Presse, Die

   / The Press

   Today, with a daily readership of approximately 103,000, Die Presse is not Austria’s most widely read newspaper. Nevertheless, with intensive coverage of local events and a network of foreign correspondents, Die Presse is the only Austrian newspaper that comes close to playing the role of such dailies as the New York Times, the Frankfurter Allegemeine of Germany, or the French Le Monde. Editorially, it supports free market economies and liberal democracy, though it has been highly critical of leftist politics and the countercultural philosophies of the 1960s. Die Presse was founded in the wake of the Revolutions of 1848. Modeled after an eponymous periodical in Paris (La Presse), it supported liberal positions. It was equally progressive in its production technology. A group of editors split from the journal in 1864 to establish the Neue Freie Presse, which became the premier daily of the Habsburg Empire.

   In 1946, the new Die Presse appeared. Initially published as a weekly by the Austrian press magnate Ernst Molden (1888–1953), it became a daily in 1949. Longtime editor Otto Schulmeister (1916–2001) generally endorsed liberal positions and pragmatic approaches to political, economic, and social problems of the Second Austrian Republic. A sharp critic of the Austrian left in the 1960s and 1970s, Schulmeister became identified with what were increasingly called conservative views. His successor, Thomas Chorherr (1932–), continued to orient the paper along centrist liberal-conservative lines. Under considerable competitive pressure from new dailies, most notably Der Standard (1988), tabloids, and electronic news sources, and beset by editorial infighting, Die Presse’s circulation failed badly from 2000 to 2006. Now more topically focused, it has recovered considerably.

   See also Press.