Ministry of propaganda

An agency or ministry of propaganda is the part of a government charged with generating and distributing propaganda.

Though governments routinely engage in propaganda,^[1] ministries with the word "propaganda" in their name have become progressively more rare since the end of World War II, as a result of which the term took on its present negative connotation. Instead of using the word "propaganda", governments today often use the terms "Truth Team", "public relations", "psychological operations", "education", "advertising", or simply "information".

Historical examples

• Germany had employed Joseph Goebbels as head of the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda.
• The Soviet Union had a Department for Agitation and Propaganda.
• The Republican faction in the Spanish Civil War had Ministry of Propaganda during period from November 1936 to May 1937.^[2]
• The Brazilian Estado Novo had a Department of Press and Propaganda (DIP).
• The Irish Republic had a Department of Propaganda, established 1918 and renamed to Department of Publicity in 1921.
• The United States had a Committee on Public Information and the United States Information Agency, and now has a Bureau of Public Affairs and state-run media in the form of the Broadcasting Board of Governors.
• The Chinese Central Propaganda Department officially changed its English name to Central Publicity Department in 1998, while its Chinese name was unchanged.
• Poland's ministry of information and propaganda was established in 1944.^[3]
• South Africa's President Jacob Zuma announced on 25 May 2014 a new Department of Communications responsible for all government communications and propaganda,^[4] echoing the role of the Department of Information under the Apartheid Government in the 1970s, whose diversion of government funds into propaganda was exposed in the Muldergate Scandal.
• Fascist Italy's analogue was the Ministry of Popular Culture, created in 1933.

In literature

• The Ministry of Truth is the ministry of propaganda in George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four.

See also

• Propaganda
• Mind control
• Crowd psychology
• United States Information Agency
• Ministry of Information

References

1. Herman, Edward; Noam Chomsky (January 15, 2002). Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. Pantheon. ISBN 978-0-375-71449-8.
2. Vergara, Alexander (1998). "Images of Revolution and War". University of California, San Diego. Retrieved 2014-06-21.
3. Christopher J. Coyne; Peter T. Leeson (February 2009). "Media as a Mechanism of Institutional Change and Reinforcement" (PDF). Kyklos 62 (1). Retrieved 9 December 2013.
4. de Wet, Phillip. "Propaganda ministry is a go - without Mac". Mail & Guardian. Retrieved 26 May 2014.