Gods Within the Machine

This study traces the colorful history of the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) as an alliance of primarily midwestern editors in the 1920s to a slightly more diverse 1,000-member organization cautiously poised to enter the 21st century. Using minutes, correspondence, interviews, official proceedings, and other in-house documents, Pratte shows how the loosely knit organization, serving as an independent bridge between the more liberal ranks of the reporters and the more conservative publishers, has been absorbed into the corporate culture. The history, presented in both chronological and topical form, discusses the leadership and lack of leadership concerning such issues as ethics, freedom of the press, world press freedom, newspaper economics, journalism education, diversity, and minority affairs. As the first critical history of the professional, elite organization of editors to be written by an independent outside source, this work suggests ASNE has provided ordinary leadership for extraordinary times.