Ringing true? The persuasiveness of Russian strategic narratives

Abstract

International Relations (IR) scholars have theorized the significance of communication and messaging across state borders, using notions such as soft power, sharp power, propaganda and illiberal communication. This study contributes to this body of research by investigating narrative persuasiveness by way of a large-scale experimental exploration of narrative reception. The projection of strategic narratives has become a central feature of modern influencing across borders. Despite the existence of a growing literature on the potentially harmful effects of such narratives, however, their persuasiveness remains under-researched. This article seeks to help fill this gap by asking what might induce people in Sweden to side with strategic narratives projected by Sputnik, the Russian state-funded news media platform. The article puts a central component of Walter Fisher’s classic narrative paradigm to the test: the notions of narrative probability (consistency and coherence) and fidelity (previous life experience). In a rare large-scale survey experiment (N = 2,032), three narratives from Sputnik were presented to respondents to establish the potential perceived narrative probability and fidelity. Contrary to Fisher’s argument and some previous works on strategic narratives, the results show that people can be persuaded by a narrative without having personal experience of the topic, and despite regarding the text as incoherent. This indicates that information influence projected through strategic narratives can be effective regardless of the form of the message and even when introducing unfamiliar ideas. This is an interesting addition to findings in previous studies that source awareness does not negatively affect the effectiveness of strategic narratives. The article ends by highlighting contributions to previous research on persuasion and by suggesting avenues ahead.