Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media by Edward S. Herman (PDF)

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A “compelling indictment of the news media’s role in covering up errors and deceptions” (The New York Times Book Review) due to the underlying economics of publishing—from famed scholars Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky. With a new introduction.In this pathbreaking work, Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky show that, contrary to the usual image of the news media as cantankerous, obstinate, and ubiquitous in their search for truth and defense of justice, in their actual practice they defend the economic, social, and political agendas of the privileged groups that dominate domestic society, the state, and the global order. Based on a series of case studies—including the media’s dichotomous treatment of “worthy” versus “unworthy” victims, “legitimizing” and “meaningless” Third World elections, and devastating critiques of media coverage of the U.S. wars against Indochina—Herman and Chomsky draw on decades of criticism and research to propose a Propaganda Model to explain the media’s behavior and performance.Their new introduction updates the Propaganda Model and the earlier case studies, and it discusses several other applications. These include the manner in which the media covered the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement and subsequent Mexican financial meltdown of 1994-1995, the media’s handling of the protests against the World Trade Organization, World Bank, and International Monetary Fund in 1999 and 2000, and the media’s treatment of the chemical industry and its regulation. What emerges from this work is a powerful assessment of how propagandistic the U.S. mass media are, how they systematically fail to live up to their self-image as providers of the kind of information that people need to make sense of the world, and how we can understand their function in a radically new way.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “[A] compelling indictment of the news media’s role in covering up errors and deceptions in American foreign policy of the past quarter century.” —Walter LaFeber, The New York Times Book Review From the Inside Flap In this pathbreaking work, now with a new introduction, Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky show that, contrary to the usual image of the news media as cantankerous, obstinate, and ubiquitous in their search for truth and defense of justice, in their actual practice they defend the economic, social, and political agendas of the privileged groups that dominate domestic society, the state, and the global order.Based on a series of case studies—including the media’s dichotomous treatment of “worthy” versus “unworthy” victims, “legitimizing” and “meaningless” Third World elections, and devastating critiques of media coverage of the U.S. wars against Indochina—Herman and Chomsky draw on decades of criticism and research to propose a Propaganda Model to explain the media’s behavior and performance. Their new introduction updates the Propaganda Model and the earlier case studies, and it discusses several other applications. These include the manner in which the media covered the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement and subsequent Mexican financial meltdown of 1994-1995, the media’s handling of the protests against the World Trade Organization, World Bank, and International Monetary Fund in 1999 and 2000, and the media’s treatment of the chemical industry and its regulation. What emerges from this work is a powerful assessment of how propagandistic the U.S. mass media are, how they systematically fail to live up to their self-image as providers of the kind of information that people need to make sense of the world, and how we can understand their function in a radically new way. About the Author EDWARD S. HERMAN is Professor Emeritus of Finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. NOAM CHOMSKY is Professor, Department of Linguistics and Philosophy, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Introduction This book centers in what we call a “propaganda model,” an analytical framework that attempts to explain the performance of the U.S. media in terms of the basic institutional structures and relationships within which they operate. It is our view that, among their other functions, the media serve, and propagandize on behalf of, the powerful societal interests that control and finance them. The representatives of these interests have important agendas and principles on behalf of, the powerful societal interests that control and finance them. The representatives of these interests have important agendas and principles that they want to advance, and they are well positioned to shape and constrain media policy. This is normally not accomplished by crude intervention, but by the selection of right-thinking personnel and by the editors’ and working journalists’ internalization of priorities and definitions of newsworthiness that conform to the institutions policy. Structural factors are those such as ownership and control, dependence on other major funding sources (notably, advertisers), and mutual interests and relationships between the media and those who make the news and have the power to define it and explain what it means. The propaganda model also incorporates other closely related factors such as the ability to complain about the media’s treatment of news (that is, produce “flak”), to provide “experts” to confirm the official slant on the news, and to fix the basic principles and ideologies that are taken for granted by media personnel and the elite, but are often resisted by the general population. In our view, the same underlying power sources that own the media and fund them as advertisers, that serves as primary definers of the news, and that produce flak and proper-thinking experts, also play a key role in fixing basic principles and the dominant ideologies. We believe that what journalists do, what they see as newsworthy, and what they take for granted as premises of their work are frequently well explained by the incentives, pressures, and constraints incorporated into such a structural analysis. These structural factors that dominate media operations are not all-controlling and do not always produce simple and homogeneous results. It is well recognized, and may even be said to constitute a part of and institutional critique such as we present in this volume, that the various parts of media organization have some limited autonomy, that individual and professional values influence media work, that policy itself may allow some measure of dissent and reporting that calls into question the accepted viewpoint. These considerations all work to assure some dissent and coverage of inconvenient facts. The beauty of the system, however, is that such dissent and inconvenient information are kept within bounds and at the margins, so that while their presence shows that the system is not monolithic, they are not large enough to interfere unduly with the domination of the official agenda. It should also be noted that we are talking about media structure and performance, not the effects of the media on the public. Certainly, the media’s adherence to an official agenda with little dissent is likely to influence public opinion in the desired direction, but this is a matter of degree, and where the public’s interests diverge sharply from that of the elite, and where they have their own independent sources of information, the official line may be widely doubted. The point that we want to stress here, however, is that the propaganda model describes forces that shape what the media does; it does not imply that any propaganda emanating from the media is always effective. Although now more than a dozen years old, both the propaganda model and the case studies presented with it in the first edition of this book have held up remarkably well. The purpose of this new Introduction is to update the model, add some materials to supplement the case studies already in place (and left intact in the chapters to follow), and finally, to point out the possible applicability of the model to a number of issue under current or recent debate. Read more

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Might be the most famous Chomsky polemic on US Foreign Policy and the Media-Government-Military alliance. Vietnam and Guatemala are center pieces. Vietnam section left me quite disturbed about the US actions and I already knew quite a bit about Vietnam foreign policy decision making in the LBJ administration.Might help to go into this book knowing that Chomsky always has the same theme in his books and talks – the US is duplicitous in its foreign policy and neither government nor corporations can be trusted. Even if other governments are bad, we must criticize ourselves first (getting the plank out of our own eye before helping with the speck in another’s eye).5/5 stars.

