Conservative Consciousness and the Press: The Institutional Contribution to the Idea of the ‘Liberal Media’ in Right-Wing Discourse

Abstract

This article examines the construction of conservative consciousness toward the establishment press, namely the articulation of the idea of the liberal media. Using discursive institutionalism and Nancy Fraser’s critique of Habermas’s conception of the public sphere as a theoretical lens, it is argued that the liberal media bias critique was developed and solidified in what the author calls the ‘conservative counter-sphere’, a sub-public sphere for right-wing activists and thinkers. A content analysis of the conservative publication Human Events empirically demonstrates that right-wing news outlets provided a public space for the emerging modern conservative movement to articulate a hegemonic discourse and mode of thought about the seeming liberal bias of the mainstream media.

Keywords

conservatism Human Events discursive institutionalism liberal media hegemony discourse news frames

Introduction

The views of the [news media] fraternity do not represent the views of America.

Vice President Spiro Agnew, 1970

The country belongs to the people, not the New York Times.

Senator Bob Dole, 1996

If you haven’t cursed out a New York Times reporter during the course of a campaign, you’re not really a real Republican is the way I look at it.

Governor Rick Perry, 2012

Since the 1970s, it is well established that conservatives have been openly hostile toward the mainstream media. From Vice President Spiro Agnew’s opening salvo against the press to Representative Lamar Smith’s (R-Texas) recent contention that the greatest threat to the USA is not another crippling economic recession or terrorist attack but a ‘liberal media bias’. Though the right-wing critique of a liberal media is, according to McChesney (2004: 110), ‘an intellectual failure, riddled with contradictions and inaccuracy’, the belief that the media is liberal is firmly ingrained in right-wing conventional wisdom. But this hostility begs the question about the origins of this irrationality. This is all the more surprising considering the wealth of literature on media bias (Adkins Covert and Washburn, 2007; Alterman, 2003; D’Alessio and Allen, 2000; Groseclose, 2011; Herman and Chomsky, 2002; Niven, 2002). Regardless of the scholarship, for most Americans, the conventional wisdom holds that the mainstream media is liberal. And it is this assumed liberal bias of the media that infuriates conservatives.

Despite being a powerful force in American politics, research is lacking on the news media’s contribution to the modern conservative movement (Phillips-Fein, 2011). Most scholarship and popular writings have focused on the current state of conservative media and actors (for example, see Dickinson, 2011; Jamieson and Cappella, 2008; Sobieraj and Berry, 2011). However, there is little research on the conservative media before Fox News and Rush Limbaugh or an examination of the basis of the liberal media critique. This article serves as a contribution to rectifying this problem by offering a theoretical conception of what I call the ‘conservative counter-sphere’ and empirically demonstrating its role in solidifying a hegemonic discourse about the establishment media.

The idea of the liberal media, however, was not always part of the conservative and conventional wisdom (Major, 2012). The 1930s through the 1960s, for example, the majority of Americans, including an overwhelming majority of Republicans, viewed the news as fair (Ladd, 2013). In fact, for those who did see the media as biased, the majority of them felt it skewed toward the Republican Party and against Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal regime (Ladd, 2011: 59–63). Furthermore, it is certainly not the case that conservatives were censored from the mainstream press even as their criticisms of the press started to increase and intensify. For example, Barry Goldwater had a popular syndicated column in the Los Angeles Times starting in 1960 and Reader’s Digest provided Richard Nixon with a column between 1965 and 1968 (Major, 2012). I contend that the critique of the liberal media was articulated and solidified in the conservative counter-sphere, an institutional communicative environment for right-wing activists and thinkers.

The ‘Conservative Counter-Sphere’ and Discursive Institutionalism

In her critique of Jürgen Habermas’s traditional conception of the public sphere, Nancy Fraser (1992) argues that multiple publics and public spheres exist rather than one (see also Major, 2012). In other words, discursive interaction occurs in a multiplicity of institutional arenas (Fraser, 1992: 110). These sub-publics, often marginalized from the mainstream, develop rhetoric within their own community as well as challenge dominant discourses in more official public spheres.¹ Like other groups, conservatives developed their own discursive sphere as they felt marginalized from the mainstream. Conservatives found the trajectory of the political order unacceptable, as they do during any period when they perceive a disruption of the status quo and the power structure becoming more egalitarian (Robin, 2011). The conservative counter-sphere began to take shape during the civil rights era, as conservative critics felt marginalized by the social upheaval and the disruption of the status quo – and articulated this discomfort through a critique of the mainstream media (Greenberg, 2008; Major, 2012).

