Lecture 1 - PR and Propoganda

In our first lecture we discussed the relationship between PR and propaganda, PR and war spin and communications strategies in regards to government defense.

The lecture was an interesting look at how public relations can be used to win over public support for war using lies or exaggerations. A video we watched about the communications strategies employed by the US government during the war in Iraq really highlighted this point. The video showed how army personnel were trained to avoid certain subjects during press conferences, how government spokesmen re-framed and put their own 'spin' on tricky questions from journalists or negative media coverage of the war. Even journalists embedded within the army were told to report in ways which would maintain the public's support for the war (such as not recording soldiers carrying guns).

It was really interesting to realize how, it can be argued that, PR essentially allowed the war to happen through creating and maintaining the public support for the war that was needed to make it happen.

This point of view seems to be supported in an article I was reading called 'Propoganda or Public Relations Campaign? Internal communication on the war against Iraq'. In it the authors state that;

"The war against Iraq is a global public relations campaign allowing the U.S. adminsistration to build a favorable public opinion against terrorism and to remove Saddam Hussein"(Jo, Shim, Jung, 63, 2007).

In terms of tactics used by the US government the article notes that

"The fundamental sentiment toward the war can be influenced by media reports. Initially the U.S government has used the WMD, Axis of Evil, and the need to dispel of international terrorism and probable connection as reasons for the war against Iraq"(Jo, Shim, Jung, 65, 2007).

What I got from the lecture was a sense of the importance and essentially 'power' of PR. War PR has the potential to determine the fate of whole countries through creating support for wars which may or may not be justified.


Jo, Samsup. Shim, Sung Wook and Jung, Jaemin. (2007). 'Propoganda or public relations campaign? International communication on the war against Iraq' Public Relations Review. Vol 34. pg 63-65.

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