Summits of Information: Advocacy Officers,Journalists, and Newsmaking at International Summits

In spite of the growing visibility of international summits in the last decade, little is known about how these events actually unfold. Neither the role played by the media in these highly scrutinized gatherings, nor the organizational setting in which news is produced, have been extensively described. Focusing on one such summit, this article shows what a close-up view of the otherwise-invisible Media Center can offer to sociological analysis. Year after year, these spaces have increasingly been colonized by certain NGOs attempting to influence the proceedings of these summits. This article highlights some overlooked factors that make some groups better able than others to promote their perspective, and lays bare a mechanism I call mediated pressure, by which journalists try to influence negotiators through the dissemination of their claims in the news.