Russia, Disinformation, and the Liberal Order

Through the prism of the first comprehensive account of RT, the Kremlin's primary tool of foreign propaganda, Russia, Disinformation and the Liberal Order sheds new light on the provenance and nature of disinformation's threat to democracy. Interrogating the communications strategies pursued by authoritarian states and grassroots populist movements, the book reveals the interlinked nature of today's global media-political pathologies. Stephen Hutchings, Vera Tolz, Precious Chatterje-Doody, Rhys Crilley, and Marie Gillespie provide a systematic investigation of RT's history, institutional culture, and journalistic ethos; its activities across multiple languages and media platforms; its audience targeting strategies and audiences' engagements with it; and its response to the war in Ukraine and associated bans on it. Their analysis challenges commonplace notions of disinformation as something that Russia does to the West, where passive publics are duped by the Kremlin's communications machine, and reveals the reciprocal processes through which Russia and disinformation infiltrate and challenge the liberal order. Russia, Disinformation and the Liberal Order provides provocative insights into the nature and extent of the challenge that Russia's propaganda operation poses to the West. The authors contend that the challenge will only be met if liberalism reflects on its own internal tensions and blind spots and defends the values of open-minded impartiality.