CovertAction Quarterly
Public Relations Secret War on Activists, continued
SPIES FOR HIRE
In 1990, David Steinman's book, Diet for a
Poisoned Planet, was scheduled for publication. Based on five years of research,
it detailed evidence that hundreds of carcinogens, pesticides, and other
toxins contaminate the US food chain. It documented, for example, that raisins
had 110 industrial chemical and pesticide residues in 16 samples, and
recommended buying only organically grown varieties.
Diet for a Poisoned Planet enabled readers to make safer food
choices. But before they could use the information, they had to know about
the book so that they could buy and read it. In the weeks after it came
out, Steinman's publisher scheduled the usual round of media reviews
and interviews, not suspecting that the California Raisin Advisory
Board (CALRAB) had already launched a campaign to ensure that Steinman's book
would be dead on arrival. The stakes were high. In
1986, CALRAB had scored big with a series of clever TV commercials using the
California Dancing Raisins that pushed up raisin sales by 17 percent.
Steinman's book threatened to trip up the careful PR choreography. | 
Even PR hacks
use the term "Astroturf"
to deride their competitor's work.
In their perverse doublespeak world,
"real" grassroots is astroturf that has been
so well designed that it looks real. |
To kill the Steinman book, CALRAB hired Ketchum PR
Worldwide, whose $50 million a year in net fees made it the country's sixth
largest public relations company. Months before the publication of Diet for a
Poisoned Planet, Ketchum sought to obtain [a] copy of [the] book galleys or
manuscript and publisher's tour schedule, wrote senior vice-president Betsy
Gullickson in a secret September 7, 1990 memo outlining the PR firm's plan to
manage the crisis.
"All documents...are confidential. Make
sure that everything even notes to yourself are so stamped. ... Remember
that we have a shredder; give documents to Lynette for shredding. All
conversations are confidential, too. Please be careful talking in the halls, in
elevators, in restaurants, etc. All suppliers must sign confidentiality
agreements. If you are faxing documents to the client, another office or to
anyone else, call them to let them know that a fax is coming. If you
are expecting a fax, you or your Account Coordinator should stand by the machine
and wait for it. "
Gullickson's memo
outlined a plan to assign broad areas of responsibility, such as
intelligence/information gathering, to specific Ketchum employees and to Gary
Obenauf of CALRAB. She recommended that spokespeople conduct
one-on-one briefings/interviews with the trade and general consumer media in
the markets most acutely interested in the issue .... [Ketchum] is
currently attempting to get a tour schedule so that we can `shadow'
Steinman's appearances; best scenario: we will have our spokesman in town
prior to or in conjunction with Steinman's appearances.
After an informant involved with the book's marketing campaign passed
Ketchum a list of Steinman's talk show bookings, Ketchum employees called each
show. The PR firm then made a list of key media to receive low-key phone
inquiries. They tried to depict Steinman as an off-the-wall extremist without
credibility, or argued that it was only fair that the other side be presented. A
number of programs canceled or failed to air interviews. In the end, an
important contribution to the public debate over health, the environment,
and food safety fell victim to a PR campaign designed to prevent it from ever
reaching the marketplace of ideas.
DIVIDE AND CONQUER
Ronald Duchin, senior vice-president of another PR spy firm
Mongoven, Biscoe, and Duchin would probably have labeled Steinman and
Tylczak radicals. A graduate of the US Army War College, Duchin worked as a
special assistant to the secretary of defense and director of public affairs for
the Veterans of Foreign Wars before becoming a flack. Activists, he explained,
fall into four categories: radicals, opportunists, idealists, and realists. He
follows a three-step strategy to neutralize them: 1) isolate the radicals; 2)
cultivate the idealists and educate them into becoming realists; then 3)
co-opt the realists into agreeing with industry.
According to Duchin,
radical activists:
"want to change the system; have underlying
socio/political motives [and] see multinational corporations as inherently
evil....These organizations do not trust the... federal, state and local
governments to protect them and to safeguard the environment. They
believe, rather, that individuals and local groups should have direct power
over industry. ... I would categorize their principal aims right now as
social justice and political empowerment."
Idealists are also hard to deal with. They want a perfect world
and find it easy to brand any product or practice which can be shown to mar that
perfection as evil. Because of their intrinsic altruism, however, and because
they have nothing perceptible to be gained by holding their position, they are
easily believed by both the media and the public, and sometimes even
politicians. However, idealists have a vulnerable point. If they can be shown
that their position in opposition to an industry or its products causes harm to
others and cannot be ethically justified, they are forced to change their
position.... Thus, while a realist must be negotiated with, an idealist must
be educated. Generally this education process requires great sensitivity and
understanding on the part of the educator.
Opportunists and realists, says Duchin, are easier to
manipulate. Opportunists engage in activism seeking visibility, power,
followers and, perhaps, even employment. ... The key to dealing with [them]
is to provide them with at least the perception of a partial victory.
And realists are able to live with trade-offs; willing to work within
the system; not interested in radical change; pragmatic. [They] should always
receive the highest priority in any strategy dealing with a public policy issue.
... If your industry can successfully bring about these relationships, the
credibility of the radicals will be lost and opportunists can be counted on to
share in the final policy solution.
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