Chapter 7. 7 Types and Functions of Propaganda

Sociological Propaganda

Sociological propaganda (which Ellul also calls “sub-propaganda”) is a far more widespread and challenging phenomenon to recognize and define than political propaganda. It consists of the techniques that social organizations use to integrate the maximum number of individuals into them. The organization (government bureau, corporation, workplace, educational institution, political party, or other) expects the propaganda to unify its members’ behaviour in line with its goals and according to the individual’s status and role. Ellul labels such propaganda “sociological” to emphasize that it attempts to conform entire attitudes and lifestyles rather than particular courses of behaviour. I examined this type of propaganda produced by American education systems earlier, consistent with the sub-propaganda produced by governments, corporations, the military, sports, and other organizations within American society (1965, p. 68). Moreover, as a general statement of the phenomenon, Ellul remarks that a nation-state intensely organized through sociological propaganda will have many organizations spinning the same integrative messages through their media, public relations, marketing, and human relations departments (1965, p. 63).

Sub-propaganda is qualitatively different from political propaganda, with different origins, methods, and impacts. In sum, it is a uniform message that seeks to integrate individuals into the dominant social order through their participation in the structural organizations of society (Ellul, 1965, p. 62). Political propaganda seeks to spread its messages through mass communication systems to convince the public to favour some political or economic activity and to engage in some action to support that policy. However, sociological propaganda reverses the movement. Structural organizations exude a world view that usually supports the status quo and promotes the smooth integration of the individual into existing social structures. This is the type of propaganda emanating from the mainstream media in the United States now championed by the old liberal consensus there.

Sub-propaganda is diffuse, coming at the individual from the media, educational institutions, workplaces, governments, and most social organizations in which the individual is involved. It establishes a general climate, covertly influencing the individual through socialization, peer pressure, and sports and leisure activities. Albert Einstein (1931, p. 5) paraphrasing the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer writes that “a man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills.” This aphorism means that a person’s hopes and desires do not come from within; they come from without, from the social structure. What an individual wants and seemingly adopts spontaneously conforms to society’s institutional structures. Sociological propaganda is ubiquitous, a conditioning process found in music, movies, television, fairy tales, novels, advertising, education, corporations, other businesses, chambers of commerce, and many other organizations.

Sub-propaganda is effective because it acts gently and subtly over time, particularly in stable societies. It explains the overwhelming conformity that most modern societies exhibit. Sub-propaganda forms are diffuse and aim to spread ideas, prejudices, values, and lifestyles. All of these message strands about the goodness of the American way of life complement each other, all in the same direction: the comforts of consumption, hard work, opportunity, the American Dream of home ownership, and plenty of money and leisure.

Ellul admits that such sociological propaganda seems quite different from the agitative political propaganda campaigns of Hitler or Stalin. Although sociological propaganda is usually non-intentional, at least in the initial stages, it strongly influences human thought and behaviour. Ellul argues that sub-propaganda must be considered part of the overall phenomenon of propaganda. Organizations express sub-propaganda through the same media as agitative political propaganda and often have their spokespersons put their spin on public relations.

Nevertheless, Ellul adds, sub-propaganda is ineffective in a crisis, in which case the sub-propaganda becomes the pre-propaganda that a political propaganda campaign requires. It is easy to graft agitative “propaganda onto a setting prepared by sociological propaganda” (1965, p. 66). Besides, he notes, sub-propaganda can easily be transformed into agitative political propaganda with a few well-chosen words.

Ellul (1965) emphasizes that sub-propaganda is initially spontaneous and not the result of deliberative action; it follows the general climate of society (p. 64). He suggests that, though sociological propaganda is often involuntary at first, it “becomes ever more deliberate” and direct over time (p. 67). It also becomes more pervasive when the status quo is threatened. It leads people to believe that their civilization is the best of all worlds and that their way of life is superior.

Ellul posits that American sub-propaganda serves several functions. Its primary function is uniformity and standardization among an ethnically diverse population. Standardization has economic benefits in terms of mass production and consumption. To have both, there is a need for uniformity in terms of life’s necessities and agreement on acceptable lifestyles. Conforming behaviour has political benefits when trying to appeal to public opinion. However, the whole conforming enterprise can go to extremes, Ellul writes, citing the mass hysteria of McCarthyism in the early 1950s (1965, p. 68).

Sociological propaganda is often aimed at integrating the individual into technological society. In premodern societies, individuals were integrated into their norms, values, and lifestyles through traditional groups and organizations, such as family, community, religion, and social class. As modernity broke the hold of these institutions on the socialization process and the increasing division of labour introduced a variety of interests and lifestyles, there was an increasing need to integrate the individual into standard norms and values. Thus, the structural institutions of society weave a standard message of conformity to society’s way of life and goals: consumption, productivity, efficiency, and work. Sub-propaganda serves as the integrative mechanism of technological societies. Ellul writes that each person should be “a functional fragment” of society, perfectly adapted and integrated. The individual reflects society and its organizations and groups, sharing its stereotypes, ethics, politics, and beliefs (1965, p. 75). The propaganda of integration is usually the product of sociological propaganda, focused on the long term; it surrounds individuals, leaving them no space to think outside their world views. However, political propaganda campaigns can also promote individual behaviour congruent with the interests of the social order (say, masking or getting vaccinated).

