Gesammelte Werke

imagination, that the democratic leader should »make use« of such tendencies; that for the sake of democratic aims he should manipulate the masses through shrewd exploitation of their mentality.
What is needed is the emancipation of consciousness rather than its further enslavement. A truly democratic leader, who is more than a mere exponent of political interests embracing a liberal ideology, would necessarily have to abstain from any »psychotechnical« calculation, from any attempt to influence masses or groups of people by irrational means. Under no circumstances should he treat the subjects of political and social action as mere objects to whom an idea is to be sold. This attitude would bring about an inconsistency between ends and means which would impair the sincerity of the whole approach and destroy its inherent conviction. Even on a purely pragmatic level such an attempt would inevitably fall short of the skill of those who think and act only in terms of power, who are largely indifferent to the objective validity of an idea, and who, unhampered by »humanitarian illusions,« subscribe to the altogether cynical attitude of considering human beings as mere raw material to be molded at will. For example, during the crisis of the Weimar Republic, the
Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold,
a liberal progressive organization with considerable membership, tried to counteract the Nazi pattern of rational employment of irrational propagandistic stimuli through imitation, by introducing other symbols. Against the
Swastika
they set the three arrows, against the battle cry
Heil Hitler,
the
Frei Heil,
later modified to
Freiheit.
The fact that these awkwardly concocted symbols of German democracy are not even known in this country evidences their complete failure. It was easy enough for the Goebbels machinery to ridicule them. At least unconsciously the masses sensed very well that this type of counterpropaganda merely attempted to steal a leaf from the Nazi book; that it remained inferior within their own domain, and that, in a way, it conceded defeat through the very act of emulation.
    It is hardly too bold to apply the lesson of this experience to our own scene. As far as the relationship of the masses to their own democracy is concerned, democratic leadership should not aim at better and more comprehensive propaganda but should strive to overcome the spirit of propaganda by strict adherence to the principle of truth. In its fight against Hitler, Allied leadership came to recognize this principle and countered German home propaganda with the exclusive statement of facts. This procedure proved not only to be morally superior to the technique of the German master-minds of propaganda, but also showed its effect by gaining the confidence of the German population.
    To revert to this principle, however, involves a problem of utmost seriousness. If stated abstractly, the demand for uncompromising sincerity has an almost disarming ring of childlike innocence. Its very idea is torn to pieces by the exponents of
Realpolitik,
above all by Hitler himself, and their case is almost overwhelmingly strong. To enroll the support of the masses – thus the argument runs – one has to take them as they are and not as one wants them to be; in other words, one has to reckon with their psychology. It is useless to spread the objective truth without an evaluation of the subjects at which it is directed. This truth could never reach them and would remain completely powerless since it would always pass their understanding. Propaganda, Hitler reasoned, has to adjust itself to the most stupid ones among those to whom it is addressed; it should not be rational but emotional. This formula proved to be so tremendously successful that to shun it seems to place one in a hopeless situation. Even the effectiveness of the truth principle of Allied war propaganda, it might be argued, could be ascribed to mere psychological conditions: only after Goebbels' system of the total lie and the Nazi promises of a short war and protection of the homeland against air attacks had broken down did truth fill a psychological want and become acceptable and enticing. Neither can a sober appraisal of the American scene disregard the fact that propaganda itself is heavily libidinized. In a business culture in which advertising has become a public institution of frightening dimensions, people are indeed emotionally linked not only to the contents of advertising but also to