Influence of fake news is undermining public trust in democratic institutions, regardless of whether people believe it or not, new research finds.
Online ‘fake news’ is an existential threat to democracy - not because most people believe bogus content, but because of the corrosive effect it has on trust among citizens and their faith in democratic institutions representing them, according to a new study.
Since the UK’s Brexit Referendum and the election of Donald Trump as US President in 2016, fake news has become a significant source of concern with most commentators worrying about the uptake of false information by the consumers of fake news.
Surveys among voters also show widespread concern about fake news on social media platforms such as Facebook, but the real danger to democracy lies in people’s views that fake news is influential – regardless of whether that belief is true.
This means that the bogus stories do not even have to be believed by those who read them to have negative effects on democratic institutions. Instead, the fear that others will believe fake news is already sufficient to cause problematic damage to the democratic process.
Publishing his findings next week in The Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, University of Birmingham researcher Dr Merten Reglitz asserts that online fake news is symptomatic of a larger problem yet to be fully understood – namely, the enormous impact of the internet on democratic processes.