According to Ellul, sub-propaganda usually supports the status quo and focuses on justifying existing social, economic, and political arrangements. It is aimed at stability, unity, and social order. It promotes norms, values, desires, and common lifestyles to mould the entire person. Ellul is most interested in integrative propaganda, believing that it is a technological society’s most potent social force.

He considers intellectuals to be much more sensitive to the appeal of such propaganda, even when they profess to be opponents of their society (1965, p. 75). He claims that comfortable and cultivated people share the stereotypes and values of the sub-propaganda and often demand that their society live up to the hype. In addition to buying in to society’s stereotypes, Ellul points out, the superiority complex of intellectuals has led many to believe that propaganda does not affect them, thus making them more susceptible to its influence. In addition, they need to have an opinion on everything, and propaganda can instantly supply that opinion without further study and thought (1965, p. 111).

Ellul suggests that sub-propaganda sometimes attempts to spread its message to other countries, “to impose itself” on other socio-cultural systems (1965, p. 62). However, it is apparent from the context that he mistakes American sub-propaganda for the whole class. Ellul cites this colossus when he calls sub-propaganda inherently and aggressively expansionist. However, his evidence for it is weak, focused on a singular, inherently unique case. The United States was the first society to attain true technological status shortly after the Second World War, and American sub-propaganda was the first to incorporate ideological justifications for rationalization, bureaucratization, mass production and consumption, and continuous technological development. As other socio-cultural systems attained genuine technological status, they adopted similar technologies, sub-propaganda techniques and messages, and organizational structures. They thus produced the same type of individuals who conformed to technological society.

As technically oriented sub-propaganda spreads worldwide, it becomes more conscious and precise, aiming at the long-term integration of the masses “and progressive adaptation” to technological society (Ellul, 1965, p. 67). In this way, much of America’s sub-propaganda became associated with the general category of sub-propaganda, specifically promoting integration into technological society. It is taken up by developing technological nation-states and spread throughout the world.

The more conscious sociological propaganda becomes in promoting integration into a technological society, the more it tends to supplement its appeal with agitative propaganda. Ellul cites the Marshall Plan, which he admits was a source of aid to the devastation of the Second World War in Europe, but it also had its propaganda elements—spreading American products and films as well as publicity about American largesse. He writes that in 1948 the American government subsidized American publications (he mentions the New York Herald Tribune and Reader’s Digest) in European markets to spread American propaganda. The propaganda efforts also included the sponsorship of film centres and libraries. The success of American propaganda was very uneven, Ellul explains, because Americans have a noticeable “superiority complex” that rankles the sensibilities of many Europeans (I add especially the French). At the same time, he admits, French opinion has favoured the “obvious superiority” of what Ellul calls “American technical methods,” which might be more accurately labelled simply “technique” (1965, p. 70).

Political Propaganda

Ellul asserts that political propaganda attracts the most attention. It is undoubtedly the flashiest, the type that most people think of when the topic of propaganda comes up in discussion. It is often subversive of the status quo and sets itself off as opposition. Party organizations make such propaganda in order to destroy or upend the established order. It has always existed, at least in primitive form, in world history; all revolutionary movements engage in such propaganda. Ellul specifically mentions the rebellions of Spartacus, the Crusades, the French Revolution, and the like. However, Lenin refined the technique to mobilize his nation for psychological and actual war against factions within and without.

Ellul points out a “very curious and recent phenomenon” on the American scene in the mid-1960s. He writes of the appearance of “agitators” among politicians and propagandists (1965, p. 69). They stir up public opinion in a seemingly disinterested fashion. They function as nationalists and do not focus on any doctrine, principle, or reform but style their opinion as being truly American. They advocate for free trade and an unregulated economy and against “plutocrats, internationalists, and socialists” as well as anything related to the New Deal or the Great Society (1965, p. 69).They are active in the lower middle class and among the proletariat and others who have not fully integrated into American society through its organizational structures or sub-propaganda. Ellul continues that these agitators also appeal through anti-Semitic, anti-communist, racist, and xenophobic tropes as well as other current stereotypes and scapegoats among their target populations.

Like other propagandists, Ellul asserts, these agitators try to provoke action. However, at the time of his writing, he could not identify the political party that they were working for or whose interests they served. The term “agitator” seems apt since their interest is anti-establishment. Despite this, he writes, they strongly influence American public opinion, an influence that might well “crystalize suddenly in unexpected forms” (1965, p. 69). The only ideological threads that Ellul overlooks but are present in the agitators of today are white supremacy (undoubtedly present in the mid-1960s) and owning the libs (a more recent development). These early agitators gradually evolved into the right wing of American politics, led first by right-wing radio, then by Fox News, and soon followed in mass and social media by a host of imitators and ever more radical propagandists. These propaganda outlets have attached themselves, of course, to the Republican Party and, at this writing, are in a six-year process of taking it over.

