tag:theconversation.com,2011:/es/topics/political-narratives-14957/articlesPolitical narratives – The Conversation2022-09-01T14:36:25Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1893322022-09-01T14:36:25Z2022-09-01T14:36:25ZWolf Warrior II: what the blockbuster movie tells us about China’s views on Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/482037/original/file-20220831-14-55nu1g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Action flick Wolf Warrior II is one of China's most commercially successful films ever.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Publicity still courtesy Wolf Warrior II/The H Collective/Well Go USA Entertainment</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Chinese film <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7131870/">Wolf Warrior II</a> (2017) has been a runaway success – even though it contains controversial expressions of Chinese nationalism and racist stereotypes of Africans. It is one of the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/robcain/2017/08/27/chinas-wolf-warrior-2-becomes-2nd-film-in-history-to-reach-800m-in-a-single-territory/?sh=1c0150483460">most commercially successful Chinese movies</a>, having grossed over US$800 million at the Chinese box office. Only Star Wars: The Force Awakens has performed better at the box office in a single territory. </p>
<p>The film tells the story of an exiled elite Chinese soldier who travels to an unnamed African country on a personal matter. He gets caught in the middle of a civil war between government troops and mercenaries. The hero rescues African and Chinese civilians and defeats the mercenaries.</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10304312.2022.2110567?journalCode=ccon20">recent analysis</a>, we argue that the movie does more than reproduce clichés from Hollywood action cinema. It is also an expression of how China sees its global status today, a status developed across its post-revolutionary and post-socialist periods from the mid 1970s. </p>
<p>Our study of the film identifies the historical precedents and ideological shifts within the nationalist discourse of “China in Africa”. We also provide contemporary contexts for the power dynamics between China and African nations.</p>
<h2>A new discourse on China and Africa</h2>
<p>The tide of westernisation sweeping China since the 1980s weakened its focus on African countries once considered allies. Media coverage of Africa dwindled in China. State media outlets such as Xinhua News Agency and the People’s Daily diminished their focus on Africa and the commercial ones found the continent “<a href="https://asq.africa.ufl.edu/files/v16a10_Li.pdf">not attractive enough to make a huge investment</a>”.</p>
<p>At the same time, the influx of western and Hollywood films filled the gap in the public perception of Africa. African countries, once portrayed as beacons of modernity, began to be shown as having poor, lagging economies. This is evident in the scenes of slums and the plots of war and plague in the fictional Africa in Wolf Warrior II. </p>
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<p>Since 2010, China’s Africa engagement has entered a new phase. It is centred on the <a href="https://www.oecd.org/finance/Chinas-Belt-and-Road-Initiative-in-the-global-trade-investment-and-finance-landscape.pdf">Belt and Road Initiative</a>, which promotes infrastructure development in more than 150 countries in the world. The historical narrative of friendship between China and Africa has reappeared in mainstream national media in China. It’s getting renewed attention due to economic incentives in the form of the <a href="https://issafrica.org/chapter-1-introduction-focac-and-africa">Forum on China-Africa Cooperation</a>, a platform established by the Chinese government to strengthen its multilateral economic relations with African countries.</p>
<p>The caricatured representations of Africa in Wolf Warrior II comprise a patchwork of memories from different historical periods. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Africa was commonly represented in China as a close “third world” brother. The 1980s to the 2000s presented Africa as a poor stranger. Finally, in the 2010s Africa is a business partner of the Belt and Road Initiative. </p>
<h2>China in Africa</h2>
<p>These different narratives can sometimes overlap. The movie brings together a montage of elements like Somali pirates, Ebola, impoverished townships in South Africa, and the Libyan Civil War. This creates a pan-African stereotype that serves mainly to support China’s nationalistic imagination of the rise of the country as a global leader. </p>
<p>Similarly, elements of China-Africa relations from different historical periods are used to create a benevolent role for China in Africa. The film depicts friendship and aid, poverty-stricken Africa, and the leadership of China in the global south. Such depictions of a “generous” China cloud the unequal power relations embedded in the Belt and Road Initiative relationship. </p>
