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Propaganda and credulity

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  • Little, Andrew T.

Abstract

I develop a theory of propaganda which affects mass behavior without necessarily affecting mass beliefs. A group of citizens observe a signal of their government's performance, which is upwardly inflated by propaganda. Citizens want to support the government if it performs well and if others are supportive (i.e., to coordinate). Some citizens are unaware of the propaganda (“credulous”). Because of the coordination motive, the non-credulous still respond to propaganda, and when the coordination motive dominates they perfectly mimic the actions of the credulous. So, all can act as if they believe the government's lies even though most do not. The government benefits from this responsiveness to manipulation since it leads to a more compliant citizenry, but uses more propaganda precisely when citizens are less responsive.

Suggested Citation

  • Little, Andrew T., 2017. "Propaganda and credulity," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 224-232.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:102:y:2017:i:c:p:224-232
    DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2016.12.006
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    Cited by:

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    2. Abraham Aldama & Mateo Vásquez-Cortés & Lauren Elyssa Young, 2019. "Fear and citizen coordination against dictatorship," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 31(1), pages 103-125, January.
    3. Denter, Philipp & Ginzburg, Boris, 2021. "Troll Farms and Voter Disinformation," MPRA Paper 109634, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Bräuninger, Thomas & Marinov, Nikolay, 2022. "Political elites and the “War on Truth’’," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    5. Edmond, Chris & Lu, Yang K., 2021. "Creating confusion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    6. Grajzl, Peter & Murrell, Peter, 2019. "Toward understanding 17th century English culture: A structural topic model of Francis Bacon's ideas," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 111-135.
    7. Liu, Xiao & Wang, Ziyu & Zhu, Minxing, 2024. "Asset prices’ responses to public information manipulation: The role of market feedback," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 239(C).
    8. Chang, Dongkyu & Vong, Allen, 2021. "Perverse Ethical Concerns: Online Platforms and Offline Conflicts," MPRA Paper 110507, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Wang, Bo & Zheng, Suli, 2023. "Public information manipulation in the financial market," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    10. Gento Kato, 2020. "When strategic uninformed abstention improves democratic accountability," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 32(3), pages 366-388, July.
    11. Rafkin, Charlie & Shreekumar, Advik & Vautrey, Pierre-Luc, 2021. "When guidance changes: Government stances and public beliefs," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 196(C).
    12. Grunewald, Andreas & Kräkel, Matthias, 2022. "Information manipulation and competition," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 245-263.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Political economy; Propaganda; Authoritarian politics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness

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