Keywords:
Edward
S. Herman, Noam Chomsky, Propaganda Model, news, media, ideology, communication
studies, media studies
Abstract:
Mass media have been given
the accolades for its significant role of informing people and providing
required information to behave in a democratic society. For its multiple characters,
media are rewarded with various titles like 'watchdog', 'voice of the
voiceless', 'guardians of citizen', 'bridge between government and citizens'
among many others. They shape opinion and inspire citizens to raise their
voices on issues of public concerns.
The ‘propaganda model’
of media operations propagated by Edward Herman[1]
and Noam Chomsky[2]
in 'Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media', supports
the idea that dominant groups take hold of media business and control news
processing mechanisms so they can have control over opinion formation in the
society. The model consists of five
filters applied by elite groups for suppressing deviant forces and using media
as a tool for propaganda. Propaganda model seeks to explain the interplay
between power, social structure, communication and ideology. Social
inequalities existing in the society that shape the function of media and
dominate disadvantaged group are the highlights of the propaganda model.
The propaganda model is
conceptually concerned to respond to the question of how ideological and
communicative power connect with economic, political and social power, and to
explore the consequent effects upon media operation and output. Highly analytical
in nature, this paper aims to provide an overview of propaganda model.
Introduction
Before discussing
"The Propaganda Model", (hereafter PM) it's wise to have a quick
insight on what 'propaganda' is. Jowett and O'Donnell (1999) define propaganda
as 'the deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate
cognitions, and direct behaviours to achieve a response that furthers the
desired intent of the propagandist'. Simply
defining, propaganda is a skillful and deliberate use of media for
disseminating information which may likely to enhance the image of the party,
establish the required point of view and generate support in one's favour,
while jeopardize the image of the other involved party.
Denish McQuail (2010) observes
the mass media are now regarded as essential to successful war propaganda,
since they are the only channels guaranteed to reach the whole public and have
advantage (in open societies) of being regarded as trustworthy. The
possibilities for synergy between war-making and news-making are obvious. The
public demand for news is high. War news satisfies all significant news values.
A variety of sources press for access. However, there are some obstacles.
Journalists generally have an aversion to what they perceive as attempts to use
them for propaganda purposes. Mass media are also uncertain instruments of
propaganda since their audience cannot be restricted, and one of the
requirements of successful propaganda is that the right message reaches the
right group.
Undoubtedly, media are
used and have served as the propaganda tool during several wars fought between
countries of the globe. However, it doesn't mean that media can be only a
reliable tool for propaganda during war; it has gained its pervasiveness in
daily life as well, where several other wars having connection to social,
political, cultural, economical, ideological and others are going on always. Thus, propaganda has earned its negative
connotation for altering the media process of informing people on what is right
and wrong.
The ‘propaganda model’
of media operations has been promulgated by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky
(1988) in their popular book, 'Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of
the Mass Media'. The PM affirms that mass media serve as instruments of power
that ‘mobilize support for the special interests that dominate the state and
private activity’ The model takes a critical view at the media operation, which
has been instrumental mechanisms of propaganda in the capitalist democracies
and suggests that class interests have ‘multilevel effects on mass-media interests
and choices’.
Andrew Mullen and
Jeffery Klaehn (2010) opines "Firmly rooted in the critical-Marxist, more
specifically the political economy, tradition of media and communication
studies, the PM, or more specifically its reception within the field, is
somewhat of a paradox. In terms of its application, mainly by those working
within the aforementioned tradition, the PM is one of the most tested models
within the social sciences. However, it has received very little attention
within mainstream media and communication studies, sociology or the wider social
sciences.
Herman and Chomsky
appreciate the function and role of mass media in any society. However, they
are also equally conscious of unprincipled activities of media, beyond their highly
allotted functions in the society, which is ruled by money and conflicting
ideologies.
The
mass media serve as a system for communicating messages and symbols to the
general populace. It is their function to amuse, entertain, and inform, and to
inculcate individuals with the values, beliefs, and codes of behavior that will
integrate them into the institutional structures of the larger society. In a
world of concentrated wealth and major conflicts of class interest, to fulfill
this role requires systematic propaganda (Herman and Chomsky, 1988).
Herman and Chomsky
agree to the trend of media falling prey at the hands of power elite and
serving them in attaining their desired interest using the available media. This
is where media becomes an influential tool of propaganda for serving the need
of a particular group or section of society. The situation is even worst when
the media are controlled through introduction of various structural mechanisms.
