The spirit of Gütersloh
Media Conglomerates: An investigative historian takes aim at Bertelsmann's business practices and pseudo-ethics. Unfortunately, however, the analysis is somewhat clouded by ideology.
Media corporations An investigative historian takes aim at Bertelsmann's business methods and pseudo-ethics. In 1998, Hersch Fischler accused Bertelsmann of systematically falsifying its own history for decades and falsely portraying itself as a publishing house that resisted the Nazis. Six years after this revelation - which has since been confirmed by an expert commission - the historian, together with journalist Frank Böckelmann, is now presenting his general reckoning with the Gütersloh powerhouse, beginning in 2002, more precisely with the dismissal of the then CEO Thomas Middelhoff. As is well known, the common explanation was that the wife of Bertelsmann patriarch Reinhard Mohn had forced his departure in order to keep power in the family. Wrong, say Fischler/Böckelmann. They think they know "what happened behind the scenes". And ask whether the journalists who spread the above official version "were not merely using the cliché of female power behind power to cover up other events". Covering up? Has the media once again unwittingly conspired with Bertelsmann to spread false legends, as they did with the myth of the resistance publishing house?
The authors claim that Middelhoff did not have to leave because Reinhard or Liz Mohn feared for the control of their conglomerate. Rather, they cite an article in the Washington Post about fictitious transactions by AOL in the USA, in which Bertelsmann was involved and where Middelhoff sat on the supervisory board. He was not even mentioned in the article. But a few days after the publication of this revelatory story, Middelhoff was fired. According to the authors, this was no mere coincidence, as Bertelsmann feared for its good reputation and global business.
As it is not conclusively substantiated anywhere, Die Welt describes this thesis - like the entire book - as a "grotesque conspiracy theory". If the authors are to be believed, however, their investigative reconstruction of this case is "highly plausible". The truth probably lies somewhere in between.
The analysis of the company's history is more convincing than the analysis of yesterday's news. For example, the legitimization of Reinhard's father Heinrich Mohn's philosophy of expansion is illuminated. Since he was soon no longer only printing religious books, he could no longer justify his business spirit with faith - and invented the ethical exaltation that still characterizes Bertelsmann today.
It is true that many examples prove the permanent reinterpretation of the pursuit of profit as working for the common good, especially by the company's own foundation. However, the accusatory undertone and the various unnecessary side-swipes reflect the anti-capitalist resentment of the 1970s, which ultimately spoils the reading of what is in itself an informative work.
> Bertelsmann - Behind the facade of the media empire by Frank Böckelmann and Hersch Fischler. Eichborn Verlag, Frankfurt a.M. 2004.
352 pages, 38 francs.
Oliver Classen
The authors claim that Middelhoff did not have to leave because Reinhard or Liz Mohn feared for the control of their conglomerate. Rather, they cite an article in the Washington Post about fictitious transactions by AOL in the USA, in which Bertelsmann was involved and where Middelhoff sat on the supervisory board. He was not even mentioned in the article. But a few days after the publication of this revelatory story, Middelhoff was fired. According to the authors, this was no mere coincidence, as Bertelsmann feared for its good reputation and global business.
As it is not conclusively substantiated anywhere, Die Welt describes this thesis - like the entire book - as a "grotesque conspiracy theory". If the authors are to be believed, however, their investigative reconstruction of this case is "highly plausible". The truth probably lies somewhere in between.
The analysis of the company's history is more convincing than the analysis of yesterday's news. For example, the legitimization of Reinhard's father Heinrich Mohn's philosophy of expansion is illuminated. Since he was soon no longer only printing religious books, he could no longer justify his business spirit with faith - and invented the ethical exaltation that still characterizes Bertelsmann today.
It is true that many examples prove the permanent reinterpretation of the pursuit of profit as working for the common good, especially by the company's own foundation. However, the accusatory undertone and the various unnecessary side-swipes reflect the anti-capitalist resentment of the 1970s, which ultimately spoils the reading of what is in itself an informative work.
> Bertelsmann - Behind the facade of the media empire by Frank Böckelmann and Hersch Fischler. Eichborn Verlag, Frankfurt a.M. 2004.
352 pages, 38 francs.
Oliver Classen
