Ultra-conservative communities and football supporters’ groups are this chapter’s main field of analysis. They tend to organize themselves, online and offline, along ad hoc issues of interest, most often “in defense of traditional family values” and against COVID-19 restrictions. Their membership and agenda are often intertwined with that of far-right and populist parties. Facebook serves as a strong platform for their organization and motivation, including live protests. The results of this chapter come from young football supporters’ communities on the one hand, and public Facebook groups and pages of most popular ultra-conservative groups in terms of membership and interactions, on the other. The insights of the online observation have been supplemented with data from semi-structured face-to-face interviews with key individuals active in their respective communities. The main conclusion of the analysis is that online communities tend to express their disagreements more radically than what was observed in interviews, which is a manifestation of how the digital socialization driver plays into their attitudes. This means that the spread of propaganda and misinformation as well as narratives generally espoused by the far-right to large, receptive audiences online has the potential to bring about a worsening of societal polarization.

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Propaganda and Misinformation as Drivers of Radicalization in Bulgaria

  • Stefan Ralchev,
  • Nadya Stoynova

摘要

Ultra-conservative communities and football supporters’ groups are this chapter’s main field of analysis. They tend to organize themselves, online and offline, along ad hoc issues of interest, most often “in defense of traditional family values” and against COVID-19 restrictions. Their membership and agenda are often intertwined with that of far-right and populist parties. Facebook serves as a strong platform for their organization and motivation, including live protests. The results of this chapter come from young football supporters’ communities on the one hand, and public Facebook groups and pages of most popular ultra-conservative groups in terms of membership and interactions, on the other. The insights of the online observation have been supplemented with data from semi-structured face-to-face interviews with key individuals active in their respective communities. The main conclusion of the analysis is that online communities tend to express their disagreements more radically than what was observed in interviews, which is a manifestation of how the digital socialization driver plays into their attitudes. This means that the spread of propaganda and misinformation as well as narratives generally espoused by the far-right to large, receptive audiences online has the potential to bring about a worsening of societal polarization.