However, the possibility of using media as propaganda tool becomes less when
media are free, private and receive a friendly.
In
countries where the levers of power are in the hands of a state bureaucracy,
the monopolistic control over media, often supplemented by official censorship,
makes it clear that the media serve the ends of dominant elite. It is much more
difficult to see propaganda system at work where the media are private and
formal censorship is absent. This is especially true where the media actively
compete, periodically attack and expose corporate and governmental malfeasance,
and aggressively portray themselves as spokesmen for free speech and the
general community interest environment (Herman and Chomsky, 1988).
According to Herman and
Chomsky, the propaganda model aims to address the inequality of wealth and
power and its multilevel effects on mass-media interests and choices. It tries
to discover the routes by which money and power are able to filter out the news
fit to print, marginalize dissent, and allow the government and dominant
private interests to get their messages across to the public.
Klaehn (2002) says media,
according to this framework, do not have to be controlled nor does their behavior
have to be patterned, as it is assumed that they are integral actors in class warfare,
fully integrated into the institutional framework, and act in unison with other
ideological sectors, i.e. the academy, to establish, enforce, reinforce and
police corporate hegemony.
Some commentator and
media experts find the PM as ‘an almost conspiratorial view of the. Upon which,
Herman and Chomsky (1988) have responded, stressing that the PM actually
constitutes a ‘free market analysis’ of media, ‘with the results largely an
outcome of the working of market forces’.
Also, the PM is different from and shares no link up
with 'the gate-keeper model' of media operation.
The
PM is to be distinguished from the ‘gate-keeper model’ of media operations. The
PM does not assume that news workers and editors are typically coerced or
instructed to omit certain voices and accentuate others. Rather, the model
outlines circumstances under which media will be relatively ‘open’ or ‘closed’
(see Herman, 2000). Whereas the PM is an ‘institutional critique’ of media
performance (see Herman and Chomsky, 1988: 34), the gate-keeper model is
principally concerned with micro-analysis and focuses on how decisions of
particular editors and journalists influence news production and news selection
processes (White, 1964; Carter, 1958 as cited in Klaehn :2002 ).
Rather, the PM put
forwards a 'general theory of the Free Press', which encompasses the overall
functioning of the media in a free society. Additionally, it extends an
institutional critique of mass media performance in a given society.
Mullen and Klaehn (2010)
observe, "Like other approaches within the critical-Marxist tradition, it
is concerned with exploring the relationships between ideology, communicative
power and social class interests. More specifically, attending to the
interlocks that exist between the media, dominant social institutions, powerful
elites and the market, the PM explores the interplay between economic power and
communicative power. The fundamental argument put forward in the PM is that
structural, political-economic elements influence overall patterns of media
performance. However, theirs is not a conspiracy theory of media behaviour;
rather, at the outset of Manufacturing Consent, Herman and Chomsky (1988: xii)
emphasize that the PM presents a ‘free market analysis’ of mainstream media,
‘with the results largely the outcome of the working of market forces.’
Importantly, the PM challenges commonly held notions that media are liberal and
dedicated to the public interest. Instead, it suggests that the structural
contexts in which news discourses are produced are such that media themselves are
predisposed to serve propaganda functions within capitalist, liberal-democratic
societies."
It is also argued that it's
not media workers or journalists involved in news production who regularly
examine their performances and detach themselves from serving the interest of
the elite, rather as PM assumes only those right-minded journalists are hired
who easily opt to agree with the system and soon internalize the belief and
attitude, shaping their expression and work dedicated at meeting the concerns
of the dominant class.
In presuming that media
personnel act in ways that effectively serve the interests of dominant elites,
however, ‘the PM can be seen to infer structural processes by appealing to
psychological processes in individuals.’ At the same time, it can be seen to
presume various ‘self-interested’ or ideological motives from structural
patterns in news coverage. The PM argues that how events are analysed,
represented and evaluated by the elite media effectively demonstrates the
extent to which editors and reporters can be seen to have ‘adapted’ to
constraints of ownership, organization, market and political power. It contends
further that elite media interlock with other institutional sectors in
ownership, management and social circles, effectively circumscribing their
ability to remain analytically detached from other dominant institutional sectors
(Klaehn, 2002).
