THE STRATCOMM INSIGHTS

Credit: atakan, istock This past month I have been working with academics on the challenge of disinformation against science. It has been genuinely illuminating. Not because it has given me a chance to get under the hood of many theoretical frameworks that were unknown, but practically very familiar, but because of what became increasingly obvious the deeper we went. We have been here before. We just called it something different. A decade and a half ago, the counter-terrori

Why do hostile narratives succeed? And what needs to change at a policy, politics and system level if we are to tryly address them? We have some thoughts. The key takeway - everything is communication. THE PROBLEM IS NOT THE MESSAGE. IT’S THE VOID. Hostile narratives do not succeed because they are sophisticated. They succeed because they are useful. Extremist ideology, populist nationalism, and foreign disinformation campaigns all offer something that democratic societies h

Every political order rests on a story it tells about itself. For eighty years, the Western narrative was coherent and compelling: a community of democratic nations, bound by shared values, had constructed an international order where law constrained power, institutions enabled cooperation, and the strong accepted limits for the benefit of all. America led this order not merely through might but through legitimacy; the arsenal of democracy, the indispensable nation, the shini

Every few months, new EU calls promise to “fight disinformation” among young Europeans — with big budgets and good intentions. Yet the system itself is flawed: it rewards visibility over depth, activity over impact. True resilience won’t come from more campaigns or fact-checks, but from long-term, emotionally resonant storytelling that builds trust before disinformation takes hold.