CHW Article Focuses on “Astroturf” Food Advocacy

Corporations and Health Watch (CHW) has published a June 22, 2011,
article claiming that food and beverage companies frequently deploy a
public relations strategy known as “astroturfing” to disguise “corporatedriven”
propaganda as “bottom-up, grassroots community activism.” Titled
“Corporations, the Public’s Health and Astroturf,” the article specifically warns
consumers against “cloaked websites” that “intentionally disguise authorship
in order to put forward a political agenda,” as well as against front groups
funded and organized by industry interests. In particular, CHW singles out
Americans Against Food Taxes as a group that advertises itself as “a coalition
of concerned citizens” who oppose the soda tax, but which is purportedly funded by the American Beverage Association and includes as members “the world’s largest food and soft drink manufacturers.”

“In some ways, these sorts of propaganda efforts are not new,” opines the
article, which likens astroturfing to legislative efforts led by the National
Smokers Alliance in the 1990s. “This kind of sophistry, ‘it’s not Astroturf, it’s
just organizing,’ is a common argument made by those trying to defend such
tactics.”