12 January 2016

Public Opinion Series





Public Relations - Public Opinion, National Will, Group Mind, and Social Purpose

Father of Spin, Edward Bernays and the Birth of Public Relations by Larry Tye, 1998, Excerpts
Sigmund Freud, Edward Bernay’s uncle, had revolutionized the way the world thought about individual behavior. He used his uncle’s ideas in the commercial realm to predict, then adjust, the way people believed and behaved, without them realizing it. And just as Freud was rewarded with the title Father of Psychoanalysis, so Bernays became known around the world as the Father of Public Relations.

Bernays was the man who, more than any other, got women to smoke, put bacon and eggs on breakfast tables, Ivory in soap dishes, books in bookshelves and Calvin Coolidge back in the White House, and in 1954, he helped to topple Guatemala’s democratic government. He died in 1995 at age 103. His story is about how public thought is routinely shaped or, some might say, manipulated by singular powers in our culture.

Tobacco and Bernays

Guatemala and Bernays


Bernay’s legendary public relation campaigns literally qualified him to write the book on:
Propaganda by Edward Bernays, 1928, Excerpts



Bernays studied mass psychology from Walter Lippmann, who was the first to coin the term ‘Manufacturing Consent’
Public Opinion by Walter Lippman, 1921, Excerpts
“The skillful propagandist knows that you must start with a plausible analysis and then stoke up energy by brandishing a passport to heaven.”

Tools to Shape Public Opinion
Public Opinion Shapers


Media Control by Noam Chomsky, 2002, Excerpts

Manufacturing Consent by Herman and Chomsky, 1988, Excerpts

Edward Bernays started his public relations career on The Creel Commission which was created to influence U.S. public opinion regarding American participation in World War I.


Documentary: The Century Of The Self - Freud, Bernays, Mass Mind Control





Other catchy monikers for Edward Bernays
The Baron of Ballyhoo
Sire of the Big Sell
Master of Mass Psychology
High Priest of Press Agents
Pontiff of Publicity
Pope of Propaganda
Prince of Propaganda
Prince of Puff

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