Broadly speaking Propaganda is a collection of techniques to channel the flow of information in populations for the material benefit of certain groups, cliques or individuals at the expense of others. Canadian philosopher Randal Marlin, one of the world’s foremost experts on propaganda, defined it as;

“The organised attempt through communication to affect belief or action inculcate attitudes in a large audience in ways that circumvent or suppress an individual’s adequately informed, rational, reflective judgement.”

A key phrase here is “adequately informed”, as inhibiting information flow is just as important — if not more important — as whatever messages are amplified, as the absence of such information or context stops us rationally assessing any given scenario. It is in other words a process of sculpting a person’s imagination of the world by altering the information they are exposed to in a way that leads them towards a certain conclusion, to the degree that they sometimes consider to have arrived at it themselves.