Introduction
In a 2018 report by the cybersecurity company New Knowledge and the Senate Intelligence Committee, the Russian-backed Internet Research Agency (IRA) was revealed to have played a key role in using memes to spread key messages to influence the American electorate in 2016. This was repeated in 2020, and demonstrate that memes have turned into a potent form of political propaganda to influence the outcome of sovereign democratic elections. Propaganda, which is a type of communication with a designated purpose or objective, aims to convey a specific range of beliefs or ideologies to a target audience, and these Russian-backed memes demonstrate how the IRA spread propaganda to influence American electoral outcomes. Clearly, memes have become a powerful form of political propaganda.
This report will review the methodology of memes as a form of political propaganda, by outlining how memes can fall into different categories of propaganda, and will contend that Russian-backed political memes primarily focus on agitative and gray propaganda. The impact of different types of messages, channels and techniques on the American electorate’s political perceptions will also be analyzed. This report will then evaluate, through a thorough review of primary sources (memes) and secondary literature, how Russian-backed memes have been an effective tool for political propaganda in the U.S. elections in order to divide the American electorate, suppress voter turnout, and increase the prospects for a specific candidate’s electoral victory.
Memes as a form of political propaganda
Memes serve as an effective tool for political propaganda in a number of ways. Foremost, memes, as image-based forms of communication that can be easily understood by a target audience, allow a key political message to be simply and effectively conveyed to an audience. If used for a targeted and inflammatory purpose, this has the potential to spread in a viral manner.
Secondly, memes can be used on a propagandistic basis to shape perceptions, identity and culture, as an instrument for the socialization of a target audience. For example, based on the discourse analysis conducted by DeCook (2018) to assess memes linked to the alt-right affiliate fraternity ‘Proud Boys’, it can be observed that memes can be used to symbolic effect, and in the case of the Proud Boys, to promote symbolic and physical violence advocacy, and serve as an effective medium for political propaganda. Successful memes tend to be simplistic and uncomplicated, and enable a key message to be presented in a targeted and highly effective manner through a visual medium. This provides a key opportunity for political meme tactics to be deployed as propaganda for the advancement of key political purposes (DeCook, 2018).
Such symbolic effects of political propaganda in the form of memes have been further enabled by the democratizing nature of technologies such as social media, which have allowed propagandists to spread propaganda in a rapidly scalable and cost-efficient manner without regard for truth or independent validation. This suggests that authoritative institutions are no longer the sole arbiters or originators of propaganda, and that grassroots movements and individuals (including those backed by malicious actors) can be equally effective at launching their own propaganda campaigns, and even countering truths with their own versions of legitimate narratives.
Thirdly, the origination and source of memes is often difficult to trace, given their viral nature, which allows propagandists to use ‘gray propaganda’ techniques to disguise the source of their communications, and to mask the origin of the political message in order to make the message appear organic in its origin and source. The best memes tend to be unattributable, anonymous in origin and authorless, which allow memes to be an effective mode of propaganda for political propagandists seeking to obscure the origin of their messages (McVicker, 2021). To this end, memes tend to be deployed to third-party accounts as part of a deflective source propaganda model, to exchange the source of the message and switch the narrative to that of an independent propagator (Dawson & Innes, 2019). This, in turn, helps to scale the impact and reach of political memes to the intended audience (Dawson & Innes, 2019).
Furthermore, memes contain specific cultural references or norms that can convey a sense of exclusivity and group inclusion, which confer a sense of acceptance and belonging on the receiver that strengthens their affiliation and identification with the political message of the meme. Memes that are part of political propaganda rarely generate original content or messages, but rather, tend to link themselves to existing content, images and tropes that have established a degree of popularity (McVicker, 2021). The hijacking of these existing messages and tropes allow memes to gain a certain level of existing currency, which then becomes a medium for the propagation of a specific political message (McVicker, 2021). For example, a political propagandist might used the ‘Distracted Boyfriend’, ‘Expanding Brain’ or ‘First World Problems’ meme to evoke existing tropes for comparison, ridicule or satire, and then overlay a subtle message of political propaganda on the meme, thus leveraging the original cultural context of the meme as a medium for the political message (McVicker, 2021). This is supported by the research of Blackmore and Dawkins, who consider this to be an ‘unconscious vetting’ process that allows the most popular memes to easily sway the opinions of a given target audience (DeCook, 2018).
