Fears about “Russian Propaganda”: The Case of Online “Opinion Celebrities” of the Bulgarian Liberal Milieu
Fears about “Russian Propaganda”: The Case of Online “Opinion Celebrities” of the Bulgarian Liberal Milieu

Summary/Abstract: As established Western liberal democracies have faced political in stabilities since the 2010s, the figure of “propaganda” has entered popular political consciousness, joining a host of semantically related catchphrases and “words of the year” (“post-truth”, “fake news”, “misinformation”). Increasingly, “Russian propaganda” is appealed to as a factor in rising illiberal sentiments across Europe. In peripheral states such as Bulgaria, propaganda has become the subject of large scale expert research but also evolved into a veritable moral panic for certain societal sectors. It is employed to explain away the public’s political views and to attribute causes to the actions or inaction of various constituencies. The narratives about Putin’s command on Bulgarians’ minds are most prominently advanced by individuals with higher levels of political mobilisation, higher educational levels, strongly pro Western attitudes, and self-proclaimed “democratic” or “liberal” political identities. This paper scrutinises how the signifier “propaganda” is mobilised within this “liberal milieu” by focusing on online “opinion celebrities” – authentic members of the community who have gained significant followings on Facebook through their assertive and unremitting commentary on politics and current affairs. Employing a Laclauian post-foundational (poststructuralist) discourse analysis framework, we conceptualise their responses as a liberal “anti-propaganda” discourse and examine its architecture, underlying investments, and broader social function. Whilst existing research concentrates on propaganda itself, we shift attention to how the anti propaganda discourse, both popular and expert, functions socially and politically.

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