Propaganda, Fake News, and Media Lies
The Diabolical Business of Global Public Relations Firms
Phillips, Peter
http://dissidentvoice.org/2017/03/propaganda-fake-news-and-media-lies/
Date Written: 2017-03-17
Publisher: Dissident Voice
Year Published: 2017
Resource Type: Article
Cx Number: CX20567
The PRP industry has experienced phenomenal growth since 2001. In 2015, three publicly traded mega PR firms -- Omnicom, WPP, and Interpublic Group -- together employed 214,000 people across 170 countries, collecting $35 billion in combined revenue. Not only do these firms control massive wealth, they also possess a network of connections in powerful international institutions with direct links to national governments, multi-national corporations, global policy-making bodies, and the corporate media.
Abstract:
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Excerpt:
PRP firms have emerged as orchestrators of global information and news. The world today faces a military-industrial-media empire, bolstered by PRP firms, that is so powerful and complex that truth is mostly absent or reported only in disconnected segments with little historical context. In late 1999, Ben Bagdikian, the author of Media Monopoly and former Washington Post editor, told me that he estimated that two-thirds of all news stories originated with PR firms; in 2003, an article from the Guardian conservatively estimated that 50-80% of news and business stories originated from public relations firms. The result is managed news by governments, corporations, and PRP firms -- often interlocked -- including both the release of specific stories intended to build public support as well as the deliberate non-coverage of news stories that may undermine capitalist elites' goals and interests.
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