D5.1 Country Report | April 2021
Author: Gregor Bulc, Apis Institute
The purpose of this report is to investigate a specific contemporary political and media discourse in Slovenia, with a focus on migration and race issues. It focuses on radicalisation mainstreaming through far-right SDP party-affiliated traditional media (like magazine front covers and billboards) and new media (such as digital platforms and social media). The report undertakes a representation and discourse analysis of media objects that have repeatedly used racialisation and othering of migrants as what seems to be a deliberate political strategy in the six years since the start of the so-called Syrian refugee crisis. The report exposes the role of the SDP and SDP-affiliated media in constructing a specific Slovenian “we” community that excludes non-white migrants (and other non-white residents). Understanding the analysed media objects as cultural drivers of radicalisation and extremism, the report argues that an alliance of far-right politicians, far-right mass media and radical(ised) audiences/users of social media has been established in Slovenia. According to the report, the alliance of these three key players appears to serve not only as an important factor in strengthening the exclusionary Slovenian identity but also as a potential trigger of radicalised behaviour of citizens in relation to migrants during the studied period, as detected by Interpol in its latest counter-terrorism report on Slovenia.