The Ukrainian International Broadcasting Channel (UATV English) as a Tool of Promoting State Narratives

Viewers leave thousands of comments below the UATV English videos every day. Many users also write in the comments that they have learned to distinguish Russian propaganda, which for decades has been broadcast in Europe through the state international broadcasting of the Russian Federation. The audience rallied into the community, many people joined in supporting Ukraine in this war for freedom and democracy in Europe by sending humanitarian and financial aid to Ukraine, providing shelter for temporarily displaced people who were evacuated from the zone of active hostilities.

Here are some examples of UATV materials with feedback:

A large share of the audience on Facebook comes from Asian countries: India, Pakistan, Indonesia, and Bangladesh. In this way, various social media provide access to audiences from different parts of the world to extremely important information about Ukraine and the Russian- Ukrainian war, how to organise humanitarian aid to our country and protect ourselves from the influence of Russian propaganda media.

Comparison with previous studies

The previous studies in the field of Ukrainian international broadcasting mostly address fundamental rather than applied issues and do not cover the period of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.

American researchers Monroe Price, Susan Haas and Drew Margolin in the joint work “New Technologies and International Broadcasting: Reflections on Adaptations and Transformations” define the term “international broadcasting”. Thus, `International broadcasting has been the elegant term for a complex combination of state-sponsored news, information and entertainment directed at a population outside the sponsoring state's boundaries. It has largely meant the use of electronic media by one society to shape the opinion of the people and leaders of another' (Price, Haas, and Margolin, 2008).

Ukrainian researcher A. Kostrubitska in her work “Features of State Regulation of Mass Communication in the European Union” defines the main functions of international broadcasting:

- promoting a positive image of the owner-state abroad;

- protection of one's own interests, both cultural and linguistic;

- support of national prestige, promotion of tourism;

- combating negative information created intentionally by other states, or by rebels, separatists (Kosturbitska, 2016).

V. Konakh in his article “The Evolution of International Broadcasting in the Foreign Countries: the Experience for Ukraine” (Konakh, 2014) draws attention to the great importance of international broadcasting in the formation of the country both in the information space and on the geopolitical map of the world. The author singles out such main functions of international broadcasting as educational, propagandistic and protective: “International broadcasting services remain an important tool not only in providing assistance to foreign audiences in getting to know their own country and its people, promoting the spread of ideological, cultural and other values of the broadcaster in the world and supporting cultural, linguistic and other mutual relations with compatriots abroad but also in promoting and protecting national interests abroad, forming and maintaining a positive image of one's own state in the world” (Konakh, 2014).

The importance of international broadcasting services in the information space cannot be underestimated, because it is a powerful tool in using the concept of so-called “soft power” or “diplomacy of influence” - achieving the goal not by militaristic means, but by psychological and informational means, including the use of media.

Since international broadcasting is a rather specific form of mass communication, it is a scientifically based opinion that it is appropriate to distinguish five main functions of international broadcasting according to Oleh Dzholos in his article “Development and Transformation of International Broadcasting Mass Media in the Modern World”: protection of national interests, propaganda, counter-propaganda, and educational and pedagogical communication (Dzholos, 2019).

Conclusion

This statistical, historical, comparative, interpretational and content analysis study was aimed to broaden the understanding of how international broadcasting works in a country suffering from external military aggression during ongoing conventional hostilities and/also information warfare. As a result, we can assume that the International Broadcasting of Ukraine has increased and concentrated the interest of overseas audiences, which has grown significantly since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, on certain essential aspects that Ukraine wants foreign audiences to know. The UATV English on YouTube is dominated by viewers from Europe and North America, and the UATV English Facebook page is a source of news about Ukraine for many Asian countries. At the same time, the YouTube platform provides up to 10 times better coverage of materials by Internet users. The content of UATV English mostly performs functions related to the protection and promotion of national interests; information about the course of the war and events in the country; countering the propaganda of the aggressor country.

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