While Fraser employs the term ‘subaltern counterpublic’ to describe those marginalized from the mainstream sphere, I do not consider the right-wing public sphere to be a subaltern counterpublic because conservatives, despite their frequent claims to the contrary, were, and are, not a marginalized group (Robin, 2008, 2011). As Robin (2008) puts it, ‘Ever since it emerged from the shadows of the French Revolution, conservatism has been a movement of insiders pretending to be outsiders.’ Rather than using ‘non-subaltern counterpublic’, I believe that ‘counter-sphere’ is a more appropriate designation for this type of discursive interaction because it signifies a reactionary stance from a dominant group. Interestingly, the conservative counter-sphere mimics many of the features of a subaltern counterpublic in that they are publicly orientated and provide for ‘spaces of withdrawal and regroupment’ and ‘training grounds for agitational activities directed toward wider publics’. Most importantly, a counter-sphere allows for the invention and circulation of ‘counterdiscourses, so as to formulate oppositional interpretations of [a group’s] identities, interests, and needs’ (Fraser, 1992: 123–124).

The conservative counter-sphere served as a critical institution to articulate a rhetorical assault against the establishment news media. Whether it was in news briefs, wisecracks and asides, or an entire news item, criticisms of the mainstream media helped establish a conventional wisdom within American conservative thought and discourse. This discursive environment would eventually influence mainstream America’s views toward the establishment media as conservatives made their case in more public forums.

Methodologically, this conceptualization of the conservative counter-sphere is conducive to the approach of discursive institutionalism, which gives primacy to the role of ideas and discourses in institutions and institutional change (Schmidt, 2008). According to Schmidt, the emphasis on discourse explicitly addresses

the representation of ideas (how agents say what they are thinking of doing) and the discursive interactions through which actors generate and communicate ideas (to whom they say it) within given institutional contexts (where and when they say it). (2008: 306)

Broadly defined, there are two areas of discourse; coordinative and communicative. Coordinative discourse involves communication among like-minded political actors whereas communicative discourse is oriented toward broader publics (Schmidt, 2008: 310). This article focuses solely on the coordinative discourse in the conservative counter-sphere regarding the liberal media bias critique, rather than assessing the communicative discourse that conservative actors employed in the mainstream spheres to turn public opinion against the media.

Frames and Consciousness

The media influences the public’s perceptions and preferences of political events, issues and actors (Entman, 2004; Iyengar, 1991; Page and Shapiro, 1992; Zaller, 1992). The media exerts one of its greatest influences through framing. Frames are an important aspect of news coverage because, as one scholar argues, they highlight the power of text (Entman, 1993, 2004; see also Chong and Druckman, 2007; Iyengar, 1991). The creation and transmission of political consciousness is best viewed as a process. Information is the raw form of knowledge; it is frames that provide meaning to knowledge and focus the message being conveyed (Iyengar, 1991). Frames serve as a way to define a problem, evaluate it, and suggest a remedy. News frames make aspects of an issue or event more salient over other equally relevant aspects.

Frames inform the interpretive processes that establish a network of ideas or an interpretative paradigm for individuals and groups such as conservatives (Entman, 2004). The power of the frame is in the details that are highlighted as well as in what is omitted (Entman, 2004). In short, frames serve as information organizers. Thus, frames are viewed as a tremendous source of power because they define the alternatives (Schattschneider, 1960). As will be shown below, right-wing framing of the press made the idea of a liberal media more salient in the conservative mind, establishing ‘scripts’ to serve as cues for thinking about this issue in the future. The Human Events reader was barraged with a variety of critiques against the mainstream media and this negative outlook helped articulate a hegemonic dialogue in the conservative counter-sphere. The following section examines the frames employed in the conservative publication Human Events.

Human Events

In order to empirically demonstrate the conservative counter-sphere’s articulation of the idea of the liberal media, I performed a content analysis of the right-wing publication Human Events between 1957 and 1965. Human Events was analyzed because it was a news weekly that was foundational to the modern conservative movement. It essentially served as a large part of the institutional communicative network for adherents of conservatism.

Deriving its title from the opening line of the Declaration of Independence, Human Events was founded in 1944, 11 years before William F. Buckley’s National Review. What is more, Buckley first attempted to purchase Human Events, recognizing the importance and influence of this news weekly, before founding his vanguard project (Major, 2012: 459).² In fact, Buckley’s rise to prominence in conservative circles was due in large part to Human Events as they published some of Buckley’s earliest writings like an article that would serve as a template for his God and Man at Yale (Ferris, 1999: 453).

Equally important, Human Events was held in high regard among onservatives. Though it initially had a small circulation rate, an editor of Human Events considered the subscribers the ‘cream list’ of conservative politicians and intellectuals including Presidents Hoover and Nixon, Senator Robert Taft, Charles Lindbergh, John Dos Passos, and Pierre S. Du Pont (Ferris, 1999: 450).³ Human Events exposed its readers to the writings of many leading conservative thinkers and politicians including Barry Goldwater, William Buckley, Paul Harvey, M. Stanton Evans, Russell Kirk, Freda Utley, William Henry Chamberlin, Ronald Reagan, and Ludwig von Mises (Ferris, 1999: 450).