The model asserts that
mass media are seen serving the interests and choices of the elite, through
different means like agenda-setting. Beyond raising the issues, media also
protect the interests of the elite group and cover up those issues which may be
harmful to those groups socially, professionally or economically or harm their
dignity in the society. Klaehn write, PM contends that media will mobilize and
divert, promote and suppress, legitimize and endorse, in such ways that it will
be ‘functional’ for dominant elites and dominant social institutions. It assumes
that media content serves ‘political interests’, serves to ‘mobilize’ (or not)
sympathetic emotion for victims and outrage against victimizers, to divert
public attention away from select news items and direct attention towards
others. It assumes that news discourse is framed so as to reproduce interpretations
which endorse, legitimize and promote elite interests and presumes that media
do in fact mislead audiences.
News production
processes are shaped by a range of factors, what Herman and Chomsky have considered
as the essential ingredients of propaganda model, or set of news termed as
"filters." The PM predicts that these filter elements impact upon
what becomes news. The five filter elements are (1) the size, concentrated
ownership, owner wealth, and profit orientation of the dominant mass-media
firms; (2) advertising as the primary income source of the mass media and the
corresponding influence of advertising values on news production processes; (3)
the reliance of the media on information provided by government, business, and
"experts" funded and approved by these primary sources and agents of
power; (4) "flak" as a means of disciplining the media; and (5)
"anticommunism "as a national religion and control mechanism or
various ideological forces deployed and adapted to correspond to elite
interests when required.
Klaehn (2009) writes, the
PM’s five filter elements draw attention to the main structural constraints that
impact overall patterns of media performance. Herman and Chomsky correctly
observe that most mainstream media are themselves typically large corporations,
‘controlled by very wealthy people or by managers who are subject to sharp
constraints by owners and other market-profit-oriented forces’ (Herman and
Chomsky, 1988, 14). Their model suggests that ownership, size and profit orientation
will influence media behaviour in a range of ways and will ultimately encourage
a right-wing bias within mainstream media discourses.
To support their point,
Herman and Chomsky give the historical reference and how the emergence of
alternative media threatened the supremacy of media owned by dominant elite.
…in
the first half of the nineteenth century, a radical press emerged that reached
a national working-class audience. This alternative press was effective in
reinforcing class consciousness: it unified the workers because it fostered an
alternative value system and framework for looking at the world, and because it
"promoted a greater collective confidence by repeatedly emphasizing the
potential power of working people to effect social change through the force of
'combination' and organized action." This was deemed a major threat by the
ruling elites. The result was an attempt to squelch the working-class media by
libel laws and prosecutions, by requiring an expensive security bond as a
condition for publication, and by imposing various taxes designed to drive out
radical media by raising their costs. These coercive efforts were not
effective, and by mid-century they had been abandoned in favor of the liberal
view that the market would enforce responsibility (Herman and Chomsky, 1988).
The media giants, advertising
agencies, and great multinational corporations have a joint and close interest
in a favorable climate of investment in the Third World, and their
interconnections and relationships with the government in these policies are
symbiotic. In sum, the dominant media firms are quite large businesses; they
are controlled by very wealthy people or by managers who are subject to sharp
constraints by owners and other market-profit-oriented forces; and they are
closely interlocked, and have important common interests, with other major
corporations, banks, and government. This is the first powerful filter that
will affect news choices (Herman and Chomsky, 1988).
Advertising has been
the prominent source of income for media, which has also been realized the by
PM as its second filter. As a result, media are often blamed for serving not
only their proprietor but also advertisers. It is said that advertiser do not
necessarily take interest in bringing out praiseworthy media attention but they
are more interested in concealing the suppressing the information that may harm
their business in the long run. Advertising have the potential and serve as the
powerful apparatus to weaken working-class press.
Before advertising became
prominent, the price of a newspaper had to cover the costs of doing business.
With the growth of advertising, papers that attracted ads could afford a copy
price well below production costs. This put papers lacking in advertising at a
serious disadvantage: their prices would tend to be higher, curtailing sales,
and they would have less surplus to invest in improving the salability of the
paper (features, attractive format, promotion, etc.). For this reason, an
advertising-based system will tend to drive out of existence or into
marginality the media companies and types that depend on revenue from sales
alone. With advertising, the free market does not yield a neutral system in
which final buyer choice decides. The advertisers' choices influence media
prosperity and survival The ad-based media receive an advertising subsidy that
gives them a price-marketing-quality edge, which allows them to encroach on and
further weaken their ad-free (or ad-disadvantaged) rivals (Herman and Chomsky,
1988).
