Countering Anti-Ukrainian Propaganda in Russia by Methods of Persuasion

In 2022, Andrey was a Hopkins student in the M.A. in Communications program, where he took a course on persuasion (cheers to Prof. Yoav Magid for amazing classes!) The Russian invasion of Ukraine had just started, along with intensifying anti-Ukrainian propaganda efforts by Russian state media. For this final paper, Andrey took a deep dive into propaganda narratives to understand the structural basis of beliefs that ordinary Russians receive from their daily media and attempted to explore persuasive mechanisms that could help convince Russians not to support the war in Ukraine. 

This study informed Andrey's future work for AgitMachine, a project by Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation that aimed at persuading Russians not to support Vladimir Putin and his war in Ukraine. 

Слава Україні!

Introduction

On February 24, 2022, the Russian military started the invasion of Ukraine. This military offensive is reported to be supported by most Russians because of fear of prosecution and because of constant propaganda efforts (Hamid, 2022.)

This paper aims at determining, what design features of persuasion can be used to counter narratives of the Russian state’s pro-war propaganda and what new beliefs can be formed to help stop the war in Ukraine.

For this study, I will provide a brief background on beliefs that are spread by the Russian propaganda, as it is important to use them as a base for new beliefs. Next, I will describe the target audience of both propaganda and counterpropaganda. For the prescriptive part, I will outline the design features that can be used to form new beliefs and explain how they will work together effectively. Finally, I will present new beliefs that are based on existing beliefs and design features.

Existing Beliefs and Propaganda Narratives

Belief is a relationship between two things or a thing and a characteristic of that thing (Jowett and O’Donnell, 2006.) This paper’s hypothesis is that propaganda in Putin’s Russia has created two major sets of beliefs that counterpropaganda needs to work with: systemic and non-systemic.

Systemic beliefs are those that have started to form at the onset of Putin’s regime in the 2000s and take deep roots in Soviet propaganda. These are ideological beliefs and values that are linked to the big world order and go back to the role of the Russian nation and the Soviet Union in World War II, as well as the post-War bipolar order and the USSR’s role in it.

Systemic Belief 1: Russia cannot do wrong or act evil, and those, who oppose Russia, cannot do or act good (Zubok, 2017.)

Systemic Belief 2: the primary goal of the U.S. government and NATO is to end Russia’s existence (Gerber, Zavisca, 2016.)

Non-systemic beliefs and attitudes have been formed during the later phase of propaganda that started with the annexation of Crimea and the onset of the War in Ukraine in 2014. These beliefs are fresh but based on systemic beliefs. Unlike systemic beliefs, they look at the present time rather than the past history, and they turn attention to the role of Russia in today’s world order. While being closely tied to a more mythical constant geopolitical order, they are turned to actions that the Russian government should take to stabilize the current situation and secure Russia’s future. 

Non-systemic Belief 1: World War III is either ongoing or inevitable (Merzlikin, 2017.)

Non-systemic Attitude 1: Russia must fight against the forces of evil (Gerber, Zavisca, 2016.)

Non-systemic Belief 2: Russia is blessed with Putin and doomed without him (Merzlikin, 2017.)

Non-systemic Attitude 2: Russia’s destiny is to fight Nazism (Nikiforova, 2022.)

Target Audience

Propaganda has two specific target audiences, which this paper labels as Distributors and Receivers. 

Distributors are extenders, ambassadors of propaganda. They are the product of ideologically mobilized, non-systemic beliefs, and their purpose is not just to believe, but to spread propaganda. They hold far-right nationalistic pro-Russian views and support the idea of novel Russian imperialism and restoration of Russia to the borders of the former Soviet Union. They are politically active, understand that Russia is an authoritarian country and support the autocratic model as superior to a Western-type liberal democracy (Merzlikin, 2017.) The roots of their ideology go very deep into systemic beliefs and their behavior is mobilized by non-systemic beliefs. Part of this group belongs to nationalist “patriotic” organizations like National Liberation Movement (Litoy, 2014). They have created and picked up a new symbol of Russian aggression – the Latin letter “Z” (Kovalyov, 2022.)

The second, much larger, group is Receivers. They remain politically inactive for now and usually do not vote unless they are forced to. They generally do not hold far-right or nationalistic views, and sometimes might even believe in liberal democracy (FOM, 2020.) Most likely, they will not admit that Russia is an autocracy, they do not believe that an authoritarian regime is the best model of government, yet they also do not support the idea of liberal democracy, because they think it is fake and does not exist anywhere (Ibid.) They are accidental victims of propaganda as they were exposed to television broadcasts for too long simply because it is their habit to turn on the TV when they are home, as only 44 percent of Russians reported that they watch television to get acquainted with the news (FOM, 2018.) They still consider themselves to be Russian patriots, and when asked if they support the invasion of Ukraine, they will agree because they think that opposing the invasion is a betrayal of their country (Hamid, 2022.) They were mostly born after 1975, and the late Brezhnev era of Stagnation was during their infancy and early childhood, so they do not remember it. The young years of their lives were during perestroika when they were exposed to democratic ideals, but they gave up on these ideas during the post-Soviet economic and social crisis because heuristically they connect democracy to poverty. 

