Neutrality (magazine)

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Front page of neutrality

The neutrality with the subtitle critical Swiss magazine for politics and culture was a German-language, political magazine in Switzerland , which was published by Paul Ignaz Vogel from 1963 to 1974. The magazine was the leading non-conformist publication in German-speaking Switzerland.

history

Paul Ignaz Vogel founded the magazine in Basel in 1963 without equity capital, which he published himself. With the “resounding and disarming naivety of a staunch pacifist”, Vogel challenged with his magazine in the middle of the Cold War. The magazine tackled one taboo topic after another: Switzerland in World War II, the Jurassic conflict , the army, arms trade, Vietnam, foreign workers.

The magazine was published monthly from 1963 to 1972 in Basel and 1973 to 1974 in Bern . From 1970 to 1971 she had a literary supplement called the pivot point . A single issue cost 2.50 francs.

Well-known authors such as the philosopher Arnold Künzli , the communist Konrad Farner , the writer Max Frisch , Kurt Marti , Alfred Rasser , Hans Erich Nossack , Renate Riemeck , Hanns-Dieter Hüsch and Dieter Süverkrüp wrote for the magazine . They were financially supported by the Swiss German specialist Walter Muschg until 1965 . The journal's sponsors included the writer Friedrich Dürrenmatt and the state foundation Pro Helvetia . Vogel and his circle of friends from around the magazine described themselves as nonconformists .

Around May 1965 there were merger negotiations with the opposition / living democracy .

At the beginning of the 1970s, the magazine's economic situation became increasingly difficult. In order to save the magazine, Vogel cooperates with the Social Democratic Party (SP) and becomes a member of its party in October 1970. Due to differences, the magazine ran out at the beginning of 1974. The interests of Vogel and the SP were too different, as Vogel said: "The SP did not want to destroy 'neutrality' - it just wanted to make it its instrument completely." The last issue of the journal Neutralität appeared in November 1974 as No. 5 of the 12th year.

Criticism of Federal Councilor Ludwig von Moos

At the end of 1969, Vogel raised the neutrality charge that the then Swiss Federal Councilor Ludwig von Moos was close to the anti-Semitism of the Nazis. Vogel described von Moos as an anti-communist and represented “the most blatant anti-Semitism”. Vogel referred primarily to anti-Semitic comments in the Obwalden Volksfreund of the 1930s. Von Moos was the correspondent and, from 1934, the sole editor in charge of this newspaper. The neutrality published a large number of passages from the Obwalden Volksfreund, which von Moos had printed as the sole responsible editor.

On December 29, 1969, at a press conference on neutrality , Vogel demanded the resignation of von Moos because of his work as editor of the Obwalden Volksfreundes. On the same day, the von Moos department issued a statement: The quotations [from the Obwalden Volksfreund] gave a "distorted picture". "You are torn out of the overall context of the time and historical reality." It cannot be proven whether the articles accused by Moos were all written by himself, as some of them were not signed by name. In neutrality -Heft 1/1970 repeated bird his resignation request.

Von Moos resigned on December 31, 1971 in the current legislative period 1971–1975. In the opinion of Paul Ignaz Vogel, his resignation should also be seen in connection with the demand for resignation addressed to him and his responsibility for contributions to the Obwalden Volksfreund .

Observation of the Swiss secret service

In 1995, through an out-of-court inspection of the state security files, it became known that the Swiss secret service had been closely following Vogel's life from 1962 onwards. In 1974 the state security stopped observing Vogel at the same time as the magazine Neutralität ended .

literature

  • Hadrien Buclin: «Surmonter le passé?»: Les intellectuels de gauche et le débat des années soixante sur la deuxième guerre mondiale . In: Swiss Journal for History, 2013/2, pp. 233–249.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Lerch, 2006, see web link
  2. ↑ a b Lukas Dettwiler (creator of the inventory). Short biography of Paul Ignaz Vogel in the “Nonconformism Archive Fredi Lerch .” Swiss Literature Archive , 2011, accessed on October 27, 2012
  3. ^ Entries in the Swiss library catalog Nebis
  4. ↑ Google Book Search
  5. ↑ a b c d e Switzerland / von Moos: Spiritually awakened In: Der Spiegel No. 3, January 12, 1970.
  6. ^ Before the thunderstorm that struck the Jura , article in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung of April 25, 2008
  7. ↑ «It is essential for us that they go where they came from very soon» , article by Hans Stutz about the Catholic-conservative anti-Semitism of the 1930s in central Switzerland, published in the WochenZeitung (WOZ) on September 1, 1995
  8. ^ A b Paul Ignaz Vogel: Farewell to the day before yesterday: Obituary to Federal Councilor Ludwig von Moos (PDF; 110 kB) , In: Neutralität , November 1972.
  9. ↑ Paul Ignaz Vogel: Napf, a tightrope walk in the Cold War , 2005, p. 121