The Kremlin’s Meta-narratives: The centralized sources of Russian information warfare

ABSTRACT

The exploitation of the information space of targeted countries represents an advantageous tactic for the Kremlin that levels the battlefield below the threshold of an open confrontation. The means of Russian information warfare are carefully crafted narratives used as tools to destabilize the information space of targeted countries.  The narratives created by Russia are either entirely false or diluted truths void of context.  This article will argue that the narratives created and disseminated during Russian disinformation campaigns do not emerge independently of existing meta-narratives. The narratives used in disinformation campaigns will be viewed as tools used on an ad hoc basis connected to one of the Kremlin’s central meta-narratives.

BY CHELSEA MAI

INTRODUCTION

Meta-narratives can be conceptualized as a “body of discourse that serves as a vehicle of communication between the regime and those living under it. The aim of a meta-narrative is to simplify the prevailing ideology and serve as a tool for symbolic construction of the society, normalizing and stabilizing some concepts and excluding others.” [1] Meta-narratives can also be defined as “grand narratives consisting of sets of more specific, narrowly focused narratives”.[2]   Meta-narratives will be analyzed as the central source from which other narrowly focused narratives flow during disinformation campaigns. These narrowly focused narratives created and disseminated by the Kremlin will be coined as infra-narratives. Infra-narratives are used as a tactic in Russian disinformation campaigns to give legitimacy and credibility to the Kremlin’s meta-narratives. The meta-narratives of the ‘Western Enemy’ and the Russkiy mir will be analyzed in the context of the Euromaidan protest of 2014 and the subsequent annexation of Crimea to illustrate the connection between infra-narratives that emerged in Russian disinformation campaigns and these central meta-narratives.  


THE META-NARRATIVE OF THE WESTERN ENEMY

One main meta-narrative created by the Kremlin is that of the ‘Western Enemy’, which asserts that Russia and the West are locked in hostilities and conflict that has transcended the Cold-War era. The meta-narrative of the ‘Western Enemy’ is circulated through several infra-narratives created by the Kremlin which depict America as Russia’s primary enemy and describe the United States (US) as an aggressive interventionist power that incites problems in other countries [3]. These infra-narratives are outsourced from the same explanatory paradigm: the West (led by the US) gets involved in foreign affairs, then countries fall apart [3]. The Kremlin’s goal is to blame the West for causing instability across the globe. For example, Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 provided an opportune moment for the Kremlin to disseminate such infra-narratives in its disinformation campaigns against Ukraine. 

In 2013, the Euromaidan protests erupted in Ukraine after President Yanukovych rejected a deal that would foster greater integration between Ukraine and the European Union (EU). In lieu of the EU deal, President Yanukovych accepted a $15 billion alternative deal from the Kremlin [4]. In response, Ukrainians participated in large-scale anti-government protests.  At the end of these protests, violent clashes between security forces and protesters broke out between February 18-21. This became known as the Revolution of Dignity [5] which ultimately resulted in Yanukovych’s removal from office on 22 February 2014. According to disinformation campaigns launched by the Kremlin, the Euromaidan protests were a western-backed coup to remove the rightful rulers of Ukraine [6].  The purpose of this narrative was to suggest that Ukraine was a failed state and was being manipulated by the West [7] and to illustrate to the rest of the world that the West is an enemy to Moscow and an enemy to the stability of other countries. 

These infra-narratives about the ‘Western Enemy’ also serve to legitimize the actions and behaviors of the Kremlin. For instance, to justify the annexation of Crimea, Putin blamed NATO, asserting that the Western Bloc was encroaching on Russia’s sphere of influence and that the West was attempting to ‘drag Ukraine in’ while Russian annexation, unlike the forced Western attempt to influence Ukraine, represented the ‘will of the Crimean people’ [8]. Russian state media became a primary tool to disseminate such infra-narratives. Russia 1, one of the main TV channels in Russia, aired a piece claiming that the West refused to recognize Crimea’s annexation because Washington was behind the coup in Ukraine. The propaganda piece also claimed that the US was responsible for training the protesters and street fighters in Kyiv at secret NATO bases in Poland [9]. 

 The Kremlin's primary aim is to influence its audience through the effect of cognitive resonance by outsourcing infra-narratives from a central meta-narrative.  In this case, the infra-narratives that were disseminated about the West during the Ukrainian crisis served to harmonize with the already existing beliefs about the established meta-narrative that the West is the enemy.  Hansen argues that ‘if consumers accept the meta-narrative saying that “the West is locked in centuries-old conflict with Russia” as well as a smaller narrative claiming that “the regime change in Kyiv in February 2014 was a coup instigated by the West,” then Russian disinformation about MH-17, blaming, for instance, the Ukrainian authorities or the West for the shoot-down, are also accepted more easily’ [10]. In this way, the Kremlin’s use of infra-narratives in disinformation campaigns serves two primary objectives: to add credibility and legitimacy to the existing meta-narrative, and to make all other infra-narratives connected to the central meta-narrative believable. The aim of the Kremlin is to make the existing meta-narrative of the ‘Western Enemy’ an unquestionable fact. 


THE RUSSKIY MIR

The Russkiy Mir is another dominant meta-narrative created by the Kremlin.  Russkiy Mir, meaning “The Russian World,” ‘implies that national borders are viewed as secondary to ethnolinguistic ties; at its core, it describes Russia not as a country, but as a people’ [11].  The Russkiy Mir is a strategic meta-narrative because it asserts an extension of the Kremlin’s sphere of influence into the ‘near abroad,’ which refers specifically to countries in the post-Soviet space. The strategic objective of the Russkiy Mir meta-narrative is to consolidate support and influence in these countries [12]. According to the Russian world meta-narrative, the Kremlin has a duty to protect the rights and security of the Russian diaspora, which is supported officially by Russia’s compatriot policy. The compatriot policy is used to legitimize Russia’s actions when the Kremlin claims to be protecting and defending the rights of compatriots abroad [13]. 

