Elite Competition and Narrative Inconsistency in Vietnam’s Propaganda Apparatus

INTRODUCTION

Vietnam’s propaganda system is widely perceived as cohesive and tightly managed, shaped by a centralised architecture that reflects the Communist Party of Vietnam’s longstanding commitment to narrative control. This perception has been reinforced by formal mechanisms of ideological oversight, from party-controlled media to mandatory editorial alignment with official positions. However, beneath this appearance of unity lies a more fractured and dynamic landscape.

This article argues that Vietnam’s propaganda apparatus, while institutionally centralised, is increasingly shaped by internal tensions linked to deeper divides between two informal but influential elite coalitions. On one side are conservative actors embedded in the military and ideology apparatus, who prioritise ideological orthodoxy and regime security. On the other hand are reformist pragmatists, often drawn from diplomatic and economic institutions, who place greater emphasis on performance legitimacy, international engagement, and administrative modernisation. These factions not only pursue different policy priorities but also articulate competing narratives, leading to inconsistencies in Vietnam’s public messaging.

The article explores these tensions through several case studies that demonstrate that Vietnam’s propaganda should not be seen as a monolithic voice, but as a contested arena where internal factionalism shapes—and often fragments—external communications. Recognising these internal contradictions is crucial for interpreting Vietnam’s foreign policy positioning and understanding the evolving political dynamics behind its carefully crafted image.

PROPAGANDA APPARATUS: CENTRALISED CONTROL, INTERNAL RIVALRIES, AND INSTITUTIONAL FRAGMENTATION

Vietnam’s propaganda apparatus traditionally revolves around tight centralisation, managed chiefly by the Central Commission of Propaganda and Mass Mobilisation. Serving as the Party’s “thought police”, this commission ensures ideological conformity by directly coordinating messaging across media, education, and culture. Editors-in-chief of all media outlets, who must be Party members to qualify for the job, regularly attend meetings where adherence to stringent content guidelines is monitored and deviations are sanctioned. Complementing this, the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism—now responsible for media licensing and regulatory functions previously held by the Ministry of Information and Communications—forms an ironclad infrastructure balancing ideological policing with regulatory management.

Despite its centralised structure, the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) encompasses latent but consequential divides between two elite coalitions: conservative guardians and reformist pragmatists. Conservatives prioritise ideological orthodoxy, Marxist-Leninist principles, and regime security, vigilantly opposing perceived “peaceful evolution” or Western influence, a narrative strongly reinforced under the late General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong (in office 2011–2024). Reformist pragmatists, however, emphasise institutional modernisation, economic liberalisation, and international integration, prioritising policy effectiveness over ideological purity. Although not formally codified, these factions significantly shape policy, governance, and especially the propaganda landscape, resulting in conflicting narratives and strategic ambiguity.

The rapid ascent of General Secretary To Lam, and his departure from the ideological conservatism of his predecessor Nguyen Phu Trong, has unsettled some conservatives.

The conservative bloc is rooted deeply within the military, internal security organs, and institutions like the Central Propaganda and Mass Mobilisation Commission. Media aligned with conservatives reinforce this ideological rigidity. Official military outlets, such as Quan Doi Nhan Dan (People’s Army) and Quoc Phong Viet Nam (Vietnam National Defence), consistently propagate narratives emphasising national sovereignty, revolutionary heroism and suspicion of Western motives. Influential social media groups linked to this bloc, such as Thang Long TV and Tifosi, routinely amplify these themes online, exploiting nationalist sentiment and postcolonial trauma to bolster regime legitimacy. This conservative media ecosystem has also served as a mechanism of symbolic reassurance to hardliners, particularly during periods of foreign policy recalibration, such as the diplomatic upgrade to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership with the United States in September 2023.

