Avsändare okänd: Informationsteknologi och desinformation i synergi mot den svenska demokratins psykologiska försvar

Sammanfattning: This paper highlights new challenges to Sweden’s psychological defense, brought on by new information and communication technology which by its nature divides society. By evaluating older theories regarding framing, the paper finds that not only the way information is spread but also the social practice in connection to it is changed by the decentralizing aspects of modern information technologies. A theoretic framework to investigate democratic ways of handling disinformation is created, where it is concluded that relying on old ways of trying to sustain a psychological defense in a democratic context risk to decrease the success of one. The paper then reviews material from Swedish government sources and government spokespersons interviewed in media to gauge whether the Swedish psychological defense seems aware of these problems. New alternatives are then suggested to the standardized method of educating about source criticism, in the form of democratic ideotainment, which entails the creation of entertainment media which carries pro-democratic messages. Such a method is suggested to cut through the information chaos and attract people to its message as well as being democratically compatible. The paper makes no claims on the effectiveness of such a strategy, but leaves suggestions to where such research can continue.