The Kremlin has created and disseminated several infra-narratives to bolster the credibility of the Russkiy Mir meta-narrative. For instance, such infra-narratives were used as tools in disinformation campaigns to justify the annexation of Crimea. The Kremlin claimed that the decision to annex Crimea was done to protect the rights of the Russian population in Crimea [14].  

Russian state media disseminated this narrative and the news pieces referred to the situation with Crimea not as an annexation but as ‘the re-joining (“prisoedinenie”) of Crimea with Russia’ [15].  In addition, Russian media and internet trolls labeled the protesters in Kyiv as ‘neo-Nazis’ and ‘fascists’ [16] which created a dominant infra-narrative of the Kyiv protesters as extreme nationalists.  In fact, ‘That life-or-death scenario—rescuing Russians and Russian-speakers from the depredations of Fascists—became the driving narrative in the Kremlin’s campaign to justify its incursion into Crimea, and it was broadcast relentlessly on all state-run media in Russia, especially television, which reaches more than 90% of the Russian population,’ [17].  These infra-narratives were used to make the population who remained in Crimea believe that their lives and freedom were in jeopardy because of the protestors in Kyiv. The intended effect of these infra-narratives was to make Crimeans who identify as ethnic Russians more receptive to Russian military protection.


CONCLUSION

Meta-narratives can be viewed as central narratives connected to the ideologies of the Russian state. Infra-narratives are then outsourced from meta-narratives to have the desired effect of cognitive resonance. Cognitive resonance is a tactic to harmonize the information disseminated through infra-narratives with the already existing notions of the meta-narrative. Infra-narratives are essential tools in Russian disinformation campaigns because they are supposed to add credibility and legitimacy to the existing meta-narrative. The objective of adding credibility and legitimacy to the existing meta-narrative via the dissemination of infra-narratives is to make all other infra-narratives connected to the meta-narrative believable. As a result, infra-narratives become potent tools in Russian disinformation campaigns if the targeted audience accepts the meta-narrative because then all other fallacious infra-narratives connected to the central meta-narrative are more easily accepted as true. Meta-narratives can be viewed as the centralized sources of Russian information warfare because the infra-narratives created and disseminated in disinformation campaigns all connect to a central theme of one of the Kremlin’s meta-narratives. Metaphorically speaking, if meta-narratives are the roots, then infra-narratives are definitely the branches of Russian information warfare. 



REFERENCES

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  2. Laruelle, M. (2012) Larger, Higher, Farther North … Geographical Metanarratives of the Nation in Russia, Eurasian Geography and Economics, 53:5, 557-574, DOI: 10.2747/1539-7216.53.5.557

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  5. Shveda, Y. (2015) Ukraine’s revolution of dignity: the dynamics of Euromaidan. Journal of Eurasian Studies 7(1), 85–91. 

  6. Lucas, E. & Pomeranzev, P. (2016) Winning the Information War Techniques and Counter-strategies to Russian Propaganda in Central and Eastern Europe. Available at https://cepa.org/cepa_files/2016-CEPA-report-Winning_the_Information_War.pdf. (Accessed 10/1/2022

  7. Ibid., et. al., 2018, 58

  8. Pynnöniemi, K & Rácz, A. (2017) Fog of Falsehood Russian Strategy of Deception and the Conflict in Ukraine. Available at 

  9. https://www.fiia.fi/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/fiiareport45_fogoffalsehood.pdf (Accessed 10/1/2022) 

  10. Hansen, F. (2017) Russian hybrid warfare: A study of disinformation, DIIS Report, No. 2017:06, ISBN 978-87-7605-880-7, Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS), Copenhagen

  11. Cotter, B. (2020) Russkiy Mir: How the Kremlin employs narratives to destabilize the Baltic states. Availablehttps://www.marshallcenter.org/sites/default/files/files/202009/pC_v7%20Special%20Edition_en-6_Cotter.pdf  (Accessed 10/1/2022) 

  12. Karmazin, A. & Hynek, N.  (2020) Russian, US and Chinese Revisionism: Bridging Domestic and Great Power Politics, Europe-Asia Studies, 72:6, 955-975, DOI: 10.1080/09668136.2020.1776221

  13. Meister, S. (2018) Understanding Russian Communication Strategy: Case Studies of Serbia and Estonia. Available at https://www.ssoar.info/ssoar/handle/document/59979 (Accessed 10/1/2022)

  14. Percha, J. (2014) Transcript: Putin says Russia will protect the rights of Russians abroad. Available at https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/transcript-putin-says-russia-will-protect-the-rights-of-russians-abroad/2014/03/18/432a1e60-ae99-11e3-a49e-76adc9210f19_story.html (Accessed 10/1/2022) 

  15. Ibid 2021, 155 

  16. Keating, J. (2014) Fascist, Fascist Everywhere. Available at https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2014/02/russia-says-the-ukrainian-protesters-are-fascists-and-nazis-are-they.html (Accessed 10/1/2022) 

  17. Dougherty, J. (2014) Everyone Lies: The Ukraine Conflict and Russia’s Media Transformation. Cambridge, MA: Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Available at https://shorensteincenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/d88-dougherty.pdf (Accessed 10/1/2022)