Reformist pragmatists primarily draw their strength from diplomatic circles, economic ministries, and technocratic agencies. Though excluded from formal propaganda organs, reformists use alternative channels such as Vietnam Television (VTV), digital platforms, and key leader speeches to signal shifts in policy direction. The rapid ascent of General Secretary To Lam, and his departure from the ideological conservatism of his predecessor Nguyen Phu Trong, has unsettled some conservatives. While the official propaganda apparatus continues to promote a discourse of unity and continuity, subtle signs of internal dissent have emerged, particularly in response to To Lam’s symbolic gestures and policy priorities. Since becoming Party Chief in August 2024, To Lam has exhibited a more proactive approach to managing public messaging—particularly via digital media—signalling a desire to consolidate narrative control through pragmatic, performance-focused communication. Under his leadership, reformist-leaning narratives have occasionally surfaced even in traditionally conservative outlets like Cong An Nhan Dan (People’s Police), which was previously overseen by Lam when he was minister of public security. In early 2025, Lam also spearheaded a sweeping restructuring that has further centralised and consolidated state media outlets, elevating VTV as the sole national broadcaster. However, reformist influence in media and ideological discourse remains significantly constrained by conservative oversight. Even popular mainstream news outlets like Tuoi Tre (Youth) and Thanh Nien (Young People), historically perceived as relatively progressive, operate under stringent regulation, with editors subject to severe repercussions for deviating from conservative guidelines.

DECENTRALISED PROPAGANDA AND INEVITABLE CONTRADICTIONS

While centralised control and factional struggles define Vietnam’s propaganda core, the explosive growth of foreign social media platforms—particularly Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok— has profoundly disrupted this structure. As Vietnamese audiences fragment into specialised, algorithm-driven networks, uniform state messaging is increasingly untenable, compelling authorities to rely on decentralised and semi-autonomous actors to maintain influence.

Foremost among these actors is Force 47, a military cyber unit established in 2017 to disseminate pro-regime content and counter online dissent. Force 47 operates numerous covert social media accounts, manages pro-regime Facebook groups, and coordinates digital campaigns against critics. Tifosi and Thang Long TV are emblematic of this growing ecosystem. As part of Vietnam’s nationalist influencer network, they play an outsized role in amplifying regime narratives and policing ideological boundaries through online mobilisation and social pressure. By enlisting these loosely affiliated actors, the regime has extended its reach across digital platforms while maintaining plausible deniability. Popular pro-regime personalities are also systematically mobilised to disseminate state-sanctioned narratives, reaching digitally engaged younger demographics and further blurring official-unofficial distinctions.

While Vietnam’s decentralised propaganda model leverages semi-autonomous online actors to counter audience fragmentation, this approach inadvertently exacerbates messaging inconsistencies through what scholars call the principal-agent problem. Central authorities (principals) such as the CPV’s propaganda apparatus delegate messaging to decentralised agents—online influencers, civilian activists, and cyber units like Force 47. While tasked with promoting official narratives, agents simultaneously pursue their own incentives, including virality, audience engagement, and self-promotion. Consequently, their provocative, emotionally charged content, albeit generally regime-aligned, occasionally diverges from central directives, generating contradictions that authorities find difficult to control effectively.

Elite factionalism further compounds these challenges. Multiple competing principals within the regime often issue conflicting directives to propagandists. In the case of Vietnam, security-oriented conservative factions tend to advocate hardline nationalist, anti-Western messaging through military-affiliated outlets, while reformist factions in economic and diplomatic institutions promote narratives of global integration and economic openness. Caught between contradictory instructions, agents inevitably produce fragmented and incoherent messaging.

Together, these dual pressures—agents’ pursuit of virality and competing elite priorities—have exposed ideological divisions within the Communist Party. Although authoritarian regimes, like that in Vietnam, strive for cohesive narratives, the decentralised media environment underscores that Hanoi’s propaganda apparatus is neither monolithic nor internally unified. The case studies below concretely illustrate how elite tensions translate into inconsistent messaging, highlighting fractures within Vietnam’s ideological framework.

