Who is responsible for creating and spreading misinformation? The subject has become increasingly concerning in both the public and academic spheres since 2016, where social media is often seen as the driver behind its proliferation. However, a new study takes a different view: misinformation is actually a political strategy adopted by radical right-wing populist parties.
Misinformation has received a lot of attention in recent years since Brexit and the election of Donald Trump as US president in 2016. The phenomena generated substantial concerns among the public, researchers, and politicians who feared it would undermine democracy while also damaging trust in institutions, such as the media and science. This has generated a significant amount of work that has sought to combat its spread or address those who promote or hold views based on false information.
The focus of this research regarded social media as a fertile ground producing an information ecosystem within which low-quality information could thrive.
But a growing body of research has shown that the number of people who actually hold false beliefs is smaller than often assumed. Instead, misinformation tends to be perpetuated by particular electoral groups.
“Early research viewed misinformation as a social media problem, with false stories spreading virally through online networks,” Dr Petter Törnberg of the University of Amsterdam said in a statement. “However, our findings show that misinformation isn’t universal or a general condition of our media ecosystem. Instead, it’s specifically associated with radical-right populist parties that spread misinformation as a political strategy, gaining significant electoral advantages as a result.”
In their new study, Törnberg and Dr Juliana Chueri of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam examined 32 million tweets from parliamentarians from 26 countries over a six-year period and several election cycles. The pair combined this information with data on political parties, elections, governments, and democracy indicators (taken from Parlgov and V-Dem databases). They also combined this information with that taken from fact-checking websites and Wikipedia’s Fake News list. From this, they identified specific patterns of misinformation linked to political parties and their ideologies.
The results show that radical right-wing popularism is the strongest predictor of misinformation dissemination. Interestingly, neither left-wing populism nor right-wing politics alone were significantly linked to misinformation.
Törnberg and Chueri argue that misinformation is not linked to populism in a broad sense, nor is it associated with right-wing parties per se. Instead, it is specifically associated with radical right popularists.
“Previous theoretical work has argued that misinformation is an expression of the anti-elitism of populist movements, which has often been associated with “post-truth” politics. However, our new study argues that it is the exclusionary ideologies and hostility toward democratic institutions of radical right populism that drives misinformation campaigns,” Törnberg said.
In contrast, left-wing populists tend to focus on economic grievances and participatory democracy. Misinformation is less useful in their communication strategies. But radical right populists tend to emphasize cultural grievances and opposition to democratic norms, which fosters misinformation as a tool.
“Radical right populists have been effective in creating and utilising alternative media ecosystems that amplify their viewpoints, ranging from online news websites and blogs to more traditional forms of media like television and radio, which have been reconfigured to cater to populist radical right narratives,” Törnberg explained.
These ecosystems strengthen their messages and produce a sense of community among followers. They also provide a valuable counter-narrative that challenges that held by mainstream media reporting. Such alternative media groups amplify fringe voices which become more politically prominent, as well as shaping radical right populist movements.
For Törnberg and Chueri, this recent wave of misinformation sharing and radical right populism diagnoses a deeper legitimacy crisis in democratic institutions. Rising inequality, dissatisfaction with the decades-long neo-liberal consensus, and the growing power of business elites have undermined public trust and produced an easily exploitable environment. They argue this crisis needs to be addressed if democracy is to be protected.
“By exploiting declining trust in institutions and leveraging alternative media ecosystems, radical right populists use misinformation as a tool to destabilise democracies and gain political advantage. The findings underscore the urgent need for policymakers, researchers, and the public to understand and address the intertwined dynamics of misinformation and radical right populism,” Törnberg concludes.
The study is published in the International Journal of Press/Politics.
