Eco-Nuclear Publicity: a Comparative Study In
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ECO-NUCLEAR PUBLICITY: A COMPARATIVE STUDY IN FLORIDA AND SCOTLAND by / DONN J. TILSON, M.A. A thesis submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Stirling March, 1994 IMAGING SERVICES NORTH Boston Spa, Wetherby West Yorkshire, LS23 7BQ www.bl.uk BEST COpy AVAILABLE. VARIABLE PRINT QUALITY CONTENTS Page No. Acknowledgments .............................................................. (1) Abstract .................................................................................(ii) Chapter One Introduction ................................................................................. 1 Chapter Two Corporate Ecology and Emerging Issues .......................... 21 Chapter Three Methodological Approaches ................................................ 53 Chapter Four Public Relations and Corporate Decision-Making ........... 67 Chapter Five Nuclear Power and the Environment: Emerging Ecological Opportunities ....................................................... 92 Chapter Six Emergence of the 'Eco-Nuclear' Agenda ........................ 109 Chapter Seven Corporate Advocational Campaigning and Nuclear Issues Management. ............................................ 118 Chapter Eight Visitor Centres and the Nuclear Campaign to Influence Key Publics ..................................................... 138 Chapter Nine Emerging Nuclear Advocational Initiatives and Perceptions of Corporate Campaigning .................. 188 Chapter Ten Conclusion ............................................................................ 204 Bibliography...................................................................... 214 Appendices Appendix 1: List of Interview Transcripts ............................................................ 235 Appendix 2: Interview Schedules ........................................................................ 236 Appendix 3: Nuclear Management Strategic Management Survey - U.S ... 239 Appendix 4: Nuclear Management Strategic Management Survey - U.K. .. 253 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My sincere gratitude goes to Philip Schlesinger, my principal supervisor, and to Peter Meech, my second supervisor, for their constant encouragement and direction during the course of this trans-Atlantic project. I also thank Tom Veenstra of Florida Power & Light and Dick Marshall and Jill Kent of Scottish Nuclear Limited for agreeing to participate in my study and for their assistance in that regard. My deepest appreciation, however, goes to my family, especially my wife, Maria, for their patience, understanding and loving support. It is to them, and to my God, that I dedicate my thesis. (i) ABSTRACT This comparative study of the corporate public relations strategies of the nuclear industry in the U.S. and Britain, specifically of Florida Power & Light (FP&L) in Florida and Scottish Nuclear Limited (SNL) in Scotland, examines the use of visitor centres and environmental messages as key components of advocational campaigns designed to influence public opinion and shape public policy in favour of a pro-nuclear agenda. The study would seem to confirm other research that draws a direct relationship between the function of public relations in an organisation and the degree of input by public relations into corporate policy-making. Moreover, the data also suggest that, given a prominent role within an organisation, public relations can and does develop strategies and programmes to pro-actively manage emerging strategic public policy issues in direct support of organisational objectives Such programmes, as the study reveals, have been designed specifically around visitor centres as communication vehicles for corporate pro nuclear messages, carried directly to key publics without gatekeeping by the mass media. Moreover, it would appear that the nuclear industry has been intentionally 'greening' its corporate messages so as to capitalise upon the public's growing concern about the environment. The study also suggests that the nuclear industry is using such centres, as well as newer, emerging advocational initiatives, in a fully promotional sense to circulate and thereby enhance the reputation of the industry. A comparative analysis of corporate nuclear public relations in the U.S. and Britain suggests a 'cross-national' exchange of intelligence, and in some respects, an outright collusion of efforts. Moreover, it would seem that there exists a further government-industry alliance both within the U.S. and Britain as well as trans-Atlantically. This alliance represents a convergence of government and industry interests in the development of nuclear energy for military and civilian purposes, and further illustrates earlier research of collusion among political economic elites and the over representation of corporate interests at the expense of unorganised public interests in the government decision-making process. Finally, the study argues that upcoming public policy decisions on the future of nuclear power in each country will be a measure of the effectiveness of pro-nuclear campaigning in achieving its objectives. The public debate on nuclear power will represent a genuine test of the relative health of democracy in both the U.S. and Britain, nation-states in which, military-industry-government interests mostly have had their way as it has concerned nuclear energy. (ii) Chapter One INTRODUCTION (i) Introduction (ii) Nuclear Energy: From Inception to World War 11 (iii) Nuclear Energy: The Post-World War 11 Era (iv) From Reorganisation to Public Relations 1 ill Introduction In the wake of Three-Mile Island and Chernobyl, perhaps no other industry has had a more troubled history in recent years than that of nuclear power. And yet, despite such disasters, not to mention scores of less dramatic, more localised incidents, the industry, particularly in the U.S. and in the U.K., instead of folding its proverbial tent and slipping away quietly into the night, has counted its losses, regrouped its forces and mounted a pro-active campaign to sell nuclear power to its key publics. The campaign, conceived, designed and directed by the industry's corporate public relations managers, is a classic exercise in issues management albeit with two extraordinary twists. Firstly, the approach, instead of being strictly one of hard-nosed advocacy, has incorporated elements of public education campaigns, and, as such, can be considered uniquely 'advocational' in design. Secondly, and more important, the industry has increasingly wrapped itself in an 'eco-nuclear' mantle, distinctly promoting nuclear power as an 'environmentally friendly' energy source. The 'eco-nuclear' message represents a significant new interpretive package in addition to those suggested by Gamson and Modigliani (1989) and Corner (1990a,b), and, as such, frames the nuclear power issue in terms of a societal commitment to environmental stewardship. Certain stakeholders - those publics which have a vested interest in or which are affected indirectly by the actions of a particular organisation - however, label such packaging as 'greenwashing', or 'eco-flim flam'. Various environmentalists, in particular, consider nuclear power to be neither clean, green nor friendly. The advocational approach is an attempt to soft-sell the industry by using a variety of educational-style media, such as visitor centres and speakers' bureaux, to provide the public with information on nuclear power. Moreover, by incorporating and highlighting environmental themes into such media, the industry wishes to capitalise on growing public concern for the environment and build grassroots support for its public affairs efforts. These initiatives to create a favourable political and financial climate are being conducted with a distinct sense of urgency by the industry in the U.S. and in the U.K. The British Government has announced its intention to formally review the future of nuclear energy in 1994, and the U.S. nuclear industry is urging approval by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission of a standardised design for future plants by the mid-1990s, with Florida rumoured as the site of the next nuclear station, the first that would be built in the U.S. since 1978. These corporate efforts, ultimately aimed at positively shaping public policy decisions in favour of the nuclear agenda, are having some measured success in influencing the opinion of certain key publics. With the blessing of the Bush Administration and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the industry in the U.S. won CongreSSional approval of one-step licensing of new nuclear plants in 2 1992. All Florida members of both the House of Representatives and of the Senate voted in favour of the legislation. This streamlining of the regulatory process will speed up the approval of future stations by requiring only one permit for the construction and operation of a station; two separate permits, one for construction and a second for operation, were required previously and each granted at a public hearing. However, such streamlining will come at the expense of public debate as it reduces the number of public hearings from two to one. The industry says that such streamlining will reduce the costs of building new stations; critics argue, however, that such manoeuvres are designed to stifle public opposition. The sample corporate groups selected for this study are Florida Power & Light (FP&L), the principal subsidiary of FPL Group, Inc., headquartered in Juno Beach, Florida, and Scottish Nuclear Limited (SNL), headquartered in East Kilbride, a town just