Propaganda

Author: Edward Bernays
Published: 1928

Edward Bernays deserves to be put on the list of “most interesting people that few have heard of”. He is known as “the father of public relations”. He was, perhaps, the early innovator of much of advertising and public relations today.

He is arguably the man most responsible for bacon as a popular breakfast, women smoking in the 1930s and 1940s, the CIA overthrow of Guatemala (for the benefit of United Fruit), and American support of World War I.

He innovated the use of psychological techniques in propaganda. This could have been via the help of his uncle with whom he corresponded frequently. He wrote to his uncle frequently and likely applied the knowledge he gained from his illustrious Austrian uncle, Sigmund Freud.

The book itself isn’t quite as interesting as the man, but is still worth the read. It is short and gives an interesting insight into the early thoughts on the field of propaganda. For anyone that worries about propaganda in our lives, it is instructive to see what the early innovator in the field thought.

That being said, keep in mind that the book itself is propaganda. He shows unreasonable optimism about why the techniques of propaganda would only be used for the benefit of mankind. Reading these with the benefit of nearly 100 years of history (the book was written in 1928) makes clear how rosy many of those predictions turned out to be.

I’m not sure how much effort I’d be willing to put into the topic of propaganda, but it was certainly worth the short read of 168 pages.

Sources

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays
• https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-secular-shepherd/201604/edward-bernays-uncle-freud-and-betty-crocker
• https://theconversation.com/the-manipulation-of-the-american-mind-edward-bernays-and-the-birth-of-public-relations-44393
• https://medium.com/@academyofideas/edward-bernays-and-group-psychology-manipulating-the-masses-2ef53544a4cd