Chapter 4 - Psychological Warfare and Leadership Change

Summary

This chapter argues that the dominant social and political forces in Malaysia appear to have influenced the manner in which the online platform has been used by partisan bloggers to shape public opinion during the general elections. It begins with a discussion of the particular social and political circumstances of the 2008 election to make sense of the online approach taken by the group of partisan bloggers. The 2008 election witnessed a convergent blogosphere where a sub-group of partisan bloggers, from both sides of the political divide, and some civil society bloggers established a loose coalition to oust the then prime minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. The loose grouping — known as the “band of brotherhood” or the “band of bloggers” — coordinated and managed the flow of online information to achieve their political goal. The fluid ties, however, collapsed after the 2008 election and, by 2013, the Malaysian blogosphere became “very partisan”. Members of the band of brotherhood returned to their political shells, in part because of the results of the 2008 election which saw the opposition coalition denying the ruling regime's traditional two-thirds majority.

The 2013 election saw the clash of two main divergent political forces — the ruling and opposition coalitions — with the opposing camps adopting various online strategies to win the “psychological warfare”. The politically divided blogosphere could also be interpreted as a representation of the contentious relationships among members of the loose network formed in the run-up to the 2008 election. The majority of the pro-UMNO bloggers who were critical of Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and the government in 2008 became online defenders of the government and Prime Minister Najib Razak in the 2013 election. By then attacks by the pro-UMNO bloggers were focused on the opposition coalition and their leaders. On the other hand, pro-opposition bloggers who had been traditionally anti-establishment remained aligned against the ruling regime in 2013. The battle lines were clearly drawn and the Malaysian blogosphere in 2013 reflected the partisan landscape of the time. Ahirudin Attan commented that, “After 2008, there was us and them.” The two political camps sought to paint their rivals in a negative light. They coordinated and managed the online battle through their volunteers and supporters, some of whom appeared to be remunerated for their efforts.