Testing New Strategies to Stop the Spread of Prejudice
At UNHCR Costa Rica, an effort to combat fake news and xenophobia has grown from one-on-one interactions into an even more ambitious initiative.
By Amy Lynn Smith, Independent Writer + Strategist
It’s a sobering reality that xenophobia exists almost everywhere, causing some people to hate those who are from other countries, hold views unlike their own, or are simply different than they are in any number of ways. We’ve seen a notable spike in prejudice against Asians in the wake of the coronavirus, and we see it in the treatment of refugees in many of their new home countries, including Costa Rica. For many years, Costa Rica has been internationally recognized as a country that promotes peace, so there was very little chance for xenophobia to thrive even when it did emerge from time to time. In fact, the country doesn’t even have an army — it was abolished in 1948 after a Civil War, to dedicate the military budget to education and culture — and is the home to the UN Peace University.
But in 2018, when an influx of asylum-seekers from Nicaragua started, the country began seeing an unprecedented spread of xenophobia against refugees and migrants. For the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), this was a startling change to the status quo. Hate speech, spread through social media and other means, and violent actions against foreigners, particularly refugees and migrants, just wasn’t something Costa Ricans were used to seeing in their daily lives.
“When the xenophobic movement began to gain a place in Costa Rica, I realized that all of us at UNHCR and my circle of friends live in a bubble — we do not discriminate against migrants and refugees. This movement is not part of our DNA,” explains Jean Pierre Mora Casasola, External Relations Associate for UNHCR Costa Rica and an Innovation Fellow. “Then the bubble exploded and we began losing the peaceful tradition of our country, and I was very, very worried.”
Mora is more than worried. His voice is tinged with sorrow and frustration as he describes what he’s seeing in his once-harmonious country. “I was so surprised,” he says, “I thought, ‘This is not possible here — we are a peaceful people. Why is this happening?’”
He quickly recognized the trend: Fake news about Nicaraguans was spreading unchecked — much like the coronavirus — and inciting prejudiced people to take violent actions against migrants and refugees. Mora realized that if they could somehow counteract the spread of fake news, they might be able to slow down or even halt the spread of anti-refugee hatred and violence.
What’s troubling about the spread of fake news isn’t simply the violence against people of concern or backlash against UNHCR, adds Irving Pérez Masis, External Relations Officer at UNHCR Costa Rica, although both of these issues are potentially dangerous for all involved. It’s that misinformation can confuse people of concern.
“The fake news can be misleading to them,” explains Pérez. “It doesn’t provide people of concern with the correct information about their rights to ensure proper access to the asylum system and fully integrate into the system and our society. We must also be sure that the world knows Costa Rica continues to have open borders and welcomes refugees.”
He points out that the fake news and violent acts of anti-refugee agitators are confined to relatively small groups, but they are aggressively speaking out against people of concern, lobbying for their rights to be limited.
“We are facing organized groups that want to put this topic on the table and on the political agenda,” Pérez says. “That’s why we must have a very organized and systematic response.”
Fighting fake news with strategic communication and collaboration
As Winston Churchill once said, “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.” Mora recognized that as someone whose job is to communicate with the media and the public, he had to overcome this long-standing reality — and do it very quickly.
There’s always a role for awareness campaigns, he says, but in this case, that would not be enough. Anti-refugee sentiment and fake news were spreading so quickly, Mora realized it was time for a different solution to combat the spread of fake news — one that could be deployed immediately, getting the truth to the public more promptly to counteract the lies. After all, xenophobia was innovating for a nefarious purpose: to spread fake news. Why not use innovation to reverse that trend?
“There are people designing fake news to harm vulnerable groups,” he explains. “However, there are also people who genuinely want to know the truth but are confused by the fake news. The goal of making innovation part of the response against fake news is to give host communities the opportunity to understand the importance of the right to seek asylum and how it really works, instead of the way the creators of fake news have misinformed people.”
