The Western Balkans region is very vulnerable to foreign disinformation, which has intensified in recent years. Why is this? What can be done to mitigate it?
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The NATO Review website published this piece by Daniel Sunter, the following is an excerpt.
Demonising the United States and NATO; presenting the EU as weak and divided; advertising Russian military might and COVID-19 vaccine superiority, and claiming that Western vaccine producers are corrupt; and amplifying threat perceptions, myths and ethnic tensions – these are among the most frequent topics of disinformation promoted by the Kremlin in the Serbian-language media in the Western Balkans. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia are the most affected by Russian information operations that attempt to undermine the European Union and NATO in the region.
In a broader sense, disinformation is an endemic phenomenon in the Western Balkans caused by internal factors. Without exception, all nations in the region are affected. When it comes to foreign disinformation, Serbia is considered to be at the epicentre. The latest disinformation study of the European Parliament called it a “launchpad for Russian disinformation operations in the Western Balkans”.
The flow of information between countries in the region is borderless. Close social, historical and cultural ties between Serbia, the Bosnian Serb entity of Republika Srpska and Montenegro mean that almost all media narratives, including disinformation, flow across borders daily.
Kremlin-sponsored media content in the Serbian language is produced, republished and disseminated widely throughout the region. It is consumed by millions in societies with inherent fragilities and internal divisions, in a region which traditionally has a positive attitude towards Russia and where perceptions are still influenced by the ethnic conflicts in the 1990s and NATO’s Kosovo Air Campaign in March 1999. Unlike Eastern-flank EU and NATO member states, the region lacks negative historical experiences with Moscow and shares a common Orthodox religion.
Beyond the idealistic presentation of Russia’s leadership and its weapons, such disinformation demonises NATO and the United States, fuels ethnic tensions and presents the European Union as a dysfunctional, racist and anti-Serb organisation. It amplifies the threat perceptions of the Orthodox population as well as a culture of remembrance that portrays Russia and the Soviet Union as powerful protectors throughout history.
We recommend that you read the rest of this very informative piece at its source, here.
I have to laugh, in each and every country where disinformation regards the west is promulgated, there biggest export is their people in search of a better life
Hardly true on the export front, they aren’t the richest countries, but that makes manufacturing there a big export because of cheap labour. Ironically same reason they come to the west, to take fill roles that locals won’t take because of low wages.
This type of disinformation doesn’t really work on the masses, it only works on the type of person that is too stupid to see reality, is already anti west, and therefore open to having their already negative views amplified. Trump played on that type of person to win, as most elections are won/lost by a handful of voters.
In 2021 there are so many sources of news and american tv shows giving a view of the west, that people that anyone that is sensible wouldn’t fall for this disinformation. The main risk is these countries having a major economic crash and when people are unemployed or struggling to make ends meat, then they start to fall for this rubbish.
Saying that corruption, around covid in the UK at least is not disinformation, its unfortunately very true, as demonstrated recently when the government lost in court around a dodgy contract.
There is huge disinformation in the UK. There are many campaigns spreading all sorts of disinformation, from the spread of untruths aimed at hampering the sales of Electric cars to our own PM spreading lies about the EU and about the benefits of Brexit and there is huge misinformation about science etc especially when it comes to climate change conspiracies. We are surrounded by it and it does have an effect. There are plenty of people that still believe France helped the Argentinians in the Falklands despite it being untrue they are not necessarily stupid people they have just been fed the lies so much that they have no reason to not believe them. People are also inclined to believe lies if those lies are aligned roughly with their own views and they simply want the lies to be true. If you keep lying and keep the lie flowing out of many outlets then it simply becomes true in the end in many peoples minds. The other misinformation danger is that if you keep lying then people simply start distrusting any information they hear no matter the source and just accept their fate as powerless. This is true of Russia where lots of people understand that Putin lies about most things but they just accept it as normal.
Wokeness is not really a thing. It is peddled by the right as a reason not to care or a reason to be fearful of the left. However most so called woke issues are simply people who do not want to change attacking people that do want to see change. Portraying people as “woke” is simply a slur in order to try to turn the tide against change. There are genuinely far left groups pushing agendas but these are in a minority of so called “woke” cases. For instance I don’t think you have to be on the far left of politics or even the left at all, to think racism is bad and needs to be eliminated.
The BBC gets accused by the right of being far left and it is accused by the left of being too far right… Clearly it can’t be both so it is likely the BBC is balanced. In fact I think it is trying too hard to be overly balanced (due to the criticism) and is in fact letting politicians get away with all sorts of lies. Being balanced does not mean not being critical, it simply means given similar circumstances you should be as critical to one side as you are to the other. If one side is doing more bad things than the other then it is fine to highlight that.
We have for instance seen Boris recently saying that thanks to leaving the EU we have been able to buy our own vaccines and do better than other EU countries. That is obviously untrue as we were always able to buy our own vaccines and so are all EU countries. The fact that the EU countries all agreed to buy centrally was their individual choices and not one enforced by the EU. Yet barely any media outlets have challenged him properly on that… If the BBC had done so they would likely be criticised for being leftie, yet he clearly lied! So we are left with a BBC that can no longer challenge important political issues for fear of being labelled “Far Left” or “Far Right”.
As a Governor at a school and my wife being a teacher, I can tell you that Wokeness is not peddled in our schools. Children are taught to be tolerant of each others differences but that is not wokeness that is just common decency. Neither myself or my wife are lefties yet both of us are accused of such for caring about the environment and being anti-racist. It is offensive to me to be labelled as a leftie for simply being a decent human being.
What formerly thriving countries are you talking about? Also what is this cure you suggest?
I believe in Government as I can prove they exist. Trusting them is a different matter with our party political system preventing MPs from voting to support their constituents over supporting their party. Along with the fact that we have no laws to prevent MPs from lying about significant issues.
Rhodesia was taken over by a dictator. South Africa was taken over by the Far Right and Kenya has been fighting against insurgents for decades… I have no idea how that relates to “woke”.
Genders are a discussion topic I am sure. It is based on many psychological factors. It is important to discuss these things as shoving them under the carpet does no good at all. Remember we effectively killed one of our greatest ever minds and someone who was a genuine hero by chemically castrating him because he was gay and therefore a danger to the public! Who really was the danger? Alan Turing or the people who consigned him to a living hell?
Children certainly are not brainwashed regarding that particular topic, however they are invited to discuss the issues and form their own opinions.
If you have not seen the video in question and you are using the word “Apparently” then I would question what was actually in it and the context around it etc” The only thing that is effectively brainwashed into children at school is Religion. My children go to a standard state school but are required to pray if they do not want to be excluded and partitioned from some lessons despite the majority of our population being non religious…
Also Constitutional Republicanism is not exactly any different from what we already have. I am not sure what benefits we would gain or what purpose it would serve. I mean the US is a Constitutional Republic and it is pretty much a religious state.
As for Libertaranian Education, That is also not a million miles away from what we have. We have already moved to teaching around discussions (Something you criticised) and allowing children to form opinions. In fact it is children forming opinions that is so threatening to the far right.