This address was delivered at the Desmond and
Leah Tutu Foundation at the Old Granary building in Cape Town on the 6th
of December 2018. The Citizen Dialogue Centre (CDC), The Citizen Research Centre
(CRC) and the Centre for Analytics and Behavioural Change (CABC NPO) held a fundraising
event to motivate for a programme to protect the 2019 South African elections –
due in May 2019 – from online and social media disruption and interference. The
event was kindly hosted by the Desmond and Leah Tutu Foundation and was opened by
Dr Mamphele Ramphele.
We are living through an era of profound change. The
democratic standards and ethics of the 20th Century – that were
developed in the post-war consensus – are being eroded in service of political
expediency and short term gain. The very fabric that constituted the post-war
consensus; one that took a long term view on how politics is contested and
conducted; is being undermined by the technological innovations – mobile
phones, the internet and social media – that promised a new era of strengthened democracy, increased
transparency and accountability, and active citizen engagement.
In the hyper-connected world of today, no country or region
can fully escape the impact of these changes. It has already proven foolish to
avoid dealing with them. The notion that tried and tested traditional methods
of mobilizing political support will eventually win out has proven desperately
wanting. Change is upon us and we have to evolve with the times. The only
question around it; is how we choose to do so. Do we choose to descend to the
level of cheap populism and inflammatory rhetoric, or do we want to harness change
to help build more cohesive societies? Both options are available to us; the
real question is whether we are caught up in short term scrambles for power, or whether we remain focused on
what we hope to achieve as societies in the long
term.
But first we need to correctly diagnose the changes that we
are undergoing, as failure to do so will result in remedies that are bound to
fail. So what has changed? Why is it so important to rethink how politics is
being contested and to embrace the new
terrain of political contestation, so to speak?
The first – and key – change to understand is that the
internet, social media and new media have fundamentally altered how political
messaging is developed and delivered to the public. Whereas in the 20th Century voters were targeted in broad demographic bands (say, white males
between the age of 25 and 35, or white females between the ages of 45 and 55),
the internet and social media have enabled political campaigners to target
individuals and small groups more precisely with messaging that is customized
to their personal preferences, biases and fears. Big data has allowed us to
develop a more nuanced understanding of individuals and small groups than ever
before. Political propaganda can now be delivered to a person or small group in
such a manner that it takes into account what they are most likely to respond
to on an emotional or affective level, as well as an intellectual level.
Moreover, mobile phones make us both constantly connected and
instantly reachable. We now live in a world that is hyper-connected – on many
levels – but especially with respect to information. We are inundated by news
feeds, video clips, trivia, listicons, motivations, fear-mongering, moral
prescriptions, Machiavellian prescriptions, echo-chambers (e.g. WhatsApp
groups), and the like. In this information overload we cannot help but feel
lost; there is precious little signal to grasp in the endless noise.
And it may seem counter-intuitive, but this seamlessness is
precisely what enables political propagandists to weaponise their messaging so
effectively. The proliferation of information and opinion today makes it easier
for people who feel disempowered by it to retreat into enclaves or “echo-chambers”
as they are now being called. Previously that “echo-chamber” might have been a
small community, a neighbourhood or a village – nowadays the echo-chambers are
online; they reside in the virtual realm as well as in the real world. We are
living in the era that is increasingly characterized by an augmented reality.
Moreover, hyperconnectivity and a high-frequency,
constant-flow information stream has been coupled with an instant gratification
culture; one where clicks and likes lend more weight to a piece of information
than its actual veracity. There is less time for contemplation; the
‘post-literate’ world is characterized by the ability to throw a wide net and
take in a vast array of inputs, but with little quality insight; we surf
everything but have little depth in anything in particular.
There is also a clear history that has fed these developments. This era is preceded by one where political spin, soundbites and the concerted ‘dumbing down’ of political messaging became the norm and fed the news cycles of media that had become driven by advertising revenue rather than sales.
These are the ingredients that have been cooked up to produce
the reality we are experiencing in the early 21st Century. New online media technologies, coupled with
advertising driven revenue models, have yielded a new status quo; where the
popularity of something is more important than its veracity and its actual
value. Throughout history, we have underestimated the impact that new
technology has on the propaganda of its time; this goes all the way back to the
printing press, with radio and television serving as more recent innovations in
the greater historical scheme of things.
The technology-driven terrain of this era is serving as a
basis for new contestations of power; not just the occupy styled protests of
the Arab Spring in the Middle East and North Africa, or more currently the ‘yellow
vests’ in France – but between nation states and large multinational/commercial
interests who are contesting the global political and economic order.
