What world affairs publication(s) should I read?

March 16, 2009 3:42 AM

What world affairs publication(s) should I read?

Since going cold-turkey on mass media consumption, I'm worrying that I might be a bit too ignorant on what's going on in the world. I'm looking for something that covers global politics and issues in a well-rounded and analytical yet not too technical or dumbed-down manner. Doesn't have to be mainstream, but it has to be available in print form because I already have 700+ items in my feed reader.


If it helps, I'm thinking of stuff like the Economist, Le Monde Diplomatique, etc (in terms of subject matter).

posted by parjanya to Media & Arts (24 answers total)

The Economist is always a good bet. It definitely has its editorial slant on economic affairs, but it covers all the things you want it too. For those of us in the US (your profile is location-less), it's also refreshing that the Economist's slant is a stance based on principles rather than parties.
posted by The Michael The at 3:50 AM on March 16, 2009

If you speak german, Der Spiegel is pretty good. They have an international english language version on line, I'm not sure if it's available in print though.
posted by jedrek at 3:51 AM on March 16, 2009

Seconding The Economist as a well-rounded magazine with excellent writing and coverage. I recently bought a print subscription, and though it takes a fair amount of time to work my way through the articles, it's well worth it.

If it tells you anything, the North American Debating standard defines a topic as too esoteric to be debated if "a well-informed University Student who regularly reads The Economist is unaware of the issue".
posted by Phire at 4:04 AM on March 16, 2009

If you desire in-depth texts, Foreign Affairs is good (at least used to be, it's quite a while since I read it).
posted by bjrn at 4:21 AM on March 16, 2009

If you want a daily publication, I would recommend the Financial Times. It covers all international events (not just financial news) and does so in a fairly evenhanded way. It is actually like a daily version of the Economist, except FT does not inject editorial opinion into its news stories.
posted by thrako at 4:33 AM on March 16, 2009

nth'ing the FT and Economist.
posted by Xhris at 4:40 AM on March 16, 2009

International Herald Tribune, the Economist, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and Reuters are some that I use for foreign affairs, int'l business & politics.
posted by icollectpurses at 4:44 AM on March 16, 2009

Response by poster: Oops, forgot to mention I'm in Australia, and I only speak English.
posted by parjanya at 4:45 AM on March 16, 2009

For balance: New Internationalist.
posted by scruss at 4:50 AM on March 16, 2009

Since the Economist comes out weekly it got to be a bit too much for me, but I'm considering trying out their website and blog as a replacement. You might try that. Reading it enabled me to mostly skip the fall in stocks. They'd been saying there was a housing bubble and that it had burst in Australia and Britain already, and that the US was sure to fall any time now. So when the subprime companies starting going and a website started tracking them, I knew it was time to move to treasuries. Your mileage might vary, of course. There's a one page news in brief section that's worth the cost alone though.
posted by jwells at 4:58 AM on March 16, 2009

The Week.
posted by meerkatty at 5:00 AM on March 16, 2009

also Council on Foreign Relations part of Foreign Affairs. Harpers, and The Atlantic frequently have good informative articles. Also keep reading Mefi political threads as many of the links are exceptional.
For a non US take on things I nth The Economist.
posted by adamvasco at 5:02 AM on March 16, 2009

Africa Confidential. (Though it is, obviously, focused on Africa.)
posted by From Bklyn at 6:34 AM on March 16, 2009

While a lot of these sources are very good (Foreign Affairs, the Week, etc.) try Current History . Every month they cover in depth one large geographic unit, this month is Europe. They only offer subscription access to content, but you do get what you pay for.
posted by mfoight at 7:53 AM on March 16, 2009

If you want a daily publication, I would recommend the Financial Times. It covers all international events (not just financial news) and does so in a fairly evenhanded way. It is actually like a daily version of the Economist, except FT does not inject editorial opinion into its news stories.

Quoting for truth. Don't miss this gem. It's more digestible than The Economist (which I love, and receive, but rarely read) and you can take a couple days off without ending up woefully behind. Also, they used a picture of Snidely Whiplash to portray hedge fund managers in an op-ed once (to convey their opinion that no widows and orphans were being tied to any railroad tracks by hedge fund managers), and I laughed so hard in public that I thought someone was going to call the cops.
posted by greekphilosophy at 9:13 AM on March 16, 2009

The New Yorker has articles on international issues frequently, perhaps as often as half of the issues. They are deep and superbly written.
posted by neuron at 10:34 AM on March 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

nthing The Economist. I think it's proof that there is still some value in the print magazine format. (Though I confess to not buying it, or following the news generally, with any great regularity.)

There's even a rap song about it.
posted by adjockey at 11:16 AM on March 16, 2009

(Sorry, here's a working link to the song, via Bellicose Studio.)
posted by adjockey at 11:37 AM on March 16, 2009

I think you should go with your first impulse and get The Economist and Le Monde Diplomatique. Between the two of them you'll get a good overview of world affairs from a variety of viewpoints. If you hunger for long, in-depth reporting on a single issue I have to recommend The Virginia Quarterly Review. It's usually about 50% literature and 50% long form journalism, usually about non-Western issues. They're almost always of very high quality, too.
posted by Kattullus at 12:05 PM on March 16, 2009 [2 favorites]

Seconding Current History. It really is fantastic.
posted by punchdrunkhistory at 2:44 PM on March 16, 2009

VQRBlue: When you subscribe to the aforementioned VQR (thanks, Kattullus!) and mention the Metafilter discount, we'll knock a few bucks off the subscription. (866-239-1394)

Less whorishly (whoringly?), I've got to recommend our competition, The Wilson Quarterly. It's just excellent. A bit dry, but both broad and deep in its coverage, and it's heavily skewed towards international affairs.
posted by waldo at 5:17 PM on March 16, 2009

Response by poster: Thanks everyone!! Haven't decided which one(s) I'll go with yet, but the Economist and FT are definitely out due to the frequency.
posted by parjanya at 3:19 AM on March 17, 2009

Current History and Foreign Affairs can both be pretty good. Sometimes their articles can be out of date by the time they are printed, though, depending how fast things are moving, most of the time it is not an issue, but you won't necessarily know what is happening in Sudan or Thailand TODAY by reading them.

Foreign Affairs gets really annoying when they do articles that are just military/government/diplomatic people justifying their policies or those of the administration or organization they work for, which happens somewhat regularly. On the other hand, Foreign Affairs does help me go to sleep at night, generally a page or two will do me. This fine magazine is also good for propping stuff up, in less than a year you could replace a broken leg on a couch or loveseat.
posted by snofoam at 8:43 AM on March 17, 2009

I used to read the Guardian Weekly for this purpose. I recommend it. It is compact, dense, worldly.

From Wiki: The Guardian Weekly offers a compact digest of four newspapers. It contains articles from The Guardian and The Observer newspapers in the UK, as well as reports, features and book reviews from The Washington Post and articles translated from France's Le Monde newspaper.
posted by hAndrew at 11:52 PM on March 25, 2009