Open Society Foundation - Disinformation and Media - 2024

Open Society Foundation’s (OSF) went trough organizational changes after a three-year transformation process. OSF is now moving towards a new “Opportunity Model,” which replaces previous regional and thematic programs. This model aims to respond more dynamically to regional and thematic contexts through an “incubation process” to develop new strategies.

Aram has transitioned from a previous theme to a new role in the Global Advocacy Team with a focus on Latin America. He described two main goals for the new Latin America initiative:

Coalition Democracy: Strengthening the political center to balance extreme political polarization. This involves building coalitions to stabilize political landscapes.

Community Democracy: Supporting skill development and leadership in civil society and government. This involves nurturing new leaders and bridging gaps left by transitions between government and civil society roles.

Cultural Democracy: Addressing misinformation and developing strategic communications to promote democratic values. This includes new methods like integrating democratic values into popular media and using data-driven approaches for audience engagement.

Aram illustrated the application of this new model through examples from Brazil, Mexico, and Colombia, emphasizing innovative strategies in communications and democratic engagement:

Quid is a Brazilian organization that worked on the 2022 electoral campaign between Bolsonaro and Lula. They analyzed audience values and used this data to create messages that appealed to broader segments of the population.Instead of pushing political messages directly, they used popular channels (like Instagram gossip accounts) to subtly integrate progressive values into existing content. This approach aimed to reach diverse audiences by embedding important messages into familiar contexts.

In Mexico, OSF supported the Beta initiative, which partnered with the Ambulante Film Festival to Utilize films and documentaries to start conversations on important issues. Facilitate follow-up discussions with audiences to deepen their understanding and engagement with the topics presented in the films.

The Puentes initiative in Colombia focused on: Value-Based Communication: They engaged feminist and faith-based groups to explore values that could bridge divides and foster inclusive dialogue.

Effective Messaging: By identifying key values and principles through focus groups, Puentes helped these groups communicate progressive policies in a way that resonated with a broader audience.

Aram emphasized that these approaches are experimental and not a replacement for traditional methods of countering misinformation. The goal is to find innovative ways to communicate democratic values and strengthen civil society.

Aram explained that in Brazil, they supported the NGO Sleeping Giants, which tracked and mapped fake news sources during the election and pressured multinational companies to withdraw their funding. This approach successfully removed around $280 million in funds from fake news campaigns. The idea was that by disrupting the financial infrastructure supporting fake news, they could prevent significant damage to the media landscape. In larger, diversified media environments like Brazil’s, this strategy is effective because the media infrastructure is robust enough to withstand such attacks, unlike in smaller countries where pulling funding might cause more harm to independent journalism.

Their work has mostly focused on electoral processes where fake news is prevalent. He mentioned that traditional fact-checking efforts, such as those seen in recent elections in Latin America, have been a key part of their strategy. However, Aram noted that there is an ongoing shift towards more proactive and strategic approaches to counter misinformation, moving from merely reacting to fake news to actively creating and disseminating counter-messages. This includes experimenting with new strategies and leveraging AI for more effective communication and message building.

Aram described the approach as economic and transactional. He explained that they allocate budgets to engage influencers or YouTubers, similar to how companies advertise products. The goal is to craft messages that align with their social change agendas while leaving the specific delivery methods up to the influencers. This strategy involves creating a wide range of messages and adapting based on what resonates with different audiences, rather than focusing on a single, in-depth conversation.

If you wish to reach out to Aram at OSF you can reach him at aram.barra@opensocietyfoundations.org.