I took out my first subscription to the Neue Zürcher Zeitung in 1950, when I began my studies at the University of Bern. I have been a loyal reader every day for 66 years. That is why the news that the NZZ no longer wanted to employ a correspondent in Ticino felt like a breach of trust from an old friend.
But this is not just about the sensitivities of a long-time subscriber. No, the editor-in-chief's decision to only report from southern Switzerland with freelance contributors is a mistake. The NZZ is shirking its journalistic responsibility.
What it means when newspapers no longer have hong kong rcs data correspondents on the ground is evident in the USA. After the election of Donald Trump, the New York Times and other major daily newspapers published countless admissions of guilt: the papers admitted that for years they had done without correspondents who were familiar with the feelings and conditions of rural America. The newspapers preferred to concentrate on cosmopolitan life along both coasts, from New York to Miami, from Seattle to Los Angeles. Or on the political and economic centers of power in Washington or on Wall Street. They simply forgot about their fellow countrymen in Idaho, Wisconsin or Ohio.