Finally, the inherent humour and irony in memes ensures that their content is addictive, and provides an entertainment value that encourages individuals to both consume and share them within a social network. As a form of entertainment, memes present an inherent utility to their audience that renders them highly effective in their reception by their target audiences.
Methods used by Russian actors in developing memes as a form of propaganda for the US elections
Russian political meme creators deployed memes as a form of political propaganda by selecting key themes that were assessed to be particularly inflammatory and topical. These included messages on issues such as anti-Clinton political activism, refugee rights, veteran rights, Muslim culture, Christian culture, feminism, ISIS and terrorism, and LGBTQ rights. The messages on these issues were then designed to reinforce existing cultural beliefs and stereotypes, and to cultivate pre-existing convictions, feelings of pride and notions of affiliation, across top social media channels such as Instagram, Facebook and Youtube (Strudwicke & Grant, 2020).
This is supported by a study by Al-Rawi & Rahman (2020), which showed the types of topics and methods used by the IRA’s political memes and political propaganda. The study used a public dataset to assess the strategic and thematic trends of IRA mem advertisements. The study’s results showed a sophisticated targeting and positioning of meme ads to United States audiences, based on the political ideology, ethnicity, gender and faith of the audience, with inflammatory topics such as immigration, police brutality and race used to conceal the intention and identity of Russian actors, and provided evidence for how the technique of ‘political astroturfing’ was used to hide strategic disinformation behind inflammatory political memes as a form of political propaganda, by stoking and inflaming tensions among micro-targeted audiences (Al-Rawi & Rahman, 2020).
Lukito (2020) also points to the versatility and comprehensiveness of the Russian political meme operation across multiple channels, as a way of seeding key political messages across ambiguous sources to promote key messages and objectives. Lukito (2020) assessed the activity of the Russian-backed organization, the Internet Research Agency (IRA) on three distinct social media channels, Facebook Twitter and Reddit, and identified specific correlations in activities on these channels. The study’s methodology used a VAR statistical analysis with tests of Granger Causality, and demonstrated that IRA Facebook, Twitter and Reddit activity was closely coupled in a complex communication ecology, with Reddit activity preceding Twitter activity within one week on average.
To support the notion that Russian political meme propaganda was inherently versatile, comprehensive and dynamic, Lukito (2020) further suggests that the IRA may have used a test-and-learn methodology in the deployment of its political memes and political propaganda, to test and trial political memes on Reddit before deploying them on more significant platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. These memes were then systematically deployed across multiple channels as part of a systematic and integrated approach, with political propaganda tested scientifically to determine the resonant types of messaging, before scaling political propaganda and meme activity on other platforms.
The impact of Russian memes as propaganda in the U.S. elections
Based on a Senate Intelligence Committee report, the influence by political propaganda memes has been significant. Social media accounts owned by the Internet Research Agency on Facebook and Instagram over 2015-2017 accumulated 3.3 million and 3.4 million followers respectively, spanning a prolific range of 61,500 and 116,200 posts respectively. Furthermore, messages deployed on these channels were designed in support of clear political objectives. These included misdirection of prospective voters, encouragement of voters to avoid voting (thus depressing voter turnout), and claims on voter fraud and electoral conspiracies.
