EUROPE-ASIA STUDIES

Vol. 59, No. 8, December 2007, 1245 1262

The Struggle for Press Freedom in Russia:

Reections of a Russian Journalist
NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

AS I WRITE THESE LINES, IN APRIL 2007, I am in a rather strange mood, subject

to mixed feelings and expectations. A week ago my oce e-mail failed because, we
were told, the server was somehow connected with the one at the Internews NGO,
and therefore had been arrested along with all the documents and equipment of
Internews after a sudden and unmotivated visit and search by police and
prosecution ocials. Internews1 was the oldest and most prominent training centre
for broadcast journalists in the country, educating hundreds of professionals
throughout the Russian regions. Its subsequent closure after this episode stunned
the media community. It was not involved in political campaigns, did not
participate in PR activities, and was wholly devoted to education and training,
promoting quality journalism, and committed to national-level broadcast initiatives.
Although it had been criticised several times by the authorities and by President
Putin for using Western aid, the same president had explicitly identied it at a
recent public event as an important NGO leader. The ocial explanation for the
search at the Internews oce was that half a year previously its chief, Manana
Aslamazyan, had not declared extra cash at Russian customs. However, in the view
of many media professionals and intellectuals, this explanation lacked seriousness
a view supported by the Russian Union of Journalists, who published open letters
in support of Internews.
The majority of colleagues interpreted this shocking, symbolic event as part of
an ideological zachistka (cleansing) of the Russian media prior to the presidential
elections due to take place in 2008. That judgement was based partly on the
experience of many previous, analogous episodes, such as the introduction of new
management in state-owned and state-associated companies, including Mayak radio
and NTV. Though one could hardly characterise the activities of either as
oppositional, the power centre apparently found it necessary to remove their last
remaining analytical programmes and to douse the last ickers of independent
thought from the air. In a similar vein, the newspaper Kommersant Daily and Ekho
Moskvy radio (the only national station to criticise the current regime openly)
received ocial warnings from the state agency controlling the media about
1

Internews was renamed Obrazovannye Media following the new NGO/NPO law passed in
December 2005 and published in January 2006, reported in Rossiiskaya gazeta on 17 January 2006;
available at: http://www.rg.ru/2006/01/17/nko-poryadok-dok.html, last accessed 1 August 2007.
ISSN 0966-8136 print; ISSN 1465-3427 online/07/081245-18 2007 University of Glasgow
DOI: 10.1080/09668130701655135

1246

NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

publishing the views of, or even mentioning, Eduard Limonovs party, the National
Bolshevik Party (NBPNatsionalnaya Bolshevistskaya Partiya). At the same
time, fascist, radical nationalist and anti-Semitic groups continue to distribute
their publications freely and no one has been prosecuted for interviewing their
leaders.
April 2007 was a time of unprecedented street violence, involving attacks by
pro-establishment forces against protest demonstrations in Nizhnii Novgorod,
Moscow and St. Petersburg. Violence towards journalists reached such proportions
that in Moscow alone 30 media professionals sent complaints to the General
Prosecutors oce about police violence during public protests. At the same time,
the ocial media (such as TVCs Post Scriptum or NTVs Realnaya politika)
presented these incidents as attacks by the enemies of the Russian state and its
people, and described participants in the protests as marginal individuals,
manipulated by enemies or foreign intelligence services.2 In other words, elements
of stagnation, and old-style Cold War propaganda were becoming increasingly
recognisable.
In April 2007, six months after her murder, Anna Politkovskaya received a
UNESCO award. Although it was announced in professional and oppositional media,
and mentioned in a few other publications, it was not a huge national event. I live in
Lesnaya Street, where Annas last apartment was also located, and I walk or drive past
her address every day. I remember how right after her tragic assassination in October
2006, people visited and left owers there all through the day and night. Six months
later, only a tiny crowd gathered to commemorate her death at Pushkin Square in the
centre of Moscow.
April 2007 was also the twenty-rst anniversary of the Chernobyl tragedy, and
marked the twenty-second anniversary of Gorbachevs coming to power. Neither
event was widely discussed. One could get the impression that the Russian media, as
well as the Russian populace, are afraid of analysing the recent past for fear of
dangerous associations, questions and conclusions. The media are becoming more and
more primitive, combining propaganda and entertainment, which is steadily edging
out serious analysis; and free voices are hardly audible.
Yet I cannot agree with those colleagues from Russia and the West who
simply announce the end of free speech in Russia and the rise of a new ideological
terror, blaming Putins regime for attacks on the free press. I do not nurture any
illusions about the current Russian regime and its instruments. However, as a
lifelong member of the Russian journalist community, and as someone who grew
up in the Soviet Union during Brezhnevs stagnationwith its atmosphere of
hypocrisy and secrecy, its discrepancy between claimed policy and practices, and its
combination of courage and betrayal, idealism and cynicismI cannot agree that
Putins regime and its lack of civil freedoms are responsible for our current
situation. I suspect that the origins lie elsewhere. Moreover, the landscape of the
Russian and post-Soviet media is considerably more complex than is usually
presented; in fact there is a variety of trends competing with each other among its
2
See the television stations websites: http://www.tvc.ru/ and http://www.ntv.ru, last accessed 1
August 2007.