<p>In Wolf Warrior II, China is a beacon of hope, development and peace in Africa. A lead female character, for example, discovers the cure for a fatal disease. A Chinese owned factory provides jobs and asylum during scenes of conflict. In the film, the Chinese government exercises diplomatic generosity by accepting an official request for military assistance from the local government to fight the rebels.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A movie poster showing a collage of action and explosions, a Chinese man holds a gun at the centre of the image." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=843&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=843&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=843&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1059&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1059&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482027/original/file-20220831-22-pzawkk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1059&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wolf Warrior II/The H Collective/Well Go USA Entertainment</span></span>
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<p>This benevolence is presented in contrast to absentee American and bloodthirsty European mercenaries. As academics have <a href="https://u.osu.edu/mclc/online-series/liu-rofel/">observed</a>, Wolf Warrior II appears to present “a new master race that has arrived to displace the whites as the new saviour of an ‘Africa’ ravaged by civil war, political chaos, starvation, and deadly disease”. As the representative of this “master race”, the lead character, Feng, becomes a messianic figure. Speaking about incarcerated Chinese and African workers, he claims, “I was born for them.” The film closes with Feng holding up the Chinese flag, leading survivors of conflict on a truck to a UN sanctuary.</p>
<h2>Conclusion</h2>
<p>It has been five years since the release of Wolf Warrior II. Yet the nationalism and racism seen in the film have not faded within China. Indeed they have grown stronger, especially on social media in China. </p>
<p>Against this backdrop, the “China in Africa” shown in Wolf Warrior II seems to fall back once again on the Third World Alliance of the Maoist era. But the regional inequality between China and African countries goes well beyond Cold War-era relations. </p>
<p>Rather, Wolf Warrior II dramatises emerging political and economic relations within the global south that are likely to generate new variations of the “China in Africa” narrative. These answer to a much more complicated political and economic role for China in the post-pandemic era that foresees a new divided world order.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/189332/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>China is seen as Africa’s saviour and friend in the film - which is still full of racist stereotypes.Yu Xiang, Assistant Professor, Shanghai UniversityJinpu Wang, Doctoral Researcher, Department of Sociology, Syracuse UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1292112020-01-10T13:44:12Z2020-01-10T13:44:12ZWe’re living in the bizarre world that Flaubert envisioned<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309128/original/file-20200108-107231-19814z9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=32%2C25%2C2132%2C1476&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'I want to produce such an impression of utter weariness and ennui that my readers will imagine the book could only have been written by a cretin,' Flaubert wrote.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/gustave-flaubert-gustave-flaubert-schriftsteller-frankreich-news-photo/537138071?adppopup=true">Photo by Nadar / ullstein bild via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Are we all trapped in a live-action version of Flaubert’s “Madame Bovary”?</p>
<p>The Jan. 3 assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani was followed by a torrent of contradictory narratives.</p>
<p>Was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/01/06/trumps-order-kill-soleimani-is-already-starting-backfire/">Soleimani planning to attack Americans</a>? What about Vice President Mike Pence’s <a href="https://apnews.com/eba793fad25f603b0fbdfa31d59118db">erroneous assertion that Soleimani was involved in 9/11</a>? Or was the plan all along to withdraw troops, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/leaked-letter-sparks-concerns-of-us-troop-withdrawal-from-iraq-2020-1">as a letter accidentally sent</a> to the Iraqi government suggested?</p>
<p>Was Trump simply trying <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/warren-reasonable-to-ask-if-trump-s-iran-strike-is-a-distraction-from-impeachment-1.8370699">to distract from his impeachment trial</a>? Was the attack <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/04/us/politics/trump-suleimani.html">the knee-jerk decision</a> of <a href="https://twitter.com/gtconway3d/status/1214715575622086657">a malignant narcissist</a>? Or was it a reasonable response <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/e293ad92-d894-11e9-8f9b-77216ebe1f17">following months of Iranian provocations</a>?</p>
<p>Were Democrats <a href="https://twitter.com/AaronBlake/status/1214890596135030785">mourning Soleimani’s death</a>? Or were <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/1/3/21048098/iran-qassem-soleimani-ndaa-2019-vote-ro-khanna-aumf">they also responsible for the attack</a>? </p>
<p>Each burst of accusations and justifications has elicited a flood of public responses, expert opinions and efforts to correct a record full of hostilities and absurdities. </p>
<p>Many might feel bewildered and demoralized. But fans of the 19th-century French novel have seen this before.</p>
