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In recent years, the Russian government has dramatically expanded its restrictions on the internet, while simultaneously consolidating its grip on traditional media. The internet, however, because of its transnational configuration, continues to evade comprehensive state control and offers ever new opportunities for disseminating and consuming dissenting opinions. Drawing on a wide range of disciplines, including media law, human rights, political science, media and cultural studies, and the study of religion, this book examines the current state of the freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and media freedom in Russia, focusing on digital media and cross-media initiatives that bridge traditional and new media spheres. It assesses how the conditions for free speech are influenced by the dynamic development of Russian media, including the expansion of digital technologies, explores the interaction and transfer of practices, formats, stylistics and aesthetics between independent and state-owned media, and discusses how far traditional media co-opt strategies developed by and associated with independent media to mask their lack of free expression. Overall, the book provides a deep and rich understanding of the changing structures and practices of national and transnational Russian media and how they condition the boundaries of freedom of expression in Russia today.
List of contents
Preface
Notes on contributors
Introduction: freedom of expression in Russia’s new mediasphere
MARIËLLE WIJERMARS AND KATJA LEHTISAARI
PART I
Frameworks for freedom of expression in Russia’s new media
1 The occupation of Runet? The tightening state regulation of the Russian-language section of the internet
MARKKU LONKILA, LARISA SHPAKOVSKAYA AND PHILIP TORCHINSKY
2 The blacklisting mechanism: new-school regulation of online expression and its technological challenges
LIUDMILA SIVETC
3 Formation of media policy in Russia: the case of the Iarovaia law
KATJA LEHTISAARI
PART II
Reinventing media formats, platforms and networks
4 The networked architecture of media freedom in contemporary Russia: the case of urban online magazines
SAARA RATILAINEN
5 Transmedia storytelling as an opportunity for re-inventing Russian federal television
EKATERINA LAPINA-KRATASYUK
6 Authenticity and affect in historical reenactments of the Russian Revolution on social media
DMITRY YAGODIN
PART III
New media and fragmented audiences
7 Challenging the ‘information war’ paradigm: Russophones and Russophobes in online Eurovision communities
VITALY KAZAKOV AND STEPHEN HUTCHINGS
8 Reconsidering media-centrism: Latvia’s Russian-speaking audiences in light of the Russia–Ukraine conflict
MĀRTI ŅŠ KAPRĀNS AND JĀNIS JUZEFOVIČS
9 Sputnik i Pogrom: Russia’s oppositional nationalism and alternative right
JUSSI LASSILA
PART IV
Tactics of control and subversion
10 Imprisoned for a ‘like’: the criminal prosecution of social media users under authoritarianism
FREEK VAN DER VET
11 State propaganda and popular culture in the Russian-speaking internet
VERA ZVEREVA
12 Freedom of expression and the Russian Orthodox Church
HANNA STAEHLE
Conclusion
KATJA LEHTISAARI AND MARIËLLE WIJERMARS
Index
About the author
Mariëlle Wijermars is a researcher at the Aleksanteri Institute, University of Helsinki, Finland.
Katja Lehtisaari is a university lecturer at Media and Communication Studies, University of Helsinki, Finland.
Summary
The book provides a deep understanding of the changing structures and practices of national and transnational Russian media and how they condition the boundaries of freedom of expression in Russia today.Drawing on a wide range of disciplines, this book examines the current state of the freedom of speech and media freedom in Russia.
Additional text
A comprehensive collection that approaches the issue of freedom of expression in the new media in Russia, as well as attempts to curb it, from multiple angles. Such an approach illuminates the multifaceted nature of the Russian media studies regime, which cannot be reduced to simple state-controlled censorship" - Olena Nedozhogina, in Journal of Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society
