By Don Ivan Punchatz.

THE spine of the newsmagazine concept that TIME introduced is the presentation of news in clearly defined departments. Like any vertebrate structure, our format has had to be flexible. The editors, responding to the trend of events, have periodically dropped or merged old departments and started new ones. AERONAUTICS was part of the first issue, later was incorporated into a department called TRANSPORT, which eventually was absorbed by BUSINESS. BEHAVIOR and ENVIRONMENT appeared for the first time in 1969, when these subjects became too important to be reported satisfactorily within other sections.

Another type of evolution occurs in response to developments that are highly important but of limited duration: we start what we know will be a temporary department. BACKGROUND FOR WAR (1939) evolved by stages to WORLD BATTLEFRONTS after the U.S. entered World War II. That department disappeared when the shooting stopped. In the meantime, as the U.S. became increasingly concerned with efforts to organize the peace, we started INTERNATIONAL, which appeared for nine years in addition to the regular FOREIGN NEWS section.

This week, on page 21, we begin another section, the title and lead headline of which are:

THE ECONOMY

World Trade: A Clash of Wills

The life-span of the new section will depend on how long the difficulties--and the Government's attempts to enhance prosperity while curbing inflation--remain a dominant concern. THE ECONOMY will report on and analyze the Administration's policies on wages, prices, taxation, the all-important matters of trade and world monetary policy. It will also cover the initiatives and responses of foreign governments. The New York-based editors, writers and reporter-researchers working in the new department will be able to call in reports from TIME's 29 domestic and foreign bureaus; five of our correspondents cover economics full time in various cities, including Brussels, the Common Market headquarters. The section will also rely heavily on the nine noted experts who make up our Board of Economists, including two former heads of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, Walter Heller and Arthur Okun.

The stories in the new section this week deal with Washington's battle to achieve a new arrangement on trade and money with America's longtime partners; foreign response to the Nixon program; and the impact of the freeze on businessmen and consumers.

Political aspects of the continuing story will still be reported in NATION; this week's lead article, for instance, deals with the President's attempts to sell his program. BUSINESS will continue to cover the diverse field of American and foreign enterprise in stories not directly related to the Administration's crisis management program. Says Marshall Loeb, who edits BUSINESS and will oversee the new section: "Perhaps never before have events conspired in so many ways to test the adaptability of the U.S. economy." In journalism, we feel, adaptability is just as important.

The Cover: Painting in acrylics and pencil by Don Ivan Punchatz.

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