Library:Bending Spines
| Bending Spines | |
|---|---|
| Author | Randall L. Bytwerk |
| First published | 2004 |
| ISBN | 978-0-87013-709-9 unverified |
| Role | Analysis |
| Domains | History Politics & Elections |
| Tactics | Propaganda Technique |
Bending Spines is a 2004 book by Randall L. Bytwerk.
Summary
Randall Bytwerk, a communication scholar at Calvin College in Michigan who created the online German Propaganda Archive, compares the propaganda systems of Nazi Germany and communist East Germany.
Two systems compared
Bytwerk examines how both regimes tried to create a new kind of citizen, using youth organizations, mass rallies, the press, posters and rituals. He shows how East Germany adapted some Nazi methods while claiming to be their opposite.
The limits of propaganda
A key finding is that both systems were more successful at shaping public behavior than private belief. In East Germany especially, citizens learned to perform loyalty while privately doubting the official story, and when the regime lost the ability to enforce conformity in 1989, its propaganda collapsed with it.
Relevance to Bullshitopedia
The book is a useful corrective to the idea that propaganda works like mind control: it often works by making dissent costly rather than by persuading.
Related entries
- Communists set the Reichstag fire
- The Wehrmacht fought a clean war
- East Germany's athletes won through training alone