CSICOP Online: Science and the Media & 30th Anniversary

How Press Coverage Limits Controversy in the U.S. Over Plant Biotechnology

Matthew C. Nisbet

When the World Trade Organization (WTO) ruled last week that the European Union had violated international trade rules by blocking U.S. imports of genetically-modified (GM) crops, the news barely registered in the American media, with coverage limited to stories appearing in the business sections of the New York Times and Washington Post. On the airwaves, the event was ignored by the television networks, though coverage did run on NPR’s Morning Edition and Marketplace. Across these news outlets, reporting was fairly technical and contextual, focusing on the specifics of the decision, the implications for trade, and the legal reasoning behind the WTO ruling.

The press left unchallenged the industry and U.S. government view that the health and environmental risks of GM agriculture are minimal. For example, the Washington Post characterized European public opposition as really a matter of social perceptions: “An overwhelming body of scientific opinion -- including regulators at the European Food Safety Authority and scientific institutes in most European countries -- holds that the crops are safe to eat and pose only minor environmental risks. But European consumers were burned by food-safety scandals in the 1990s involving dioxin-laced chickens, beef capable of causing a fatal brain disease, and other disasters in which they were initially assured that the foods were safe. Their trust in the opinion of European, much less American, scientists on such matters is low.”

Alternative and more dramatic interpretations, however, were available. London’s Daily Mail tabloid trumpeted headlines full of moral outrage: “America’s GM food blitz on Ireland: Floodgates opened to Frankenstein Food.” In another article appearing at the tabloid, a Friends of the Earth UK spokesperson was able to dramatically frame the decision in terms of public accountability, with the following prominent quote: “This ruling is a direct attack on democracy. Last year, European countries voted to uphold national bans on GM products. This dispute is a desperate attempt by the U.S. and biotech industry to force GM foods onto an unwilling European market. But consumers will not be bullied into eating GM foods.” A similar framing was emphasized in coverage at The Guardian by a second spokesperson for FoE UK: "It's a desperate attempt to force these products on an unwilling market. This will lead to even greater opposition to GM crops. Protecting wildlife, farmers and consumers is far more important than free trade rules.”

To Read More of This Column Visit: http://www.csicop.org/scienceandmedia/biotech/

Matthew C. Nisbet (Ph.D., Cornell University) is Assistant Professor in the School of Communication at The Ohio State University. His research on the interplay between science, media, and politics appears in the journals Communication Research, the Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics, the International Journal of Public Opinion Research, Public Opinion Quarterly, and Science Communication. From 1997 to 1999, he worked as Public Relations Director for CSICOP. Nisbet maintains the blog FRAMING SCIENCE, which tracks news coverage of technical controversies.

To Read More Columns By Matt Nisbet Visit: http://www.csicop.org/scienceandmedia/

Comments on the column should be address to Matt Nisbet at nisbetmc@gmail.com

Come Join Us for CSICOP's 30th Anniversary and the Inauguration of the Center for Inquiry

http://www.csicop.org/events/anniversary.html

goto: CSICOP home -- CFI home

CSICOP'S 30TH ANNIVERSARY
& INAUGURATION OF THE CENTER FOR INQUIRY

EVENT SCHEDULE - SPEAKERS - REGISTRATION - INFORMATION

Speakers

Paul Kurtz is the founder and chair of the Council for Secular Humanism, CSICOP, and the Center for Inquiry. He is the author or editor of forty-five books. He is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Ray Hyman is a Professor of Psychology at University of Oregon and a Member of CSICOP’s Executive Council.

James Alcock is Professor of Psychology at York University and a Member of CSICOP’s Executive Council.

Amardeo Sarma is manager NEC Europe Ltd. and executive director, GWUP, Germany.

Ken Frazier is Editor of Skeptical Inquirer magazine. and a fellow of the AAAS.

Barry Beyerstein is a Professor of Psychology at Simon Fraser University and a Member of CSICOP’s Executive Council.

Thomas Casten is Chairman and CEO of Primary Energy Thomas Casten is a nationally recognized expert on energy and environment issues and is a Board Member of the Center for Inquiry.

Eddie Tabash Chair, CFI–West, a Los Angeles attorney and an active proponent of civil rights and religious liberty. First Amendment Expert.

Jan Loeb Eisler has played various roles in the CFI family, serving on the board of the Council for Secular Humanism and, currently, on the board of CFI. She has been a program speaker for the Council in the U.S., India, Australia, and Russia and is the founder of the Center for Inquiry–Florida.

David Koepsell Executive Director, Council for Secular Humanism and Associate Editor for Free Inquiry magazine. Prof. Koepsell is an adjunct Asst. Prof in the SUNYAB Dept. of Philosophy, has lectured all over the world.

Barry Karr Executive Director of CSICOP (Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal) and CFI (Center for Inquiry). He has spoken at numerous conferences and events around the world.

Tom Flynn a longtime secular humanist activist, is editor of Free Inquiry magazine and editor of the “forthcoming” New Encyclopedia of Unbelief, a major reference work.

John R. Shook received his PhD in philosophy from University at Buffalo in 1994. From 2000 to 2006 he has been assistant and associate professor of philosophy at Oklahoma State University. He writes about pragmatism, naturalism, philosophy of science, and the history of American philosophy. He authored Dewey’s Empirical Theory of Knowledge and Reality.