<p>In a 1852 letter, French author Gustave Flaubert <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=0DBGvhtXUzoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=a+world+abandoned+by+god&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiUt7qv4LzmAhWaBs0KHQFyD_wQ6AEwAHoECAQQAg#v=onepage&q=a%20world%20abandoned%20by%20god&f=false">mused</a>, “When will we write the facts from the point of view of a cosmic joke, that is as God sees them from on high?”</p>
<p>He answered his own question in his 1857 novel, “<a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Madame_Bovary.html?id=Cg5CwY-GAl0C">Madame Bovary</a>,” which he published during the regime of Napoleon III – the French president whose autocratic ambitions were aided by a swirl of misinformation and warring political factions.</p>
<h2>When language loses all meaning</h2>
<p><a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/A_World_Abandoned_by_God.html?id=0DBGvhtXUzoC&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button">As I’ve previously written</a>, “Madame Bovary” traffics in deliberate meaninglessness, or, as literary critic Leo Bersani <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=P9NBAAAAIAAJ&q=bersani+balzac+to+beckett&dq=bersani+balzac+to+beckett&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwii6JuJg9TmAhXmtlkKHf88ABUQ6AEwAHoECAIQAg">put it</a>, the “arbitrary, insignificant, inexpressive nature of language.”</p>
<p>The main character, Emma Bovary, has devoured romantic novels and is disillusioned by a provincial existence that has proven dull. Her search for excitement and escape leads to adulterous disasters and financial ruin.</p>
<p>That’s a common enough premise, but what makes “Madame Bovary” unique is its insistence on the unreliability of narratives, phrases, descriptions and words. All the characters, from the callow manipulators to the well-meaning dullards, are awash in cliché. Emma and her future lover, Léon, declare that they love sunsets by the seaside, though neither has been to the ocean. The pharmacist Homais counsels prudence to others, though no one listens, and he himself is ruthlessly ambitious; the novel ends with him receiving the cross of the Legion of Honor. Léon tells Emma that he wanted to be buried in a rug she gave him, though the narrator reveals that this is false. </p>
<p>It isn’t even that everyone in the novel lies; some earnest characters really mean what they say. The problem is that language itself has had the meaning drained out of it by a combination of insincerity, repetition and bombast. In a famous scene at an agricultural fair, the audience of attentive townspeople hangs on every word of <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=WtomKs0j8kUC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Madame+ovary&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjZ7uLyw-vmAhVDrp4KHbw7CLwQ6AEIJzAA#v=snippet&q=Tigers&f=false">a mind-numbing, meandering speech about crops</a>: “Here we have the vine, there we have the cider apple, further on we have cheese, and flax!” </p>
<p>When the fireworks planned for the event’s grand finale sputter out, the newspaper nonetheless reports that they went off without a hitch, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=WtomKs0j8kUC&printsec=frontcover&dq=madame+bovary&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiav9eb8N3mAhXNKs0KHeDrBzQQ6AEwAHoECAMQAg#v=snippet&q=transported%20into%20the&f=false">describing them</a> as a “veritable kaleidoscope, a true stage-setting for an opera.” No one cares that the description is made up. </p>
<p>The ultimate punchline of Flaubert’s cosmic joke is that the narrator himself is a master of subtle confusion. He starts the story in the first person, positioning himself as a schoolmate of Emma’s husband, before changing abruptly to the third person. Some of his accounts are straightforward and dispassionate. Others are entirely confounding. Descriptions of a boy’s cap, a wedding cake and a medical device are so detailed – and yet so baffling – that readers find themselves unable to even imagine what they might look like.</p>
<p>“I want to produce such an impression of utter weariness and ennui,” <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=rAoaAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA393&lpg=PA393&dq=I+want+to+produce+such+an+impression+of+utter+weariness+and+ennui+that+my+readers+will+imagine+the+book+could+only+have+been+written+by+a+cretin&source=bl&ots=y2K9xXAaPQ&sig=ACfU3U2dChMqif5i4DALvljbYSmpsjyMDw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjY49GW3bzmAhUvWN8KHalbC7cQ6AEwAHoECAoQAQ#v=onepage&q=I%20want%20to%20produce%20such%20an%20impression%20of%20utter%20weariness%20and%20ennui%20that%20my%20readers%20will%20imagine%20the%20book%20could%20only%20have%20been%20written%20by%20a%20cretin&f=false">Flaubert later wrote</a> in the plans for a subsequent literary project, “that my readers will imagine the book could only have been written by a cretin.”</p>
<h2>France in political turmoil</h2>
<p>Flaubert didn’t write “Madame Bovary” in a vacuum. As he was starting the novel in 1851, elected President Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte was staging the coup d’état that would transform him from president to emperor. </p>
