Necessary Illusions

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Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies

First edition
Author	Noam Chomsky
Publisher	South End Press, Pluto Press
Publication date	June 1989
Media type	Print (Paperback)
Pages	422
ISBN	0-89608-366-7
OCLC	19457706
Dewey Decimal	302.2/3 19
LC Class	P95.8 .C48 1989

Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies is a 1989 book by United States academic Noam Chomsky concerning political power using propaganda to distort and distract from major issues to maintain confusion and complicity, preventing real democracy from becoming effective. The title of this book borrows a phrase from the writings of Reinhold Niebuhr.

Nearly the entire first half of the book is based on Chomsky's five 1988 Massey Lectures on Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Radio from November 1988 and extends his and Edward S. Herman's propaganda model to a variety of new situations. The remaining appendices address criticisms of the work and provide additional detail.

Synopsis and themes

Chomsky argues that, in systems where the state cannot easily rule by force, ideological control becomes central. He analyzes ownership, advertising, sourcing, flak, and dominant ideology as filters shaping news production, and illustrates these dynamics with case studies on Central America, Indochina, elections, and “worthy vs. unworthy” victims. The appendices provide the detailed citations and media comparisons underlying the lectures’ claims.^[1]

Reception

• Academic & media-studies discourse: The book is frequently cited in scholarship reassessing or extending the propaganda model in the post-Cold War/early internet era.
• Science & Society review (1991): A formal review in Science & Society discussed the book’s arguments and documentation (issue 55:3, pp. 371–373). SAGE Journals
• Media-criticism community: FAIR (Extra!) referenced Necessary Illusions in 1989 while engaging debates over U.S. press coverage and “double standards” on press freedom.

See also

• John Taylor Gatto: The Underground History of American Education
• Adam Curtis: Century of the Self

References

1. Dall' Acqua, Anna; Novaga, Matteo; Pluda, Alessandra (2020). "Minimal elastic networks". Indiana University Mathematics Journal. 69 (6): 1909–1932. doi:10.1512/iumj.2020.69.8036. ISSN 0022-2518.

External links

• The 1988 CBC Massey Lectures, "Necessary Illusions"