I work at a place with a pretty active public relations department.  There's a heavy social media presence and plenty of company-wide emails celebrating events in the industry.  Most of it is pretty benign, but I can't help but question the difference between public relations and propaganda.  They both seem to be about branding and messaging and creating a story aimed at getting people to believe something about your organization.  It's not reporting or journalism, because it's not free from bias.  It's specifically biased to convince people to believe what you're telling them, not what they think they already know. 

One source says, "Propaganda is a deliberate attempt to persuade people to think and then behave in a manner desired by the source; public relations ... is a related process intended to enhance the relationship between an organization and the public."  The ellipsis actually says public relations is "a branch of propaganda," which I think sums it up nicely.  Another source says, "In the 1920's, propaganda renamed itself 'public relations' and is now an important function of every large business."  So I guess there you have it.  They're essentially the same thing, but the propaganda about public relations made us think they were different. #psychology