<p>Bonaparte gave his followers important positions, reminded soldiers of their oath of “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=j9lZAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA436&dq=napoleon+soldiers+%22passive+obedience%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi_6rOe-_HmAhWm1FkKHZOKBXIQ6AEwAHoECAAQAg#v=onepage&q=napoleon%20soldiers%20%22passive%20obedience%22&f=false">passive obedience</a>” and crushed <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=JbnWCwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=napoleon+coup+parliamentarian+revolt&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjrhsy1-_HmAhULzlkKHUeHBrUQ6AEwAXoECAEQAg#v=onepage&q=napoleon%20coup%20parliamentarian%20revolt&f=false">parliamentarian revolts and rural insurrections</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309146/original/file-20200108-107261-lrejtx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309146/original/file-20200108-107261-lrejtx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=936&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309146/original/file-20200108-107261-lrejtx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=936&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309146/original/file-20200108-107261-lrejtx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=936&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309146/original/file-20200108-107261-lrejtx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1176&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309146/original/file-20200108-107261-lrejtx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1176&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309146/original/file-20200108-107261-lrejtx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1176&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Portrait of Napoleon III.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/99/Franz_Xaver_Winterhalter_Napoleon_III.jpg/384px-Franz_Xaver_Winterhalter_Napoleon_III.jpg">Napoleonic Museum</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Roughly 10,000 political opponents <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=5cSEpZMwFp4C&pg=PA111&dq=napoleon+coup+victor+hugo&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiVysPE-_HmAhUwwFkKHYF_ALgQ6AEwBnoECAkQAg#v=onepage&q=napoleon%20coup%20victor%20hugo&f=false">were deported to penal colonies</a>. Victor Hugo, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=X9_nxmc4QJAC&pg=PA135&dq=napoleon+coup+victor+hugo&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiVysPE-_HmAhUwwFkKHYF_ALgQ6AEwA3oECAEQAg#v=onepage&q=napoleon%20coup%20victor%20hugo&f=false">a staunch opponent of the coup</a>, fled to Brussels, while Alexis de Tocqueville retired from political life <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=UXkJ0gvjS0AC&pg=PA903&dq=Alexis+de+Tocqueville+retired+from+political+life+to+avoid+joining+the+regime&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi17dav_PHmAhVKrVkKHfLGBgQQ6AEwA3oECAEQAg#v=onepage&q=Alexis%20de%20Tocqueville%20retired%20from%20political%20life%20to%20avoid%20joining%20the%20regime&f=false">to avoid joining the regime</a>. </p>
<p>French citizens found themselves bewildered and disoriented. Journalist and politician Eugène Ténot, writing an account of the coup in 1868, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=XJTSAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Paris+in+December,+1851:+Or,+The+Coup+D%27t%CC%81at+of+Napoleon+III.&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjz_tGsmdnmAhXBVt8KHVjrB1sQ6AEwAHoECAAQAg#v=onepage&q=Paris%20in%20December%2C%201851%3A%20Or%2C%20The%20Coup%20D't%CC%81at%20of%20Napoleon%20III.&f=false">warned readers</a> that “no truthful narrative of that event has been published in France.” He also remarked that “narratives written in troubled times are always imbued with partiality, exaggeration, injustice, even bad faith.” </p>
<p>In an open letter published in December 1851, Bonaparte announced the dissolution of the National Assembly, <a href="https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k4492967/f1.item.r=napoleon.zoom">which he called</a> a “hotbed of conspiracies.” In January 1852 he put in place a new constitution, <a href="https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k5688240b/f4.item.r=%22fausses%20nouvelles%22">all the while accusing</a> “démagogues” of spreading “fausses nouvelles” (“fake news”). In December 1852, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte became Napoléon III. France’s Second Empire commenced. </p>
<p>Described as “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&id=OLwOAQAAMAAJ&dq=second+empire+burchell&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=modern+dictator">the first modern dictator</a>” and “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=W0ktX_xI1fYC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Events+that+Changed+the+World+in+the+Nineteenth+Century&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj06vOnsdHmAhWHjVkKHQtxBBoQ6AEwAHoECAYQAg#v=onepage&q=Events%20that%20Changed%20the%20World%20in%20the%20Nineteenth%20Century&f=false">one of the first modern leaders to rule by propaganda</a>,” Bonaparte went from being France’s first elected president to its last emperor. The Second Empire lasted until 1870, when the emperor, conscious of his declining popularity, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Franco-German-War">declared war on Prussia</a> – and lost. </p>
<h2>Echoes today</h2>
<p>France’s political upheaval, misinformation wars, sporadic uprisings and public confusion likely left a deep impression on Flaubert.</p>