Like so many new ideas, this one grew out of a simple action. Mora began collaborating with reporters working in what he calls “fact-check journalism” in Costa Rica, who are dedicated to verifying whether statements or other news are true. He already had established relationships with the media, but now he and his colleagues give priority access to those who want to check the facts — and have the power to dispel the misinformation being spread by fake news.
“It used to take one day to respond to a media inquiry, but for these fact-checking journalists we answer as soon as possible, even in a couple of hours,” Mora explains. “Fake news and xenophobia are working very fast so we have to respond just as quickly. Now every reporter who is looking for a response to fake news gets our immediate attention.”
As a result of this measure, he says, UNHCR Costa Rica has established strong alliances with fact-checking journalists. Unfortunately, as much good as that one step did, it wasn’t enough to stop the anti-refugee outcry. In one tragic example, disreputable news sources spread the word of a large anti-refugee demonstration in a park in San José where Nicaraguan migrants and refugees often gather, leading to violence. About a hundred of men armed with baseball bats and bottles stuffed with gasoline-soaked rags descended on the Nicaraguans in the park, leading to 40 arrests after the confrontation.
“Because fake news has led to violence, the media started turning to UNHCR more and more for the facts,” Mora says. “Fake news can get viral very quickly, so the media is thankful for UNHCR’s quick response. In fact, one of the biggest media outlets in Costa Rica published an article about how UNHCR was being targeted by fake news groups, and our relationships with the media are getting stronger because of our prioritization of fact checking.”
UNHCR Costa Rica has also enlisted the support of a National High Profile Supporter: Hanna Gabriels, who is the World Champion in the super welterweight category for the World Boxing Association. According to Mora, they chose her because, despite her public support for social causes, including fair treatment for all Central Americans, she’s a very popular figure, including among groups of people who are not typically familiar with refugee issues.
“She has a great personality and has a very strong influence in social media among people who tend to be xenophobic,” he says, noting that Gabriels has more than 485,000 followers on Facebook and more than 59,000 on Instagram. “When she announced she is now working with UNHCR, all the people who tend to comment with xenophobic posts are now congratulating her. This is something new for us to experiment with, in an effort to influence xenophobic groups.”
Creating a safe space to experiment with new ideas
In conjunction with the operation’s success working with the media to dispel fake news, Mora developed a project as part of his Innovation Fellowship to establish a laboratory to collaborate, brainstorm, and experiment with new ways to address a social problem as complex as prejudice.
Known as PeaceLab, the social innovation lab is designed to bring together partners across the region interested in protecting Costa Rica’s heritage as a place of peaceful coexistence.
“We see the importance of not only providing innovative answers to our operation but to the entire organization, by creating this space where we can better understand the phenomenon of xenophobia here and how we can better respond to it,” Pérez explains. “We want to experiment and be creative, which will, of course, involve a lot of trial and error, but it is our mandate to protect and enhance what we have here.”
UNHCR isn’t the only organization concerned about the rise of prejudice and hate in Costa Rica. The government, other humanitarian organizations, and UNHCR’s partners want to protect the country’s peaceful status. As part of the PeaceLab process, UNHCR is bringing together participants from various sectors, such as academia, the private and government sectors, people of concern, and host community leaders, among others.
In February 2020, UNHCR Costa Rica officially launched PeaceLab during an international conference organized by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), and UNHCR.
Mora spent more than one year developing and refining the PeaceLab process with input from his colleagues and other Innovation Fellows. There are multiple steps in the process, all designed to develop solutions for UNHCR and the other participants to implement. The team at UNHCR Costa Rica ran through some exercises similar to what will take place as part of the PeaceLab in preparation for the launch.
Like Mora, Pérez is enthusiastic about the potential of PeaceLab.
“By experimenting within a safe space, we can talk very openly about problems and solutions without the risk of confusing messages reaching the public,” he says. “We cannot turn our heads and pretend the xenophobia and violence against people of concern isn’t happening, so instead we must better prepare the country to maintain peaceful coexistence that has been so characteristic to Costa Rica, our operation, and UNHCR.”
Watch for a second story with more details on the PeaceLab innovation process, including a progress report and feedback from participants.
