Bernays and Lippmann

A break from Ramage... yay : )

Bernays writes about using persuasion in public relations by identifying problems and discovering solutions that involve some type of manipulation of the public mind (though this is not necessarily a bad thing). Though attempts to sway others may sometimes be for self-fulling reasons, it can also be serving a social purpose that brings about new ideas. This requires an evaluation of the group of people that they are attempting to persuade, and the examples he gave resulted in a financial gains and changes to the public's ideas.

Lippmann discusses persuasion in the political sense, that when politicians and other members of the public attempt to persuade voters to vote, they are often unsuccessful. He discusses the separation between the mass of people who are only affected by politics once in a while and the politicians who are daily accountable, mostly to other people they encounter directly, like other politicians. It then makes sense that those who don't go to the polls turn a cold shoulder to the politicians who try to convince them of the significance of voting.

I think that both Bernays and Lippmann are trying to get across that in order to persuade others you have to be able to analyze why they feel the way they do and act the way they do in certain situations, and bridge the gap by satisfying their personal needs while fullfilling your own. It has to be a give and take relationship.