<p>Americans today might sympathize with his characters, who exist in an endless vortex of repetition, insincerity and stupidity.</p>
<p>Recent technological advances are partially to blame.</p>
<p>Over the past decade, abundant research has emerged on <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/digital-altruism/201308/media-saturation-your-health">media oversaturation</a>, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=K4r6DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA151&lpg=PA151&dq=narrative+overload&source=bl&ots=4-UwMgpxoy&sig=ACfU3U2pVePHN_qYqHF3JRliGnRKeU0VqA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj89-LfsbvmAhVNpFkKHRyEDm4Q6AEwEnoECAoQAQ#v=onepage&q=narrative%20overload&f=false">narrative overload</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/exposed-to-a-deluge-of-digital-photos-were-feeling-the-psychological-effects-of-image-overload-52562">the deluge of digital images</a> – and what this does to the brain. Incessant stimuli and distractions lead to memory impairment, confusion and troubles with retention.</p>
<p>These conditions are ripe for political warfare.</p>
<p>In his 2014 book “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=STtuBAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=the+contradictions+of+media+power&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwitm7mqn9zmAhWFylkKHawiAS0Q6AEwAHoECAQQAg#v=onepage&q=the%20contradictions%20of%20media%20power&f=false">The Contradictions of Media Power</a>,” media studies professor Das Freedman wrote that, in times of political instability, “existing narratives are under stress and audiences themselves are actively seeking out new perspectives.” Information wars and fake news seem to be endemic during times of political upheaval.</p>
<p>In many ways, we’re living out an extreme version of the cosmic joke Flaubert envisioned. </p>
<p>A continual stream of tedious lies, meaningless clichés and empty grandstanding has disillusioned Americans just as much as it confounded Emma Bovary. Lieuvain’s boring, bizarre address at the agricultural fair has its modern equivalents – think of Trump’s <a href="https://factba.se/transcript/donald-trump-speech-kag-rally-battle-creek-mi-december-18-2019">meandering rally speeches</a>, or his complaints about <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/12/27/791707318/trump-vs-toilets-and-showers-dishwashers-and-light-bulbs">toilet flushing</a> and <a href="https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/apr/08/donald-trump/republicans-dismiss-trumps-windmill-and-cancer-cla/">cancer-causing windmills</a>. Republican Congressman Devin Nunes <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/03/19/ridiculousness-devin-nunes-suing-devin-nunes-cow-what-it-really-signals/">is currently suing a fictitious cow for defamation</a>, while the president’s supporters applauded the statement that there was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/11/27/trumps-claim-war-thanksgiving-is-absurd-also-sinister/">a war on “Thanksgiving</a>.” </p>
<p>With the assassination of Soleimani, disregard for truth and reality – and examples of Madame Bovary-esque word salad – remains as blatant as ever. Mike Pence’s reference to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/01/03/pences-problematic-tweet-tying-qasem-soleimani/">Soleimani’s involvement in 9/11</a> is as detached from reality as Emma’s vision of Roman ruins bordering a forest of tigers, camels, swans, sultans and English ladies. </p>
<p>The flood of narrative confusion continues unabated. Only time will tell if Iran becomes the Prussia of 21st-century America.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susanna Lee does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Is a 19th-century French author’s cosmic joke turning into a real-life global nightmare?Susanna Lee, Professor of French and Comparative Literature, Georgetown UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/759652017-04-12T00:38:46Z2017-04-12T00:38:46ZIn the wake of Syrian missile strike, a look inside Russia’s alternate media reality<p>On April 11, the White House <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/11/world/middleeast/russia-syria-chemical-weapons-white-house.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news">released an intelligence report</a> accusing Russia of trying to cover up the use of chemical weapons by Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad through a global disinformation campaign replete with “false narratives.” </p>
<p>As a professor of Soviet history with an interest in media studies, I’ve been following Russia’s response to the chemical attack and subsequent U.S. missile strike – the various television and print news stories, tweets and analyses put forth by Russia’s domestic and international media outlets.</p>
<p>Together, they’re reflective a larger Russian information strategy: Stress a unified message at home but sow discord abroad. </p>
<h2>Jumping to the wrong conclusion</h2>
<p>Inside Russia, all state-run media outlets and many independent ones are emphasizing that the Trump administration has wrongfully (or at least prematurely) condemned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for being behind the April 4 attack; has taken military action overseas without congressional or U.N. authorization; and has indirectly helped terrorists by damaging an airbase essential to fighting ISIS.</p>
