taz on Greece: Why in English?

Editorial

Greece stands on the brink of exiting the euro — and perhaps not only Greece. What do people in the eurozone and the rest of Europe think about the crisis? From Lisbon to Athens — what are newspapers and websites reporting on? The taz wants to find out, and also wants to help lend some transparency to the European debate.

Though the European press participates in this debate predominantly within the borders of their respective national states — not least because of the language barriers — international discussion is dominated almost exclusively by the English language.

While platforms such as Britain’s Guardian offer their readers a differentiated perspective on the crisis, what is missing are the voices of all of Europe. In order to form the most complete picture possible, we need to know what is being discussed in each of the individual countries. We are only then able to participate in the kind of transnational discussion that makes Europe what it ought to be.

As such, the taz has decided to, for a short period, publish a modest selection of articles on the Greek crisis. „For us as journalists, the Greek crisis makes clear the necessity of reporting on a European scale,” explains Chief Editor Andreas Rüttenauer. „Just as we read the thoughts of our colleagues in Spain, Slovenia, Italy and not least Greece with great interest, we want to offer our readers the chance to understand the discussions we are having in Germany.”

Since translating into all European languages would be a task impossible for the taz to achieve on its own, we have decided to present the texts in the language which is the most common second language in Europe — English — in the hope of addressing the broadest possible audience.

The texts will be published on taz.de, as well as on medium.com.

Translation: Hans Kellett