Republic of Spin: An Inside History of the American Presidency by David Greenberg (review)

This is a good book with a misleading title. It is not actually a history of the U.S. presidency, but rather a detailed analysis of some presidents (Theodore Roosevelt through Barack Obama), the twentieth century and twenty-fırst century presidencies, and their relationships with the mass media and the public relations industry. The author understands this relationship as "spin," a concept he uses to cover all manner of things, from dishonest and disingenuous communication to image promotion and public relations(2). He generally treats spin as legitimate efforts by the president to communicate with the public and seems to try to avoid its more pejorative connotations. Although he also notes that spin has always been with us, and although he argues that we are always ambivalent about it—we hate it as somehow dishonest and valorize it as evidence of presidential leadership (3, 4).

Once past the rather murky discussion of what spin is and how it operates, the book offers a detailed history of the presidency as it evolved concomitantly with communication technologies and practices. Greenberg focuses particular attention on the ways in which this relationship troubles our understanding of democracy. He notes ways in which there are several kinds of blurred lines: journalists who need to accommodate presidents to gain access but also want to remain aloof and analytic; journalists who, like some of the muckrakers, sometimes want to be activists as well as dispassionate reporters; journalists, like Theodore H. White, who report on the behind-the-scenes aspects of the presidency and presidential campaigns and thus focus on personal character above issue content; and journalists who understand the need to educate citizens in a democracy but also have business interests at stake. He focuses on presidents who want to educate, inform, and manipulate the public, sometimes all at once. Much of the book revolves around how much we should trust the public and how susceptible members of the public might be to manipulation. This tension is, of course, at the heart of democracy, and it is revealed in the continual conflict concerning communication technologies. However, there are those who hope that technology will make government more transparent and more accessible, and there are those who fear that it provides government with even more sophisticated means of manipulation.

The book is rich in detail, although the author is evidently more interested in moments of origin rather than in how these elements develop over time. He gives Theodore Roosevelt, for instance, approximately the same number of pages as he dedicates to Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama combined. There is little here that is new to scholars of the media and the presidency, but the standard history is provided in a well-written and interesting way. It is conveyed through a longitudinal history of public communication and the presidency and through brief vignettes of very well-known and equally obscure members of the public relations industry and presidential staffers charged with the president's public relations message: we get quick biographies of luminaries like Upton Sinclair, George Creel, Walter Lippmann, H. L. Mencken, Edward Bernays, and Archibald MacLeish. We also learn about Harding speechwriter Judson Welliver and Coolidge advisor Bruce Barton. These vignettes are each only a few pages long and are placed in context in ways that are both interesting and accessible.

It is a hefty book, comprising 49 chapters that are presented in six parts. Part 2 takes readers through the early days of spin, detailing the relationship between Theodore Roosevelt and the press, the inception of public relations as a profession, and ending with Woodrow Wilson's communicative strategies in peace and war. It ends with a discussion of the ambivalence with which members of the public, journalists, and political actors tended to regard public relations. It also recognizes the ways in which changes in the national government and its duties and the...