21 | MP introduction
definition stresses this aspect:
"Propaganda is promotion which is veiled in one way or anoth-
er, as to 1. its origin and sources, 2. the interests involved,
3. the methods employed, 4. the content spread, and 5. the results
accrueing to the victims - any one, any two, any three, any
four, any five."
In part 2 we discuss the problems of that self-deception of
ours which makes us want to see the real truth only when it is
veiled.
Finally, in the conclusion, we discuss the part propaganda
plays in the evolution of history, and in the planning of social
events, and we try to discover how deep it goes, and what kind
of social transformations can be expected from it.
The argument which goes as a red thread through this book
can be summed up as follows: "The purpose of propaganda is to
increase the sense of social unity. It aims at making up for the
relative weakness of social ties within a group. In other words,
propaganda succeeds in making good a deficiency in
genuine social unity by creating a superstructure of artific-
ial social unity. Genuine social unity cannot be obtained
unless the members of a group are approximately equal in income,
status, education, and sense of values. Wherever inequalities
diminish social unity, propaganda generates artificial social
bonds which bind people together by a common hatred, by a comm-
on conceit, or by a common servitude to a leader, or to an
'ideal'."[25]
It would, however, be difficult to say anything useful about
propaganda in general, and in the abstract. Like any other