Bulgaria’s April 2026 parliamentary election took place after several years of political instability and repeated elections. This NECE Campus session examined how political narratives circulated during the campaign, with a focus on Facebook posts monitored in the weeks before and after the vote.

The session was led by Dr Keith Peter Kiely, Research Group Lead at the GATE Institute in Sofia and Scientific Coordinator of the Bulgarian-Romanian Observatory of Digital Media. His presentation focused on narrative clusters, digital ripples and manipulation during the election campaign. The analysis was based on a five-week monitoring project carried out as part of a rapid response mechanism supported by the European Commission.

The session did not approach disinformation only as a question of individual false claims, but it examined how narratives organise political meaning. This distinction matters for civic educators because many manipulative narratives do not rely only on inaccurate information. They draw on frustration, social insecurity, distrust, local grievances and a sense that institutions no longer serve the public fairly.

A central theme in the presentation was institutional distrust. The monitored posts showed repeated claims that institutions such as the prosecution, electoral bodies, police and local administrations were no longer neutral. In this environment, official explanations can lose credibility before they are even heard. When this happens, citizens may turn to emotionally satisfying interpretations, including conspiracy claims, moral absolutism, spiritual explanations, or narratives built around betrayal and rescue.

Dr Kiely described this as an “analytical void”: a space where trusted expertise, journalism, public institutions and policy debate no longer provide a shared basis for interpretation. In that void, emotionally charged stories can become more persuasive than evidence, and political choices can be reduced to simplified oppositions between saviours and enemies.

The session also explored how foreign and regional examples were used as political mirrors. Narratives about Hungary, Romania, the United States, Brussels, Russia and the war in Ukraine were adapted to the Bulgarian context. These references were often used less for analysis and more for emotional alignment. They suggested that Bulgaria was part of a larger historical struggle around sovereignty, betrayal, national identity and elite control.

Another important concept was “digital ripples”. Narratives did not spread randomly. They moved from larger accounts or “digital megaphones” into smaller communities, where they were repeated, reinforced and made more resistant to challenge. In this process, political messages became identity markers. People shared content because it confirmed who they were, what they feared, or which group they felt they belonged to.

The discussion also addressed local and regional vulnerabilities. In some monitored narratives, political control in parts of the country was described through stories of economic pressure, dependence on municipal support, fear of losing access to basic services, or pressure around voting behaviour. Whether or not every individual claim can be verified, the presence of such stories matters because they translate national political distrust into concrete personal experiences.

For civic educators, the session raised the question of how can societies rebuild the conditions for democratic judgement when expertise, journalism and education are themselves being delegitimised? Dr Kiely pointed to the need for stronger cognitive resilience, better recognition of emotional triggers, and educational approaches that help people pause before accepting simple explanations for complex problems.

The recording offers a detailed look at how political manipulation works through narrative structure, emotional framing and identity-based sharing. It also shows why civic education must engage with the digital information environment as part of democratic life.

The video recording of the session is available below.