Consistent with the writings of Ellul, Fox News and the like specialize in sub-propaganda of the right wing of the Republican Party. It is often deliberate (ignoring some news events entirely) and practises some specific propaganda techniques to bolster its messaging. The mainstream media, in contrast, have continued to espouse the liberal consensus, mainly restricting themselves to the integrating sub-propaganda of the American way. Recently, some media outlets and politicians have begun to counter the right-wing media through leftist sub-propaganda. However, they have not yet used all of the propaganda tools available or are not yet competent in the techniques. Suppose Ellul is correct in his analyses, as the Republican Party continues to lean toward neo-fascism, opposition organizations, of necessity, will become more deliberative with their sub-propaganda and intensify their agitative propaganda.

Political propaganda aims to stretch the efforts and energies of its target population toward the goals of productivity, sacrifice for the future, or hatred of the other. It takes individuals out of their routines, Ellul notes (1965), plunges them into “enthusiasm and adventure,” and inspires them to strive for seemingly impossible goals (p. 72). It can be explosive, responding to a crisis or provoking one, but individuals can sustain such intensity only briefly. Unless the objective is achieved quickly, “enthusiasm will give way to discouragement and despair” (p. 72). Because of this, technicians of agitative propaganda tend to work in stages: intense agitation for a short-term goal, relaxation and reliance on sub-propaganda, and then agitation for the next stage.

Political agitative propaganda is easy to make, Ellul argues; it is often based on hatred, jealousy, or fear of the other and is, consistent with the essential needs of all human beings: “the need to eat, to be one’s own master, to hate” (1965, p. 73). He points out that it is easy to designate someone or some group as the source of all evil or misery, mainly if the person or group is relatively powerless to reject the label. The party can successfully pass on the big lie and the most absurd delusions through such appeals. Along with this appeal to violent sentiments, political propaganda often combines appeals to nationalism, liberty, and equality to broaden its attraction. These appeals often aim at the less informed and the oppressed.

The propagandist (technician) instills and exploits fear and resentment among the population toward a “collective fixation” on an enemy. If propagandists desire to blame social ills on an enemy, then they choose a scapegoat. Capitalists play this role for communists; Jews, communists, and Romani for Nazis; and immigrants for others. The propagandist condemns and slanders the scapegoats repeatedly, putting forth a collective goat that the population can blame for all of its ills, transferring all evil and sin to the goat, and justifying its own purity and goodness in the process.

Once the propagandist fixes the enemy as the cause of all social ills in the imagination of the target population, resentment builds, and, “like a flock of sheep, they stampede much further than they had actually been commanded to go,” Ellul says, anger and self-justification causing them to attack their designated enemies verbally and physically (1964, pp. 366–367). In extreme cases, the propagandist can cast adversaries as the incarnation of evil and the cause of all society’s ills: they are pedophiles; they kill babies; they perform bizarre rituals of cannibalism and orgies. When such accusations proliferate, it is a sign, Ellul writes, “that there is no rational basis for hate; it results solely from subconscious mechanisms” (1964, p. 367).

Ellul connects the effective use of propaganda on individuals with their loss of a sense of reality—motives become confused, accusations of every form of evil against the other mount, and all that is wrong transfers to the official enemy. Individuals define the world as good and evil, with all “absolutely good” people in their political, ethnic, or social camp and all “absolutely evil” people in the other camp. Those defined as good are given political, social, and historical virtue, and those labelled as evil are considered subhuman, mentally deficient, or in league with the devil. In the modern world, Ellul adds, good and evil are defined more readily in terms of social and political opponents within rather than foreign enemies without.

Vertical and Horizontal Propaganda

Political or sociological propaganda, agitative or integrative, is almost always vertical; it is made at the behest of an organizational hierarchy seeking to influence the masses. Propagandees are isolated even when they are part of a crowd. Their shouting in agreement is in response to the leader rather than communicating with the people around them. They are passive. When they act, it is with a “vigor and passion” not their own. The action, Ellul asserts, is conceived from the top. Propagandists act through individuals, directing them as an instrument. This control is even more firm when the individual is part of a crowd. Propagandees lose their individuality and engage in acts that would be “inconceivable” if they acted alone (1965, p. 80). Vertical propaganda is the most common type, and it needs the mass media to spread its messages.

Conversely, horizontal propaganda is made from inside the group and depends on the tight organization of people. The two examples that Ellul explores are early Chinese propaganda and human relations departments in American corporate and government organizations. Chinese propaganda is political, sociological, agitative, and integrative; human relations are simply integrative propaganda. The characteristics of the two are remarkably similar, according to Ellul, even though they have hugely different origins, contexts, and methods. In both, the propaganda comes from inside the group, using social and psychological pressures to get the individual to agree with the group’s consensus. The individual might not even recognize the propagandist within the group as the leader. Such propagandists are leaders or teachers who guide the discussions of individuals of equal status in desirable directions. The information presented in the group is selective, and the data and reasoning on which the group base their discussions are deliberately chosen to lead to the desired conclusions.

