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About the ‘scarecrows’ in election campaigns
Given the election campaign that started in Moldova, the director of the Association of Independent Press, Petru Macovei, referred to the election scarecrows our media uses, stressing that ‘the populist politics is trendy now and Moldova is no exception’. According to Petru Macovei, ‘propaganda exploits people’s emotions’, because they all fear war, disease and famine. Thus, the biggest scarecrows used by politicians in the campaign and taken over by their obedient media are as follows: the Russian tanks as opposed to Europe and its gay community, among which citizens have to choose; the so-called foreign interference with Moldova’s political life; issues related to the language spoken and the invention that Romanian language would narrow the scope of Russian language use; promotion of the idea of country’s savior – if you don’t choose us, the chaos will come; stories like those 30,000 Syrians – a story many people believed in the past campaigns, etc. Many other examples offered Lilia Zaharia, reporter at ‘Stop Fals’, the portal that denied such information fakes in a number of materials. According to the journalist, the relations between the Republic of Moldova and Romania or the European Union, presented in black colors, or the relation of our country with the Russian Federation, seen only through rose-colored glasses, are among the most frequently discussed topics in the propaganda materials. ‘We also have a top of the media that misinforms’, Lilia Zaharia said.
What do authorities do to dismantle the myths?
According to Rosian Vasiloi, security policy expert at IDIS Viitorul, misinformation and foreign propaganda have not ceased in Moldova event after the adoption of the ‘Anti-propaganda Law’. He asked those present at the conference: ‘Who fights against fake news in our country? – Civil society, API, which is also attacked. In Georgia and Ukraine, the anti-propaganda mechanisms are approached at state level.’
Marta Kowalska, Vice President of Poland’s Center for Propaganda and Disinformation Analysis, spoke about the experience of authorities’ collaboration with non-governmental organisations on combating misinformation and propaganda. ‘Journalists cannot fight misinformation themselves, we need to act together’, Marta Kowalska said. The Center created a platform to develop a common strategy to fight these phenomena. In Poland, propaganda is seen as a complex problem, fueled not only from the outside but also from the inside, by the political stakeholders interested in power. There are organisations that control the manipulation in the national media.
What can journalists do?
In the Baltics appeared at the same time three news portals ‘Balt News’, which received messages from the Kremlin as to what information to transmit to the public in those three countries. Estonian investigative journalists found that behind these portals is Rosia Segodnea, a state-owned Russian company. The Estonian investigative journalist Holger Roonemaa, who heads the Investigative Journalism Department at Eesti Meedia in Tallinn, told about this at the conference.
Sigita Roke, Project Manager at the Latvian Association of Journalists, told about another practice. The invited guest said that the journalists had played an important role during the previous election campaign. They helped citizens how to properly interpret electoral polls, how to read election candidates’ agendas. Another method was to thoroughly analyse the candidates’ promises, passing them like through a ‘polygraph’.
One method to combat manipulation and misinformation is the fact-cheking. Aaron Sharockman, Director of the US ‘Politifact’ Project, in his Skype intervention, referred to the role of this method in dismantling fake news, noting that it would be necessary to create an information system of the media that does fact-cheking journalism. The ‘Truth-O-Meter’ Project, which monitors politicians’ behaviour both in elections and afterwards, takes a kind of public control and builds on a well-developed methodology. It carefully monitors if politicians’ statements are true, half true, false or mostly false. For instance, every promise of President Tramp was put under a microscope, i.e. a list of promises already made, of those that haven’t yet been delivered and of those without a chance to be delivered was drawn up. Finding himself/herself in front of such a ‘mirror’, any politician understands his/her own responsibility better and knows that any empty statement will be sanctioned by the society.
How do wepenalise the sources that misinform?
This topic also stimulated a special interest among the conference participants. In Ukraine, under war conditions, when Russian propaganda gained considerable momentum, the MPs banned the main misinformation sources – Lenta.ru, Zvezda, Rossia 24, Rossia Segodnea and other TV channels. About this told Victoria Romaniuk, Deputy Editor-in-Chief of StopFake.org Project in Ukraine. According to the expert, there were serious reasons: from 2014 until now, the StopFake website has published 3,000 materials that denied various information fakes launched by Russian propaganda. Under war conditions, they cultivated fear, hate, discredited the Ukrainian army, spread false rumors, such as, for instance, that NATO forces, Poles, Americans, etc. were fighting in Ukraine. Therefore, the ban was a welcome measure, Victoria Romaniuc believes.
According to the expert Adam Lelonek, President of the Center for Propaganda and Disinformation Analysis, though in Poland the Russian propaganda is not so widespread, there are several sites supported by the Russian Federation that misinform. The most dangerous of them spread the Euroscepticism and target those 2 million Ukrainians living in Poland. However, Adam Lelonek believes that the TV channels or online media that do propaganda should not be closed, since they eventually would reach citizens via the Internet and social media. According to him, the emphasis should be on media education, especially of the younger generation.
There are also situations when propaganda and misinformation do not burst into flames. Boris Navasardian, President of Yerevan Press Club, said that at the last year’s Armenian elections, although Armenian Republicans who have been in power for a long time, disseminated all sorts of fake information, the voters didn’t believe them and voted for their counter-candidates – young people who weren’t involved in politics before. Nicolae Tibrigan, collaborator of the ChekMedia.ro Project told about the failure of the Romanian Referendum to amend Article 48 of the Constitution. Misinformation in this care was also hugely widespread, but eventually it was a total failure: citizens didn’t swallow the anti-gay hate speech, though it was promoted by important priests.
Are there remedies against misinformation?
Solvita Denisa-Lipniece, Advisor at Baltic Center for Media Excellence in Latvia, believes that misinformation can only be countered through media education. Hence, Latvia work a lot on digital education. Trainings for journalists, teachers are organized, and media lessons are taught in schools and universities. They aim to teach young people to detect fake news, to distinguish journalism from propaganda.
In the context of discussions about media education as one of the key methods of combating propaganda and misinformation, Corina Cepoi, Internews Chief of Party in Moldova, also recalled Moldova’s practices in this field. Thus, for several years the Independent Journalism Center has been conducting multiple media education activities. At IJC’s initiative, textbooks were developed for the pupils in primary and secondary school, and the textbook for the high school is currently being developed. In the past year, this optional discipline was taught in 40 schools.
However, the participants believe that the journalists themselves have a special role to play in fighting fake news and misinformation, especially in election campaigns. ‘If journalists would observe ethical standards, we’d have no fake news’ was the unanimous conclusion of the conference participants.
