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Edward Bernays

Edward Louis Bernays (/bɜːrˈnz/ bur-NAYZ, German: [bɛʁˈnaɪs]; November 22, 1891 − March 9, 1995) was an American pioneer in the field of public relations and propaganda, and referred to in his obituary as "the father of public relations".[3] His best-known campaigns include a 1929 effort to promote female smoking by branding cigarettes as feminist "Torches of Freedom", and his work for the United Fruit Company in the 1950s, connected with the CIA-orchestrated overthrow of the democratically elected Guatemalan government in 1954. He worked for dozens of major American corporations, including Procter & Gamble and General Electric, and for government agencies, politicians, and nonprofit organizations.

Edward L. Bernays

Eduard Bernays[1]

(1891-11-22)November 22, 1891

March 9, 1995(1995-03-09) (aged 103)

(m. 1922; died 1980)

  • Ely Bernays (father)
  • Anna (Freud) Bernays (mother)

Martha Bernays (aunt)
Sigmund Freud (uncle)
Isaac Bernays (great-grandfather)
Marc Randolph (great-nephew)
Nicolae Steinhardt (cousin)

Of his many books, Crystallizing Public Opinion (1923) and Propaganda (1928) gained special attention as early efforts to define and theorize the field of public relations. Citing works of writers such as Gustave Le Bon, Wilfred Trotter, Walter Lippmann, and Sigmund Freud (his own double uncle), he described the masses as irrational and subject to herd instinct—and he outlined how skilled practitioners could use crowd psychology and psychoanalysis to control them in desired ways.[4][5] Bernays later synthesized many of these ideas in his postwar book, Public Relations (1945), which outlines the science of managing information released to the public by an organization, in a manner most advantageous to the organization. He does this by first providing an overview of the history of public relations, and then provides insight into its application.


Bernays was named one of the 100 most influential Americans of the twentieth century by Life.[6] He was the subject of a full-length biography by Larry Tye entitled The Father of Spin (1999) and later an award-winning 2002 documentary for the BBC by Adam Curtis entitled The Century of the Self.

Family and education[edit]

Edward Bernays was born in Vienna to a Jewish family.[7] His mother, Anna (1858–1955), was Sigmund Freud's sister, and his father Eli (1860–1921) was the brother of Freud's wife, Martha Bernays; their grandfather, Isaac Bernays (through their father Berman), was the chief rabbi of Hamburg and a relative of the poet Heinrich Heine.[8][9]


The Bernays family moved from Vienna to the United States in the 1890s. After Ely Bernays started working as a grain exporter at the Manhattan Produce Exchange, he sent for his wife and children.[10] In 1892, his family moved to New York City, where Bernays attended DeWitt Clinton High School.[11] In 1912 he graduated from Cornell University with a degree in agriculture, but chose journalism as his first career.[12]


He married Doris E. Fleischman in 1922.[13] Fleischman was a member of the Lucy Stone League, a group which encouraged women to keep their names after marriage.[14]


Later, however, she changed her mind and her name, becoming Doris Bernays. By all accounts, Fleischman played a major though quiet role in the Bernays public relations business—including ghost-writing numerous memos and speeches, and publishing a newsletter.[15]

Techniques[edit]

Third parties[edit]

Bernays argued that the covert use of third parties was morally legitimate because those parties were morally autonomous actors.[64]

New York: Duffield & Co. (1917).

The Broadway Anthology

. New York: Boni and Liveright (1923). OCLC 215243834.

Crystallizing Public Opinion

A Public Relations Counsel (1927).

An Outline of Careers: A Practical Guide to Achievement by Thirty-Eight Eminent Americans (1927).

Verdict of Public Opinion on Propaganda (1927).

. New York: Horace Liveright (1928). ISBN 978-0-8046-1511-2.

Propaganda

This Business of Propaganda (1928).

Universities—Pathfinders in Public Opinion (1937).

Careers for Men: A Practical Guide to Opportunity in Business, Written by Thirty-Eight Successful Americans (1939).

Speak Up for Democracy: What You Can Do—A Practical Plan of Action for Every American Citizen. New York: (1940).

