THE BATTLE FOR HAPPY VALLEY News Media, Public Relations, and Environmental Discourse Saing Te A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy in Communication Studies, Auckland University of Technology, 2010. ...the specific character of despair is precisely this: it is unaware of being despair. SØREN KIERKEGAARD, The Sickness Unto Death ii Table of Contents Abbreviations v List of Tables vi List of Figures vi Attestation of authorship vii Acknowledgements viii Abstract ix 1. Introduction 1 Overview of chapters and their purpose 1 News Media Organisations and Public Relations 5 Framing and Environmental Discourse 7 The Corporate Response to Environmental Criticisms 9 Theoretical and methodological considerations 10 Method 18 2. News Media, Public Relations and Environmental Discourse 22 The News Media Domain 22 The Public Relations Industry 26 Public Relations and the News Media 32 The News Media and Public Relations in New Zealand 33 News Frames and Environmental Discourse 39 Reframing Environmentalism: The Corporate Response 43 Conclusion 49 3. Mining, Environmental Concerns, and the Corporate Response 52 Mining and the Environment 52 Coal Mining 54 Anti-Coal Activism and the Corporate Response 56 Development of the Environmental Movement in New Zealand 63 Conclusion 70 iii 4. From State Coal Mines to Solid Energy 72 Overview of New Zealand‟s Coal Industry 72 Shifting Structures of Official Environmental Discourse 83 Political Machinations and „Dirty Tricks‟ 94 Conclusion 109 5. The Cypress Mine Project 111 The West Coast Economy 111 Stockton Mine 113 The Cypress Extension of Stockton Opencast Mine 115 Local Responses 118 Environmental Groups 122 Issues surrounding the Cypress Mine Project 126 Conclusion 130 6. News Media Representations of the Cypress Mine Project 132 Environmental discourse in the news 132 The Metropolitan and West Coast news media domains 134 Newspaper outlet profiles 136 Broadcasting samples 140 The Cypress Mine Project 141 The Mt Augustus Snails 149 The Spy Saga 157 Discussion and Implications 165 7. Conclusion: Evaluating the battle for Happy Valley 170 Solid Energy strategies 170 Evaluating the news media coverage 172 Environmental Discourses and the battle for Happy Valley 174 Appendix I: Solid Energy’s industry associations and groups 177 Appendix II: Examples of Solid Energy’s sponsorship in the West Coast 180 Appendix III: Save Happy Valley materials 189 Bibliography 195 iv Abbreviations AMD Acid mine drainage BCG Buller Conservation Group BFAC Beech Forest Action Committee CCS Carbon Capture Storage CSR Corporate Social Responsibility DOC Department of Conservation EDS Environmental Defence Society ETS Emissions Trading Scheme IGCC Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle ISL In-situ leaching ISR In situ recovery NZI New Zealand Institute NZIER New Zealand Institute of Economic Research PM Particular matter emissions RMA Resource Management Act ROM Run-of-mine SCM State Coal Mines SHVC Save Happy Valley Coalition SLAPP Strategic lawsuits against public participation v List of Tables Table 1 Percentage distribution of news sources within major West Coast press stories on the Cypress Mine project 145 Table 2 Percentage distribution of news sources within major West Coast press stories on the Mt Augustus news stories 153 Table 3 Percentage distribution of news sources within major Metropolitan press stories on the Spy Saga news stories 158 Table 4 Percentage distribution of meso-frames within major Metropolitan press stories on the Spy Saga news stories 159 List of Figures Figure 1 State Coal Mines Organisational Structure 75 Figure 2 Coal Corporation Management Structure 78 Figure 3 Slide 3 of the LEARNZ Waikato Coal Mining Field Trip for Term 3, 2009 based at Huntly 104 Figure 4 Slide 7 of the LEARNZ Waikato Coal Mining Field Trip for Term 3, 2009 based at Huntly 104 Figure 5 Slide 9 of the LEARNZ Renewable Energy Field Trip for Term 1, 2009 based at Canterbury 105 Figure 6 Slide 11 of the LEARNZ Renewable Energy Field Trip for Term 1, 2009 based at Canterbury 105 Figure 7 Map of the Stockton Mine area and the Cypress extension 117 vi Attestation of Authorship “I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, it contains no material previously published or written by another person, nor material which to a substantial extent has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma of a university or institution of higher learning, except where due acknowledgement is made in the acknowledgements.” Signed: vii Acknowledgements I am grateful to my supervisor, Dr. Wayne Hope, for his intellectual inspiration, generous support and patience. I would like to acknowledge the Communication Studies department for their research