PR Watch, Second Quarter 2002, Volume 9, No. 2

Flack Attack

Public Relations

The public relations industry was born at war, and
it bears the imprint of its origins. Early PR pioneers including Edward
Bernays, Ivy Lee and Carl Byoir got their start with the Committee for Public
Information (also known as the Creel Committee), which organized publicity
on behalf of U.S. objectives during World War I. The Second World War also
saw a proliferation of propaganda agencies, which in the U.S. alone included
the Office of Facts and Figures, the Office of War Information (which worked
closely with Hollywood, sometimes going so far as to write movie scenes
and dialogue), the Office of Censorship, and the Office of the Coordinator
of Information (a forerunner of today's Central Intelligence Agency).

Big Brother Incorporated

by Eveline Lubbers

For years, activist groups in Europe thought that Manfred Schlickenrieder was a leftist sympathizer and filmmaker. He traveled around Europe, interviewing a broad spectrum of activists, and even produced a documentary video, titled Business As Usual: The Arrogance of Power, about human rights groups and environmentalists campaigning against the Shell oil company.

In reality, Schlickenrieder was a spy, and Shell was one of his clients. His film and his activist pretensions were merely cover designed to win the confidence of activists so that he could infiltrate their organizations and collect "inside information" about their goals and activities.

Dumpster Diving to Trash Activists

by Eveline Lubbers

Going through your opponent's garbage to collect information--in detective slang, "garbology"--is a particularly dirty kind of research. A Dutch information broker developed a new cover for the collection of wastepaper: its collector said he wanted it so he could sell it to recyclers to raise money for charity.

Activists and advocacy groups in the Netherlands knew their garbage was being gathered, but not what it was being "recycled" into: intelligence files for companies those groups were boycotting. Little did they realize how interesting their paperwork could be to the companies they campaigned against, tabloids, and occasionally even the police, public prosecutor or secret service.

Ecos Corp's "Win-Win" Spin for Corporate Environmentalism

by Sharon Beder

PR Watch first reported in 1999 on the activities of the Ecos Corporation, an "environmental PR" firm founded in 1995 by former Greenpeace International executive director Paul Gilding. The 1999 article described how Gilding kick-started his fledgling company by recruiting Ben Woodhouse, a former PR executive and vice president at Dow Chemical. In 1999 Ecos only had a modest staff of six others operating from an old church in a suburb of Sydney, Australia.

Although Woodhouse has since left, Ecos now boasts a staff of 15 and has expanded its operations into the United States. The Australian headquarters have moved to a building commanding harbor views in the expensive Sydney Central Business District. Ecos was aided in its rapid growth by Sam Weiss, an American who formerly headed Nike in Europe and now sits on the Ecos board of directors.

Managing Activism: PR Advice for "Neutralizing" Democracy

Book Review by John Stauber

When
I first picked up Denise Deegan's book, Managing
Activism: A Guide to Dealing with Activists and Pressure Groups,
I imagined a roomful of uniformed pest applicators at the Orkin company,
sitting on benches like military aviators before a bombing mission, being
briefed on the best tools available for eradicating cockroaches.