<p>Their stories echo positions championed by the Russian government. When news of the chemical attack broke, a spokesman for the Ministry of Defense <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB-6_MQDpoM">posted a YouTube video</a> explaining that the Syrian Air Force hadn’t dropped chemical bombs on civilians. Rather, it had destroyed a warehouse where militants – unbeknownst to the Syrian government – were producing land mines packed with toxic chemicals.</p>
<p>And after the U.S. missile strike, the Russian Foreign Ministry <a href="http://www.mid.ru/ru/foreign_policy/news/-/asset_publisher/cKNonkJE02Bw/content/id/2721218">published a report</a> detailing numerous cases in which (it claims) terrorist groups have deployed chemical weapons and then blamed Assad. </p>
<h2>What about Mosul?</h2>
<p>Meanwhile, Russia’s Kremlin-funded, English language media, intended for a foreign audience, are echoing these claims, but with a twist. </p>
<p>With its slogan “Question More,” the international television agency Russia Today (RT) is promising to expose its viewers to certain “truths” of the Syrian story that, it says, are being clouded by Western spin. </p>
<p>For example, RT’s English website <a href="https://www.rt.com/op-edge/384041-syria-war-attack-trump-criminal/">published an editorial</a> deploring the “absolutely psychopathic knee-jerk reaction” of Western media in voicing immediate support for the U.S. decision to retaliate against Assad through military action. </p>
<p>In particular, RT is emphasizing the difference between the international outrage over civilians killed in Syria’s recent chemical weapons attack, compared to what it casts as the Western world’s relatively subdued response <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/03/voices-concern-high-civilian-deaths-mosul-170325111006277.html">to the deaths of between 150 and 200 Iraqi noncombatants</a> in a U.S.-led bombing raid on Mosul in mid-March.</p>
<p>“Media, officials react to Syria ‘toxic attack,’ not to Iraqi deaths,” read an RT graphic this weekend that scrolled across multiple TV reports.</p>
<h2>Show us the evidence!</h2>
<p>“Show us the evidence” was another mantra of the weekend, with networks pointing to “suspicious” American reliance on secret information to implicate Assad. </p>
<p>Between stories, the network repeatedly ran a montage of U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley holding up pictures of young children killed in the chemical attack, followed by a soundbite of President Trump referring to the “beautiful babies cruelly murdered” in Khan Sheikhoun. The sequence then cut to a shot of former Secretary of State Colin Powell speaking to the U.N. Security Council in 2003 and holding up a vial of powder (meant to resemble anthrax), followed by a soundbite of former President George W. Bush warning of Iraq’s vast stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. </p>
<p>Such a montage aims to remind viewers that U.S. “evidence” of Iraqi WMDs was inaccurate, and subsequently deemed a massive intelligence failure. Further, it suggests that U.S. government officials can – and do – use images to play on the emotions of citizens and conceal lack of concrete proof. </p>
<p>“When we see heart-wrenching images of dying children on our TV screen, it’s hard not to be moved,” a voice off-camera intones. “But we should ask ourselves – are our better instincts being manipulated?”</p>
<h2>Souring on Trump</h2>
<p>And then there’s Trump. During the presidential campaign, most Russian media outlets were <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-media-outlets-from-around-the-world-are-reacting-to-the-presidential-campaign-66263">staunchly opposed to Hillary Clinton</a>. They often mocked Trump’s various foibles, but when he was elected, the Russian Parliament <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-wins-us-election-russia-putin-result-a7406866.html">burst into applause</a>. Since then, he’s been consistently portrayed as a successful pragmatist, <a href="http://fortune.com/2017/02/18/donald-trump-russia-vladimir-putin/">a leader with whom the Kremlin could do business</a>. </p>
<p>Now some in Russia are branding him a <a href="http://izvestia.ru/news/678596?utm_source=TW">crazy cowboy</a>.</p>
<p>“Trump – more insane and dangerous than Obama?” one analyst <a href="https://twitter.com/delyagin/status/851361633469444099">queried</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"851361633469444099"}"></div></p>
<p>Even Echo Moscow, an independent radio station and staunch critic of the Russian government, <a href="http://echo.msk.ru/blog/day_photo/1959512-echo/">tweeted</a> as its “photo of the day” a caricature originally published by the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. In it, Trump smiles and shoots a mini-missile. The heading reads: “This April, let’s just do whatever we please.”</p>
<p>Other sources cast Trump as a great manipulator, trying to win over critics appalled by his earlier rhetoric of nonintervention. Many suggest that he’s attempting to appear tough on Russia just as he’s facing congressional scrutiny for his administration’s alleged Russian ties. </p>
<p>“He’s not the not the first president to use war to deflect from a troubled domestic situation,” a scripted RT piece declared, flashing to a picture of former U.S. President Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky. </p>