In China, Ellul writes, the state expects individuals to participate. Individuals in the group are encouraged to voice their opinions and, through extended discussions over time, discover their own convictions, which invariably are the group’s convictions. Through expressing these opinions in a group setting, the individual becomes even more committed to the party line and goes on to help others in forming these opinions. Group members help one another to discover the correct line consistent with the party line (1965, pp. 80–82). It is a drawn-out process. The group settings are intimate, and the discussions tend to be informal. It is primarily an intellectual enterprise (technique) rather than an appeal to emotions. It is even more successful if the individual belongs to several groups with the same orientation. However, groups that might give counter-messages, such as family or informal friendship networks, are discouraged. The groups consist of people of equal status (homogeneous in terms of sex, age, and class), specialized, and small; Ellul estimates from 15 to 20 people.

Horizontal propaganda aims to create voluntary adherence to the party line. Indeed, Ellul suggests, it is a very advanced technique that leads individuals to “find” the party line through their own reasoning processes, which he believes can be more effective than vertical propaganda. The illusion that individuals arrive at their thinking through freedom of thought is subtle manipulation and, Ellul adds, “risky” (1965, p. 82).

Although there are advantages to such total horizontal propaganda, there are also disadvantages. It is time consuming and expensive (group leaders must be trained, paid, and bureaucratically coordinated and monitored). Group leadership takes a unique individual thoroughly integrated into the party and of “unswerving” devotion to its causes. The person must have the characteristics of successful group leaders. Despite these issues, it has been successful in China because, though it is political, it is closely identified with education (Ellul, 1965, p. 83). The small groups are China’s education system, teaching adherence to the rules of society, its ideologies, principles, values, and myths. In 1965, according to Ellul, the Communist Party of China delivered sub-propaganda through the technique of horizontal propaganda, and it was remarkably effective in attaining obedience to the authorities.

However, the expense of the effort and its inefficient and risky results are responsible for the decline of such horizontal propaganda in China, at least outside the re-education camps and prisons. Also, there is the need to consider the requirements of a growing technical society for a more specialized economic and professional education system—which Ellul points out would be incompatible with China’s small group system. These factors are responsible for most of the propaganda of the modern Chinese state, which relies on traditional, vertical propaganda of the sociological, political, integrative, and agitative varieties.

Ellul’s American example of horizontal propaganda practised through human relations departments is a short reference to William H. Whyte’s classic study, The Organization Man (1956), in which Whyte demonstrates that American schools are becoming the training ground for adapting youth to prosper in American society (1965, p. 84). Nevertheless, unlike the early Chinese example, higher education and other institutional structures in the United States can better be described as using vertical sociological propaganda to integrate their clients into technological society.

Rationality and Irrationality

The characterization that propaganda is an irrational appeal to emotions has some truth, but it is not always so. There is rational propaganda based on facts, stats, and data; it is propaganda if it uses selective facts to demonstrate or bolster a position of superiority or appeal for support. Remember, people can quickly check facts, but the “realm of the lie” is interpreting facts (Ellul, 1965, p. 57). According to Ellul, US propaganda tends to be factually based (1965, p. 84). This factual basis holds today, at least for the traditional mainstream media, which still subscribe to the liberal consensus. Ellul asserts that modern people must believe that they act consistently with information and experience. It is part of the rationalization process or the increasing hold of rational techniques guiding human behaviour. Propaganda has responded to this need by becoming more rational and factual in its relation to information.

Emotional appeals tend to lessen the individual’s critical thinking skills. There is even some blowback to excessive or blatant appeals to fear and shock, according to Ellul (1965, p. 85). However, given the recent MAGA (Make America Great Again) phenomenon and its relation to factual material, more research is needed to examine differences in individuals’ reactions to such appeals based on their social class, gender, pecuniary interests, party affiliation, and education level. At the least, the recent history of Trumpism calls into question Ellul’s assertion that “The Big Lie” is now ineffective.

Regardless, Ellul posits that propagandists (technicians) can present factual propaganda to evoke an emotional reaction. For example, an individual who views a factual documentary on US relations with the Iraqi people might come away with the overall impression of what a great relationship it was and take pride in American foreign policy. The individual who reacts to the mythical (manufactured) images is left with an emotional response that overrides factual analysis (1965, p. 85). The appeal is factual (though selective in the facts presented, a frequent practice in documentaries), but its effect on the individual is emotional.

Ellul argues that this is true for propaganda and all information. He asserts that the flood of information is such that individuals are drowning (and this in the mid-1960s!)—statistics, factoids, and professional opinions—their capacity to form judgments and opinions overwhelmed. Thus, all rely on a general impression of the world, an impression often simplistic and one-sided. Much of propaganda’s success stems from controlling the flow of information to the target audience and engendering emotional reactions in response to this information. These emotional levers are implanted within individuals and used to guide their attitudes and behaviours, depriving them of their locus of control (1965, p. 87). This has severe consequences for the future of democracy and social justice.