grant and the administrative staff for their assistance. Thank you to Jason Byrnes for his comments and encouragement throughout the process, and William Robertson and Yvonne Cooke for their assiduous attention to detail. Special thanks to Kevin Hackwell, Tane Feary, William Auton and Nicholas Heffernan. Thanks also to my family, for their unfailing support and encouragement. viii Abstract This thesis explores the ways in which state-owned enterprise Solid Energy and the news media have constructed and positioned the Cypress Mine project. Using public sphere critique, critical discourse analysis and ideology critique it shows how Solid Energy‟s framing of environmental discourse in its texts dominated the news media domain at the expense of environmental activist organisations. In this context, I examine the cumulative effects of the news media‟s organisational routines, the pressures and constraints of news practices, and the economic base of the media industry on news content. I also consider the symmetrical and asymmetrical manifestations of public relations, and how they permeate the news media domain and the public sphere generally. Organisational routines of news construction combined with corporate employment of public relations practices generate particular depictions of coal mining and its effects on the environment. Solid Energy, I argue, both shaped and benefitted from these depictions during the Cypress Mine controversy. I also examine actual mining practices and how they affect the environment both generally and in the case of the Cypress Mine project. Against this background I evaluate the conflicts between mining interests and their opponents in Happy Valley. I conclude that official environmental discourses comprised of „Promethean‟ and conservative „sustainability‟ conceptions marginalised ecologically informed arguments proposed by environmentalists. ix 1. INTRODUCTION This thesis looks at the ways in which the Cypress Mine project has been constructed and positioned in the news media. In this introductory chapter, I will outline the structure of the thesis and the sequence of chapters. I will then briefly explore how corporations and environmentalists have used their resources to shape public opinion on ecological matters. In this sense, I look briefly at the news media domain and the public relations industry. Next, I propose the theoretical approach that will enable a critical evaluation of how the Cypress Mine issues have been constructed and positioned in the news media domain (and the opposing perspective on this). I will also outline my methodological approach for analysing environmental discourses in the news media. The important themes to be considered in relation to news coverage of the Cypress Mine issues are, the degrees of prominence accorded to environmental news stories, the use of news sources and the influences of frames. Overview of chapters and their purpose Chapter two builds upon introductory observations about the news media and public relations. I view the news media as part of a set of institutions embedded within society. Drawing on the work of scholars such as Rodney Tiffen, Herbert Gans, Gaye Tuchman, and Sharon Beder I explore the cumulative effect of the media‟s organisational routines, the pressures and constraints of news practices, the economic base of the media industry, and patterns of news content. Next, I consider symmetrical and asymmetrical manifestations of public relations, as described by James. E. Grunig and Todd Hunt. I also outline the history of public relations and its evolving practices since the early twentieth century by focusing on individuals such as Ivy Lee and Edward Bernays. They facilitated the proliferation of public relations throughout the government, public and private sectors. Since the news media is a central vehicle for public information and publicity, public relations practitioners have sought to cultivate a working relationship with news media personnel. In exchange for publicity, public relations firms can offer the journalists access to influential figures and stories, as well Introduction as pre-packaged news. Even if the media do not use the resources offered to them by the public relations practitioners, these resources are always ready at hand. The news media and public relations are powerful institutions that can distort as much as they illuminate our understanding of social reality. I will develop these insights in relation to New Zealand. I focus on how successive governments have handled and managed the news media and how public relations practices have migrated into state-owned enterprises and the public sector generally. Lastly, in the context of the news media and public relations