PROPAGANDA INCONSISTENCIES ON DISPLAY: CASE STUDIES

This section examines two overarching themes: Vietnam’s engagement with the United States and the emerging tensions surrounding General Secretary To Lam’s leadership. The first focuses on two illustrative cases—the state’s reconciliation narrative and the Fulbright University Vietnam controversy. The second theme explores subtle contradictions in regime messaging regarding To Lam, including his public remarks praising pre-1975 Saigon, the quiet removal of The Economist magazine’s print cover featuring his image, and disputes over his flagship bureaucratic reform programme.

Vietnam’s Reconciliation Narrative and the “Yellow Flag” Backlash

Vietnam officially promotes national reconciliation, emphasising unity with overseas Vietnamese and openness toward those historically associated with the defeated U.S.-backed South Vietnamese regime. This policy aims for inclusivity, economic pragmatism, and international engagement, actively encouraging diaspora contributions.

However, between early 2023 and mid-2024, a wave of aggressive online nationalism severely disrupted this stance. Prominent pro-regime Facebook pages and nationalist cyber-groups targeted overseas Vietnamese artists like K-pop idol Hanni and singer Myra Tran for their perceived allegiance to the “yellow flag” – a politically sensitive symbol representing the pre-1975 South Vietnamese regime. These nationalist actors meticulously scoured social media for past appearances alongside the flag, branding these artists as traitors and igniting intense online backlash that compelled several celebrities to issue high-profile public apologies.

Yet these apologies only intensified scrutiny. Initially, some mainstream official media reinforced this nationalist fervour. Notably, Cong An Nhan Dan (People’s Police) criticised Myra Tran’s apology as insincere and placed sole responsibility for ideological breaches on artists. Similarly, Dai Doan Ket (Grand Unity), the Vietnam Fatherland Front’s official newspaper, demanded entertainers proactively avoid any association with “reactionary symbols”. As this nationalist fervour escalated, the CPV’s mouthpiece intervened. In November 2024, Nhan Dan (People) newspaper explicitly condemned extreme nationalism and aggressive online vigilantism, warning that these actions undermined Vietnam’s fundamental reconciliation policy. In an editorial, Nhan Dan emphasised that true patriotism rejects extremism and advocated measured, responsible expressions of national pride.

This episode underscores how decentralised nationalist actors—particularly prominent pro-regime social media groups—can aggressively undermine official reconciliation narratives. It also reveals internal contradictions within Vietnam’s own media institutions, which initially amplified nationalist extremism before later restraining it. These tensions, however, extend beyond historical symbolism into contemporary debates about Vietnam’s evolving relationship with the United States, vividly illustrated by the controversy surrounding the American-backed Fulbright University Vietnam (FUV).

The FUV Saga

The backlash against FUV began with a seemingly minor incident at its June 2024 commencement parade, where graduates carried banners proclaiming “Class of the Fearless” without displaying the Vietnamese national flag. Pro-regime social media actors swiftly interpreted this as defiance against state authority. This incident reignited past controversies surrounding FUV, notably the 2016 appointment of former U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey—whose Vietnam War record provoked nationalist anger—and a 2022 screening of Ken Burns’ Vietnam War documentary, viewed by hardliners as promoting pro-American historical perspectives.

From July to early August 2024, triggered by deadly student-led anti-government protests in Bangladesh, nationalist Facebook pages, state-aligned influencers, and conservative bloggers escalated their accusations and framed FUV as a hub for pro-Western subversion, potentially incubating a “colour revolution” under the guise of America’s “peaceful evolution” strategy. These claims intensified after the military-affiliated television channel Quoc Phong Viet Nam broadcast an explicit critique on 21 August 2024, linking FUV’s liberal curriculum and U.S. connections to threats of ideological infiltration. Such factional-driven messaging vividly demonstrates what scholars like Tuong Vu and Alexander Vuving have previously documented: Vietnam’s internal elite contention frequently manifests in competing ideological narratives and intra-regime power plays.

