Alex Carey. Taking the Risk Out of Democracy: Corporate Propaganda Versus Freedom and Liberty. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1997. $15.95, paper, ISBN 978-0-252-06616-0.

Reviewed by Karen S. Miller

Published on H-Business (October, 1997)

Taking the Risk Out of Democracy opens with as the Sacred and the Satanic. Business leaders a discussion of Henry Wallace's notion of "the cen‐ also co-opted social science to aid their cause, and tury of the common man," a twentieth century they exported their free enterprise campaigns to American society ruled not by individual power other countries, including Carey's home, Aus‐ or class privilege but by common consent. It is the tralia. By taking corporate power out of the range "failure to move signifcantly" toward Wallace's of public discussion, Carey argues, propaganda vision that concerns Carey, a failure he attributes has closed minds and society. "in important measure to the power of propagan‐ The book, a collection of essays ably edited af‐ da." Propaganda, he asserts, especially corporate ter Carey's death by Andrew Lohrey, contains propaganda, has been used to "control or defect three sections. The frst includes fve chapters on the purposes of the domestic electorate in a demo‐ Closing the American Mind. Carey discusses in de‐ cratic country in the interests of privileged seg‐ tail the Americanization movement and the post- ments of that society" (p. 11). World War I red scare, McCarthyism, and the In Carey's view, U.S. corporate propaganda credibility gap of the Vietnam and Watergate eras, emerged because of the growth of democracy arguing that "by 1947 the war for control over the (specifcally, increased popular franchise and the American mind had all but been won," for union movement) and the growth of corporate "[o]bjection to democratic propaganda on ethical power, which clashed to create a climate where grounds had almost completely disappeared by business leaders perceived a need to protect cor‐ this time" (p. 81). He makes a strong case that cor‐ porate power against democracy. Thus they devel‐ porations have been tremendously active propa‐ oped both internal and external programs that gandists, noting time and again the huge amounts identifed free enterprise with cherished values, of money devoted to free enterprise--anti-union, and government and unions with tyranny and op‐ anti-government-campaigns. He also presents an pression--a Manichean juxtaposition he refers to engaging discussion of the relationship between H-Net Reviews the American philosophical tradition of pragma‐ Carey's emphasis on corporate propaganda tism and the public relations community, focusing leads him to ignore other forms of propaganda especially on the elastic meaning of "truth" within that have been used to combat corporate power. both spheres. Unions have conducted public relations cam‐ The second section consists of three chapters paigns of their own, for example. And while Carey that deal with the export of American corporate praises the growth of popular franchise, he ig‐ public relations to Australia. Carey's discussion on nores the campaigns conducted by the woman Enterprise Australia, an organization similar to sufrage and civil rights movements which helped the United States' National Association of Manu‐ to extend the vote to women and African-Ameri‐ facturers, includes an interesting distinction be‐ cans. This is relevant because, as Carey himself tween grassroots propaganda, aimed at the mass‐ notes, "business hegemony over American society es, and what he calls "treetops" propaganda, was re-established" (p. 95) at least three times, af‐ aimed at the elite, particularly intellectuals who ter each World War and during the 1970s, but he are recruited by corporations to work in think does not explain why it had to be reestablished. tanks in both Australia and the United States. Moreover, Carey overlooks the fact that no cam‐ "There should be no doubt," Carey concludes, paign--corporate or otherwise--takes place in a "that the objective of corporate grassroots and vacuum. Not only does he fail to prove that any‐ treetops propaganda is an expansion of neo-con‐ one read all of these admittedly widely available servative doctrine" directed at dominating the corporate materials (how many of us read every‐ electoral process (p. 105). thing our own universities publish?), Carey can‐ not and does not try to show that exposure led to The fnal section, "Propaganda in the Social changes in opinions or behaviors of individual cit‐ Sciences," includes three essays in which Carey izens. Nor does he identify the mechanism by analyzes the felds of human relations and indus‐ which changes in individuals, if they occurred, trial psychology. A particularly compelling chap‐ created public opinion or the "closing of the ter dissects the Hawthorne Studies, a series of American mind" at the national level. In assuming projects conducted from 1927 to 1935 under the that materials simply by being published are per‐ direction of Harvard professor and native Aus‐ suasive, Carey disregards many moderating fac‐ tralian Elton Mayo. The Hawthorne studies con‐ tors, such as family beliefs or community culture, cluded that economic incentives were of relative‐ that must also have contributed to individuals' ly little importance to workers, but Carey fnds se‐ opinions. For example, in a discussion of the post- rious faws in the research. However, he argues, World War I red scare, he argues that Europe this series and other studies "which are claimed turned left after the war and the United States to have substantiated these conclusions... have turned right, the only diference being "a propa‐ commonly become 'classics' and gained fame and ganda assault on public opinion" in the United infuence in industry and in academia" (p. 143). States (p. 23); this ignores problems associated This indicates to Carey that industry and social with immigration and racism that plagued Ameri‐ scientists have the common objective of helping cans long before any company conducted a free to "take the risk out of political democracy" (p. enterprise campaign. The postwar swing right 144). He worries that Australians have not could as easily be attributed to Wilson's political learned from American mistakes in these felds, misjudgment as to propaganda, but such ideas are having adopted American research and theory left unexplored. rather than developing it indigenously. The book is more successful when Carey fo‐ cuses on the motivation and thinking of the pro‐

2 H-Net Reviews pagandists themselves, as in the chapters on prag‐ matism and public relations, treetops and grass‐ roots propaganda, and human relations. Carey also raises important questions about the role of corporate public relations in American society. The corporate campaigns were highly visible and probably did infuence the labor movement and the culture in ways that certainly merit further research, even if Carey overstates the case. One might wish Carey had lived long enough to devel‐ op his position more thoroughly, but perhaps rais‐ ing the issue is contribution enough.

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Citation: Karen S. Miller. Review of Carey, Alex. Taking the Risk Out of Democracy: Corporate Propaganda Versus Freedom and Liberty. H-Business, H-Net Reviews. October, 1997.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=1428

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