Thus, the first two
filters of PM reflect that political-economic dimensions play heavily into news
production processes, highlighting the macro-level structural dimensions that
in effect ‘shape’ mainstream news discourses.
The third filter of
Herman and Chomsky’s model deals with the sources of information for media.
Media as social institution have to rely on various sources for generating
required information before delivering back to the society. Similarly, there
are many actors that take part in news discourse and constructing meaning. Media
and various sources share reciprocal relations in day to day work. Media make
use of their sources for information and verification of the gathered
information, while sources utilize and also take advantage of media sometime
for taking their information and opinion to the public, which is otherwise
impossible without the use of media.
Klaehn (2009) observes,
institutionally affiliated sources (the ‘primary definers’ of social reality)
typically dominate news discourses. As a result, news comes to reflect
institutional interests on a macro level. Within individual news stories,
preferred meanings are typically encoded into media texts, influencing how news
articles are constructed vis-à-vis their headlines and leads, as well as
overall story presentation, particularly in relation to choices of emphasis and
overall tone. Herman (2000) writes that: ‘Studies of news sources reveal that a
significant proportion of news originates in public relations releases. There
are, by one count, 20,000 more public relations agents working to doctor the
news today than there are journalists writing it.’
The
mass media are drawn into a symbiotic relationship with powerful sources of
information by economic necessity and reciprocity of interest. The media need a
steady, reliable flow of the raw material of news. Economics dictates that they
concentrate their resources where significant news often occurs, where
important rumors and leaks abound, and where regular press conferences are
held. The White House, the Pentagon, and the State Department, in Washington,
D.C., are central nodes of such news activity. On a local basis, city hall and
the police department are the subject of regular news "beats" for
reporters. Business corporations and trade groups are also regular and credible
purveyors of stories deemed newsworthy. These bureaucracies turn out a large
volume of material that meets the demands of news organizations for reliable,
scheduled flows.
Government
and corporate sources also have the great merit of being recognizable and
credible by their status and prestige.
Another
reason for the heavy weight given to official sources is that the mass media
claim to be "objective" dispensers of the news. Partly to maintain
the image of objectivity, but also to protect themselves from criticisms of
bias and the threat of libel suits, they need material that can be portrayed as
presumptively accurate. This is also partly a matter of cost: taking
information from sources that may be presumed credible reduces investigative expense,
whereas material from sources that are not prima facie credible, or that will
elicit criticism and threats, requires careful checking and costly research (Herman
and Chomsky, 1988).
The model’s fourth
filter element is related with controlling and assessing media performance as a
whole. In the words of Herman and Chomsky (1988), "Flak" refers to
negative responses to a media statement or program. It may take the form of
letters, telegrams, phone calls, petitions, lawsuits, speeches and bills before
Congress, and other modes of complaint, threat, and punitive action. It may be
organized centrally or locally, or it may consist of the entirely independent
actions of individuals. If flak is produced on a large scale, or by individuals
or groups with substantial resources, it can be both uncomfortable and costly
to the media. Positions have to be defended within the organization and
without, sometimes before legislatures and possibly even in courts. Advertisers
may withdraw patronage. If certain kinds of fact, position, or program are
thought likely to elicit flak, this prospect can be a deterrent.
Thus, flak can also
weaken the performance and image of the media and raise a question over their
credibility, inviting the active role of political authorities into the news
room activities.
The model’s fifth
filter was originally ‘anti-communism’ but has since been modified and
broadened to refer to dominant ideological elements. Analytically, the fifth
filter is extremely useful and applicable to a range of case studies. It may play
out in different ways at different times, contingent upon specific time/place contexts,
and is extremely broad (as are many other concepts within the social sciences,
such as hegemony and/or patriarchy, for instance). That the fifth filter is so
generalized makes it relatable to a range of social phenomenon, and creates space
for the PM to be utilized in a variety of social scientific research. For instance,
it could provide a framework for assessing othering in the mainstream media
The fifth filter
element, in addition to being particularly relatable, is oriented toward
broadening understandings of how ideological power intersects with political-economy
and dimensions of social class. The focus of the modified fifth filter remains
consistent with its original incarnation; this filter may now be termed simply
‘the dominant ideology.’ Herman and Chomsky (1988, 29) originally wrote of the
fifth filter element: ‘This ideology helps mobilize the populace against an
enemy, and because the concept is fuzzy it can be used against anybody
advocating policies that threaten property or support accommodation with Communist
states and radicalism (Klaehn, 2009).’
