Step 2: Processing analysis on linguistic meso-level

significant drop in share price. On the contrary to Baumann, most shareholders perceive these issues as existentially threatening. This gap between perceptions of Baumann and perceptions of stakeholders will be further analysed in the next sections, where I scrutinize Baumann’s ideology and the intended reality that should be shaped from this.

businesses in chemical and biological crop protection, in conventional and biotech seed, and also in digital farming” (Baumann, 2019, p. 5). Here, Baumann’s statements about state of the art technology are overly positive and optimistic. This is intended to reassure and focus shareholders on that Bayer is well prepared for the future. However, he completely blends out negative facts like the product liability and compensation payments for Roundup. This is what shareholders are in fact the most worried about. Actually, this is positive framing and obviously a tactic of avoidance and denial becomes apparent.

He added: “Today, we are already more profitable than our direct competitors. We have the right people and an outstanding regional positioning, which enables us to continue increasing Bayer’s earning power and outpace market growth in the coming years” (Baumann, 2019, p.

5). “In addition, the transaction (meaning the acquisition of Monsanto) is financially worthwhile. The divestments to BASF that were required for antitrust reasons were accomplished at an attractive sale price of EUR 7.3 billion (US$ 9 billion) and with a gain of EUR 4.0 billion. Even though divestments were required on a larger scale than expected and this reduced the synergies, Bayer will still realize one billion euros a year in synergies from the Monsanto acquisition from 2022 onward” (Baumann, 2019, p. 5). Talking about the financials, Baumann was also strictly positive. The critical audience might be under the impression that Bayer’s CEO is ignoring any downsides. He tries to influence the listener in a way to believe the acquisition of Monsanto will be a big financial success in the future. However, listeners have their own thoughts and at this particular moment in time they can see that the financial targets do not realise, with a share price plummeting and an unclear starting point of this promised ‘brilliant future’ as long as all the court cases are not settled.

Bayer’s CEO continues to defend his standpoint and showed no doubt that he or top management might have done any mistake in acquiring Monsanto. “For all these reasons – the outstanding positions of Bayer’s businesses, the great potential for Bayer’s customers, the possibilities for more sustainable agriculture and also the economic rationale – the acquisition of Monsanto was and remains the right step for Bayer. We’re as convinced of that now as we were before. And this is still the case when taking into account the discussion about glyphosate, a matter I’ll address in more detail shortly” (Baumann, 2019, p.5). Here again, CEO Baumann used strictly positive framing. This is exercised to influence the ways in which audiences interpret his text, which goes hand in hand with the purposes of impression management.

According to Thomas et al. (2004) language can be used to steer people’s thought and beliefs.

While favourable aspects of a desired reality can be emphasized (e.g. scientist claim that Roundup is safe if appropriately applied) negative ones are downplayed or excluded (e.g.

glyphosate has caused cancer in several cases) by Baumann in order to steer audiences toward a particular interpretation that Bayer will come back to great success soon (Entman, 1993).

Ideology is the strongest when it becomes opaque, meaning that it is no longer visible as ideology. When ideology becomes a part of everyday common sense then the discourse becomes natural and thus words become available for the speakers and writers to express themselves unconsciously and naturally (Fairclough, 2010). It is the ideology that constitutes the identities and constructions of the world. Baumann himself appears to sincerely believe in what he was saying and holds on to a strict argumentation that glyphosate is safe and Bayer in his opinion is well set up for the future. Looking at particular excerpts from Baumann’s speech in April 2019 as elaborated on above, it becomes clear that the CEO communicates continuously on the background of a very strong ideology.

This deeply embedded particular ideology becomes especially apparent through the scrutiny of the following comments where Baumann continues to eagerly defend Bayer and top management’s decisions and denies any error: “Regulatory authorities worldwide have approved glyphosate-based products and extended their registrations multiple times over several decades. The plaintiffs’ attorneys in the United States wrongly claim that glyphosate-based products are carcinogenic and that Monsanto knowingly exposed its customers to this risk. These really are quite incredible accusations” (Baumann, 2019, p. 7-8). “Bayer remain convinced of the safety of glyphosate. At the same time, we’re also aware of the tremendous importance of glyphosate for the global food supply and for sustainable agriculture that uses less land, causes less soil erosion and releases less carbon dioxide” (Baumann, 2019, p. 8).

These statements get to the heart of how strong CEO Baumann’s ideology effectively shapes his reality.

Baumann’s defensive strategy entails a complete denial of the product harmfulness, that stakeholders claim to be present in glyphosate. Further, he did not refer to any details of the jury’s argumentation for declaring glyphosate hazardous to health. In Werner Baumann’s point of view, there is simply no reason for refraining from his standpoint, leave alone admitting any form of mistake. As soon as the CEO’s intention is interpreted, the invisible agenda becomes vivid. What Baumann tries to do is to implant his version of reality into the mind of his audience (the stakeholders). Thereby he wants to mollify stakeholders to an extent that they believe Bayer

will undoubtedly get out of the crisis, which is only temporary and completely unjustified.

However, the strongly embedded ideology rather created distance to stakeholders who have a completely different reality and resentment because Baumann did not show enough sensitivity.