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The Koch-funded Atlas Network

https://multinationales.org/en/investigations/the-atlas-network-france-and-the-eu/

«…the Atlas Network – a global association of libertarian, free-market, and ultra-conservative think tanks and organisations

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The Heritage Foundation was until 2020 a key partner of the Atlas Network, and Milei’s radical austerity and deregulatory political platform is heavily influenced by Atlas Network think tanks.

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Based in Arlington, Virginia, the Atlas Network is a major network of think tanks and other organisations working around the world to “change the climate of ideas”. Founded in 1981 by British battery farm entrepreneur Antony Fisher, the Atlas Network aims to blanket the world with libertarian think tanks, modelled on his original Institute of Economic Affairs (IAE) in the UK which contributed to Margaret Thatcher’s victory.

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Its members in the United States include influential think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute and the Heartland Institute. Behind the Atlas Network are right wing billionaires and foundations such as the Koch’s and the Templeton Foundation, as well as major corporations in sectors such as oil, tobacco and pharmaceuticals. The Atlas Network is a reflection of a wider alliance, in the US, between economic libertarians – with their anti-climate, anti-regulation and anti-social justice agenda – and ultraconservatives which focus on issues such as abortion, migrants and minority rights.

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the Atlas Network and its partners use a range of influence strategies that sometimes involve manipulation, such as offering falsely neutral expertise or ‘astroturfing’.

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Georges Monbiot recently asked in The Guardian: “What links Rishi Sunak, Javier Milei and Donald Trump?” Answer: the Atlas Network.

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Wherever its influence is felt it promotes a ranch of ultra free market policies that inevitably involve tax cuts for the rich, slashing public spending, massive deregulation, and opposition to climate justice, backed by well-resourced but mostly hidden funders.

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ECIPE is funded by the ultraconservative Templeton Foundation, one of the Atlas Network’s key funders which also supported the Madrid Liberty Forum.

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The Washington-based Consumer Choice Center (CCC) claims to be a global movement of grassroots organisations.

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While it proclaims itself a ‘representative of consumers’, the CCC is above all a lobbying front group; it admits its role as lobbyist in the European register. Its specialty? ‘Astroturfing’, in other words, hiding the fact that it is defending the interests of corporations and the rich behind a false appearance of the grassroots mobilisation of ordinary people. The source of its funding is not known.

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For multinationals like Syngenta, the CCC’s work is particularly useful. When Bill Wirtz tweets, produces a podcast or takes part in debates, he is seen not as a GMO salesman but as a consumer. This allows messages identical to those of the industry to be repeated through ‘non-commercial’ channels, creating the kind of apparently independent echo chamber that is a key feature of the Atlas Network approach.»

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