Although the word
propaganda
is today scarcely admissible, having ceded its place to the more polite term
communication
, it nonetheless remains one of the most powerful levers of power for ensuring the unity and cohesion of modern societies. Lacking the same means of coercion as the totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century, postmodern society must maintain its cohesion through ever more effective ideological mechanisms - through a form of total propaganda that touches every aspect of life, from cradle to grave, via the news, advertising, films, television series, video games, sports spectacles, school curricula, official celebrations, education, and so forth.
Contemporary Western society may justifiably be described as a
propaganda society
- a society in which propaganda is massive and constitutes the primary mechanism for controlling social behaviour. This book examines the mental gulag imposed on Europeans, with the aim of fostering resistance.