Studies also demonstrated a few key channel-based characteristics that allowed political memes to have a significant and pronounced impact on the US electorate. Foremost, Instagram engagement for Russian political memes far outperformed Facebook, indicating the channel’s strength as a weapon in image-based meme propaganda. Secondly, Russian political memes targeted marginalized groups, such as African American communities and rural white communities, and created expansive cross-platform ecosystems of meme content to exploit and manipulate their vulnerability to political messaging. Thirdly, the political messaging of the memes was varied across Russian-backed political meme operations. These included memes to support lower voter turnout and misdirection on voting rules, to insurrectionist and secessionist sentiments.
These studies suggest that, while a large proportion of the memes were focused on promoting the electoral prospects of Russia’s preferred candidate (Donald Trump), a large proportion of the memes deployed were also used to sow general political polarization, confusion, division and doubt. McCombie et al (2020) also demonstrated, through quantitative analysis on election outcomes, that divisions and partisanship did not actually impact voter turnout significantly, but had a strong and symbolic effect in claiming victory via an apparently effective covert action, which then served to degrade the political reputation of the United States on an international stage (Wimberly, 2020).
Categorization and analysis of Russian memes as a form of political propaganda in the context of the US elections, based on the activities of the Internet Research Agency
In categorizing and analyzing the use of Russian memes as a form of political propaganda in the context of the US elections (using the Internet Research Agency as a key case study), it is useful to view these memes as a form of audience targeting, psychological warfare and gender-based discrimination.
Foremost, in terms of audience targeting, Russian political memes were significant in their political influence for their use of political memes that targeted both Democrat and Republican voters. Actors such as the Internet Research Agency managed to exercise significant influence in inflaming political tensions and greater polarisation, thus increasing the prospects of greater political division, and the victory of their preferred candidates, by creating memes that appealed deeply to issues that specific voter segments cared about (Thompson, 2018). For example, for left-leaning Social Democrats, Russian actors created memes that showcased police brutality and protests against Planned Parenthood, while toward conservative Republican voters, the Internet Research Agency designed memes with taglines such as ‘Like and share if you think US veterans should get benefits before refugees’ and ‘Jesus loves Donald Trump’, to appeal to their inherent religiosity and support for veteran rights (Thompson, 2018). These memes served to inflame existing tensions to given target audiences.
Next, Russian memes can be understood as a form of psychological warfare, as a means to effectively subvert the enemy (the American electorate), and to destroy their capacity to resist Russian political influence in the American political arena. In particular, the residual power of psychological warfare in Russian political memes has been effective at propagating a long-term change in the psyche and mindsets of the American electorate. For example, due to the impact of Russian political memes in alleging that there was widespread electoral fraud in the 2016 and 2020 U.S. elections, a large proportion of Republican voters now continues to maintain that fraud has continued to proliferate in the American political system. This ultimately led to an inflaming of political tensions in the American political electorate, and the eventual storming of the Capitol building by an armed mob during the certification of the U.S. elections by the electoral college on January 6, 2021.
Finally, the impact of Russian political propaganda memes can be understood from a gender-based discrimination perspective, with memes used to reinforce messages based on existing gender categories. Nee & De Maio (2019) discuss how political propaganda was constructed in the form of Russian-financed memes to discredit Hillary Clinton during the 2016 U.S. presidential race, and to doctor images of Clinton that reflected specific gender stereotypes and gender-based prejudice that were socially constructed.
These memes, backed by Russian agents, helped to portray Clinton based on anti-feminine traits and female-linked biological, physical traits, painting her as weak, ill, dishonest and untrustworthy as a female leader. This ultimately motivated latent sexism within the U.S. electorate, particularly among white, rural and conservative voters, who were eventually motivated to vote against Hillary Clinton (Nee & De Maio, 2019). The study thus demonstrated the pervasive impact of propaganda and political memes in influencing gender-based political divisions, and discouraging support and depressing turnout for a leading U.S. candidate (Nee & De Maio, 2019).
