Summary |
Research on propaganda as a political form of mass communication started in the 20th century. In recent years, philosophy has started to pay increasing attention to studying its nature, mechanisms and effects. The current predominant sense of the word in English refers to political propaganda, and it has a negative connotation. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, for instance, propaganda is “the systematic dissemination of information, esp. in a biased or misleading way, in order to promote a political cause or point of view.” (OED). Paradigm examples of propaganda include Nazi calls for the extermination of Jewish people from as early as 1933, the messaging of the Bolshevik revolution, anti-communist campaigns in Indonesia prior to the 1960s mass killings, or the discourse in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda in the 1990s. Propaganda in the sense illustrated by these cases involves intent, exploits mass media, and can influence entire populations to engage in acts of mass violence. It is especially consequential and hence worth close study. However, not all paradigmatic instances of propaganda are associated with mass violence. Philosophers have been interested in the nature, language and epistemology of propaganda, as well as its weighty moral and political dimensions. Early analyses of propaganda can be grouped in three categories: (1) As an attempt by individuals or groups to convey a message deliberately designed to influence the opinions and actions of other individuals or groups towards a certain end; (2) As an attempt to influence public opinion by conveying falsehoods; (3) As an attempt to persuade the public by arousing irrational emotions. Each analysis faces problems. There are virtuous forms of communication that aim at legitimately persuading; there are forms of propaganda that rely on cherry-picking truthful information, rather than on conveying falsehoods; there are forms of propaganda that do not arouse irrational emotions. Despite this, many authors seem to agree that propaganda is epistemically defective. However, since the 2010s, several philosophers have advanced a revision of the concept of propaganda, and suggested that it is not a necessarily negative form of communication. The debate about the justification for this revisionary project and the defectiveness of propaganda is ongoing. Similarly ongoing is the delineation of the differences between propaganda and related phenomena, such as disinformation, advertising, fake news, and political rhetoric. |