CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PRESS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 25, 1998
• Sequence Number: 4
• Content Type: REPORT

Sani
zed - Approved For Release : CIA-
From "The Press and Foreign Policy" by Bernard C. Cohen, Professor of
Political Sciences at the Univ-
ersity of Wisconsin
CPYRGHTONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PRESS
he Department is concerned, although they do little to alter
he reporters' image of the handout as propaganda.
The second level of voluntary contribution to foreign affairs
overage includes the more serious efforts to keep correspond-
nts informed on major or continuing aspects of American
oreign relations. These are invariably ad hoc efforts through
informal channels, and their general purposes may be sum-
marized as letting the leading correspondents and analysts-
particularly those who are read by other correspondents-
know what is going on in crucial areas, and what the state of
Departmental thinking is in these problem areas, so that news-
paper comment will not get divorced from reality as the officials
see it. One "danger" in such a divorce, as we shall see in Chap-
ter VII, is that the policy makers may subsequently be forced to
adapt themselves to the correspondents' view of reality. Stated
this way, the instrumental component in these informational
efforts is obvious; it is equally apparent in many of the volun-
tary contacts between correspondents and informed working-
level officials, where the very act of informing the reporter in a
particular context inescapably involves communicating a par-
ticular ordering and interpretation of a set of facts. t thpe
en_~ =0ta.c ements s''-hould Bois Q .~? ?~ ersta ding
that t ' he context in which the press is unobtrusively
kept informed-not for attrition aid sgmetimes not teyenY
icattiion-of the develogmei ts,thptnare currently_sensi
j~ relesery?
@an~here# a not likely to be the subj%cj of
or statements.l..
tl-ird type of voluntary contribution consists of the
deliberate instrumental use of the press in order to achieve
specific foreign policy objectives. The identification of these
occasions, in which information on particular issues is fed
1 See Chapter V, footnote 11: "On some big matters the State Depart-
ment informs him [Reston] almost automatically, as it would the
representative of a major power." (Joseph Kraft, in Esquire, Novem-
ber 1958, p; 123.) For this process at work in the developing stages
of the Marshall Plan, see Joseph M. Jones, The Fifteen Weeks, p. 237.
Sanlized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-5
 Sanitize="'- Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-5
CPYRGHTTHE PRESS AND FOREIGN POLICY
and nature of the other things that are in THE news" Mat zlay~'
It should be clear from these remarks that the formal lines
of news distribution in the State Department and in other
agencies having foreign policy responsibilities are adequate
and satisfactory only for the more formal or routine types of
messages about foreign affairs, and for the declaratory. aspects
of foreign policy-that is, when the announcement of an official
position is itself an important or even an essential part of the
policy. Since there are many of these items in contemporary
foreign policy, these lines are busy most of the time. They
are much less efficacious for the not-for-attribution material
relating to on-going foreign relations or the non-declaratory
phases of policy; and so they are not the channels that are
used by officials in offering, or by correspondents in eliciting,
these kinds of information. And while the correspondents have
to cover the former class of material in the performance of
their neutral role as objective recorders of daily history, they
are usually more interested in the latter class and so they work
hard at the cultivation of the necessary informal channels.
These informal connections range from the structured back-
grou ndriefings that Department officials' will manage on
articular occasions, to the casual private conversations on a
personal level betweenma correspondent and .an official. The
former are sometimes hard to distingiush from press confer-
7 This holds not only for reporters' reactions to speeches but in
general for all information volunteered by officials through these
formal channels. For example, in the confusion of developments in the
Congo in the summer of 1960, the public affairs people in the State
Department thought it was important to balance the Soviets' picture
of their contribution to the United Nations' troop lift to the Congo by
telling the American people about the United States' contribution to
the troop lift. The Department issued a handout, and accompanied it
with a press release, giving the statistics on the American effort; there
was even an official on hand to answer any questions about what the
Soviets had done. The officials were disappointed, but not greatly sur-
prised, that very little of this was carried in the press as an independent
story. One of them said, "To the press this was an old story.... [The
correspondents] blame it on the city room: `Don't blame me, it's not
news: "
enceE
The
giver
offici;
ment
erall)
share
that I
matte
off hi
usefu
Some
news
porte
from
be in
mean
the d
betwe
the E
persp
Inl
almos
State
well-s
dinne
in sta
on hil
Some
the S
press.