The Viking Press

Future of Private Enterprise in the Post-War World (1942).

Democratic Leadership in Total War (1943).

Psychological Blueprint for the Peace—Canada, U.S.A. (1944).

(1945).

Public Relations

New York: The Gerent Press (1945).

Your Place at the Peace Table. What You Can Do to Win a Lasting United Nations Peace.

What the British Think of Us: A Study of British Hostility to America and Americans and Its Motivation, with Recommendations for Improving Anglo-American Relations, with (1950).

Doris Fleischman

(as contributor). Norman: University of Oklahoma Press (1955). OCLC 550584.

The Engineering of Consent

Your Future in Public Relations (1961).

New York: One Wall Street (1964).

Survey of the World's Greatest Square Mile: Manhattan Island Below Fulton Street.

. New York: Simon and Schuster (1965).

Biography of an Idea: Memoirs of Public Relations Counsel

with Burnet Hershey, eds. New York: Praeger (1970).

The Case for Reappraisal of U.S. Overseas Information Policies and Programs (Incorporating Congressman Fascell's Report)

Bernays, Edward. Biography of an Idea: Memoirs of Public Relations Counsel Edward L. Bernays New York: Simon and Schuster, 1965.

The Unseen Power: Public Relations. A History. Hove, UK: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1994. ISBN 0-8058-1465-5

Cutlip, Scott M.

. PR! A Social History of Spin. New York: Basic Books (Perseus), 1996. ISBN 0-465-06179-6

Ewen, Stuart

Marks, Barry Alan. "The Idea of Propaganda in America." PhD dissertation accepted at the University of Minnesota, 1957.

. "Reception of Edward Bernays' Doctrine of 'Manipulating Public Opinion". Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, 6 August 1984; (ERIC).

Olasky, Marvin

Olasky, Marvin. "Bringing 'Order Out of Chaos": Edward Bernays and the Salvation of Society Through Public Relations". Journalism History, 12(1), Spring 1985.

. The Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays and the Birth of Public Relations. New York: Crown, 1998. ISBN 0-8050-6789-2

Tye, Larry

American National Biography v. 2, Oxford University Press, 1999.

Edward Bernays, Biography of an Idea: Memoirs of a Public Relations Counsel ( )

excerpt

(November 26, 2008). "Century Of Self. 1-1 Happiness Machines". BBC. Archived from the original on 2021-11-18. Retrieved February 12, 2010.

Curtis, Adam

. NPR.org. National Public Radio. Retrieved February 12, 2010.

"Freud's Nephew and the Origins of Public Relations"

Nimmo, Dan D.; Chevelle Newsome (1997). Political Commentators in the United States in the 20th Century: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook. Westport, Conn.: . pp. 1–9. ISBN 0-313-29585-9.

Greenwood Press

column on his interview with Bernays at Townhall.com Archived 2008-12-07 at the Wayback Machine

Marvin Olasky

(1919). Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War – 4th impression, with postscript. New York, MacMillan.

Wilfred Trotter

Stephen Bender. , LewRockwell.com, 2005-02-04

Karl Rove & the Spectre of Freud's Nephew

Edward L. Bernays papers

online

The are located in the Northeastern University Libraries, Archives and Special Collections Department, Boston, MA.

Edward L. Bernays papers, 1982–1998 (bulk 1993–1995)

Torches of Freedom Video Clip

Edward L. Bernays tells the story of "Torches of Freedom" in his own words – video clip – 1999

. Memory.loc.gov. Retrieved February 12, 2010.

"Everett Dean Martin and Edward L. Bernays, Are We Victims of Propaganda? (Library of Congress reproduction from The Forum Magazine, March, 1929)"

on C-SPAN

Appearances

at Project Gutenberg

Works by Edward Bernays

at Internet Archive

Works by or about Edward Bernays

; "LETTER TO MR. EDWARD L. BERNAYS FROM <Sanitized> RDP80B01676R003800020084-9 ", 1958, Central Intelligence Agency,

LETTER TO MR. EDWARD L. BERNAYS FROM <Sanitized> RDP80B01676R003800020083-0