Efforts of countering the propaganda do not have much use against Distributors. They are ideologically mobilized, and their vision of the world and global order is fully dictated by systemic mythological beliefs that have become their cultural and personal values. Receivers, on the other hand, share the same systemic beliefs but they are not yet deeply enrooted and have not turned into monumental values. They also hold the same non-systemic belief but not because they truly believe in them, but because in the atmosphere of the absence of objective truth they have to believe in something (Yakutenko, 2022.) They think that sharing non-systemic beliefs is their way to show their patriotism, and their attitude to systemic beliefs is mostly dictated by their passive position, not active. They do not truly believe that Russia is in danger, but they fear it might be true (Gerber, Zavisca, 2016.) 

Positions of Distributors and Receivers are very much dictated by propaganda channels and different design features. Distributors consume and reproduce propaganda, they exist among other ideologically mobilized Distributors and feed their beliefs off other Distributors. They are a lot more involved in political thinking than other Russians, so propaganda messages are more effective for them (Petty, Cacioppo, Goldman, 1981). Receivers are less involved in political groups, but their persuasion goes through different features: social proof and the spiral of silence. While they are not politically active, Receivers remain socially active, and as they interact with other Receivers, propaganda messages reach their desired effect through social proof on the one hand, when Receivers see confirmation of their view in others (Deutsche Welle, 2022,) but also, through fear of social isolation as described by the spiral of silence theory (Noelle-Neumann, 1974.) 

Although appeals to these groups can be in the same TV show, narratives for these groups are different. Distributors are subject to rational appeals, but the rationality of these appeals is twisted. As they elevate systemic beliefs into their core values, propaganda messages gain logical sense if put on top of these systemic values. For Receivers, the appeal is emotional. While also being put on top of systemic beliefs, propaganda targets the appeal through images of ethnically Russian refugees from the Donbas region and other archetypal constructs like crucified children in Ukraine (Kalashnik, 2021.) 

Forming New Beliefs

The only effective way to build a counterpropaganda narrative is to base it on top of existing attitudes and beliefs since the public is more receptive to unquestioningly believing a news story if the story is based on existing beliefs due to the confirmation bias. Ideally, we would like our counterpropaganda narrative to be accepted just as unquestionably as the propaganda message itself. In this case, our messages can be presented as a simple cause-effect relationship and can gain traction without explicit persuasion since they will confirm existing attitudes and beliefs (Ali and Zain-ul-abdin, 2021). Messages that will cause a clear cognitive dissonance are very likely to be rejected automatically (Festigner, 1962), and messages that confirm an already existing position are more likely to be accepted (Lord, Ross, Lepper, 1979.)

This campaign can use several design features to boost and support the messages. As we are basing new beliefs on old systemic ones, we can use confirmation bias to support our narrative, sourcing confirmations from existing attitudes (Ibid.) Since propaganda messages utilize peripheral processing and emotional appeals, utilizing rational appeals will be a more effective way to counter propagandistic narratives. Rational appeals will also use existing systemic beliefs that are spread by the propaganda so that our campaign does not cause cognitive dissonance but will also utilize other deep beliefs that are not highlighted in propaganda like the perception of corruption (Stiff, Mongeau. 2016.) These messages will use the accessibility feature: an attitude that comes to mind because it supports the belief that a person holds (i.e., corruption level.) All of this combined will cause an outcome-relevant involvement that could lead to the desired behavior.

Additionally, this campaign will use the authority feature to boost a part of the narrative and call to a countervalue that would contradict some of the non-systemic beliefs. To support the countervalue, we can use representativeness to call people’s attention to the similarities between the 2022 invasion and the German invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II.

First, we need to define our desired behavior. In this situation, the most effective behavior is to actively oppose Putin’s regime as it is the best way to stop violence in Ukraine (Shivaram, Schneider, 2022; Johnson, 2022; Dickinson, 2022.) This desired behavior clearly contradicts a non-systemic belief Russia is blessed with Putin and doomed without him – which makes forming a new belief complicated. 

To base our new belief on more fertile ground, we need to go deeper into more systemic, even archetypical beliefs. An effective strategy here can be placing two non-systemic beliefs in contradiction to each other while citing a systemic belief in our favor. If we want to eliminate Russia is blessed with Putin and doomed without him belief, we can juxtapose it with another existing belief: World War III is either ongoing or inevitable and attitude Russia must fight against the forces of evil. The new beliefs might look like this:

Russia is the Warrior of Light, and Vladimir Putin doesn’t keep up with this responsibility. 

Here we address a more monumental and archetypal systemic belief: Russia cannot do wrong or act evil, the U.S. cannot do or act good. We admit that Russia must act as a force of good against the force of evil (USA and NATO) but suggest that Putin and his regime are not up to this task.  