However, as internal tensions rose, different factions within the state became clearly discernible. FUV publicly rejected the accusations on 14 August 2024, emphasising compliance with Vietnamese laws and endorsement by senior officials. Shortly afterwards, students and alumni defended FUV in international media. Recognising potential diplomatic damage, the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) intervened on 26 August 2024, publicly reaffirming support for FUV’s role in promoting bilateral educational ties, effectively countering hardline narratives. Following MOFA’s diplomatic intervention, by early September 2024, state media—including Quoc Phong Viet Nam—had softened their rhetoric and removed the inflammatory report from official channels. Conservative-aligned social media campaigns rapidly lost momentum.

This saga vividly exposes contradictions within Vietnam’s propaganda system. Decentralised nationalist actors aggressively propagated anti-FUV narratives, starkly conflicting with diplomatic messaging that underscored the university’s positive role in bilateral relations. The swift intervention by the pragmatist bloc to counter military-affiliated media narratives highlights factional tensions between conservative security-focused groups and reformist proponents of international integration. Intriguingly, the timing also raised speculation about whether newly minted Party Chief To Lam’s diplomatic standing was being targeted ahead of his scheduled visit to the U.S. for the 2024 UN General Assembly, foreshadowing subsequent incidents that revealed deeper disagreements about his leadership vision.

While tasked with promoting official narratives, agents simultaneously pursue their own incentives, including virality, audience engagement, and self-promotion. Consequently, their provocative, emotionally charged content, albeit generally regime-aligned, occasionally diverges from central directives, generating contradictions that authorities find difficult to control effectively.

Between Reform and Resistance: Competing Narratives on To Lam’s Leadership

The internal tensions surrounding To Lam’s leadership—particularly conservative resistance to his pragmatic reformism—have surfaced vividly in recent public messaging episodes. A telling instance occurred in January 2025, when To Lam awarded the Gold Star Order—Vietnam’s highest decoration—to former Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, a long-time rival of the late General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong. The move drew unease among military-linked social media influencers, though few voiced direct criticisms. On a livestream, Thang Long TV offered a cryptic response: “How should I respond?… To be honest, I feel a bit deflated… I just want to use the words of General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong: ‘the people know everything’”. The phrase, widely understood in Vietnam, implies public awareness of a leader’s moral or political failings. On another page, Bo doi Cu Ho (Uncle Ho’s Soldiers), posted a video juxtaposing Dung’s 2015 award of a Military Merit Order to To Lam with Lam’s 2025 return gesture—suggesting a reciprocal relationship. The post attracted unmoderated criticism of Dung, an unusual departure from Vietnam’s normally censored online environment since 2018.

A broader rupture appeared in February 2025, when To Lam delivered remarks during a National Assembly session. Addressing Vietnam’s lagging development trajectory, Lam openly praised the economic achievements of pre-1975 Saigon. He referred to the city by its historic moniker “Hon ngoc Vien Dong” (Pearl of the Orient) and explicitly recognised it as the capital of the Republic of Vietnam without pejorative connotations, a move that was considered unprecedented for a Party chief. Drawing a stark comparison, Lam highlighted Saigon’s regional prestige in the 1960s, claiming it had even surpassed Singapore at the time, and lamented Vietnam’s current stagnation relative to the city-state’s rapid advancement. By recalling how Singaporeans once aspired to seek treatment at Saigon’s Cho Ray Hospital—contrasted with today’s reality where Vietnamese citizens pursue medical care in Singapore—Lam implicitly recognised the former South Vietnamese regime’s genuine modernisation efforts.

