Institucijska epistemologija propagande
Institutional Epistemology of Propaganda

Summary/Abstract: The paper argues that propaganda defined as non-verbal exchange of explicit norms and reasons should be understood as a mechanism for harvesting collective intelligence in institutional epistemology, along with votes, talk and prices. Firstly, it is argued that propaganda has been misleadingly defined as exclusively a malign social phenomenon – it is shown that all of its usual “sins” are either trivial or epistemically beneficial from the standpoint of institutional epistemology. Secondly, it is shown that propaganda fits the criteria which need to be satisfied to consider something a collective intelligence harvest mechanism. Thirdly, propaganda is investigated as similar to talk inasmuch as its primary epistemic task is making norms explicit and reasons available, and different from talk because it involves non-verbal means of communication. Non-verbal exchange of explicit norms and reasons for purposes of persuasion is a fundamental resource in any population and governance of knowledge, and should be regarded as a distinct feature of propaganda as an intelligence harvest mechanism.

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