I got a copy of a lecture that Chomsky gave once. It is not dated. For reasons of copyright and boredom I am not copying the whole thing here but just the small summary I have included in the Indymedia Dissertation – which by the way, will be posted here and on some indymedia wiki as soon as possible.
Chomsky (undated) presents two possible conceptions of democracy:
one – where the public has the means to participate in the management of their own affairs, and the means of information are open and free, and
another – where the public is barred from managing of their own affairs and the means of information must be kept narrowly and rigidly controlled.
He argues that the latter is the prevailing conception. This is done through propaganda and the result is the manufacture of consent.
This is the conception of Walter Lippmann, who was the dean of American journalists: There are two functions of democracy: the specialised class of responsible men who carry out the executive function, and the bewildered herd, whose function is to be “spectators” and who are occasionally allowed to vote one or another member of the specialised class – because it is a democracy.
The bewildered herd need to be tamed, or properly distracted from the real issues that affect their lives, because otherwise, they will cause trouble. This is done through the manufacture of consent. But the bewildered herd never gets properly tamed, so this is a constant battle. For instance, in the 30s, they arose, and again in the 60s.
The wave of dissidence, Chomsky continues, was called by the specialised class “the crisis of democracy”. The crisis was that large segments of the population were becoming organised and active and trying to participate in the political arena. By the dictionary definition, that is an ‘advance’ in democracy. By the prevailing conception, that is a ‘problem’, a crisis that has to be overcome. The population has to be driven back to the apathy, obedience and passivity that is their proper state, because organisation has its effects. It means that dissidents discover that they are not alone.
In circumstances of generalised social and economic problems like homelessness, joblessness, crime, deterioration in the inner cities, declining educational standards and/or shrinking wages, the bewildered herd are likely to notice that something is not working and that they are the victims of it. The model then, Chomsky argues, whips them into fear of enemies, to keep them diverted and controlled.
But the issue is not simply disinformation; it is whether we want to live in a free society or under what amounts to a form of self-imposed totalitarianism.