<h2>‘Question More’ – if you’re not Russian</h2>
<p>Such coverage of Trump illustrates how Russia’s international media policy expands on its domestic one. </p>
<p>Inside Russia, propaganda functions in a more familiar way, <a href="https://themoscowtimes.com/articles/how-the-kremlin-and-the-media-ended-up-in-bed-together-44663">with a government bureaucracy working to ensure</a> that the country’s three major television stations – Channel One, Rossiya and NTV – produce a united political message about a strong Russian state. (The Kremlin watchdogs are so careful to protect Vladimir Putin’s image that they recently <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-bans-image-of-vladimir-putin-in-makeup/">made it illegal</a> to circulate altered pictures of the Russian president wearing makeup.) </p>
<p>But RT – the international network – is ecumenical in its criticism, rather than rote. The network invites guests from all sides, with varying degrees of legitimacy, to air their views. Essentially, they provide a forum to sow almost any kind of doubt about the American status quo. It’s not about controlling a message as much as it is about confusing whatever messages are put out by Western – especially American – authorities. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/ICA_2017_01.pdf">Labeled by U.S. intelligence organizations as a Russian propaganda weapon</a>, RT nevertheless casts itself as a voice dedicated to helping viewers become less gullible media consumers. <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/jimwaterson/russia-today-says-it-wants-to-help-facebook-combat-fake-news?utm_term=.rvdZ5Rdww#.mhrQdJjWW">It has even volunteered</a> to help Facebook fight “fake news.”</p>
<p>If it is a weapon, then, it operates by encouraging a lack of trust in the institutions and ideals of a Western-led world order, all under the guise of independent thinking. At the same time, its anchors are quick to shut down or redirect any statements that call Russia’s actions into question. When, for example, CNN <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/07/world/syria-military-strikes-donald-trump-russia/">ran a story</a> about a Pentagon investigation into possible Russian knowledge of Assad’s chemical attack, RT mentioned CNN’s coverage – but only as an example of Western bias. </p>
<p>U.S. and Russian journalists both claim to champion the right to criticize, to challenge authority and to investigate potential wrongdoing. However, only one country’s major media outlets seem interested in holding leaders accountable to the same degree both at home and abroad. Dependent on Kremlin patronage, Russia’s domestic media, with a few courageous exceptions, work to reinforce Kremlin power.</p>
<p>RT goes a step further, seeking to turn the strengths of liberal democracy into vulnerabilities. Its programming demonstrates how the right to question authority – an essential pillar of an open society – can also be “weaponized” by those who are prepared to exploit freedom of speech to undermine their rivals.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/75965/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Cynthia Hooper does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A Russian media expert spent the weekend consuming Russian coverage of America’s response to the chemical attacks in Syria.Cynthia Hooper, Associate Professor of History, College of the Holy CrossLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/374072015-02-12T20:45:12Z2015-02-12T20:45:12ZCalls for clear political narratives ultimately demand greater honesty<p>Whenever an Australian government runs into trouble we hear calls for a clearer narrative. The latest contribution comes in a <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/comment/coalition-needs-a-heart-transplant-not-a-facelift-20150205-136hjx.html">thoughtful article</a> from Waleed Aly.</p>
<p>Aly points to the similar undermining of our last three prime ministers, all of whom seemed unable to combine public trust with the respect of their colleagues. And all of whom, he argues, sacrificed principles for short-term expediency.</p>
<p>Tony Abbott won office because of the seeming dysfunction of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd governments, having held his party together through the repetition of simplistic slogans and <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-05-07/abbott-promises-no-cuts-to-education-health/5436224">promises to maintain government programs</a>, which are now under threat.</p>
<p>This tactic has paid off handsomely for oppositions across the country. The exception is the South Australian Liberals, who failed to unseat the <a href="https://theconversation.com/labor-lives-to-fight-another-day-in-south-australia-24222">Labor government</a> last year. It follows the pattern across Western democracies; the only major political survivor is German Chancellor <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/07/ten-reasons-angela-merkel-germany-chancellor-world-most-powerful-woman">Angela Merkel</a>, who has held office since 2005.</p>
<p>Such longevity now seems almost an aberration; maybe many Australians support the monarchy from a sense that it survives the short-term nature of the political process. Calls for a convincing narrative are common across the Western world, as traditional political parties struggle to reposition themselves in a rapidly changing environment.</p>
