“Freedom of Speech in Russia” conference paper University of Maryland—College Park, April 24, 2015 The Putin-Era Propaganda State: Virtual Politics, Postmodernism, Steampunk and More Conventional Appraisals of Official Russian Media, 2000-2015† David Brandenberger •
[email protected] / please do not cite or distribute / Much of the past century has been characterized by modern states’ increasingly sophisticated use of propaganda for the purpose of popular mobilization. In many senses, the USSR exemplified these governing practices until its demise 25 years ago. And despite the fact that Russia broke with its Soviet-era media monopoly and embraced freedom of speech and the press during the early 1990s, official interest in state-run media and messaging has returned with a vengeance—particularly since V. V. Putin’s accession to the presidency in 2000. Recent literature on the subject has focused on his administration’s steady cooption of formerly independent television broadcasting, consolidation of state news agencies, embrace of unconventional approaches to mass mobilization and information warfare, etc. Although there would seem to be a lot of continuity in this reestablishment of a post- Soviet propaganda state, a number of analysts and commentators have argued since 2012 † This paper borrows elements from David Brandenberger, “Promotion of a Usable Past: Official Efforts to Rewrite Russo-Soviet History, 2000-2014,” in Remembrance, History, and Justice: Coming to Terms with Traumatic Pasts in Democratic Societies, eds. Vladimir Tismaneanu et al. (Budapest: Central European University Press, forthcoming 2015), 191-212, which in turn is related to Brandenberger, “A New Short Course? A. V. Filippov and the Russian State’s Search for a ‘Usable Past,’” Kritika 10:4 (2009): 825–833.