ABSTRACT

This chapter examines newspaper coverage of the transplant projects in three states: Tennessee, Kentucky, and Indiana. It also examines the coverage devoted to transplants by six newspapers—one local paper and one state paper from each of the states. The chapter assumes that newspapers are the principal source of information for citizens about the general issues of growth and development, and about specific efforts by state governments to use economic incentives to attract Japanese auto plants. It analyzes newspaper coverage in terms of legitimizing incentives, the persons and organizations who are called upon to speak through the newspaper. The chapter discusses newspaper coverage of the transplants, and the way in which this coverage contributes to, or undermines, the political legitimacy of the corporatist project. The corporatist project, embodied by the transplants, represents a departure from established or traditional ways of fostering economic development.