Can Authoritarian Propaganda Compete with the Opposition on Social Media? Experimental Evidence from Russia

Abstract

We study the political effect of pro- and anti-regime social media videos on voting in Russia, a typical autocracy. We conducted a field experiment (N=798) before the 2018 presidential elections by promoting either propaganda or opposition YouTube videos among the respondents of a telephone survey before the election and following up with a survey of voting behavior after. We find state propaganda unable to engage online news consumers, yet it mobilized consumers of offline news to vote for Putin by improving perceptions of his competence. The opposition treatment discouraged votes for Putin among both groups.

Keywords: Propaganda, opposition, social media, autocracy, Russia, field experiment

JEL Classification: D72, D83, C93, P16