And how do they achieve this? More recent investigations have
shown that it is not just “fake news” that is instrumental in these information
warfare styled strategies but sowing discord in the ranks of the enemy – a
divide and conquer strategy, so to speak. This is the exertion of soft power
through asymmetric information (and psychological) warfare. When unity and cohesion within a group
is lost they become more vulnerable and open to manipulation.
We know that state actors are active in this space. For
example, the Russian government has invested heavily in creating well staffed
capabilities that focus on sowing division in countries that they seek to
manipulate. Other actors such as Breitbart news – the news media darling of the
‘alt right’ in North America, who are now making moves into Europe – have also
been very successful at this.
But some skeptics still ask, “why South Africa?” Who would
seek to manipulate our elections, and why?
In our provincialism we often fail to adequately appreciate
our critical role in the world and on the continent in particular.
First, South Africa is of great geo-strategic interest to
countries and multinationals that are looking to exploit the next, most
significant, emerging class of consumers in the world; a market that is
essential for global growth. Let me read you a short quote from the State of
the African Cities Report 2014 by UN HABITAT.
“By 2020, 128 million African households are projected to
have transited to “middle class” (see also Box 1.1), boosting consumption and
spending potentials; and by 2030 Africa’s highest-performing 18 cities might
reach a combined purchasing power of USD 1.3 trillion. Projections over the
longer term include growth of the middle class from 355 million people in 2010
(34 per cent of the total population) to 1.1 billion (42 per cent) in 2060,
exceeding that of China today.”
South Africa is uniquely positioned to help access these
opportunities, particularly because of its stable, reliable tertiary sector
capacity (e.g. Finance, Insurance, Real-Estate, Banking), and could very well
become the financial capital of Africa; so to speak.
In addition, South Africa’s resources are of global import
and significance. For example, we have the second largest uranium reserves in
the world. Any country that has invested heavily in nuclear power offerings
(e.g. Russia and France) would naturally have an interest in being able to
influence how our uranium resources are administered. Moreover, we have
globally significant coal reserves, platinum group metal reserves, rare earth
metals, phosphates, and so forth. This is before we even consider the natural
resources we possess above the ground, as well as the many other sectors in
which we play a key role.
And perhaps most importantly, there is precedent for us to be wary of the use of social media to influence
the public political discourse in South Africa. We need only look to the
Bell-Pottinger debacle that unfolded towards the end of Jacob Zuma’s second
term (they were hired by the Gupta family and Jacob Zuma’s son Duduzane). The
African Network of Centres for Investigative Reporting found that between July
2016 and July 2017 220,000 tweets and hundreds of facebook posts[1]
were put out by Bell-Pottinger in a deliberate attempt to manipulate and divide
public opinion.
Narratives such as that of “white monopoly capital”, “radical
economic transformation” and “land reform” were artificially amplified and – in an environment that was ripe
for populist sloganeering and divisive rhetoric – were quickly taken up and
became normative. It soon felt like these terms had been around for a long time
when in reality they had moved from the fringes of the public political
discourse to the centre very quickly. This is precisely the objective of
propaganda, and social media and new media have made it easier to deliver
messaging more precisely, and amplify it more successfully at the same time; a
dangerous combination.
More recently – according to the Digital Forensic Research
Lab – during the December 2017 ANC presidential elections a host of automated
‘bots’ numbering “in the low hundreds” were mobilized out of the US to
influence it[2].
Although it is doubtful that it actually played a role in swaying the election,
it serves as an important warning of what may come next. Indeed, it may have
actually been a ‘test run’, to help calibrate their approach.
What this tells us is that South Africa is already on the
radar for those who would meddle with our political discourse and electoral
processes. It would be deeply ignorant to imagine that we can wish these threats
away; or simply hope that they will not prove significant.
Further afield, organisations such as Cambridge Analytica
have been deeply involved in sowing discord and spreading dangerous, polarizing
rhetoric in elections at home, as well as around the world; they were involved
in Brexit, the 2016 US elections, the most recent Kenyan elections, and many
others around the world. Cambridge Analytica even leveraged its network of
retired intelligence operatives to support political campaigns and safeguard
the interests of nefarious individuals and leaders, and were prepared to use
devious, old traditional means as well.
Recently, reports of heavily staffed Russian government
funded operations to leverage social media to influence the 2016 US elections
have surfaced. While the Russian government denies it, it is clear that Russia
has taken the gap provided by both Brexit and Trump to exert soft power and
position itself more prominently in the global political order.
And you can be sure that China is already well equipped in
this arena as well, as they already possess extensive capabilities to monitor
online conversations in China.
There are also internal threats to consider.
Just last month a UNISA employee was exposed – along with his
sister – of creating several fake news websites and distributing them via a
series of Facebook pages. Apparently, the pair had been operating similar
websites from at least early 2016.
We have also seen a dramatic increase in Trump-styled
disinformation campaigns being carried out by political actors in South Africa.
