Dr. Milena Iakimova will present her research proposal on the topic: "Fear Management and Social Governmentality" on 30 March 2017 (Thursday) at 16:30h at CAS Conference Hall.

Abstract:

Over the last two decades, the entire liberal democratic world has seen voting behaviours and the rise of political actors which can be grouped in a common phenomenon: cultivation of anti-systemic / anti-establishment attitudes. They are broadly, though vaguely presented as criticism of ‘the system' and mark a shift of political activity towards radical populisms and non-systemic political players. The examples range globally: not only in Europe, where the rise of ALDE and Brexit are perhaps the most conspicuous examples; to them we must add the rise of Donald Trump with his anti-establishment ‘charm' in the US presidential campaign and office. The rise of anti-systemic / anti-establishment movements has been concomitant with the replacement of the deliberative forms of interpretation of collective identities and social living-together by collective myths and propaganda clichés. Here is what they look like, according to a preliminary review of the media landscape in Bulgaria: One of the central feelings/expectations that are directed, intensified, fostered and stereotyped to the point of becoming mythic facts is the feeling of the collapse of Europe (here is a random example, from A-specto: ‘the last day of the Christian European Union' – referring, in a funereal tone, to the negotiations with Turkey on visa liberalization for its citizens. ‘America will be delighted that the colonization of Europe is finally over.' Here is another example: ‘The US organized the pogrom in the Middle East, and it is now engineering the conquest of Europe'; ‘Europe has been taking part, with stubborn recklessness, in America's geopolitical adventures which are foreign to its interests; it is taking part in the war against Russia, which is a war of the US against Europe' – Velislava Dareva). This collapsing Europe is represented by the local political elites among which ‘there are no people with morals and character' (Georgi Atanasov, Weekend), therefore ‘mother Bulgaria is faced with its most tragic ordeal in centuries' because ‘what values, ideas and causes have been left in this wretched statelet […] What do we have left except the fear of whether we will survive at all?' (Kevork Kevorkian, Weekend, 3-9 September 2016, p. 33). The conspiratorial villain in this picture is ‘America', which has wrecked the Middle East in order to swamp Europe with a ‘migrant tsunami', with ‘hordes [which] are on their way to your homes' (ibid.). This picture intact is now enacted in the early called election campaign for National Assembly in Bulgaria.

In short, a general, diffuse anxiety of society, recorded for years now in ESS and ESV data on declining levels of institutional and personal trust, is wrapped up in mythic fears which form the following rough overall picture: a general feeling that ‘everyone is lying', so let ‘facts' speak for themselves. Wrapped up as ‘facts' are myths that rework old clichés or public frustrations caused by the growing sense of injustice in an explosively liberalized social and economic environment. This is coupled with a compensatory strategy of victimization and self-victimization: ‘We are badly off because the Gypsies and refugees are living off our backs, while the political elite is corrupt and uses this to remain in power, so there is no point in taking any action.' The perception that corruption is all-pervasive increases social governmentality because of the public's withdrawal from action and, at the same time, erodes the legitimacy of power structures. But how does this comply with the appeals to vote for the spokesmen of those mythical clichés?