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  • 4 - How American Businessmen Made Us Believe that Free Enterprise was Indivisible from American Democracy: The National Association of Manufacturers’ Propaganda Campaign 1935–1940

  • from Part III - Historical Roots of Disinformation
  • Edited by W. Lance Bennett, University of Washington, Steven Livingston, George Washington University, Washington DC
  • Book:
    The Disinformation Age
    Published online:
    06 October 2020
    Print publication:
    15 October 2020, pp 95-119
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  • Summary

    Oreskes, Conway and Tyson ask a deceptively simple question: how did so many Americanscome to believe that economic and political freedoms are indivisible from one another? Onepart of the answer involves organized campaigns by trade associations to sell neoliberalprinciples to the American people. This chapter examines one such campaign: the NationalAssociation of Manufacturers’ propaganda effort of 1935–1940. A central part of thiscampaign was the radio show The American Family Robinson. This folksy drama of small-townAmerican life didactically warned of “foreign” socialist theories and reassuredlisteners of the beneficence of business leaders. The program offers a case studyin corporate propaganda. In its bid to convince listeners that the American way of lifedepends on the free market – and that any move toward social democracy presents athreat – the show dramatizes argumentative and rhetorical procedures that continue toshape American political culture.