<h2>Parties struggle for consistency</h2>
<p>Australian political parties emerged as essentially class-based. Labor, centred in the unionised workforce, faced a series of conservative parties representing business, which were able to appeal to those who identified as middle class and maintain an alliance with the rural-based Nationals. Since the Second World War no minor parties have been able to break the dominant story of politics as built around class and the role of the state, though the Greens have come closest.</p>
<p>As the workforce has changed radically – more women, fewer blue-collar workers, an expansion of service jobs and small businesses – so too has the nature of political discourse. An increasingly complex society demands more of the state while the dominant language of neoliberalism means constant pressure to reduce taxes and the ability of governments to deliver.</p>
<p>The Hawke-Keating Labor governments introduced a number of neoliberal measures, but with some concern to maintain safety nets and keep the union movement on side. The Howard Coalition government was able to introduce a GST, one of the most far-reaching tax reforms of the past few decades. But it <a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2007/09/21/south-korea-versus-australia-our-pathetic-savings-record/?wpmp_switcher=mobile">squandered much of the gain</a> from the minerals boom in unnecessary perks for well-off voters.</p>
<p>The call for new narratives is in effect a call for greater honesty about the role of the state. Treasurer Joe Hockey touched on this when <a href="https://theconversation.com/hockeys-first-budget-redefines-the-role-of-government-in-australia-26573">he declared</a> the <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/national/the-end-of-the-age-of-entitlement-20120419-1x8vj.html">“age of entitlement”</a> over. Yet he then failed to acknowledge that a balanced budget requires far greater cuts to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/to-cut-fairly-commission-of-audit-should-look-at-tax-expenditures-23769">benefits built into our tax system</a> – for example, superannuation tax breaks and negative gearing – than his constituency would wear.</p>
<h2>Reducing the big issues to individual impact</h2>
<p>Thirty years of neoliberal rhetoric has poisoned political discussion, by reducing major issues to immediate impact on individual incomes. Abbott’s sustained <a href="https://theconversation.com/abbotts-big-victory-on-carbon-tax-has-a-tart-taste-29327">attack on the carbon tax</a>, which was designed to help combat climate change, drowned out sensible discussion of the bigger issues. </p>
<p>Labor is following suit in not acknowledging that to maintain and improve government programs will require a major overhaul of taxation. While the Gillard government took some important steps towards shifting the balance, particularly through the national disability scheme and greater funding for schools, she failed to explain clearly that this would require greater government revenue.</p>
<p>The current Coalition government has sought to spell out the costs, but its solutions are so clearly short term and biased in favour of the well-off that they have backfired.</p>
<p>Menzies and Howard benefited from a growing economy, which allowed them to satisfy their supporters without inflicting too much pain. With an ageing population and a slowing global economy, it is less clear how a party deeply connected with the interests of business can retract some of its most unpopular promises and pay for increasing demands on government.</p>
<p>A Labor narrative would involve a coherent defence of the continuing role of the state. This would be, in effect, a return to the ALP’s social democratic roots (as Andrew Scott <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-can-learn-a-lot-about-public-policy-from-the-nordic-nations-32204">has argued</a> in his book <a href="http://www.challengemagazine.com.au/northern_lights_the_positive_policy_example_of_sweden_finland_denmark_and_norway">Northern Lights</a>). Not only has the ALP ceded important moral ground to the Greens – especially in the case of asylum seekers – but the party has failed to construct a meaningful story about creating a better society which voters might trust.</p>
<p>For both sides a better narrative means more than a set of specific policies and promises of government savings and reform. It means restoring trust in the ability of government to deliver what we cannot deliver for ourselves. And that requires a defence of the public sphere, which <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-price-the-public-good-when-governing-parties-bow-to-markets-37046">neither side seems able to articulate</a>.</p>
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<p><em>Other articles in The Conversation’s ongoing series, “New Politics”, can be read <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/new-politics">here</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/37407/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dennis Altman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Whenever an Australian government runs into trouble we hear calls for a clearer narrative. The latest contribution comes in a thoughtful article from Waleed Aly. Aly points to the similar undermining of…Dennis Altman, Professorial Fellow in Human Security, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.