Discourse on America's Discourse, published by Matt Armstrong

Personal approach may be more effective than broadcasts

By Matt Armstrong on December 12, 2009 11:03 PM 4 Vote 0 Votes

The Army’s planners found “that you can neither wage nor resist a guerilla war successfully unless the local population is with you… To win over native populations, a personal approach may be more effective [than] radio broadcasts.” So says a story titled “Secret Weapon: The Con Man” from The Washington Daily News published May 18, 1961.

4 Comments

| Leave a comment

Jim | December 12, 2009 11:35 PM | Reply

would be an interesting article to read!

Bill Kiehl | December 13, 2009 9:41 AM | Reply

The more things change the more they remain the same.

Shawn Powers | December 13, 2009 9:58 AM | Reply

Different purposes, no? Broadcasting is typically news-based, and ideally that operation is separate from strategic communications and direct persuasion efforts, the types of things that are greatly enhanced with a personal approach.

Also, a "personal approach" probably means something different today when compared to 1961. Whereas in 1961, that almost certainly is a reference to people-to-people, direct contact, a modern "personal approach" may include a "personal" selection, e.g. information based on the target audience's specific preferences, of news articles emailed to their laptop.

Erik719 | December 15, 2009 3:01 AM | Reply

The PSYOP community has never moved away from this premise. Face-to-face dissemination of the message is _THE_ most effective means of communication. However, that is not always possible and you can reach a much larger target audience via radio/TV than you can with people on the ground.