George Monbiot again, who had previously written in detail about "think tanks", and now comes up with an edifying case.
Think tanks are anything but. I mean, they (most of them at any rate) don't do much thinking -except in terms of thinking about rhetoric. Most of the conclusions are decided in advance, to be creatively justified.
Surprise surprise, even though they do their utmost never to make their funding public, determined investigations will eventually highlight funding by the very groups that the preconceived conclusions would benefit the most.
In essence, they are Public Relations companies. But they are not forced to divulge their clients, and are given much too strong an access to the media, which makes them far more dangerous.
It's high time that they be forced to disclose their sources of funding -and even that would not be sufficient regulation of the sector.
As for me, I'm happy to disclose: so far, no funding ;-)
Think tanks are anything but. I mean, they (most of them at any rate) don't do much thinking -except in terms of thinking about rhetoric. Most of the conclusions are decided in advance, to be creatively justified.
Surprise surprise, even though they do their utmost never to make their funding public, determined investigations will eventually highlight funding by the very groups that the preconceived conclusions would benefit the most.
In essence, they are Public Relations companies. But they are not forced to divulge their clients, and are given much too strong an access to the media, which makes them far more dangerous.
It's high time that they be forced to disclose their sources of funding -and even that would not be sufficient regulation of the sector.
As for me, I'm happy to disclose: so far, no funding ;-)
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