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A Critical Review and Assessment of Herman and Chomsky’s ‘Propaganda Model’ 143

straightforward and relatively unproblematic. 23 The PM does assume class
cohesion, and argues that mass media interlock with other institutional sectors.
Moreover, it concedes that the powerful have individual objectives and acknow-
ledges that these are manifest in disagreements over tactics. The PM assumes that
elite institutional sectors share common interests and subscribes to the view that a
unified ruling class and institutional nexus exist, with common political, economic
24
and social interests. The model presumes that media behaviour will reflect these
interests. Media performance is understood as an outcome of market forces. [...]
The authors state that media serve to foster and enforce an intellectual and
moral culture geared towards protecting wealth and privilege ‘from the threat of
public understanding and participation’ (Chomsky, 1989: 14). Herman (2000)
comments that, ‘Because the propaganda model challenges basic premises and
suggests that the media serve antidemocratic ends, it is commonly excluded
from mainstream debates on media bias’ (see also Herman, 1996a, 1999).
Herman and Chomsky’s (1988) view of media as an ideological apparatus
for dominant elites mirrors the thesis put forth by William Domhoff (1979) in
his book, The Powers That Be: Processes of Ruling Class Domination in America
(published nine years before Manufacturing Consent). Domhoff contends that
there are four basic processes through which the ruling capitalist class ‘rules’:
(1) the special interest process; (2) the policy formation process; (3) candidate
selection; and (4) the ideological process. […]
Herman and Chomsky argue that mass media behaviour is patterned and
shaped by interlocks in ownership, common institutional imperatives and shared
goals, market forces and internalized assumptions. The PM does not, however,
argue that media are monolithic, or determined to the extent that they are entirely
25
closed to dissent or debate. It does not ignore dissent. 26
Whatever the advantages of the powerful ... the struggle goes on, space
exists and dissent light breaks through in unexpected ways. The mass media
are no monolith. (Herman, cited in Schlesinger, 1992: 308)

Elsewhere, in the final pages of Manufacturing Consent, Herman and Chomsky
(1988: 306) make this same point, acknowledging that the ‘system is not all
powerful’.

Government and elite domination of the media have not succeeded in
overcoming the Vietnam syndrome and public hostility to direct US
involvement in the destabilization and overthrow of foreign governments.
(Herman and Chomsky, 1988: 306)
In conclusion, Herman and Chomsky’s PM has been criticized for its basic
assumptions regarding political economy, for its view of the major mass media
as purveyors of ideologically serviceable propaganda, and for overall general-
izability. Having introduced the article by overviewing several of the criticisms
that have been levelled against the propaganda model, the article now provides
a critical assessment and detailed review of the model itself.