Human Events also helped bridge old conservatism with the new conservatism. Much of the racist and isolationist rhetoric inherent in the old conservatism was deemed unfit for the new conservative vanguard trying to bring their political project into the mainstream (Hendershot, 2011; Major, 2012). While the new right-wing were sympathetic to the ideology of the old conservatism, they wanted to repackage the rhetoric and leave behind the baggage of groups like the John Birch Society (Hendershot, 2011: 167, 209, 216; see also Major, 2012).

Ronald Reagan credited Human Events for his disillusionment with, and eventual renunciation of, liberalism and the Democratic Party (Major, 2012: 460). In addition, during the eight years in the White House, the Reagan administration received several dozen copies of Human Events (Ferris, 1999: 450). It was for these reasons that Human Events was selected for analysis as it held an institutional and cultural power in developing a ‘common sense’ framework within conservative consciousness and rhetoric.

The period of analysis, 1957–65, was chosen for many reasons. First, this period coincided with the ascendance of the modern conservative movement as evidenced by the rising popularity of figures like Barry Goldwater and Richard Nixon. Second, this represented a critical period in American political development as other social and political movements were also gaining traction (Major, 2012).

Findings

News items with media-related critiques yielded 120 Human Events newsletters.⁴ The focus of the content analysis was Human Events frames of the mainstream press. More specifically, I examined the type of discourse surrounding the establishment media and in what context. I identified more than 20 themes about the media; the overwhelming majority of them were situated in a negative context (see Figure 1). The late 1950s did not generate much critique of the mainstream press, only three newsletters in 1957, five in 1958, and six newsletters in 1959 contained criticisms of the media. However, by 1961, hostility towards the press grew as criticisms were found in nearly a quarter to more than half of the newsletters each year (Major, 2012).

Figure 1.

Human Events frames about the mainstream press.

In fact, as Table 1 shows, throughout the eight year period of analysis, there were only 13 benign⁵ or positive statements⁶ about the establishment press, six of which were not coupled with any frames. Of those six, only two were identified as positive statements about the media. In other words, in less than 1 percent of the Human Events newsletters were readers able to find standalone positive references about the news media. The conservative counter-sphere provided the institutional framework to articulate right-wing hostility towards the mainstream press.

Table 1.

Categories of media criticism.

Frames	# of Comments (% of total)
Democrats manipulate and manage the news	42 (14%)
Double standards applied to conservatives	32 (11%)
Pro-communism	30 (10%)
Anti-American national interests	30 (10%)
Bias against Sen. Goldwater	24 (8%)
Favoritism towards Kennedy or Johnson administration	23 (8%)
Unprofessionalism	22 (8%)
Too powerful	20 (7%)
Pro-unions/Anti-business	16 (5%)
Benign or Positive statement	13 (4%)
Pro-civil rights/Bias against the South	11 (4%)
Book censor	6 (2%)
Anti-war	5 (2%)
Human Events/conservatives showing liberals the errors of their ways	4 (1%)
Bias against Richard Nixon	4 (1%)
Pro-United Nations	4 (1%)
Other*	7 (2%)

Please note that percentages are rounded.

Other comprises: Bias against Sen. Joe McCarthy (1); Pro-homosexuality (1); Anti-religion (2); and Unrelated foreign media reference (3).

According to Table 1, there were a variety of criticisms toward the mainstream press that served as evidence that it was liberal. The top five frames made up more than 50 percent of the total (54%). Criticisms included frames like the media being against the national interests of the USA, and the press being biased against Republican politicians while providing favorable coverage to Democratic presidents. It was Human Events’ most frequent contention that part of this favorable coverage was due to mainstream news organizations allowing themselves to be manipulated and managed by Democratic administrations like Kennedy and Johnson.

What Table 1 fails to show is the impact of the conservative counter-sphere in making specific frames more salient during critical periods. For example, while management and manipulation of the news was the most frequent criticism of the media, it was nowhere to be found in the pages of Human Events during the Eisenhower administration. The first denunciation of news manipulation does not appear until April 1961, three months after the Kennedy administration took office.

Another example is coverage of Senator Barry Goldwater, the Republican presidential nominee in 1964. While the Goldwater bias made only 8 percent of the total number of critiques, the negativity was heavily concentrated during the year of the election. Two-thirds of the 27 newsletters featuring media critiques in 1964 made references to the seeming bias against Goldwater. Along with other criticisms, with the exceptions of March and July, the Human Events reader was fed a healthy diet of the idea that the media was biased against Goldwater during the 1964 presidential election.