Additionally, we can use outcome-relevant involvement to manipulate victims into the new desired belief. In early April 2022, the Russian military command turned the attention of their special military operation to the Eastern part of Ukraine instead of a full-scale invasion of the entire territory of the country (Eckel, 2022.) Using the reports of the U.S. intelligence agencies that Kyiv was supposed to fall within 96 hours of the invasion (Lonas, 2022; Heinrich, Sabes, 2022), we can manufacture a new belief: Putin failed and even the U.S. is shocked.

We build this belief on top of all systemic and non-systemic beliefs that already exist except for Russia is blessed with Putin and doomed without him. In this situation, deeper systemic belief can trump the new non-systemic belief that Putin is a blessing for Russia.

Additionally to beliefs that were manufactured by the propaganda, there are several more beliefs that have a systemic nature but appeared more naturally from history and observations. One of these beliefs can be used in our efforts: the level of corruption in Russia is very high. According to Transparency International 2021 Corruption Perception Index, Russia is the 136th place in the world on how citizens perceive corruption in their country with a score of 29 out of 100, which means that Russian citizens perceive the level of corruption as very high (Transparency, 2021.)

Based on every desired belief listed above, we can outline one major belief that would have a positive outcome for this campaign and would be based on a simple cause-effect relationship that would not need more additional explicit persuasion.

Russia is losing this war and the global war because of Putin’s inefficiency and corruption.

This belief is based on several design features. Applying the level of corruption in Russia is very high belief to the overall militaristic narrative will boost confirmation bias, as most Russians perceive the level of corruption as very high. Continuing the militaristic narrative will not cause cognitive dissonance over the overall militaristic agenda of propaganda and gives us the opportunity to stimulate the outcome-relevant involvement by positing a strong argument fully based on existing beliefs.

The important caveat in this question is that for this message to become a rational appeal, we also need to provide evidence that Russia is actually losing the war, which is the opposite of what propaganda is saying. The attitude Putin failed and even the U.S. is shocked – will be helpful here if we cite news and reports from the first days of the war when the Western media and intelligence agencies were reporting that Ukraine would fall in 96 hours. This makes the appeal rational: the message uses a simple logic that our enemies were scared of us, and we failed their expectations.

Reapplying Representativeness

Russian propaganda often draws parallels between the present time and the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany during World War II using representatives and recognition (Shah, 2022; Meduza, 2022a.) Russian propaganda uses the glory of the victory in 1945 to persuade people to support the war in Ukraine now. However, the message that uses the same parallel can be an effective way to counter the propaganda efforts if it uses recognition and authority features, forming the value-relevant involvement. The belief that we would want to evoke is not new but goes back to the post-War Soviet Union: Anything rather than war – which was a common saying among the people who saw World War II firsthand (Portnikov, 2015.) It is an old belief that can also be called systemic – almost every Russian family has a story of a relative who died or was injured in World War II, and families were raised in antiwar tradition. In itself, it is a value that we can use to counter militaristic beliefs.

However, this same phrase is used by the propaganda to instigate war: it is used to strengthen the systemic belief the primary goal of the U.S. government is to end Russia’s existence – where the invasion into Ukraine is justified as a defensive act against the possible future NATO aggression, also by citing non-systemic belief World War III is either ongoing or inevitable to support the main narrative.

In a counterpropaganda campaign, these words can be said by veterans and survivors of World War II: both Russian and Ukrainian – along with a general antiwar narrative. Veterans and survivors will be seen as authoritative figures by Russians as they are very respected and also had to go through war and occupation themselves.

Uncertainty and Future Social Proof

As we combine all of the above, we are able to evoke uncertainty that is beneficial for the antiwar campaign. If a person is doubtful and uncertain, it is a perfect ground to use future social proof. When people notice a change, they expect to see this change continue in the same direction (Cialdini, 2021.) After the start of the invasion, the informational environment in Russia is monolithic due to restrictions on the free press. Now, as the initial shock subsided, more and more signs of antiwar activity appear in the environment, where Receivers can see it: on pro-government online resources (BBC, 2022), as graffiti on streets (Svoboda, 2022), as parts of pro-government rallies (Meduza, 2022b), and so on.

Using future social proof, we can formulate the following narrative: More and more Russians protest this war. You should too. Alone, this narrative will hardly turn into an attitude as it contradicts main systemic beliefs. However, if it is presented along with the rest of the campaign, it can turn into an attitude that works on previously stated beliefs. Moreover, it is the only attitude in this study that actually calls to action, so building up to and forming this attitude is essential.

Channels and Settings

As all the information dissemination in the media is fully controlled by the Russian government, the question of channels of distribution of this campaign is the hardest one. None of the above is legal in Russia, and dissemination of such information can lead to a jail sentence. Thus, sources of this information must be either interpersonal or online with a certain degree of anonymity. The most effective way to spread these beliefs is through personal authority figures: a family member or a friend could use these beliefs and try to persuade other, who perceive this person as an authority.

Another way to spread these beliefs is through social media. Now, many Russians continue to use their social media to persuade people to oppose this war, however, the main narratives contradict systemic beliefs too much, and cause viewers to disengage. If narratives and beliefs are chosen more thoughtfully, they can be more effective.

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