Application of consistency theory, exposure learning theory and social judgment theory to the assessment of the impact of Russian political propaganda
In understanding how and why Russian political propaganda has achieved such a high level of efficacy in influencing the American electorate in successive US elections, it is useful to draw from existing literature on propaganda and its effects. The consistency theory, exposure learning theory and social judgment theory offer compelling explanations as to how and why Russian political propaganda has successfully influenced mindsets and perspectives in an election season.
Foremost, the consistency theory suggests that there is a latent desire for cognitive consistency in receiving new information, and that this need for consistency governs the formation of new attitudes and behavioral patterns. New information that contradicts previously held beliefs tends to be rejected, unless there is sufficient tension with the existing ideals to overcome their previous intellectual foundations. Russian political memes, particularly those produced by the Internet Research Agency, applied this principle through the use of subtle and inflammatory memes containing messages that both gently affirmed and challenged pre-existing notions, by suggesting that issues such as electoral fraud, criminal behavior by politicians and fake news were worse that their audiences previously imagined (Bastos & Farkas, 2019, 5).
For example, Russian political memes targeted followers of the QAnon conspiracy movement with memes that exaggerated the alleged ‘crimes’ of politicians such as Hillary Clinton, and published false information and accusations alleging fraud by voting machine companies to skew the vote. The message of these memes did not represent a radical departure from the truth, but rather, a subtle skewing of the original message to motivate their audiences to heightened levels of outrage, thus reinforcing and shaping their original perceptions that the U.S. electoral process was fraudulent, and that Democrats were responsible for such electoral fraud.
Next, the theory of exposure learning suggests that frequent, repeated and consistent presentation of a given piece of information or stimuli tends to reinforce either positive or negative impressions. The creators of Russian political memes, such as the Internet Research Agency, applied this principle effectively through the use of targeted paid media advertising on key social media channels such as Facebook and Twitter. By deploying targeted advertising that repeatedly served political memes in different formats, across different channels, these actors were able to effectively reinforce key messages on the US elections to their target audience of the American electorate (Al-Rawi & Rahman, 2020).
Finally, the creators of Russian political memes were able to apply principles from social judgment theory, by designing memes and messages to align quite closely to existing conspiracy theories and anti-Democrat sentiment in the United States. Social judgment theory holds that a person tends to base their social judgments on their instinctive acceptance or rejection of a given piece of information. If the message is fairly close to the views of those in their given social network and latitude of acceptance, individuals are more likely to then accept the message. To this end, actors like the Internet Research Agency designed memes and political messages that were based on existing authentic memes created by supporters of then- Presidential candidate Donald Trump, in order to inflame existing tensions, rather than creating new messages altogether (Alsmadi & O’Brien, 2020).
The application of key principles from consistency theory, exposure learning theory and social judgment theory thus indicate a sophisticated and targeted use of propaganda principles in the use of political propaganda memes to disrupt, influence and impact the US elections.
Limitations of memes as a form of political propaganda
Despite the potency of memes as a form of political propaganda, there are a number of key limitations inherent to memes that limit their effectiveness for political propagandists. Foremost, memes are cultural artifacts that tend to take on a life of their own, and their inherent virality and evolution over time can make it difficult for political propagandists to harness memes in order to deliver a targeted political message (Boatwright et al, 2018). Furthermore, the continued growth of the online meme community continues to render memes a blunt weapon in communicating key political messages, as political memes have to compete for attention with other content creators. Finally, because memes tend to be simplistic and uncomplicated, they are less effective in contexts where nuanced political messages have to be communicated, which cannot be condensed into easily accessible and understandable messages.
Conclusion
This study has demonstrated how memes were a potent form of political propaganda in the U.S. elections of 2016 and 2020, and how agitative and gray propaganda was used to divide the American electorate, suppress voter turnout, and increase the prospects for a specific candidate’s electoral victory. With these sophisticated and comprehensive methods used by Russian-backed actors, it is clear that there is a need for greater oversight and regulation to prevent subversion of American institutions and the electorate by malicious actors through the use of meme propaganda.
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