Document details

Network Propaganda: Manipulation, Disinformation, and Radicalization in American Politics

New York, NY: Oxford University Press (2018), ix, 462 pp.

Contains index

ISBN 978-0-19-092363-1 (pbk); 978-0-19-092362-4 (hbk)

CC BY-NC-ND

"Analysing millions of news stories together with Twitter and Facebook shares, broadcast television and YouTube, the book provides a comprehensive overview of the architecture of contemporary American political communications. Through data analysis and detailed qualitative case studies of coverage of immigration, Clinton scandals, and the Trump Russia investigation, the book finds that the right-wing media ecosystem operates fundamentally differently than the rest of the media environment. The authors argue that longstanding institutional, political, and cultural patterns in American politics interacted with technological change since the 1970s to create a propaganda feedback loop in American conservative media. This dynamic has marginalized centre-right media and politicians, radicalized the right wing ecosystem, and rendered it susceptible to propaganda efforts, foreign and domestic. For readers outside the United States, the book offers a new perspective and methods for diagnosing the sources of, and potential solutions for, the perceived global crisis of democratic politics." (Publisher description)
I. MAPPING DISORDER
1 Epistemic crisis, 3
2 The architecture of our discontent, 45
3 The propaganda feedback loop, 75
IV. DYNAMICS OF NETWORK PROPAGANDA
4 Immigration and Islamophobia: Breitbart and the Trump Party, 105
5 The Fox diet, 145
6 Mainstream media failure modes and self-healing in a propaganda-rich environment, 189
III. THE USUAL SUSPECTS
7 The propaganda pipeline: hacking the core from the periphery, 225
8 Are the Russians coming? 235
9 Mammon's algorithm: marketing, manipulation, and clickbait on Facebook, 269
IV. CAN DEMOCRACY SURVIVE THE INTERNET?
10 Polarization in American politics, 295
11 The origins of asymmetry, 311
12 Can the Internet survive democracy? 341
13 What can men do against such reckless hate? 351
14 Conclusion, 381