Propaganda Model

Based on the discussion about the relationship between journalism and democracy, and the role of business/financial journalism, “the propaganda model” presented by Herman and Chomsky provides the guideline to analyse how journalists have pressures and risks of being manipulated by circumstances. It consists of five “filters” to analyse the media such as ownership, advertising, limited news sources, flak and anti-communism. With using these elements, they criticise the media as “they serve to mobilize support for the special interests that dominate the state and private activity” (1988: xi). Besides, the media’s action such as “preselection of right-thinking people, internalized preconceptions”, and self-censorship contribute to the tendency to support the elites’ interests. Klaehn summarises that “the PM [propaganda model] constitutes an institutional critique of mass media” (2002: 170).

2-3-1. Ownership

The first one is ownership which has a risk to affect the news selections and the way of reporting. They argue General Electric and Westinghouse are the examples of the media’s ownership. Their boards of directors are dominated by corporate and banking executives and their business gets involved in weapon production. Media became a part of the business conglomerates. As discussed above, the corporations care about the shareholders’ return, and there is “market-profit-oriented forces” toward news organisations (Herman and Chomsky 1988: 14). This pressure is a concern of objectivity because the ownership has a possibility to intervene to the news contents.

Now, not only GE, but also Walt Disney and AOL-Time Warner become the ownership of the media organisations and “subsumed journalism inside their larger corporate cultures”. This means, for example, it becomes harder for the journalist working for Time to cover the AOL and other Internet business companies without any biases (Kovach and Rosenstiel 2001: 126).

Advertising

The second filter is advertising. The advertisers can give the media pressure through pulling out their advertisement. Herman and Chomsky discuss the television networks as “an advertising-based media system will gradually increase advertising time and marginalize or eliminate altogether programming that has significant public-affairs content” (1988: 17). Advertisers like the entertainment and want to avoid controversial and serious programs.

It actually influences media’s situation. According to Kovach and Rosenstiel, “The bonuses of newsroom executives today are generally based in large part on how much money their companies make in profit” (2001: 50).

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