⭐This book changed the way I see my country, and its place in history. The specific information it gives about US involvement in S. America clarified events that had been on my radar, but that I had never taken the time to read about specifically.The virtual side-by-side comparison of the media’s treatment of the rape and murder of four US citizens working as nuns in the a US client state and the torture and murder of a Polish dissident priest is typical of the method by which they highlight how the media favors “worthy”victims, (coincidentally all murdered by regimes not friendly to us) and “unworthy” victims, sadly, unavoidably, somehow made victims of the disorder in our client states. Other examples include comparing media coverage of E. Timor to that of Kosovo, and how the media narratives and meta-narratives shifted over the course of US involvement in Vietnam and Cambodia.That said, the book was a challenge to read. I find history and politics quite interesting, but the authors belabored their points (as an academic might, understandably, need to) far beyond the patience of a person reading the book in his spare time might be willing to tolerate. I eventually finished it, but just this once I’m excusing myself from the appendices. I feel the points they had to make were well made by page 70, and while it was all informative and solidly researched, I’m nearly giddy to close the cover on this one.

⭐Carefully consider before you buy the amount of time it will take to read this exhaustive study of basically everything you already knew about the media. This will give you in depth particulars that, for me, did not end up being particularly worth my time knowing. Stopped reading it because I’m satisfied with my own understanding of the US media’s propagandizing on both sides. In the end, I decided not worth that much of my life and time trudging through the scummy particulars of what I understand as a basic fact.

⭐It’s not a fun read by any means, but I am incredibly grateful to have read this book. It is dry and academic, yet the clarity of its reasoning, the horror implicit in its conclusions and the endless march of its shocking historical evidence leave an indelible impact.Much like when I learned the theory of evolution by natural selection, I am left unable to see the world the same way again. And much the same as Darwin, Chomsky’s explanation requires no grand conspiracy of intelligent design, the result simply emerges naturally from the workings of the system.Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the modern world and who wants to consider how the future may be steered in a better direction.

⭐Understanding the propaganda model that this book explains is a life-changing eye-opener.”In a world of conflict, a world of victims and executioners, it is the job of thinking people not to be on the side of the executioners.” – Albert Camus

⭐This is a must read for anyone and everyone who cares about Democracy. Democracy can not exist without a free and independent media; Noam Chomsky proves his case that our media is anything but free and independent. This was written in 1987 but is even more true today, now that, thanks to deregulation, only six companies own 98% of the total media. This book highlights many of the propaganda tactics used in order to demonize those countries which challenge U.S. policy and say nice things about despots who go along with U.S. policy. There is a large section on the Vietnam war which illustrates this very well.

⭐An extraordinarily illuminating read that details the myriad ways in which the mainstream media internalize the propaganda system of corporate and US government voices by (consciously or not) subtly and insidiously reframing the debate and the ethics that shade those debates. Using two main examples of wars in the 70s/80s in IndoChina and Central America, the authors present a coherent and detailed argument that the “spreading of democracy” is often genocide, but by failing to objectively report events or by dividing casualties into “worthy” and “unworthy” groups, the media is complicit in the fallout of US aggression: genocide, famine, the suppression of democracy in client states (while claiming to spread freedom!). Almost invariably the US sides with a wealthy elite in any given country, and the poverty-stricken population fights back. We fund the suppressors with money and weapons, eradicating as much of the local population as we can even (into the hundred of thousands) until there’s no dissent left. But you’d never read it that way in the newspapers of the day.

⭐Every American who thinks he knows what’s going on in the world needs to read this book, and every American who has NO IDEA what’s going on in the world needs to read it. Although Chomsky’s examples may seem dated, the patterns they describe are as visible in 2017 as they were when he wrote the book.

⭐Excellent read, never more apt for an ever more complex media and corporate propaganda.Gives you an insight into how Laura Kuenssberg and the BBC spin against The Labour Party.

⭐Disappointing to say the least. This book is extremely pretentious and boring and goes into extreme, extreme detail on tiny pointless matters. I got to halfway through and realised I literally hadn’t learned anything and didn’t bother finishing. This is one of those books people like to read so they can act like they’re smarter than others. Please don’t bother wasting your money.

⭐One of the most important Books in modern media and political theory, especially the first chapter. The book is fantastic however it definitely begins to slow down towards the end (the Vietnam chapter is a bit of a drag) however it’s a must read

⭐It opened my eyes to how the world, and the media worked, although it is a bit repetitive. Well researched, with references, and examples of media biases and false media narratives. I think you only need to read half the book to get the picture……

⭐The first chapter, his model of propaganda, is disturbing but essential reading. Only the brave need attempt to read the rest of the book chapter by chapter: the odd chapter read in detail is enough to convince you that there are data available to support his argument and to give you sleepless nights.

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