Lam’s remarks drew an immediate rebuke from nationalist online actors. Before long, Tifosi labelled the comparison historically inaccurate, noting that in 1970 Singapore’s GDP per capita was six times that of South Vietnam. It also highlighted Singapore’s early medical achievements, such as pioneering conjoined-twin surgeries and kidney transplants, to counter Lam’s suggestion that Singaporeans used to aspire to seek treatment at Saigon’s Cho Ray Hospital. Tifosi concluded bluntly that Lam’s claims were “NOT ACCURATE” (emphasis in original). This open challenge—especially one directed at the Party’s top leader—was highly unusual and suggested either tacit approval or coordinated resistance from conservative quarters. Thang Long TV soon echoed the critique, adding to what appeared to be an orchestrated response.

These ideological rifts also surfaced during the 50^th anniversary of the Vietnam War’s end in April 2025. In his keynote speech, To Lam notably avoided longstanding pejoratives like “nguy quyen” (puppet regime) and “nguy quan” (puppet troops) used against the former South Vietnamese government. In stark contrast, Quan Doi Nhan Dan—in its section dedicated to combating “peaceful evolution”—repeatedly referenced the “collapse of the Saigon puppet regime”, even mocking South Vietnam forces as “clowns” and “cowards”. Notably, Quan Doi Nhan Dan’s use of such language far exceeded that of Cong An Nhan Dan. These thematic divergences were also evident more broadly: While Quan Doi Nhan Dan emphasised safeguarding core ideological principles, Cong An Nhan Dan increasingly highlighted themes aligned with To Lam’s agenda, including private sector growth, bureaucratic restructuring, and national reconciliation.

The most recent and symbolically charged episode came with the publication of a May 2025 cover story in The Economist, which described To Lam as Asia’s “most consequential reformer”. While the article received wide attention on Vietnamese social media, military-linked influencers quickly launched counter-narratives. They accused the magazine of using “false praise” to discredit both To Lam and the regime. Yet in their attempts to defend Lam, these posts seem to have employed paralipsis—raising accusations while ostensibly dismissing them. One Tifosi post, for instance, claimed The Economist was “insinuating dictatorship and cronyism”— thereby introducing these charges into public discourse regardless of intent. Notably, the print edition of The Economist was subsequently banned in Vietnam, and only Quan Doi Nhan Dan commented on the incident publicly—echoing the online criticism. Whether this represents intentional rhetorical strategy or unintentional exposure of criticism, remains ambiguous. Yet, this pattern contrasts notably with previous defensive communications: when defending former leader Nguyen Phu Trong, these same pro-regime accounts scrupulously avoided reproducing derogatory terms.

CONCLUSION

This article has argued that Vietnam’s propaganda apparatus, far from being monolithic, is a contested terrain shaped by internal factional competition and narrative inconsistencies. Operating under formal Party authority, these inconsistencies strategically reflect competing imperatives—ideological continuity versus pragmatic adaptation, conservative orthodoxy versus reformist openness. Divergent narratives emerge not only around longstanding ideological cleavages, but also in response to new leadership under General Secretary To Lam, highlighting persistent frictions among institutional actors, policy priorities, and narrative strategies.

With elite coordination likely constrained by intensifying power struggles ahead of the CPV’s 14^th National Congress in early 2026, internal narrative contradictions are expected to persist. If unresolved, these ongoing inconsistencies could significantly complicate effective policy implementation, exacerbate elite instability, and undermine international perceptions of Vietnam’s political coherence and credibility.

For external observers, this complexity calls for a more granular reading of Vietnam’s public discourse. Apparent contradictions are important signals of deeper power struggles, legitimacy concerns, and strategic shifts. As Vietnam’s new leadership consolidates its authority amid shifting global and domestic pressures, its propaganda will likely remain a valuable—if ambiguous—indicator of the country’s internal political dynamics. Nevertheless, accurately interpreting these signals will remain a challenge due to Vietnam’s opaque political environment and tightly controlled information landscape, further underscoring the need for sustained, nuanced analysis.

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This is an adapted version of ISEAS Perspective 2025/58 published on 14 August 2025. The paper and its references can be accessed at this link.