User:LaurenLainez/Overview of 21st-century propaganda

Since the end of the 20th century, propaganda has evolved significantly. In the 21st century, propaganda is largely disseminated through the internet and on social media platforms such as Twitter. Modern propaganda still utilizes classic tactics such as name-calling and bandwagoning in order to sway the audience toward or against a particular belief. Pieces of "traditional" propaganda are typically created and distributed by larger entities or organizations, while modern propaganda can be created and spread by vast numbers of individuals simultaneously online.

North Korea

Every year, several cartoons (called geurim-chaek in North Korea) are released, many of which are smuggled across the Chinese border and, sometimes, end up in university libraries in the United States. The books are designed to instill the Juche philosophy of Kim Il-sung(the "father" of North Korea)—radical self-reliance of the state. The plots mostly feature scheming capitalists from the United States and Japan who create dilemmas for naïve North Korean characters.

DPRK textbooks claim that US missionaries came to the Korean Peninsula and committed barbarous acts against Korean children, including injecting dangerous liquids into the children and writing the word "THIEF" on the forehead of any child who stole an apple for missionary-owned orchards in Korea.

Past leader of North Korea such as Kim Il-Sung never considered tourism as an important priority and only promoted it through some brochures and magazines focusing on scenery and culture. Kim Jong-il made an effort to incorporate tourism as a larger priority for financial purposes, allowing U.S citizens starting in 2010. In the time of the leader Kim Jun un, tourism has become a "national development priority" and a means of propaganda in order to shift the countries negative image. Classified as "heritage tourism," the goal is to promote the North Korean ways such as communism and authoritarian government regimes. Though past leaderships have focused on promoting successful rulership and power through tourism, Kim Jong-Un has focused more on changing the image of the country to encourage more tourism in profitable numbers. The country has been known for things like poverty, abusiveness, strict government and isolation from the outside world. To try and combat this image, they have made use of the internet and social media for tour companies to promote travel blogs and photos to give themselves a more "human face" that is appealing to western tourists. There are now over 40 international tour companies to bring in foreigners. Social media blogs and posts have assisted the country in changing their image with many tourists having positive emotions and insights on social media after their trips. Although, North Korea will still attempt to keep tourism numbers in order to avoid the potentially disruptive political impacts of having too many tourists interacting with their citizens.

People's Republic of China[edit]

Propaganda is used by the Chinese Communist Party to sway public and international opinion in favour of its policies. Domestically, this includes censorship of proscribed views and an active cultivation of views that favors the government. Propaganda is considered central to the operation of the Chinese government. The term in general use in China, xuanchuan (宣傳 "propaganda; publicity") can have either a neutral connotation in official government contexts or a pejorative connotation in informal contexts. Some xuanchuan collocations usually refer to "propaganda" (e.g., xuānchuánzhàn 宣传战 "propaganda war"), others to "publicity" (xuānchuán méijiè 宣傳媒介 "mass media; means of publicity"), and still others are ambiguous (xuānchuányuán宣传员 "propagandist; publicist").

Aspects of propaganda can be traced back to the earliest periods of Chinese history, but propaganda has been most effective in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, following the Chinese Civil War, owing to mass media and an authoritarian government. China in the era of Mao Zedong is known for its constant use of mass campaigns to legitimise the state and the policies of leaders. It was the first Chinese government to successfully make use of modern mass propaganda techniques, adapting them to the needs of a country which had a largely rural and illiterate population. In poor developing countries, China spreads propaganda through methods such as opening Confucius Institutes, and providing training programs in China for foreign officials and students.

The Chinese Dream is an example of mass media being used to promote propaganda in the 21st Century. The overall message of its propaganda was a new start for China through posters and displays.  Visuals were used in order to shape the thinking of people considering past historical and social events. Posters showing rural environments, peasants, and folk art were intended to mix both the past and present of China.

As the internet is becoming more advanced, China has began to implement technology into their media and mass propaganda techniques. China has created their own digital applications throughout the recent years in order for its government to spread their word through more efficient communication. An instance where an uproar occurred was an Internet water army, where false rumors about the Coronavirus in Wenzhou and the nuclear pollution in Fukushima was spread throughout social media platforms. Because of the catastrophic outcomes, the government had taken stricter precautions with social media. WeChat was monitored in 2014 by the government for any sensitive posts (which later were deleted) and censored to minimize the possibility of any false rumors spreading.