Human Events also highlighted to their readers the awesome and unchecked influence that the national press has on the American political system. Placing it in the context of Senator Barry Goldwater’s dim prospects in the 1964 presidential campaign, M. Stanton Evans (1965) contended that ‘the most awesome power of the national media … is the power to define the issues.’ Though the media ‘cannot manufacture public opinion, they can in large part decide what public opinion will be about.’ Focusing on its framing power, Evans added that the press ‘can zero in on certain matters to the exclusion of others’ and ‘demand certain answers from one candidate’ like Goldwater ‘while not demanding like answers from his opponent [President Johnson].’ He concluded that this influence was invoked ‘repeatedly in the 1964 election’ (Evans, 1965).

The editorial preamble of Human Events reveals the mindset informing the conservative counter-sphere. Human Events claims to be objective but not impartial. It is objective because ‘it aims for accurate presentation of the facts.’ However, it lacks impartiality because:

It looks at events through the eyes that are biased in favor of limited constitutional government, local self-government, private enterprise and individual freedom. These principles represented the bias of the Founding Fathers. We think the same bias will preserve freedom in America.

For Human Events, conservative values are synonymous with American values because it is only conservatives that understand the original intent of the Framers. At the very least, the liberal establishment, led by the media, have degenerated the principles of America so severely that conservatives are tasked with the responsibility of resuscitating the country back to its glory. So to be against the conservative cause is to be anti-American. The working assumption for conservatives was that the mainstream press was against them because the establishment media were against the national interests of the USA.

For example, one editorial castigated the mainstream media for its undermining of the free enterprise system in particular and American values more broadly, a critique which is still standard among right-wing commentators. The columnist found it ‘strange’ that criminals and other subversives ‘receive sympathetic, tolerant and forgiving treatment by all the media … while businessmen receive such hostile, prejudiced and scurvy treatment’ resulting in them having to hide their benevolent role to the public. Corrupt labor leaders, it is further argued, ransacking pension funds or ivory tower professors preaching anti-Americanism are ‘led to view with indulgence’ but the press has ‘lasting disdain’ for the businessman ‘who uses an expense account to entertain a customer for the purpose of making a sale, or who uses his ingenuity, foresight and risk-taking courage to make a whale of a profit’ (Widener, 1965: 13).

This approach also laid the framework for the ideology of right-wing victimhood (see Robin, 2011). The discourse on the mainstream media was normatively and cognitively sensible to conservatives as they were battling a seemingly liberal establishment. Conservative wisdom held that the mainstream press was against them so conservatives were the real victims.

Conclusion: Spheres of Conservative Consciousness

Hallin (1984) asserts that journalists operate in three ideological ’spheres’ that inform their reporting: consensus, legitimate controversy, and deviance. These spheres influence, and are influenced by, a broader ideological framework that sets the parameters of acceptable reporting. While he was focused on the mainstream press, Hallin’s notion of ideological spheres is perfectly applicable to the right-wing media. In this sense, the seemingly liberal bias in the mainstream media is part of the sphere of consensus in the conservative counter-sphere. Just like motherhood and apple pie, it made perfect sense to conservatives that the media was not an ally to their cause. And since it was against their cause, the media was un-American. As Hallin puts it, ‘Here the case for a Gramscian model of the media as maintainers of the hegemony of a dominant political ideology is strong’ (1984: 21).

The conservative counter-sphere was crucial to the articulation of this hegemonic discourse and cultural norm of right-wing thinking about the establishment media. The loosely based objective facts and anecdotes of liberal biases emanating from the mainstream press transformed the subjective reality of the conservative movement. While the conservative counter-sphere primarily served its own right-wing community, the sub-sphere discourse, in turn, would go on to influence the mainstream discursive environment as conservatives would eventually make their case among the broader public. To be sure, criticism of the news media was not the sole focus in the conservative counter-sphere. Rather, the importance of the conservative counter-sphere is that it served as a critical institutional tool to solidify and energize the broader critique of regulated capitalism and a liberal social, racial, and gendered order (Major, 2012).

The next time Sarah Palin assails the ‘lamestream media’, or a hostile Ann Romney tells Good Morning America that ‘We’ve given all you people need to know’ about her husband’s financial dealings, or Newt Gingrich laments that questions about his marital life asked during a Republican primary debate are irrefutable proof that the media wants Barack Obama to win reelection, the irrationality is nothing new, but rather a rich tradition among the right-wing that finds its origins and clear articulation in the conservative counter-sphere.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Anthony DiMaggio, David Fasenfest, Erin Heidt-Forsythe, Lauren Langman, Michael Thompson, and the two reviewers.

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Notes

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