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Is the Internet Eroding Europe's Middle Ground?

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Is the Internet Eroding Europe's Middle Ground? ESPAS Foresight Reflection Paper Series March 2018 Is the Internet Eroding Europe’s Middle Ground? Public Opinion, Polarisation and New Technologies Tim Dixon and Míriam Juan-Torres AN INTER-INSTITUTIONAL EU PROJECT Disclaimer This publication was prepared for the European Political Strategy Centre (EPSC) in the context of the forthcoming European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS) Global Trends to 2030 Report. The views expressed in this publication represent only the views of the authors. This publication does not bind, nor may be attributed to, any of the European Union institutions and bodies participating in ESPAS, namely the European Commission, the European Parliament, the General Secretariat of the Council of the EU and the European External Action Service, as well as the Committee of the Regions, the European Economic and Social Committee and the European Investment Bank. Table of Contents Foreword 3 Executive Summary 4 1. Introduction 5 2. Polarisation in Europe 6 2.1. What is polarisation? 6 2.2. Reasons for perceptions of increasing polarisation 7 3. Social Media and Public Opinion Trends 8 3.1. The transformation of information creation and dissemination 8 3.2. Does social media intensify polarisation? 9 3.3. Social media and the mainstreaming of extreme positions 10 3.4. Algorithms and the business models of social media 11 4. Public Opinion in Europe 12 4.1. Differentiated attitudinal segments 12 4.2. The conflicted middle in Germany, France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom 14 5. Immigration, Identity, and the Context of the Conflicted Middle in Europe 16 5.1 The salience of identity, immigration, and cultural debates 16 5.2. The underlying drivers for the identity concerns of conflicted middle groups 18 5.2.1. Economic insecurities 18 5.2.2. Anxiety about cultural change 19 5.2.3. Fear of crime and terrorism 19 5.2.4 Declining trust in institutions and democracy 20 6. Future Scenarios 21 7. Conclusion 22 About the authors Tim Dixon is a co-founder of More in Common and also co-founder and Managing Director of Purpose Europe. He trained as an economist and lawyer, and during his career has worked for two Australian Prime Ministers as senior economic adviser and chief speechwriter. Since 2011, he has worked on building new social movement initiatives on a wide range of issues including modern slavery, the Syrian crisis, gun control in the United States and the Colombian peace process. Míriam Juan-Torres is More in Common’s Research Coordinator and Senior Researcher. A multidisciplinary researcher, Míriam has conducted field studies in West Africa and worked for UNHCR in Ghana and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Colombia. Míriam obtained a master’s degree in global affairs from Yale University and is also a qualified lawyer in Spain, where she worked in public law for the firm Baker & McKenzie. The authors want to acknowledge the contributions by Laurence Heijbroek, researcher at More in Common. More in Common acknowledges the support of the European Union through the European Political Strategy Centre in funding the preparation of this research paper under technical offer EPSC/2017/NP/22 2 In this report, Tim Dixon, Co-founder of More in Foreword Common and Managing Director of Purpose Europe, and Míriam Juan-Torres, Senior Researcher and Research Over the past three decades, scholarly and popular Coordinator at More in Common, present the research discourse has enthused that the internet and new that they have been undertaking in a number of EU digital technologies would ‘wire the world’, inevitably Member States. They present their findings and insights increasing and improving free and open democratic into how and why new narratives of identity, belonging deliberation, transparency, access to information and and ‘othering’ are gaining traction, facilitated by the participation. Today, as digital media play an increasing spread of digital media. role in public debates and politics, there is a growing need to understand how these may be impacting The hope is that these findings can be used to support democracy, and whether they are contributing to more effective decision-making at EU level by feeding polarisation within our liberal societies. into the forthcoming ‘Global Trends to 2030’ report that is being prepared by the European Strategy and Policy Yet there is still limited research on whether and how Analysis System (ESPAS). ESPAS is an inter-institutional digital media – and social media in particular – are collaboration among the officials of the European impacting on the notions of identity and belonging; Commission, the European Parliament, the Council how they may be used to sway public opinion; or of the EU, and the European External Action Service, whether they are intensifying existing cleavages in with the support of the Committee of the Regions, the public attitudes. Information is particularly scarce given European Economic and Social Committee, and the that these are not only relatively new phenomena but European Investment Bank which monitors global trends also ones that are changing dynamically and evolving and offers strategic foresight to the EU’s decision- at extremely fast pace. There is thus an urgent need makers. for more research in this field. The societal impacts of emerging technologies and digital techniques need to By Ruby Gropas, be studied against the background of economic and Leader of the Social Affairs Team cultural insecurity, and of decline in trust in established European Political Strategy Centre national institutions such as parliaments, governments and traditional media that we are witnessing today. For these reasons, the European Political Strategy Centre commissioned a report to investigate whether and how the Internet and new digital technologies are influencing public opinion and polarising our societies. The aim is to distil recent events, identify trends and contribute to new policy insights. 3 • Extreme right actors, largely motivated by cultural Executive Summary narratives, coordinate internationally for resourcing and operational support. Their sources of funding and geo-locatable online traffic reveal cross-border Within Europe, public debate has become increasingly • cooperation. concerned with issues of identity, belonging and threats associated with ‘out-groups’ (such as • Extreme right actors carry out targeted online immigrants and refugees). These issues are the focus information and disinformation campaigns and of many insurgent populist parties, which are shaping psychological operations to promote campaigns and debates in many countries across Europe. shift the public’s attitudes. Reportedly, they are increasingly developing playbooks to share know- When asked to identify the most important issue • how. facing Europe, survey respondents in 2017 gave the highest rankings to terrorism and immigration – two • One of the most useful methodologies to help issues that provoke public debate on the threat of understand the changing nature of public attitudes minority ‘out-groups’ to majority ‘in-groups’. involves segmenting national populations concerning their attitudes to issues of identity, belonging and Polarisation is reflected in deeper divisions and • ‘otherness.’ These issues are re-shaping national distrust between opposing groups. There are many debates and creating a new spectrum of opinion indicators of increasing polarisation in European between the ‘open’ and ‘closed’ values. Segmentation societies (though no agreed measure or major studies find two groups clustered at opposite ends comparative study). of this scale, with profoundly different values and • The issues around which polarisation is taking place beliefs. are especially related to national identity, culture and • Despite the intensity of debates between those who inclusion, between people who espouse cosmopolitan espouse ‘open’ and ‘closed’ values, a large number values and people who espouse traditional cultural of people – in some countries, more than half of and nationalist values. the population – do not identify with either end of • In several ways, social media seem to contribute to the spectrum. Instead, they hold a mix of open and the process of polarisation (such as through echo closed values and belong to the ‘conflicted middle’ chambers and filter bubbles that reinforce people’s groups. existing beliefs and reduce their exposure to opposing • Conflicted middle groups often feel a sense of tension perspectives). Nevertheless, many of the drivers of between competing values and priorities on issues of polarisation were gathering strength before the use identity, belonging and otherness. For example, most of social networking sites became ubiquitous. people in the conflicted middle segments support the • These drivers of polarisation include increased principle of providing asylum for refugees, but many economic inequality and insecurity, perceptions of are also concerned that it is dangerous and that their increased threats from terrorism and violent crime, government has lost control of their borders. rapid cultural and demographic change, a widespread • More research is needed to understand their sense of cultural loss and division, and a decline in interaction with technologies and social networks. trust in institutions and other members of society. The characteristics of these ‘conflicted middle’ groups • Fringe or extreme perspectives can far more differ between countries and reflect unique national easily enter mainstream debate in
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