Social Conditions for Propaganda to Thrive

Several conditions are necessary for modern propaganda to exist and thrive within a socio-cultural system (1965, p. 88). Much of it could not exist without mass media. When Ellul wrote, US media comprised hundreds of daily and weekly newspapers, magazines aimed at various interests, radio stations, and three major television networks. With the proliferation of cable and satellite television, streaming services, internet news sources, and social media, the vehicles for disseminating propaganda have multiplied exponentially despite the decline of newspapers and magazines. Whereas past media had filters—editors, publishers, sponsors, and critics who would vet material before publication or broadcast, much of today’s internet media is click-and-play. Thus, all manner of opinions, rumours, and conspiracy theories are amplified and propagated on the web. There have also been significant advances beyond Ellul’s time in psychology, sociology, social psychology, public opinion polling, big data, and other fields aimed at understanding and influencing human thought and behaviour.

Ellul asserts that centralized media are necessary for propaganda to be effective. This concentration is necessary not because the individual has a choice of media but because no media (TV, newspapers, radio) can monopolize the individual’s attention. It is only through the concentration of the media, preferably in a few hands, that propaganda can become truly effective in applying the psychosocial “orchestration” necessary for manipulating the thoughts and actions of individuals (1965, p. 102). Nevertheless, even media concentration is not enough. Fortunately for the few media conglomerates that made it through the great narrowing, there is a concomitant increase in the number of recipients who can read and purchase radios, televisions, cell phones, and computers. Both mass production and mass consumption are necessary to sustain each other; no modern propaganda can exist without the simultaneous existence of producers and consumers.

Ellul also remarks on political developments that are more immediate causes of the evolution of massive propaganda campaigns. He refers to the two World Wars, the Russian Revolution, Hitler’s rise to power, and since 1945 wars in China, Vietnam (French Indochina for Ellul), and the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union. Each event spurred technical developments—as wars often do—including the sharpening and spread of propaganda techniques (1965, p. 88).

Ellul maintains that propaganda can best succeed in an individualistic society: that is, in a society in which traditional integrative institutions such as family, community, and friendship networks lose their essential life-support functions of occupational, financial, and emotional aid, socialization, education, and social support. Where traditional groups hold individuals to their norms and values, propaganda has only a negligible effect on them. Such groups are tightly structured, with a distinct way of life that propaganda cannot easily penetrate. Modernity tends to limit severely the functions of these traditional groups, replacing them with formal institutions. This functional replacement is not to say that traditional groups have disappeared. However, because they have lost many of their primary functions (except emotional gratification), they have become much less stable and vital in the individual’s life. Although modernization has freed the individual from family and community norms and values, it has made them directly vulnerable to the influence of secondary groups and thus “the entire society” (1965, p. 90).

The rise of mass society, Ellul continues, is the counterpart of the rise of individualism. Secondary organizations sponsored by government and capital—such as educational institutions, social services, psychological services, credit unions, Social Security, insurance, banks, nursing homes, daycares, Medicaid, Medicare, and abuse shelters—have all taken over these functions. Family and community ties used to provide all of these services, though haphazardly and inefficiently at best, the primary reason for the rise of secondary service organizations. These new secondary organizations were promoted in their founding by propaganda and are themselves the hubs of propaganda; “they are instruments of propaganda” (1965, p. 97). These organizations, always based on bureaucratic rules and procedures, are thus based on technique. Such groups interact impersonally and are goal directed, with written rules of conduct and strict hierarchies. These are the groups in which people are now integrated and socialized (propagandized) into their societies.

Ellul admits that there are societies in which propaganda thrives that are neither individualistic societies nor mass societies, such as Russia in 1917 or China in the initial stages of communism (1965, p. 97). Nevertheless, early on, government authorities in these countries moved to break down these traditional groups and develop new mass structures to replace them functionally. These new organizations are open to and carriers of propaganda. Where the modernization process of breaking down traditional groups does not happen naturally as part of the social evolutionary process, authoritarian states often force the issue (1965, p. 98). Modern propaganda can take firm root only with this breakdown of traditional social structures.

In premodern societies, public opinion was a function of the individual’s interpersonal relations within small, primary groups. These dominant opinions have a tight hold on the individual because of the everyday experiences of the group, the tight integration of members, and their well-defined and stable roles within the group. Secondary organizations have quite a contrasting character. In societies dominated by these organizations, individuals have little common experience with which to base decisions, engage in mindless yet scripted interactions (do you want fries with that?), or their status and role within the organization restrict communications. Ellul asserts that societies dominated by large bureaucratic organizations (all individualistic, mass, technological societies) are ideal environments for the development and success of propaganda. It is the mechanism by which public opinion is formed.

A significant point that Ellul (1965) makes is that the propagandee is complicit with the propagandist. It is the individual who buys the newspaper, purchases a TV set, goes to a movie, or wanders the internet. Individuals do not buy these things because they want propaganda. Rather, the attractions of amusements, sports, news, or infotainment are more significant than the fear of propaganda. Ellul also suggests that we choose to read the newspapers that we like, tune in to the television stations whose news and fictional depictions of life coincide with our views, and visit websites that reflect our opinions and help to shape them (p. 103). In all such cases, the individual chooses the propaganda. As stated earlier, not all propaganda is about changing opinions; sometimes it reinforces existing opinions and calls the individual to action. Readers, or more likely viewers in this graphics-oriented age, offer their “throat[s] to the knife of the propaganda” that they choose (p. 103). Even more “remarkable,” according to Ellul, is that the propagandist, through the media, attracts the propagandees, integrating them into the collective, into the mass (p. 104).

