Fake news as a weapon of persuasion

Abstract

Our study is qualitative research. It is a content analysis of more than 2,500 European and American posters of war propaganda identifying modern principles of persuasion and forms of discourse. The analysis of the themes demonstrates that the techniques used one hundred years ago to convince civilians to enlist had enormous potential for development to such a degree that they were adopted by modern political and commercial persuasion. Therefore, we can consider the propagandists of the Great War as modern spin doctors. The idea evolved after reading Propaganda (1928) by Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud. This is an astonishing book; it provides illuminating interpretations both for understanding of war propaganda -not just for the Great War- and for the commercial discourse of which Bernays became a promoting agent. During the Great War the propagandists used emotional and rational stratagems to convince volunteers to leave to the front. Among these, the fake news played an important role in the production of the posters that served to motivate and galvanize people to defend the ideals of the war. It was an organized disinformation action because, especially for American people, the war was very far in kilometres and in interest. Fake news has two different factors: wrong or unreasonable argumentations and false information used as premises. The success of the posters was that of moulding the agenda-setting and the opinion of citizens in order to increase the enlistment to defend the identity of the nation.