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Lies masquerading as news are as old as news itself. It’s a history we should keep in mind amid the current panic about “fake news.” Donald J. Trump’s victory in the presidential election has focused attention on the torrent of false stories, particularly on social media, that many believe played a pivotal role in his victory. But too much of the debate ignores the long history of fake news and fails to recognize what is actually distinctive about contemporary politics.

In the past, governments, mainstream institutions and newspapers manipulated news and information. Today, anyone with a Facebook account can do it. Instead of the carefully organized fake news of old, there is now an anarchic outflow of lies. What has changed is not that news is faked, but that the old gatekeepers of news have lost their power. Just as elite institutions have lost their grip over the electorate, so their ability to define what is and is not news has also eroded.

The panic about fake news has given fuel to the idea that we live in a “post-truth” era. The Oxford English Dictionary has even made post-truth its “word of the year,” defining it as “circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” But just as with fake news, the truth, if I may still use that word, about post-truth is more complex than many allow.

Politics has always relied on more than just facts about the world. It rests also an ideological framework through which to interpret facts. Consider some of the big questions that may dominate the early Trump presidency. Should there be a registry of Muslims? Should undocumented workers be deported? Is torture acceptable? Should abortion be made illegal?

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All this has led to anguished discussions about people living in echo chambers, sealed-off social worlds in which the only views they hear are ones echoing their own, and about the role of social media in creating such worlds. Studies suggest that such fears are exaggerated; that, for instance, Facebook users do have access to contrary views.

More important, social media have not created a fragmented world. They merely reflect and amplify one that already exists, a world in which the authority of traditional institutions has eroded, in which old vehicles of political change have disappeared and in which there is often a welling of anger without a conventional political outlet.

If the problem of fake news is more complex than is commonly suggested, the solutions offered are often worse than the problem itself. There are demands that Facebook should censor feeds and weed out fake stories, and for the law to come down hard on those who promote lies. But who should decide what is fake and what isn’t?

Do we really want Mark Zuckerberg, or the United States government, to determine what constitutes truth? Do we really want to go back to the days when the only fake news was “official” fake news?

Fake news is a problem. But we should not exaggerate its newness, misunderstand its cause or promote cures worse than the disease.


Kenan Malik is the author, most recently, of “The Quest for a Moral Compass: A Global History of Ethics” and a contributing opinion writer.

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