Oksana Shelest: Education and media reforms can withstand political techniques of third generation

Any political situation allows for the use of political techniques. However, in such authoritarian countries as Belarus and Russia their usage leads to total manipulation.

What can we oppose to the political techniques of the third generation? The “EuroBelarus” Information Service didn’t learn any specific answers to this question. However, we managed to identify it in order to dwell upon it and, finally, elaborate an “action plan”. Oksana Shelest, a sociologist and methodologist, made it possible in the open lecture from the series of public lectures of the Flying University “The main question”.

Political techniques of third generation is a concept introduced by the Belarusan philosopher and methodologist Uladzimir Matskevich. Political techniques as a sphere of human action is a quite widespread phenomenon that exists not only in totalitarian or authoritarian regimes but all over the world. And if we mention third generation, it would be logical to know about the previous two.

Political process has certain forces (figures, candidates), who bring certain programs. And when entering some space different from the personal space they voice these programs and try to attract those whom these programs concern. This is what happens in a situation of a usual political process, where there is the so-called offer and electorate or public that this offer serves to. Every politician is trying to attract as many electors as possible with the help of different methods, which include not only speeches, but also different creative steps, RP, creating an image, and so on. Such steps that help to inform the public can be called political techniques and refer to the first generation. In this situation the presence of independent arbiters and institutions that help to provide the transparency of political processes is important. Generally, in European society state structures and independent media that secure equality and competition perform their role. It is a necessary condition for the existence of politics in its normal mode.

Political techniques of second generation appear when additional interests apart from the competition for the realization of one’s programme appear; in other words, when a political authority prefers, say, realization of economic interests to political programme. This is where another figure appears – an investor. He helps the politician secure victory in the election process. At the same time, an independent arbiter remains and still controls the rules of the game.

But at some point the party that got authority thinks about keeping the power forever. In order to do that, one need to control not only finance but also institutions of power and information. This is the situation of modern Belarus and Russia.

At the same time, when monopolization of money, power, and information happens, one need to secure the imitation of politics of the first level. There are several reasons to do that. First, the need of relations with the world. Presence of political opposition and democratic movements gives opportunity to be a part of civilized countries. Second reason is connected with the images about social development and guarantors of stability. If protest activity, political and cultural alternative is destroyed or pressurized, on the one hand, a danger of underground movements appears; on the other – active people might leave the country. Any underground gets out of hand and starts being dangerous. And it is absolutely impossible to close the borders in the modern world. The best way-out would be to leave space for alternative initiatives, but in certain borders that enable their control. These two reasons cause political techniques of third generation.

First thing they work with is erasing the figures that present an alternative. In “normal” politics, when an opposition of different stances is played out on the screen, all that becomes a fact in people’s consciousness, after which they take some action – vote for one candidate or another, enter a certain party, go to the riot… “Humanity” of political techniques of third generation lies in the fact that political actors are almost never physically destroyed, but are merely “erased” from the screen, leaving them without a chance to appeal to the electors. Only one dominant figure should be left in public mind.

Second sphere that political techniques of third generation work with is minimization of acting force of what is happening on the “screen”.

And the third element is formation of a new type of human, a peculiar identity and self-awareness in the world, which makes people unable to take a stance.

How can the institute of opinion leaders be disconnected in the country? First, by silence: when they are mentioned neither in mass media nor in other sources. Second, by “multiplication” and equalization of opinion leaders, when public space is provided to anyone, thus equaling the people and the things they can say.

As soon as someone becomes popular, he is lowered to a usual, middle level.

For now mediatization of politics is taking place – activity of political actions has almost completely transferred to a virtual space. In fact, media sphere reflects what is happening in it.

What should the person that is able to take part in this game look like? Few people in our country are unaware as to what is really happening (absence of politics, elections, unequal conditions, and so on). However, knowledge doesn’t prevent anyone from taking part in this action.

It has been happening through a number of changes in people’s worldview. Modern European idea about the world consists in believing that all human and all social in it can be constructed. People admitted that all values, norms, and morality they create for themselves. Thus, if there is no absolute truth there is no need to aim for that truth. Absence of the absolutes poses corresponding attitude towards the scale of human actions. However, human is not proportionate to the creation of the world. Having stopped having attitude to the absolutes, a person also stops being responsible for them.

We all have to be objective. But what we mean by that is often presentation of different points of view on the world. This is untrue, since objectivity means the complete knowledge about the object, not only knowing that it can be perceived differently.

When we recognize every person as an absolute value we start attaching certain importance to his or her opinion on some certain issue. And modern informational space is an apparatus for creating opinions that do not require justification. These opinions change as easily as they appear. They all display some type that we metaphorically can call “enthusiast”. Decision-making that affects our life is transformed into a show that can be treated emotionally but gives no chance to join the game. This type of political culture closes opportunities for civic actions, but enables imitation of a political process without a political process as such and keeps the feeling of being related to it.

But the main question is what can we do and what should we do in the situation of political techniques of third generation? Uladzimir Matskevich claims that they should be prohibited together with the other weapon of mass destruction. But in the modern situation there are not enough possibilities for that. So in the first turn, Oksana Shelest suggests paying attention to education, by which she doesn’t mean teaching something, but personal self-development to the degree adequate to the modern situation.

The other sphere is media, since mass media have long time ago ceased to be an instrument, but turned into an environment that forms our opinions, habits, and practice. The program of “erasing” opinion leaders works both in the state as well as in non-state media. However, if the state media merely “erases” people that have big authority, independent media evens them. And there is an example of that. Recently the Center for European Transformation has been researching into Belarusan organized civil society’s and Belarusan society’s solidarity potential. By result of research 85% of the Belarusan society couldn’t name anyone who they are guided by. In the civil society there are approximately as many people, who don’t have any guidelines, while the rest named so many leaders that, obviously, each of them only guides one person. Having different strategies and different aims we have the same result, which makes us think about the ways of working, the ideological foundation, and the ethos on which our understanding of the modern media and their role in securing political processes and democratic transformations.