Having established tight control over the domestic media scene in the early 2000s, Putin's regime proceeded to invest in international broadcasting strategies with the emergence of RT in 2005, Sputnik News Agency in 2014 (and their consequent expansion in audience and language scope), ensuring tailored narrative delivery.
Simultaneously, Russia's leadership has been working on acquiring control over messages shared in the digital domain via armies of online trolls known as the Internet Research Agency, but also via applied pressure on platforms, legal amendments and subsequent social media user arrests. In such legal realities, potentially anyone can face the law for virtually anything they shared online.
State strategies to empose full control over political discourse have been challenged by alternative narratives online. As a result of investigations led by Anti-Corruption Foudnation (FBK) and Bellingcat, several 'loud' cases became public one after another, exposing the kleptocratic nature of the establishment, the riches of the elites, and the criminal nature of the Federal Security Service (FSB), whose "poison squad" has been accused of murders and operations involving "Novichok" nerve agent.
What are the media tactics of the ruling elites in response to such exposure?
On 18-02-2021 Eastern European Student Association of Erasmus University Rotterdam hosted an online open lecture on the subject of Vladimir Putin's media strategies and challenges in the digital age. It was my please to respond to the above-stated question. In doing so, I also talked about the evolution of the media landscape in Russia, the instrumentalisation of youth and the role of platforms. The entire lecture with Q & A is available as a YouTube video and can be viewed below.
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