The Toronto Star
Oct. 3, 2001
Propaganda - most simply, information used to persuade a group - is as old as civilization. The Aztecs used it to rationalize human sacrifice. Alexander the Great understood its symbolic power and had his image etched on coins. But propaganda has always been most crucial during periods of conflict and war.
So today, with advertising and other forms of modern persuasion ubiquitous, how do leaders slice through the muddled cacophony and target citizens with messages? "The whole notion of propaganda now is up for grabs," says Robert Thompson, a professor at Syracuse University. "In this age of 24-hour news and spin, where there is constant coverage, propaganda has come out of the closet and it really lives among us every day."
If Thompson is right, what does this mean to the "War Against Terrorism," which seems to be moving toward a more active phase in Afghanistan this week?
Unlike past military efforts, the White House has warned the new war will unfold with "unprecedented secrecy." Though it's now a cliché, it is important to remember truth is often the first casualty of war.
Ironically, says Thomas DeLuca, a political science professor at Fordham University in New York, the sheer magnitude of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks created a temporary "propaganda-free zone" because people were simply horrified by the visceral images.
For days there were no television commercials. Almost all news coverage was devoted to the story. The entire world seemed to collapse into the deepening tragedy.
"This is an unprecedented event in U.S. history," DeLuca says. "There has never been an attack like this. Concentration on this event is highly focused. People want the president to have a plan, to reassure them, to be straightforward.
"So George Bush will have an enormous benefit as his words cut through the propaganda that is usually around us."
Anthony Pratkanis, professor of psychology at the University of California in Santa Cruz, and author of Age Of Propaganda: The Everyday Use And Abuse Of Persuasion, agrees. But he says in the weeks ahead, as collective shock begins to ebb, Bush will be faced with a number of daunting challenges. "If Bush wants to maintain and sustain the effort, the emotional propaganda will be okay for a short war, but in the long term he needs to deliver persuasion. He needs to form consensus and argue with substance, not slogan."
That seemed to be the case recently, as Bush addressed U.S. Congress. As cameras rolled and politicians and lawmakers frequently wobbled to their feet, and to thundering applause, Bush delivered a rousing, evocative speech.
But the raw emotion and patriotism that has since bloomed atop the rubble in New York and Washington is not necessarily beneficial to anybody in the long run, says Nancy Snow, assistant director with the Center for Communications and Community at UCLA. "A `war mentality' needs to be decontextualized. It needs to be very clear, black and white, good guys versus bad guys," says Snow, author of Propaganda Inc.: Selling America's Culture To The World.
"So you end up with a single enemy, with slogans like `Wanted: Dead or Alive,' ones that simplify the issues. Bush is using an `everyman' approach to what is actually a very complex problem, burdensome in a historical and economic context."
And this simplification, whether deliberate or not, can cloud fundamental issues. In times of conflict, things are not always as they appear.
Before the Persian Gulf War, for example, the world gasped with reports that Iraqi troops were yanking sick babies from hospital incubators and leaving them to die on the floor during the invasion of Kuwait. The "dead babies" account was repeated hundreds of times, in the media and in speeches by U.S. leaders, who were now clearly on a war footing. Other reports - that Iraq had amassed thousands of troops along the Saudi Arabia border - were also used to convince the public that military action was necessary.
Both of those reports proved incorrect, but not until the war was over.
Larry Jacobs, a political science professor at the University of Minnesota, says the Persian Gulf War took traditional propaganda to a new level as U.S. authorities controlled the flow of information in the media and expanded the lexicon of military euphemisms. Cruise missiles. Smart bombs. Collateral damage. Safe bunkers. Hard targets. Hit ratios. Surgical strikes. To western television viewers, the war must have appeared essentially bloodless.
John R. MacArthur, publisher of Harper's magazine and author of Second Front: Censorship And Propaganda In The Gulf War, says he believes the war on terrorism will unfold with even more secrecy and censorship. "Already we have a kind of `ahistoricality' setting in," he explains. "Nobody here is talking about some very important issues. You're simply not allowed to discuss the history of American foreign policy."
Such discussions are seen as unseemly, morally ambiguous, and steeped in preposterous and offensive anti-Americanism. The issue, to many, is simple good versus evil.
Says Jacobs: "The whole notion of propaganda raises a larger question: How do you control and manage press reports and the information that is reaching the general public?"
During the uprising in Germany, as the Nazis gained power, Josef Goebbels was able to impart nationalist rhetoric and manufacture consent through selective advertising, state-produced films, and elaborate, orchestrated public events. (Adolf Hitler also asked Leni Reifenstahl to film the Nazi Party's annual rally in Nuremburg. Her film, Triumph Of The Will, is now considered a seminal exercise in fascist propaganda.)