The EFF, in particular, have made use of twitter to make accusations against
other politicians, their families and businesspeople; a few facts are often
strung together to arrive at completely spurious conclusions. But they are not
alone in their ‘shoot from the hip’ tactics; irresponsible rhetoric and spin
has come to characterize our political realm.
And to be sure, South Africa is currently fertile territory
for divisive rhetoric and misinformation campaigns. The reasons are simple.
Even though South Africans now enjoy democratic freedom, South Africa endures
that highest inequality in the world. And that inequality is even higher in our
major cities. When viewed through a historical lens, this inequality is easily
construed as a continuation of Apartheid era forms of exclusion. Rampant
inequality, historical racial cleavages and the slow pace of land reform are
but a handful of the broader issues that can and are being used to manipulate
the political sphere in South Africa.
There is also massive frustration among ordinary South
Africans with the political establishment; they are largely viewed as elites
who are out of touch with the everyday realities that ordinary people
face. Among poor and marginal
communities, major ‘service delivery’ protests have risen exponentially over
the past decade or so; it is now convention to take to the streets and make localities
ungovernable in order to draw government’s attention to the pressing issues
that these communities endure. We are a society that is balanced on a knife
edge; we are acutely aware that our current condition is not sustainable. This
renders our body politic extremely vulnerable to populist actors – who may
occupy the fringes at first – but can quickly move to the centre if tipping
points are breached.
And to be sure; the internet and social media are the key
avenues through which they can amplify their public voice and tip the scales
one way or another. It is cheap, easy to use, and the damage it wreaks is
difficult to undo once it has been done. Its fundamental asymmetry makes it
attractive to those who are currently outliers or outriders, but aspire to
greater power.
So to the point of why we are gathered here today; what can
we do about it?
Well firstly, we need to understand that this problem cannot
be ‘regulated away’. Regulations simply cannot keep up with the rapid changes
occurring in the technologies and innovations that govern this space.
What we need to do is to begin building the capabilities that
can actively engage and counter fake news and polarizing and incendiary
rhetoric online. We need dedicated organizations that are well staffed, and
possess the right intellectual capital, as well as the software and hardware
they need to be effective. We also need to test and establish the methodologies
that have been developed to counter online interference.
We need to become better at countering online interference
through two key avenues; (1) through directly crippling the online ‘nodes’
through which messaging is artificially amplified, and (2) drawing on the
self-organising capability of the internet to boost engagement by reasonable, level-headed
people and key influencers who can help dampen out the loud and irresponsible
actions of online ‘trolls’.
And importantly, we need to make sure that we share all the
information about how to set up these capabilities and make them effective; so
that other groups across the world can set up similar capabilities in their
local contexts. Over time, a broad network of such organizations will become a ‘learning
network’; sharing case studies, methods, techniques and the like to improve
each other’s success rates at countering interference.
To reiterate, the strategy for dealing with online
interference will not be successful if a purely regulatory stance is adopted. We
need to be embedded within the new terrain and evolve with it. This asymmetric
threat can be fought asymmetrically; and this is good news for us, as we can
leverage knowledge based resources and bring them to bear on this nascent
threat. And to be sure, as it is with any threat, measures and countermeasures
will co-evolve in response to each other into perpetuity. We need active
capabilities to be effective in our efforts to safeguard social cohesion and
democratic politics. Our electoral integrity will increasingly be defined by
our ability to be effective – in real time – in this new terrain of political
contestation.
Having heard this talk, you may feel that it would be easy to
convince those who can help establish such a capability to throw their support
behind it. But we are faced with a situation where people are so overwhelmed by
the multiple ‘threats’ they are constantly bombarded with, that they have
become somewhat numbed, unable to clearly assess the threat before them.
We know that the internet, social media and mobile phones are
changing society, but we are in deep denial about the extent to which its reach
has rapidly grown. This is a very real threat. And as it is with elections;
once they are over and the winners and losers have been announced, it is
extremely difficult to roll back. There are no second chances, and the organizations
who have come before you here today are not merely interested in studying how these political disasters
occur retrospectively. Our central
objective is to insert ourselves into this space in real-time so that we can
play a meaningful role in actively protecting our democracy.
After many years of sacrifice, struggle and strife we emerged
with a hard won democracy; and we have seen – in recent years – what it takes
to safeguard it. What we must recognize,
at this crucial point in history, is that the terrain of contestation has changed, and we must adapt with it, or
face the consequences of lagging behind it.
Note: The author and speaker of this piece is the Executive Head of the Centre for Analytics and Behavioural Change (CABC NPO).
[1]
https://medium.com/dfrlab/electionwatch-american-bots-in-south-africa-1487a537bf59
[2]
https://medium.com/dfrlab/electionwatch-american-bots-in-south-africa-1487a537bf59
