Power Lost and Freedom Relinquished: Russian Journalists Assessing the First Post‐Soviet Decade

Abstract

This article seeks a nuanced understanding of the troubled state that Russian journalism finds itself in today. As much as the Kremlin may be blamed as the source of these woes, it cannot be responsible for low ethical standards and lack of solidarity among journalists. This article explores what has hindered the journalistic community from developing stronger ethical standards over the past twenty‐five years. Three significant events in the first post‐Soviet decade serve as case studies: first, an early ethical code of conduct, the Moscow Charter of Journalists, produced in 1994; second, the 1996 presidential election campaign, which led to president Yeltsin's victory over the Communist Gennadii Zuiganov; and third, the so called “information wars” between oligarchs, culminating in the 2001 demise of the television channel NTV. In unique interviews, conducted by the authors, thirty‐five Russian elite journalists and media managers assessed the role they played in major political events and how these events impacted the freedom of media in Russia today.

Post-socialist self-censorship: Russia, Hungary and Latvia

“…Recent authoritarian tendencies in Hungary resemble in many respects those which emerged in Russia a decade earlier (Agh, 2016;Oates, 2013;Vendil Pallin, 2017;Schimpfössl and Yablokov, 2017b). This is less the case, however, with the ways in which journalistic communities in both countries responded to the new circumstances.…”

“…Mickievicz, 2005: 242–264). Hungary's journalistic community, however, responded very differently to the new censorship and pressure to self-censure than did their Russian colleagues, who, as a previous research into Russia has shown, exhibited great flexibility and creativity in elaborating coping stategies (Schimpfössl and Yablokov, 2014, 2017b).…”

“…This is less the case, however, with the ways in which journalistic communities in both countries responded to the new circumstances. Our previous research has shown that Russian journalists demonstrate a great level of creativity when elaborating strategies to circumvent the constraining side-effects which result from heightened censorship and self-censorship (Schimpfössl and Yablokov, 2014;Schimpfössl and Yablokov, 2017b).…”

“…Most of our respondents saw adekvatnost ’ as a mandatory quality of anybody who aspires to become a top journalist. That is, journalists might be highly professional in their craft, but adekvatnost ’ distinguished the ‘best’ of them (Schimpfössl and Yablokov, 2017b). As with Boyer’s (2003) observations regarding East Germany (p. 529), this is partly due to the expectation that top journalists quickly understand, ‘in the best spirit of professional ethics’, which questions are not to be asked and which sentences not to be written, without requiring any detailed instructions (see also Lee and Chan, 2009: 127).…”

Towards a Bourdieusian sociology of self-censorship: What we can learn from journalists adapting to rapid political change in Crimea after 2014

“…Yablokov (2016) and Schimpfössl and Yablokov (this issue) relate the metaphor to the concept of adekvatnost , which means ‘adequacy’ in Russian and has been used by many Russian journalists to describe the habitus (to use Bourdieusian terms) of a journalist who follows the rules of the game (Schimpfössl and Yablokov, 2014: 308, this issue). Schimpfössl and Yablokov have developed an analytical tool from folk category of adekvatnost , defining it as ‘the right instinct combined with adroit appropriateness and a portion of wiliness’, or the skills, sensitivity and knowledge needed to successfully navigate the journalistic field and excel in your career – what Bourdieu would identify as the habitus of journalists working for heavily controlled Russian media who enjoy a level of success (Schimpfössl and Yablokov, 2014: 308, 2017: 4, this issue). A journalist’s ‘adequate’ sense for these rules should ensure that they do not cross the ‘solid double line’ which would result in the media outlet or the journalist facing sanctions and losing capital.…”