Decades later, Slobodan Milosevic created "demo networks" - ragtag groups of unemployed youth that would optically boost the size at rallies held for Serbian nationalism.
More recently, Osama bin Laden, the Saudi exile U.S. authorities are calling the prime suspect in the recent attacks, has filmed several training videos. As tools of propaganda, the grainy, disjointed footage is used to mollify moderates and recruit new soldiers for the Holy War. (During its bloody war with Russia, Afghan rebels were given camcorders to record their triumphs.)
In totalitarian states, persuasion is straightforward. Citizens are simply told what to believe and how to behave. But in democratic nations, governance has nuance, inextricably tethered to divergent principles of individual freedom and mass control.
As scholar Noam Chomsky says: "Propaganda is to democracy what violence is to totalitarianism."
In this context, says Pratkanis, where propaganda is concerned, governments realize the importance of the media. "The mass media is now the primary place where we have political discussions. So one of the keys to effective political leadership is being able to control the news media's agenda. That agenda is not necessarily how you are talking about something, but what you are talking about."
In the war against terrorism, he says, there have been a number of examples where U.S. authorities announced, "they were planning to release" certain information in the future. This allows the media to run a story about the "future release" of information, rather than the information itself.
"This war will be a challenge for democracy itself," Pratkanis predicts. "Because democracy thrives when everything is in the light of day. Now democracy in the United States will require a high degree of trust."
And trust is a commodity in rapid decline. The Internet, decades of independent research, and the rapid evolution of alternative media has created a population that is much more sophisticated in its ability to recognize and decipher propaganda - irrespective of the source.
"Audiences throughout the world are constantly becoming more exposed to the latest in international mass media entertainment, they are better trained, more aware, often more cynical," notes Oliver Thomson, author of Easily Led: A History of Propaganda.
Randall Bytwerk, a professor of communication at Calvin College in Michigan, author and a foremost expert in propaganda, says: "Propaganda, and the control of public opinion, becomes harder when you lack control over the images."
This proved to be the case in Vietnam, where public support suddenly dipped as the horrifying images of war were broadcast back home. "Vietnam was a turning point because there were reporters all over the place," Bytwerk says.
In the stormy, post-Vietnam years, the U.S. has taken a cautious approach to war. (In fact, the number of firefighters and police offices who died during rescue efforts at the World Trade Center is more than the total military personnel who have fallen in combat since the 1983 invasion of Grenada.)
Given the global scope of the new war, and the potential repercussions, Garth Jowett, a communication professor at University of Houston, says Bush has to be very careful in the propaganda he uses. "I fully expected a propaganda onslaught that was going to be totally irrational. But as I understand it, there was an internal conflict within the Bush administration in terms of what kind of message to give the American public."
Jowett says many people have compared the attacks with Pearl Harbor. But the analogy is problematic. In that case, there was a clear nation-state enemy. And it's important to remember, he adds, that most Americans did not see footage of the Japanese attack for almost a year.
"In terms of propaganda, those visual images (of planes striking the World Trade Center) could not be matched by any other imaginable images," says John Lampe, chair of the Department of History at the University of Maryland. "In fact, if there is any propaganda campaign at play at all, it is to prevent the violent, stereotypical response we have seen domestically in the past."
Lampe is referring to the threats and attacks that have been levelled at Arab-Americans and Muslims throughout North America. The violence, including suspected murder, has raised the spectre of the Japanese internment camps during World War II.
As Jowett notes: "Bush has to maintain the public's confidence that the government will actually do something. But he also doesn't want to get the public so riled up so that they are running out murdering their own citizens."
And as Bush said during his speech to Congress: "I also want to speak tonight directly to Muslims throughout the world. We respect your faith. It's practised freely by many millions of Americans and by millions more in countries that America counts as friends."
First Lady Laura Bush went on 60 Minutes recently to discuss the importance of solidarity and urge Americans to not attack their fellow citizens. And during the recent celebrity telethon, America: A Tribute To Heroes, a number of stars, including Will Smith and Muhammad Ali, urged tolerance.
Similarly, this week, U.S. authorities have scrambled with messages about the safety of air travel - even though Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport has remained closed (it will open partially tomorrow). And a number of experts have also started appearing on television telling Americans their country is prepared for any biological attack, even though other non-government sources warn the opposite is true. "We are an action oriented culture," Snow says. "We are not an introspective culture.
``And that's where the sloganeering and jingoism comes into play.
``We are almost given a script and walking papers in terms of how we are supposed to respond."