Ellul (1965) also remarks on some ideal demographic conditions for propaganda to thrive. A large population of high density and urbanization is necessary to increase interaction, impersonality, geographical mobility, and isolation. (The internet is thus an ideal environment for propaganda.) All such characteristics weaken the hold of family and community groups and provide the conditions for secondary organizations to proliferate and enlarge. An average or decent standard of living is also ideal for spreading propaganda since people who struggle for subsistence focus on survival and thus are poor candidates for propaganda (p. 105). Besides, he writes, propaganda aims at the most significant portion of the masses, which lies in the middle of modern technological societies, between rich and poor. Sub-propaganda aims for normalcy, an average standard of living, clear national goals of productivity and efficiency, and a shared lifestyle regarding work and consumption (p. 106). It is about adjusting individuals to the status quo and integrating them into the socio-cultural system; the individual is formed into a “pattern most useful to society” (p. 108).

According to Ellul, propagandists come from the middle class across all societies (1965, p. 106). The poorer classes do not have access to education, and the wealthy do not understand the masses well enough to devise or exploit the symbols necessary for propaganda. However, more recent experience indicates that this is a tendency rather than an absolute. Also, it is possible that some people, regardless of class, have personality traits (sociopathic or narcissistic?) that naturally lend themselves to being good propagandists.

In addition to an average lifestyle, propaganda thrives where people have some level of cultural learning. Basic literacy is essential, but Ellul asserts that “perhaps 90 percent” know how to read but do not exercise their critical faculties much beyond that (1965, p. 108). They attribute truth, or lies, to whatever they read or view. They select the reading material that is the easiest to digest and parallels or reinforces their basic assumptions and beliefs. As a result, basic literacy campaigns make significant numbers of individuals susceptible to propaganda. In fact, Ellul claims that propaganda becomes the culture, what the masses learn and act on regarding politics, economics, and culture.

To summarize, Ellul maintains that basic education is necessary for organizational propaganda. Most of the populations of technological societies have attained this level but not yet a level of critical thinking and discernment to recognize their manipulation. Widespread critical thinking skills would make propaganda too difficult (1965, p. 109).

Ellul’s estimate of non-critical readers is too high; surveys of Americans indicate that large numbers do not read books beyond high school or even college. However, much depends on the exact question, though it must be admitted that books are seemingly going out of fashion. (Does reading require too much time? Too much thought? Yet another commitment that modern people are unwilling to make?) (Pew Research Center, 2012).

Since Ellul’s time, other reading materials are available on the internet, brief, to the point, and cast in the technique of propaganda. Widespread internet use is not one of his conditions for propaganda (given, of course, that Ellul was writing in the mid-1960s). However, it is undoubtedly a media accelerant for all types of propaganda—sociological and political, agitative and integrative, aimed at a national audience and an adversary’s population. Information is a vital part of propaganda. For it to be successful, it must have some “reference to political or economic reality” (1965, p. 112). It requires a literate mass—the broader the information base of the mass, the greater the effectiveness of the propaganda.

Ellul (1965) argues that propaganda thrives in societies in which more information is available to the public (p. 112). Propagandists can then confront the public with a problem. In doing so, they can magnify the problem or report on it accurately, but the point is that they must have some factual basis for their assertion. “The problem need not actually exist, but there must be a reason why it might exist” (p. 113). The propagandist follows up by promising a solution to the problem. John F. Kennedy’s “Missile Gap” in his 1960 campaign was a good example. A more recent example is the 2020 “Stolen Election” in America, though now the propagandist need only declare an endless series of lies as facts and get a considerable number of people to believe them and an even more significant number to parrot them.

The Necessity of Propaganda

In Ellul’s (1965) view, propaganda is necessary for the social organization of a technological society; in addition, it is necessary for the individual. In the 1960s, Ellul asserts, it pervaded nearly every aspect of political, economic, and social life. It has been even more ubiquitous and effective in the first quarter of the 21st century. Propaganda is an integral part of formal social organization; it is the great motivator of action, the symbols that our institutions manipulate to win our hearts and minds, and the push for us to participate in politics with “deep satisfaction” (p. 118). Propaganda meets the needs not only of social organizations but also of individuals. According to Ellul, it is needed by almost every citizen of our “technological age” (p. 121).

In the modern state, the masses are expected to participate in politics and know their political leaders through the media. People in Western democracies have become used to making political judgments and being consulted on issues through polling and voting. Some are superficial in their interests, some are more serious, but a sizable proportion of modern citizens vote, and the vote, aside from money, is the lifeblood of politics. Besides, Ellul opines, “political decisions affect everybody,” and many people want to be involved in the game to make their influence felt (1965, pp. 122–123).

Unfortunately, there are some problems with public opinion, even regarding the vote. Ellul (1965) disparages public opinion as often mixed, uninformed, and prone to stampedes in unexpected directions. It is emphatically not made up of “rational decisions” (p. 124). There is simply no way that the modern state, even if benevolent and seriously democratic, can govern according to public opinion. “But it cannot escape it either” (p. 125). According to Ellul, the only solution possible is to “channel and shape” public opinion to follow the necessities or whims of the government and convince citizens that they are involved (pp. 126–127).

