common room and a seminar at Davos," writes Sullivan.
       These are harsh words. They get harsher. "The closer you look, the weaker [The Economist] gets. Beneath the shrewd blizzard of one-liners, Oxford Union ripostes, and snazzy graphs, the little secret of The Economist is that it actually contains less original reporting than many other newsmagazines." Truth be told, writes Sullivan, the magazine relies on stringers to rip off reporting from other publications.
      Sullivan blasts the magazine for its lush profitability--$40 million or so a year—its stiff subscription price--$125 a year—and its wealthy American readership.
     Why are Americans so enamored of a magazine with so many failings? A genius for marketing, explains Sullivan.
     Officially, The Economist offers no response to Sullivan’s attack. But that’s officially.
      Unofficially U.S. marketing director Humphry Rolleston has a lot to say.
    "We were slightly stunned," says Rolleston of the story, which ran on The New Republic’s cover. "That The Economist was more important than Kosovo or the new governments in Israel or South Africa to put on the front pages is bewildering."
     "I can't imagine we'd put The New Republic on the front page of The Economist," he says. "Why their readers would be interested in us is bewildering. It's just weird."
      He dismisses Sullivan’s attack as "one of those snooty British things." Says Rolleston: "They're just jealous because we make so much money."
       "This is a tribute to the fact that we are successful. I can't imagine this would have happened when I first came to America. Now that we are visible we are a fair target. We have become respectable," says Rolleston, who has been in the U.S. 16 years.
     He notes that while Sullivan takes issue with reliability of some of The Economist’s market predictions—the writer suggests that investors who followed the magazine’s advice would soon be unable to afford a subscription—The New Republic has some creditability issues of its own to deal with. The political journal got a lot of unwanted attention a year or so ago when one of its most respected young writers was exposed for fabricating stories.
       "I quite like The New Republic," says Rolleston. "They make up their stories. What was it? The editor of Forbes had to point out to them that the companies they were reporting on didn't exist. Oh, I enjoy the magazine."
       Rolleston finds only one contention in the Sullivan piece that he's inclined to agree with: Sullivan's back-handed praise for The Economist's marketing acumen.
"He said we have brilliant marketing. Call me crazy but I'm not going to disagree with that."

-Rebecca Finkel is a staff writer for Media Life.