many
with
foreig
conve
Now
Sanitized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-5
 S4iitized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-5
CPYRGHTCONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PRESS
antes, the latter from ordin discourse between individuals.
ie distinctive feature of a ` acgrouncls'a that the material
o cia s, or identified as the of pial viewpoint of the Depart-
went, nor is it considered bindin The purpose, most gen-
l y; is to enl hten and instruct the re orers, to let them
s are k, a inTc ng and pcrspectn es o# the policy officials, `rso
t at t_ now what the should know about important policy
matters "so the wil act e$ p~onsibly";"so they will' not go 41 o c z pother important purpose is to get politically
use u in ormation into circulation without revealing the source.
Some officials insist that only the Office of News gives out
news, and that in their own background discussions with re-
porters they provide only a context or perspective; but apart
from the non-attributability of the latter the distinction may
be meaningless to a reporter. Context or perspective lends
meaning to events, and may be "newsworthy" in itself. In fact,
the distribution of the foreign affairs correspondent's time as
between the News Office and his own contacts throughout
the Department shows that the distinction between news and
perspective is a distinction without a difference.
Informal sessions with reporters can be varied to meet
almost any kind of circumstance. Assistant Secretaries of
State have regularly held background briefings of a relatively
well-structured sort. Secretary Dulles would often have a
dinner discussion with a small group of correspondents, senior
in status, who stood by, as it were, ever ready for a hint from
on high that the Secretary would welcome a dinner invitation.
Some of Dulles' critics suggest that the hints came whenever
the Secretary was getting especially rough treatment in the
press. The practice itself, however, is a common one, and
many friends of Secretary Acheson attribute his difficulties
with the press to his refusal to "play favorites" among the
foreign affairs correspondents in this fashion. The 1 ncheon
Conversation with a reporter is another wirv rnmmnn nrar*irp
Maur,.. dy-_
+,.~* - r,- ~1e~a!xr?+? re-ari: .R. ,nw .,k.. nPs
? 181
aven the reporter ~ar~not lie quoted or attributed to particular
SanItized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-5
 Sanitized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-A
CPYRGHI~6 PRESS AND FOREIGN POLICY
among policy officials, but it is only one variety of what an
.r ~:N4 .::>xw
-ffi ral called "backgroundin .r~ deux", other forms are cur-
ricuTax; iri tie sense a e area sanctioned use of the
woi time s who have the inclination and
co` a ei nce to deal uireck y with the reporters. And, of course,
there are extensive personal friendships between correspond-
ents and officials, of a kind that facilitates the interchange
of information not otherwise shared between the two institu-
tions. There are thus multiple opportunities for officials to
"plant a story" in private, and as a result there is a steady flow
of information pertaining to current developments in foreign
relations-called "leaks" by people who have not given it out
themselves-from all sides of the Department.
C Criteria Governing the Distribution of News
The foreign policy official who has some reason for talking to
reporters has no trouble finding a way. There are, to be sure,
some fine points that he may want to consider in making his
choice of the most appropriate channels-whether to make a
public speech, for example, or to make a statement at the start
of a press conference; whether to pass the word along to a
small number of leading columnists, or to talk to' a particular
one; or whether to prepare a handout, etc.-but these are not
separable from the specific issues of substance that he wants
to discuss and the reasons that lie behind them, since his choice
will be shaped in some measure by his estimate of the effects
of handling particular policy ideas in particular ways. Ques-
tions of purpose, therefore, are relevant in any consideration
of approaches to the press. What kinds of regularities can
we discover in the reasons for the distribution of foreign policy
information? What are some of the criteria governing the
channeling of foreign affairs news to the press?
Ideological Considerations. The point was made in the pre-
ceding chapter that ideological or philosophical reasons for
being favorably disposed toward the press are weak, and
Sanitized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R000100870004-