There is an almost “mystical belief in the people’s sovereignty,” according to Ellul (1965, p. 129). A democracy is not the only system to hold this belief; even dictators attempt to demonstrate their legitimacy by appealing to democratic procedures and manufacturing consent. Propaganda not only manipulates information to achieve consent but also provokes public demand that the government act—for example, that the United States invade Iraq or that Russia invade Ukraine—thus giving the impression that the government is only responding to the will of the people (1965, p. 131). This game of constant propaganda shaping and provoking public opinion and governments pretending to respond to this opinion with policies and actions now characterizes much of the relationship between the government and the people (1965, p. 132).

Although democratic states might hesitate given their values and revulsion to using political agitative propaganda, Ellul (1965) posits that, when under threat or serious competition, they will be driven to use it more frequently (p. 133). The sheer intensification of production in modern states demands strict coordination within and between structural organizations as well as significant coordination and control of large populations. This coordination necessitates permanent propaganda campaigns by governments and industries. Ellul asserts that nation-states have no choice but to use propaganda (p. 134).

Another reason that a nation-state cannot escape using propaganda is the existence of psychological warfare or indirect aggression using propaganda on another nation-state. Nation-states must counter such aggression. The Nazi propaganda campaign targeted Austria and the former Czechoslovakia before the Reich absorbed the two nations. The campaign sapped the strength of the two regimes and deprived them of the support of their people (Ellul, 1965, p. 134). A country cannot defend itself against such aggression, Ellul believes, unless it uses the same means to counteract the assault.

Not only that, but also the state must constantly encourage loyalty in its citizens and commitment to the values of the socio-cultural system. According to Ellul (1965), this encouragement is especially critical when these norms and values are attacked (p. 135). This crisis is another reason for the nation-state to intensify its dissemination of integrative propaganda, often through sub-propaganda filtered through educational institutions and the media and mirrored in advertising, social services, and economic activity. Nevertheless, Ellul insists, the effects of a nation-state’s propaganda on its citizens are identical to those of enemy propaganda on another nation-state’s citizens. Regardless of where it originates, propaganda destroys one’s “personality and freedom” (p. 137).

Any politically oriented education, according to Ellul, is selective in terms of the values that it encourages its citizens to internalize. We tend to believe that our national values and opinions are genuine, justified through practice and time, and thus the only values that matter. We therefore think that it is simply a matter of education. Nevertheless, Ellul writes, we are mistaken. The inculcation of some values, such as the benefits of competition or patriotism, is a rejection of other values, such as cooperation or internationalism. Thus, when education is undertaken to inculcate civic virtue, it “is precisely a propaganda operation” (1965, p. 138). So, Ellul concludes, by various means we keep arriving at the same conclusion: the modern nation-state must use propaganda to govern.

Propaganda serves many individual needs as well. Ellul posits that it fulfills individuals’ need for help understanding the world and their position in it. As the state increasingly relies on public opinion to rule, individuals face myriad decisions that demand knowledge, judgment, and information that they do not have. Many desire to be involved in political decisions beyond elections, but other areas of life (family, work, consumption) demand their attention. Time is a scarce commodity for most, and in-depth knowledge of economic and foreign policy issues is not widespread.

According to Ellul, average people work eight hours daily and must devote up to two hours to commuting. If they are old-fashioned, they read the newspaper (or at least scan the headlines, perhaps reading a paragraph or two of a few stories). Alternatively, they watch the TV news or browse internet news and opinion sites. Moreover, this is the case for most people. They are then shown snippets of information, much of it factual, from the wide variety of happenings in the world that day or week. They would retain hundreds of factoids, at least briefly, but with no real coherence (1965, p. 143).

Furthermore, the variety of information is incredible—foreign and immigration policy, economic news, and Ukraine (updated from Ellul’s reference to Indochina). Broadsides from all directions hit the individual, creating a bewildering mix of news and opinion pieces; advertisements; weather reports about tornadoes, earthquakes, and floods; statistics on crime in the streets; and stories of political and white-collar crimes that drag on forever in the courts. The attention of the citizen/voter, Ellul (1965) notes, is continually pulled in one direction after another, a “kaleidoscope in which thousands of unconnected images follow each other rapidly” (p. 144). Furthermore, it keeps coming, for news comes daily. It is “incoherent, absurd, and irrational” to the average person (p. 145). The individual is overwhelmed with news and developments. However, the government, teachers, peer groups, fear, and patriotism continually press for the involvement of the individual. The various forms of propaganda bring order to social, political, and economic life. Propaganda provides the scaffolding in which the masses can fit the different pieces of information to one another (or ignore them entirely). Propaganda provides a coherent world view and an “affirmation” that we are actively involved in our governance and in control of our destinies (p. 146).

Polls indicate that our fellow citizens have opinions about everything, even the most arcane political issues. Many people prefer to express manufactured opinions from pundits, television personalities, or websites than not expressing any opinions at all. Regarding this general problem of incompetence, Ellul adds that the highly technical and complex nature of many political and economic problems is beyond the average person’s grasp and scope. For all of these problems, propaganda is the solution. Individuals desire to participate but do not have the time or energy to master the issues. Propaganda supplies them with a simplified version of a world view that allows them to participate in the democratic process “without eliminating their incompetence” (1965, p. 140).