This last filter also
shows that how fear is deployed within the media discourse during adverse
situations. Chomsky explains that media may generate fear and/or redirect
existing fear, depending upon specific contexts, whenever it is ideologically
serviceable to the interests of power. Klaehn says fear may be deployed as an
ideological control mechanism and used to legitimize policies, mobilize
resources and push specific agendas. Herman and Chomsky (1988) wrote that:
Communism
as the ultimate evil has always been the specter haunting property owners, as
it threatens the very root of their class position and superior status. The
Soviet, Chinese, and Cuban revolutions were traumas to Western elites, and the
ongoing conflicts and the well-publicized abuses of Communist states have
contributed to elevating opposition to communism to a first principle of
Western ideology and politics. This ideology helps mobilize the populace
against an enemy, and because the concept is fuzzy it can be used against
anybody advocating policies that threaten property interests or support
accommodation with Communist states and radicalism. It therefore helps fragment
the left and labor movements and serves as a political-control mechanism. If
the triumph of communism is the worst imaginable result, the support of fascism
abroad is justified as a lesser evil. Opposition to social democrats who are
too soft on Communists and "play into their hands" is rationalized in
similar terms.
Liberals
at home, often accused of being pro-Communist or insufficiently anti-Communist,
are kept continuously on the defensive in a cultural milieu in which
anticommunism is the dominant religion. If they allow communism, or something
that can be labeled communism, to triumph in the provinces while they are in
office, the political costs are heavy. Most of them have fully internalized the
religion anyway, but they are all under great pressure to demonstrate their
anti-Communist credentials.
Klaehn (2009) terms
these five filter elements outlined above as the foundations of the propaganda
model. Taken together, the five filters provide a framework that illuminates
why and how structural dimensions encourage a systematic right-wing bias and
limited range of debate within mainstream media discourses. The five filters
provide a basis for the PM’s general argument that the news which is deemed
‘fit to print’ will overwhelmingly be that which is politically and
ideologically advantageous to the interests of power.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the
'Propaganda Model' laid out by two prominent scholars Herman and Chomsky
continues to be enthralling and convincing in showing how media are constantly
used as an tool of propaganda by dominant elites, power holders and influential
figures of the society along with how opinion are formed in contemporary world.
Chomsky's slogan ‘Brainwashing under freedom’ is seemed to given backing
through this propaganda model. The situation of suppressing diverse voices
against the ethos of the power elite, using the available powerful media, seems
to be more pertinent now.
The five filters illustrate
how varieties of news are limited and their definition has been altered. News is
primarily those which meet one of the filter requirements before being
accommodated by media. Information related to and generated from dissidents and
weak, unorganized individuals and groups are deprived of making their voices
heard through media as they are at clash with the dominant ideology and
interests of the gatekeepers and other powerful groups that enjoy the
relatively easy access to media and can be influential during the filtering
process.
In sum, a propaganda
approach to media coverage suggests a systematic and highly political
dichotomization in news coverage based on serviceability to important domestic
power interests. This should be observable in dichotomized choices of story and
in the volume and quality of coverage. In the chapters that follow we will see
that such dichotomization in the mass media is massive and systematic: not only
are choices for publicity and suppression comprehensible in terms of system advantage,
but the modes of handling favored and inconvenient materials (placement, tone,
context, fullness of treatment) differ in ways that serve political ends
(Herman and Chomsky, 1988).
Bibliography:
- Herman, E.S. (2003) 'The Propaganda Model: A Retrospective', Against All Reason, (1): 1 –14.
- Herman, E.S. and N. Chomsky (1988) Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, New York: Pantheon.
- Klaehn, Jeffery. (2009) 'The Propaganda Model: Theoretical and Methodological Considerations', Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture, 6(2): 43 –58.
- Klaehn, Jeffery. (2002) 'A Critical Review and Assessment of Herman and Chomsky’s ‘Propaganda Model’, European Journal of Communication, 17 (2): 147–182.
- McQuail, Denis 2010. McQuails’s Mass Communication Theory (6th edition). New Delhi: Sage Publication.
- Mullen, A. and J. Klaehn. (2010) 'The Herman–Chomsky Propaganda Model: A Critical Approach to Analysing Mass Media Behaviour', Sociology Compass, 4(4): 215–229.
- White, David M. (1964) ‘The Gatekeeper: A Case Study in the Selection of News’, in L.A. Dexter and D.M. White (eds) People, Society and Mass Communications. New York: Free Press.
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