> Environmental and Health Concerns

Exposing Hidden Agenda
by author Barbara Yaffe

Some things in life just aren’t what they seem. This is particularly so in the case of astroturfing.

The little-known term refers to a cunning trend in the highly enterprising world of lobbying. It describes a nefarious practice whereby special interest groups cast themselves as sincere and worthy grassroots organizations in order to achieve entirely self-interested goals.

Astroturfing was born as a verb after being used in 1986 by US Democratic Senator from Texas Lloyd Bentsen, himself a Washington insider. Astroturf, of course, refers to the somewhat tacky artificial grass product used in sports stadiums. “The grassroots,” Bentsen scoffed at the time, referring to fake lobby groups, “is Astroturf in many cases–artificial turf.”

Astroturfing reflects a violation of the Code of Ethics of the Canadian Public Relations Society, according to Sara K. Jones, speaking for the group last December. The Public Relations Society of America also gives a thumbs-down to astroturfing.

That said, the record strongly suggests that North American public relations practitioners have not all been entirely pure.

The End Justifies the Means

The reason few care to be associated with this practice is because it’s adirty business.

Astroturfers seek to mislead public opinion by being less than honest about their true motivations. They deploy mass mailings, phone banks, and computer databases. They mobilize people to write lettersto the editor, place advertisements, lobby governments, and, occasionally, launch lawsuits.

A garden-variety example of the practice occurred in Canada back in 1998 when BC politician Paul Reitsma wrote letters to newspapers under the false name of Warren Betanko. The letters praised himself and lambasted his political opponents. The jig was up when an editor consulted a handwriting expert and outed “Betanko.” Reitsma was expelled from the Liberal caucus; his political career was over.

But such artifice often goes undiscovered and citizens get hoodwinked. The Reitsma case, when boiled down, reflected small potatoes. Astroturfing becomes far more dangerous when big-money special interests, be they corporate or political, set out to manipulate public opinion–in which case a lot more is at stake than just one individual’s reputation.

It is often the more controversial enterprises in society that seek to gain influence through astroturfing: producers of tobacco, alcohol, chemicals, and pharmaceuticals, as well as oil companies.

Environmental Friend or Kyoto Foe?

An example of just this sort of astroturfer is a group calling itself the Friends of Science.

The name would suggest a coterie of environmental activists, tree huggers who embrace the scientific consensus reached in support of the need to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Think again.

On its website, Friends of Science states its goal is to “encourage and assist the Canadian federal government to re-evaluate the Kyoto Protocol by engaging in a national public debate on the scientific merit of Kyoto and the Global Warming issue.” The group castigates “warmists,” and insists the sun, not human activity, is behind climate change. In its six years of operation the organization has produced dozens of papers on climate change and sponsored speakers who do active astroturfing before business breakfast and luncheon groups.

Friends of Science, based in a city that serves as the headquarters for Canada’s petroleum set, includes in its ranks geologists and engineers who have worked in the oil industry.

The surest way to determinewhat a group is about is to scrutinize its funding sources: no simple task for those curious about the Friends of Science.

Its website describes an “extremely limited” budget. An undisclosed portion of funds reportedly derives from the Calgary Foundation, which transfers grant money to the University of Calgary. From there it’s directed toa special science fund managed by Friends member Barry Cooper, a right-leaning political scientist at the university. The arrangement helps keep things anonymous.

When pressed in a 2006 newspaper interview about where donations originate, Cooper admitted: “There were some oil companies.” Group founder Albert Jacobs, himself a retired oil exploration manager, was quoted in 2007 as saying, “Some of the smaller oil and gas companies have occasionally contributed.”

Friends of Science briefly had company in its efforts to rain on the Kyoto Protocol parade.

Irresponsible Lobbying for Environmental Responsibility

Barbara Yaffe is a national political columnist at the Vancouver Sun. Her column is read across Canada in CanWest newspapers. Born in Montreal, Yaffe has lived in Vancouver for 19 years.

Source: alive #308, June 2008