Manufacturing Consent

The Political Economy of the Mass Media

By: Edward S. Herman, Noam Chomsky

Narrated by: John Pruden

In this pathbreaking work, now with a new introduction, Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky show that, contrary to the usual image of the news media as cantankerous, obstinate, and ubiquitous in their search for truth and defense of justice, in their actual practice they defend the economic, social, and political agendas of the privileged groups that dominate domestic society, the state, and the global order.

Based on a series of case studies - including the media's dichotomous treatment of "worthy" versus "unworthy" victims, "legitimizing" and "meaningless" Third World elections, and devastating critiques of media coverage of the US wars against Indochina - Herman and Chomsky draw on decades of criticism and research to propose a Propaganda Model to explain the media's behavior and performance. Their new introduction updates the Propaganda Model and the earlier case studies, and it discusses several other applications.

©2002 Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky (P)2017 Tantor

Critic reviews

"[A] compelling indictment of the news media's role in covering up errors and deceptions in American foreign policy of the past quarter century." ( New York Times)

Didn’t work well in audio format. Book's better

Yes - struggle is a good worrd. The detail is too complex to keep straight while casually listening.

Very engaging!

Wonderful narrator and great book. Really gets the brain working! Noam and Edward are a match made in heaven.

Amazing

Amazing, wonderful, spectacular, lovely, great, but depressing af, sad, melancholy, and brought me towards actual nihilism

dense

This is a super comprehensive book. if you are truly interested in the media and how they shape narratives this is the book for you.

Holding a mirror to America's distorted self image

If you have lived outside the USA and more generally the west, you realize the news, self image and self righteousness are all a great deal of sham. Faced with even a little fact on Gaza, or Iraq or Vietnam one would imagine you know we are living in Propagandist culture. This books attempts to show how this distorted self is kept from revealing itself to its citizens. Extraordinary stamina to pursue and publish this mirror on a world of lies.