To maximize production, Ellul observes, modern propaganda must push individuals to give their all to jobs that are never ending, often devoid of meaning, but play key roles in their identities and stations in life (1965, p. 140). According to him, propaganda spurs modern people’s dedication to work and productivity. Advertising stimulates the desire for money, benefits, status, and other extrinsic rewards of work—the education system, human relations departments, management, and supervision rouse commitment and job satisfaction.

Not only must modern people sacrifice themselves to their work, but also they must pay heavy taxes for the privilege of living in a technological society. Using force to collect taxes for the elite was acceptable in the past. Today there is at least some need for citizens to commit to the system so that they will not cheat too much. Thus, positive propaganda engenders commitment, such as a sign indicating “Your Tax Dollars at Work” on a highway construction project or a parade of military hardware. Then there is the need to call its citizens periodically to war or to subject them to the constant threat of war. Again, only the nation-state can engineer propaganda to get young people to sign up for service; only propaganda can whip up the general population’s support for war (Ellul, 1965, p. 143).

Aside from taxes and war, technological society also subjects many of its citizens to inhumane working and living conditions, noise, constant stress from money or health problems, crowded streets, and periodic or chronic unemployment in a culture that puts a premium value on work. Ellul adds that the stress of adjusting to a technical environment can be unbearable (1965, p. 143). Medical treatments to address widespread anxiety and depression are one solution. Social services at various levels provide psychological and social support to help reduce tensions (and keep people productive). Finally, the market sells many psychological comforts such as alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, electronic games, and other amusements. Again, Ellul stresses that propaganda is a necessary tool that all structural organizations within bureaucratic mass societies use as well as the overall government of the nation-state. Propaganda works because it gives modern people simple explanations for what is happening in the world. In addition, it provides the fundamental causes of the problems that beset us, as well as promises of solutions for these and future problems, often involving the promotion of further techniques (technology and organization) (1965, pp. 146–147).

Ellul posits that several psychological characteristics common to modern people can also help to explain the need for propaganda. Modernity brings about overcrowded cities, and one can become lonely in such diversity. Many live in a spiritual void and experience a need for community. This loneliness, Ellul writes, is perhaps “the most terrible ordeal” for modern people to bear. It leads to mental health issues, addictive behaviours, and physical ailments. Human relations departments in many corporations and government agencies, as well as social services and counselling organizations for the public, are all remedies (1965, p. 148). Moreover, propaganda can create feelings of commitment and community, integrating individuals into social movements and providing a sense of purpose and meaning, which can be “a powerful boost” to coping with the individual’s loneliness and self-esteem (1965, p. 150).

Ellul (1965) also claims that society pushes modern people to become more passive. This passivity goes into the job, where most workers perform limited functions within large organizations and participate in various roles within mass society (limited though these roles might be). Training in school, military service, jobs, games, and new techniques is constant. We are under constant supervision and trained to act in certain ways (p. 148). But some of us rebel against this anonymity, these feelings of inadequacy and unimportance. Propaganda allows such individuals to feel like heroes, to be considered as somebodies, and to express their “drive for power and domination” (p. 149). The football team at our school wins, and we feel pride; America’s military displayed in parades and the field keeps many youths enthralled. If we are in a profession, then the association “invest[s] it with idealistic or moral justification. It becomes our calling, and we will not tolerate its being questioned” (p. 157).

According to Ellul (1965), a final psychological need that propaganda fulfills is some relief from our increasingly organized, rule-bound, rationalized institutions. Modernity represses many human drives (which he admits would be chaos if completely released) far more than traditional societies (p. 151). Propaganda can permit what is generally prohibited, such as hatred, since it can legitimate hatred by pointing to crimes committed by enemies. Propaganda “opens the door and allows [one] . . . to kill the Jews, the bourgeois, the Communists, and so on, and such murder even becomes an achievement” (p. 152). People have an overpowering need to be proper and correct in their opinions and behaviours, and propaganda gives them the “proof” that they are by offering ready-made justifications for actions, giving “assurances equivalent to those formerly given” by religion (p. 159).

In conclusion, propaganda plays a fundamental role in modern societies. It provides many essential social functions. Propagandees are not innocent victims but co-conspirators, for propaganda fulfills many of their needs for meaning, belief, and action. Ellul posits that the poor and lower working classes are the most susceptible to political agitation and subversive propaganda. People of the middle class are less susceptible to agitative propaganda but much more likely to be the target of sociological integrative propaganda (1965, p. 112). In addition, and to even the score, Ellul also writes that intellectuals are particularly susceptible to sub-propaganda. Propaganda is a technique that plays a vital role in a technological society. It is rational messaging that furthers the interests of the formal organizations of our economic, social, and political institutions. “The need for psychological influence to spur allegiance and action is everywhere the decisive factor, which progress demands and which the individual seeks in order to be delivered from his own self” (1965, p. 160).