Since the war in Ukraine began in 2022 (or in 2014), it is not only on the battlefield that a fierce struggle is taking place. The war for the minds and hearts of all nations involved in the war is also being bitterly fought. “This is a propaganda war”, affirmed American journalist and Pulitzer Prize winner John Pilger (SCMP, 2022). However, in other areas of society,people's thoughts and feelings are also the aimed at by targeted psychological influence. One example is the 400 “nudge units” spread around the world. These are teams of specialists in behavioral economics (Fusaro & Sperling-Magro, 2021) from the private sector as well as the political sector, who strive to promote the “right” decisions on the part of the population through unconscious control techniques in areas such as waste separation, climate protection, health or old age care.

Before the use of soft power techniques can be discussed as a challenge for Western democracies, the concept of soft power itself should be explained. This is not easy from a psychological perspective, because although the concept and the techniques associated with it are well known, the term is rarely used in psychology. An example of this is the very comprehensive “Lexicon of Psychology” (Wirtz 2000), in which many thousands of psychological terms are explained on more than 2000 pages, but in which soft power is not mentioned.

This chapter will define what is meant by the term democracy before using this definition to explain individual aspects that make the targeted use of soft power techniques appear problematic.

A look back to the beginnings of modern propaganda at the advent of the 20th century can help to work out the type of argumentation of the then still young “propaganda” science. This will be exemplified by one of the founding fathers of modern propaganda or public relations, Edward Bernays.

The matter-of-fact manner with which the basic idea of Bernays and other intellectuals of his time persists to this day is surprising, because the targeted control of public opinion can certainly be criticized from the perspective of democratic theory. Four particularly salient points of criticism will be explained in this chapter: the question of power, the question of the vulnerabilities of decision-makers, the question of public debate space, and the danger posed by the misuse of soft power techniques as war propaganda, addressed at the outset by Nicolas Cull.

When one considers the term soft power in its literal sense, one encounters the English word power and thus the question of who exercises that power and what legitimizes it. Indeed, the legitimacy of power is a feature of democracy. “All citizens thus have a right to comprehensive democratic participation in all relevant aspects of society. [...] All power structures have to prove their right to exist and justify themselves to the public, otherwise they are illegitimate and therefore to be eliminated”, explains one of the critics of propaganda, Rainer Mausfeld (2018, p. 105). Mausfeld also associates democracy with the demand that “every citizen should have a fair share in all decisions [...] that affect his or her own social life” (ibid. p. 209). It is obvious that not every citizen had the opportunity to spend 150 million euros on advertising in 2020, as the federal government did (cf. Parts 2020, n.d.). Very high advertising expenditures can also be found in the military or economic sectors. For example, the most expensive advertisement in the world, a 30-second commercial during the American Super Bowl finals, cost 5.6 million U.S. dollars (cf. Malone 2021, n.d.). NATO's civilian budget, which is, in part, also used for PR, is set at $289.1 million for 2022 (cf. NATO 2022). Consequently, the opportunities to exercise soft power are not equal for everyone. This, however, leads to an imbalance of power and these power structures, although very effective, are not democratically legitimized, according to critics.

The second point refers to the fact that one reason why soft power can work as an imperceptible manipulation at all (cf. Thaler & Sunstein 2019, p. 12ff) is the presence of human ‘vulnerabilities’. This leads to the question of how rationally those people who use soft power act. It is striking that this question is little discussed by those who see soft power as an achievement. Thaler and Sunstein do defend their call for nudges:

They do, however, not explain how decision-makers within private or public institutions are themselves exempt from what constitutes a “flawed but genuine” (Thaler & Sunstein 2019, p. 167) human being. Noted democratic theorist Sheldon Wolin recognized this point, pointing out the need to discuss why “elites ... should claim for themselves a special system of rationality [and] ... possess the substantively superior form of judgment” (Wolin 2022, p. 382).

Another criticism of the use of soft power also derives from the understanding of democracy explained above. Democracy also includes the ability to discuss factual issues controversely (Crouch 2020, p. 9), openly, honestly and on an equal basis with one another (cf. e.g. Ruß-Mohl 2020, p. 8ff). The Federal Agency for Civic Education in Germany states on this point:

For Rainer Mausfeld, the public debate space is therefore “the heart of democracy” (Mausfeld 2020, n.d.). As early as 1956, the American sociologist Charles W. Mills lamented in his work “The Power Elite” that the “respect for public debate [...] so important to a democratic society [has been] replaced by unscrupulous psychological warfare” (Mills 1956/1962, p. 251). Consequently, critics like Mills see in the use of soft power techniques the danger of no longer debating using rational arguments, but rather using psychological techniques to “manipulate the crowd” (ibid. p. 216).

The final point of criticism relates to the historically demonstrable link between hard and soft power. Again and again, critics of propaganda such as Nicolas Cull warn of the danger of escalation of wars, which are further fueled by the skillful use of soft power or propaganda. A historical example of this is the aforementioned Creel Commission, founded in 1917 (cf. Zinn 1980, p. 355ff), which prepared the U.S. entry into the war propagandistically. In modern times, evidence of the involvement of PR agencies in wars can also be found. One example is the war in Yugoslavia. The American advertising agency Ruder Finn, for example, was active here from 1991 onward and openly admitted this (cf. Sremac 1999). Currently, NATO's so-called “cognitive warfare” (Tögel, 2023) provides a particular focus, which is considered the most advanced manipulation program ever, further escalating the war for minds and hearts with the help of state-of-the-art soft power techniques.

Targeted use of soft power techniques takes place with surprising naturalness and ubiquity (Cull, 2019) in Western democracies today. The well-endowed budgets for advertising, political or strategic communications of corporations, governments, or militaries illustrate the great importance attached to soft power in Western democracies. Its daily use in the most diverse areas of our society cannot be denied, which makes it all the more important to have an in-depth, scientific debate on the question of its legitimacy. Above all, however, the compatibility of propaganda and nudging using the help of soft power techniques with fundamental democratic principles requires closer scientific examination.