Year: 2020
Type: article
Abstract: This article examines the scope of pro-Kremlin disinformation about Crimea. I deploy content analysis and a social network approach to analyze tweets related to the region. I find that pro-Kremlin disinformation partially penetrated the Twitter debates about Crimea. However, these disinformation narratives are accompanied by a much larger wave of information that disagrees with the disinformation and are less prevalent in relative terms. The impact of Russian state-controlled news outlets—which are frequent sources of pro-Kremlin disinformation—is concentrated in one, highly popular news outlet, RT. The few, popular Russian news media have to compete with many popular Western media outlets. As a result, the combined impact of Russian state-controlled outlets is relatively low when comparing to its Western alternatives.
Author: Yevgeniy Golovchenko
Institution: University of Copenhagen
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $1,060
Funder: H2020 European Research Council
OpenAlex ID: W3112806367