Authoritarian Propaganda
Haifeng Huang, Xing ChenAbstract
Studies of propaganda in authoritarian regimes have multiplied rapidly over the past two decades, generating several important developments. This chapter reviews and synthesizes recent scholarship, organizing it around four analytically distinct frameworks through which propaganda exercises political influence: (1) persuasion; (2) signaling; (3) collective influence; and (4) upward messaging. The chapter then proposes a new definition of propaganda that goes beyond the traditional persuasion-centric understanding to incorporate a range of non-persuasive functions that propaganda serves, the various audiences it targets, and the orders of belief it shapes. It concludes by identifying major gaps and outlining promising directions for future research.