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A timely book and a much needed leaven in a democracy the leaders of which are constantly and glibly talking of public opinion not only as if it were a tangible, ponderable, concrete entity but something that could easily and at any time be determined in regard to any pending issue.
This book undertakes to analyze the stuff of which public opinion is made up, it discusses the affective factors that so frequently distort and determine perception, it tells us something of the way news is gathered and how it is presented, in short it is an attempt to dismember the complex, public opinion, and see what results.
In addition to this analytical aspect of the book it has a constructive aspect which is included in a series of suggestions touching the functions of government and the manner and machinery of governing. Inaccuracy of information as to the actual facts of a given situation is inescapable so long as the information must come from interested parties. Therefore the author advocates a bureau of information, made as independent as possible, which shall have the function of uncovering the facts in any issue, impartially, so that the responsible administrators and executors can act upon them and also as the material about which an informed public opinion may crystallize. Such a centralized bureau of information would not only prevent duplication of work by different agencies, and discover the facts in accordance with which action must be taken, but it would become an immense center for sociological information and experiment and furnish such studies, statistical and otherwise, of enormous social material as to be of inestimable service in furthering the day when sociology shall be recognized on an equal footing with the other sciences because at least it will be able to predict.
White