Uncertainties and Post-Truth Politics in the Central Sahel

Since 2015, Burkina Faso is confronted with an unprecedented security crisis and (geo)political upheavals. After the coup d'état in Mali in 2020, the now-Sahelian crisis has morphed into a complex amalgamation of conflicts between multiple parties, including jihadist forces, military governments, foreign powers and other armed groups. Information warfare looms large, as government propaganda and spurious information leaks circulate abundantly via various circuits of social media. In this post-factual reality, people pick sides without being able to verify much of the information that such positioning is based on. Accusations against Western imperialism and French neo-colonialism have emerged as major narratives, resonating with decolonial thought on a global geopolitical scale. The impact on the region's political and security dynamics is significant, with the arrival of Russia as a new player in the situation, and Ukraine recently following suit. Understanding the influence of post-truth and the process of its emergence in this context is crucial to grasp the informational aspects of current and future counter insurgency and the possibilities of stabilization and depolarization. Moreover, highlighting post-truth dynamics outside the global north seeks to critically reflect on the normative simplifications that reduce post-truth issues to moral problems.