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News :: Miscellaneous |
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PBS's "Commanding" Conflict of Interest |
Current rating: 0 |
by FAIR
(No verified email address) |
04 Apr 2002
Modified: 05 Apr 2002 |
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Enron & other corporate giants sponsored new globalization series |
In the latest example of PBS's inconsistently applied underwriting guidelines, the network is premiering a six-hour series about the global economy which was sponsored by major corporations-- including Enron-- that have a clear interest in the show's content.
Titled "Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy," the series is based on the eponymous book by Daniel Yergin and Joseph Stanislaw. It has already received a rave review from the Wall Street Journal (3/28/02) under the headline "PBS Likes Capitalism More Than the Commercial Networks Do," in which it hailed the series as a "paean to private enterprise."
Corporate funders of "Commanding Heights" include the Electronic Data Systems Corporation (which bills itself as "the leading global information technology services company"), BP (formerly British Petroleum, one of the world's largest oil companies) and FedEx-- all firms with a major stake in the debate over the future of the global economy.
Enron no longer appears on lists of the show's funders, but the Boston Globe (1/23/02) has reported that Enron was one of the series' original underwriters, providing backing that might have been "in the six figures." Since Enron's scandalous collapse, PBS has downplayed the Enron link, calling it "a distraction." In January, after more than two years of work on the series and just three months before its debut, Yergin told the Globe that "preliminary discussions" had been undertaken to find a replacement underwriter.
This isn't the first time that PBS has distributed a show with a funding-related conflict of interest. Nor is it the first time that Yergin has been involved. Over the years, FAIR has found that PBS scrutinizes the underwriters of certain documentaries with more vigilance than it does others. Shows produced or funded by "interest groups" like unions and public interest activists have been rejected by PBS as compromised by these connections, while programs funded by corporate or conservative interests are A-OK.
Here are a few examples of that trend:
DISTRIBUTED BY PBS:
*The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power, a 1993 series funded by PaineWebber, a company with significant oil interests. The series' main analyst was Daniel Yergin, a consultant to major oil companies. Almost every expert featured was a defender of the oil industry.
*Living Against the Odds, a 1991 special on risk assessment that asserted, "We have to stop pointing the finger at industry for every environmental hazard." Funded by Chevron, a petrochemical company often criticized for environmental pollution.
*James Reston: The Man Millions Read, a flattering documentary about the New York Times' most famous pundit. The film was funded by and produced "in association with" the New York Times. The director and producer, Susan Dryfoos, is part of the Sulzberger family that owns the paper, and is the daughter of a former Times publisher.
REJECTED BY PBS:
*Out At Work, a 1997 film about workplace discrimination against gays and lesbians. Why? It was partially funded by unions and a lesbian group. PBS acknowledged that the underwriters had clearly not controlled the program's content, and that it was "compelling television responsibly done," but still refused to distribute it.
*Defending Our Lives, a 1993 Academy Award-winning documentary about domestic violence. Why? One of the producers was the leader of a battered women's support group, and PBS felt that gave her a "direct vested interest in the subject matter of the program."
*The Money Lenders, a 1993 film about the World Bank. Why? PBS was concerned that "Even though the documentary may seem objective to some, there is a perception of bias in favor of poor people who claim to be adversely affected."
According to the "Commanding Heights" trailer-- which, though it doesn't disclose the show's underwriters, does feature footage of FedEx airplanes-- the show aims to tell "the story of the battle between the power of governments and the power of the marketplace over which will control the commanding heights of the world's economies."
"It's unfortunate that public television is presenting viewers with a report on the struggle over globalization that's been bankrolled by some of the key players from one side of the debate," said FAIR's Rachel Coen. |
See also:
http://www.fair.org/media-outlets/pbs.html
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Comments
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Globalization & the Ministry of Truth |
by Nancy Snow
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
05 Apr 2002
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An excellent follow-up to the story above. ML
"Seattle is dead." I recall someone mentioning this shorthand for the globalization protests against the World Trade Organization and IMF in the days following the September 11 attacks. The battle in Seattle had been displaced by the battle for our very lives. Good versus evil. Freedom versus tyranny. Bin Laden versus Bush. Oh we of little faith. Did we really think that the globalization debate would go away for good? It's back but in a post-9/11 reconstituted form that draws new revisionist battle lines. In looking back, some now want to point to the battle in Seattle as a precursor to the war on terrorism, narrowly framed between those who love freedom and those who would destroy it. Consider this observation from Helle Dale, editorial page editor for the Washington Times:
"Perceptive observers have pointed out that, despite the vast difference in scale, the terrorists of September 11 had a certain amount in common with the anti-globalization demonstrators who descended on Seattle, Geneva, Stockholm and other venues of international meetings - a deep-seated hatred of the modern world." ("Let the Markets Rule," Washington Times, April 3, 2002)
Let's revision, why don't we. Either you are with the terrorists and anti-globalization demonstrators, or you are against us. It almost makes one nostalgic for that momentary lapse in Christian charity and compassion when another `perceptive observer' Jerry Falwell said that "the pagans, the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America, I point the finger in their face and say, `You helped this happen.'"
United we stand, Reverend.
Helle Dale's ad hominem attack linking global citizen protest to global terror came in the form of an ironic approving nod to that bulwark of "liberal/left" public broadcasting system (PBS) for airing, "Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy" (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/commandingheights), a six-hour globalization, Inc. literacy project. Dale could not resist weighing in on the station's health: "One imagines that the conclusive victory of free-market economics over central planning and state control must have been rather a bitter pill to swallow at PBS, where capitalism is not often celebrated. Perhaps it is due to the meticulous case built by the authors, whose book of the same title has been published by Touchstone Books/Simon and Schuster, that the programs are aired at all."
Hmm. "Meticulous" sounds scientific and objective until Dale mentions "case built." Then one starts to wonder. Could it be that the authors were helped along in their case-building by substantial corporate underwriting that made it all flow together seamlessly? In an effort to be a more perceptive observer in a capitalist society, I tend to follow the money. And in the case of "Commanding Heights," it leads one to the heights of corporate sponsorship in the form of EDS, British Petroleum, FedEx, Microsoft, and the Calvin Kazanjian Economics Foundation, Inc. for helping build that case and the impressive website, book, and video accompaniments.
You ask, Kazanjian who? The mission of the Kazanjian Economics Foundation, as stated on its website (www.kazanjian.org) begins with a quip from its founder, Calvin K. Kazanjian: "The purpose of business is to serve. Profits from this service are not measured in dollars but rather in increased happiness resulting from such service." - CKK. That's the shorthand version. CKK weighs in again, in case you missed the point the first time: "The way to greater happiness and prosperity for all lies in mutual understanding of economics and mutual cooperation in the true spirit of the Golden Rule. You and I and millions like us throughout America must first understand the problems, must clearly see the obstacles that hold us back. Then, whether we be in industry, agriculture, labor or government, do our part by first removing the obstacles we ourselves are placing in the path of Progress, then insist that others do their part. By our united might, through our voice and our vote, we must push aside all those who, through greed or ignorance, place blocks on the road to Progress and Prosperity. It can be done, it will be done, if you and millions like you will do your part." Calvin K. Kazanjian 1889-1948
Beam me up, CKK.
With a vision like Mr. Kazanjian, you can only imagine that the roadblockers and lowlights on that road to Progress and Prosperity include the political economy writings of those who were not interviewed by the series producers, including The Best Democracy Money Can Buy by Greg Palast, When Corporations Rule the World by David Korten, One Market Under God by Thomas Frank, The Selling of "Free Trade" by John MacArthur, No Logo by Naomi Klein, Global Dreams by Richard Barnet and John Cavanaugh, and The Case Against the Global Economy by Jerry Mander and Edward Goldsmith.
Is it the Golden Rule or that some should not speak unless spoken to?
The function of a Ministry of Truth is to deliver the official party line. In a one-party totalitarian state, it's easy to follow the simple rules: obey the official doctrine and you'll be okay. If you stray from the party line, the bludgeon will take over. It doesn't matter what you really think because your actions are controlled through force. Democratic societies like the United States have no Ministry of Truth because the government is limited in controlling behavior through force. On paper, we Americans have vigorous debate, lots of opinions, and no thought police but the debate takes place within ever narrowing margins. This is what the globalization debate has become. Anyone who dares question the sacred cows of global progress measured through limitless growth, the free market and privatization is marginalized as some kind of troublemaker,
John Dewey-eyed idealist, enemy of the state or shopping mall.
"Commanding Heights" is just like it sounds: a view-from-the-top discussion of the global economy. And from high above even planet earth looks peaceful.
Nancy Snow (nsnow (at) usc.edu) is the author of Propaganda, Inc. and the forthcoming Info War: American Propaganda & Opinion Control after 9-11 (Seven Stories, 2002). She is a Lecturer at the University of Southern California, Annenberg School for Communication.
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