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The LM network has never been transparent about its funding. Not one of its myriad organisations provides a breakdown of all funders and how much they have provided. We do know, however, that they are funded by some of the same corporations that fund the right wing think tanks that are dedicated to obscuring the damage that corporations do to the environment, human rights and democracy. For example, the pharmaceutical company Pfizer has funded both Spiked and the Institute of Ideas. 24 As well as funding the LM network, Pfizer also funds a wide range of free market think tanks such as the US-based Competitive Enterprise Institute and Cato Institute, 25 the Netherlands-based Edmund Burke Foundation,26 the Brussels based Centre for the New Europe (which also does work on climate funded by Exxon),27 and the UK’s Social Market Foundation. 28 Pfizer’s bosses fund these organisations for the same reason they are part of one of the most important global corporate lobby groups, the International Chamber of Commerce29 - to safeguard their licence to make profit. Pfizer also funds the American Council on Science and Health, a deceptive front group,30 and two organisations with which the LM network has connections, the Science Media Centre31 and Sense About Science. Both are engaged in managing debate about scientific issues.32 The obvious evidence-based conclusion is that all these organisations are useful to Pfizer’s corporate strategy. Other corporations and corporate lobby groups that have funded the LM network are BT, Cadbury Schweppes, IBM, Novartis Orange, O2, The Mobile Operators Association and the Society of the Chemical Industry.33 This kind of funding makes it look as if the LM network is a collection of lobbying or PR outfits. Unsurprisingly, some of the biggest lobby firms also fund the network. Hill and Knowlton is one of the most controversial lobbying and PR firms in the world, having famously been behind the deception on the incubator baby story in Kuwait in 1990/91. It also worked for a long list of controversial corporations, including some from the oil, tobacco, pharma, fast food, and GM industry. It worked too for repressive regimes, including Egypt, Haiti, Indonesia, Morocco, Turkey – and China after the Tiananmen square massacre.34 Along with PR firm Luther Pendragon (which has worked for the Hinduja brothers, Macdonalds, Pepsi, the GM industry and others),35 Hill and Knowlton has put up cash for LM network events. The LM network has also worked with other free market think tanks such as the International Policy Network (which took money from Exxon for climate change ’outreach’)36 and the Social Issues Research Centre (which takes money from the food, alcohol and tech industry and downplays the risks from their products).37 full: http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/12194-hidden-agendas-the-lm-network-and-spinwatch ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: [email protected] Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
