Russian Strategic Malign communication on Sweden and Finland, during and post NATO accession

Sammanfattning

Geo- and security political uncertainty in the West is growing. An important source of insecurity comes from strategic malign narratives distributed from Russian media-outlets. The study of this is important for global democracy, since the communication of malign narratives may erode public trust. This study explores, whether after a major shift in security policy, Russian malign narratives about other countries change. Using a framework inspired by Somers (1994), Wagnsson and Barzanje (2021), and Hellman (2024), articles from the Russian state-controlled media-outlet Sputnik about Finland and Sweden were studied, from the time when Finland and Sweden communicated their NATO accession plans, to one year after the respective country joined the alliance. Compared to previous studies about Russia’s strategic malign narratives, targeting Finland and Sweden, the study found that the Russian strategic malign narratives about Finland during these periods, significantly changed. The Russian strategic malign narratives about Sweden also changed, but to a lesser degree, with narratives about NATO application by Sweden as the main change. This makes manifest, that, with Finland and Sweden becoming NATO members, the shift of the Baltic geo- and security political structure made an imprint on Russian strategic malign narratives. It is also interesting to note, that once the memberships were announced, the number of articles issued by Sputnik about Finland and Sweden quickly dropped.