Evidence in the service of dissent
Strategic communication of science by German corona-protest movements
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 22429023 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Aidar Zinnatullin (0000-0001-9465-044X, University of Applied Sciences Kaiserslautern), Lukas Fock (0000-0002-3182-2408, Rheinland-Pfälzische Technische Universität Kaiserslautern-Landau), Berend Barkela (0000-0002-9146-1384, University of Kaiserslautern) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 25 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Publication date | 2026-02-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Science Communication (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1824-2049 • E-ISSN: 1824-2049 |
| Publisher | Sissa Medialab Srl (PUBLISHER • IT) |
| DOI | 10.22323/225220251221034603 |
| OpenAlex | W7127131169 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
This study investigates how Germany’s anti-lockdown and anti-vaccine protest movement, led mainly by the Querdenken network, allied with conspiracist and far-right groups, utilized scientific authority while opposing COVID-19 policy. We analyse posts published in 161 public Telegram channels using a computational pipeline that combines named-entity recognition, structural topic modeling, a BERT sentiment classifier, and an open-source large language model, Mixtral. We report that mentions of scientific information surged during periods of heightened policy uncertainty (e.g., national lockdowns and the vaccine-mandate debate), indicating tactical appeals to epistemic authority. References to science were initially scarce rather than hostile, but evolved into a selective, strategic endorsement: protest communities increasingly cherry-picked scientific claims to delegitimize containment measures (foremost, vaccination) while sidelining evidence contradicting their narrative. The findings show that, even among actors who reject official institutions, appeals to scientific language are strategically deployed as a discursive resource.
German · Science communication · Scientific communication · Sociology of scientific knowledge · Strategic Communication · Climate Change Communication and Perception · Computational and Text Analysis Methods · Misinformation and Its Impacts
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 2 |
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |