Role Reversal

Today I had my first interview with a German journalist for my research paper: Sigrid Kniest at the Berlin paper Der Tagesspiegel. I could tell she was definitely not used to being the one answering the questions, she seemed a bit nervous and unsure of her speech, but then again it's always difficult to communicate in a language that isn't your mother tongue. Still, I was able to get a bunch of good information. One of the most interesting things she touched on was the tension between journalists and politicians on the issue of Hartz IV, the German unemployment assistance/ welfare system which we've been hearing a lot about in our various meetings with political parties and NGOs here. She told me that the current Minister of Finance has been reluctant to give her more information after she embarrassed him by publishing a "Hartz IV menu" he had written up to show how someone receiving Hartz IV aide could still eat a sufficient amount of healthy food each day. The problem was his calculations severely underestimated the caloric needs for an average-sized adult male. Whoops. She also mentioned the economic woes faced by both newspapers and individual journalists thanks to declining readership, and something else I found really interesting. Apparently in Berlin, each of the major newspapers has a very established relationship with one of the five main political parties. Sounds to me like a potential threat to objectivity. Definitely worth a closer look for my project.