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRESS FREEDOM IN RUSSIA

1247

hills and valleys. It is dicult in todays Russia to analyse the medias status and
everyday circumstances, rather than to fall victim to media simplication
(ubiquitous at all levelslocal, national, and global) but the time for such an
analysis is long overdue.
Dangerous assignment
As I noted above, on 7 October 2006, Anna Politkovskaya, a sta writer for
Novaya gazeta, and a winner of many Russian and international press awards for
her courageous reports and stories about the Northern Caucasus, was shot dead in
the entrance hall of her apartment in the centre of Moscow. The murder shocked
both the city and its diverse journalist community. The national TV channels
temporarily lifted their taboo on the oppositional paper Novaya gazeta, and on
Anna herself, with her consistent critique of Russian policy in Chechnya. For a
short period the journalist community (far from homogeneous, for it includes
people of dierent political views and positions) demonstrated an exceptional
solidarity. Thousands of people attended Annas funeral. Many TV viewers who
had never read the Novaya gazeta or heard of Politkovskayas reports expressed
their solidarity with her colleagues.3 The Russian Union of Journalists issued a
special edition of a newspaper dedicated to Annas memory, as well as to the other
211 Russian journalists who had died since 1991.4 Everybody felt that this criminal
killing had to be the last, and that society had to do everything in order to prevent
any repetition. Unfortunately however, such hopes were shattered. On 2 March
2007, Ivan Sofronov, a military analyst with the political daily newspaper
Kommersant, died in unclear circumstances in the middle of his investigation of
Russian military trade aairs with Arab states.
The investigation of Anna Politkovskayas murder continues, but the public has
not received any clarication or information since it occurred. In December 2006,
the International Federation of Journalists in London organised an independent
commission to investigate the murders and unexplained deaths of Russian
journalists. The Commission included representatives of the Russian Union of
Journalists (RUJ), the Centre for Risk Journalism of the RUJ, the Russian
Committee for Defence of Glasnost, and international experts. The purpose of this
initiative was to draw public attention to the problem of violence against
journalists in Russia.
Various explanations have been oered as to why Russia, a country not involved
in an armed conict, is second after Iraq in the number of murders and cases of
violence against journalists. The causes of these murders should be thoroughly
investigated and analysed. Experts have come up with a few key explanations.
According to Alexei Simonov, president of the Fund for Protection of Glasnost,
Oleg Panlov, director of the Centre for Risk Journalism of the RUJ, and Aidan
3
According to Dmitrii Muratov, editor-in-chief of Novaya gazeta, in his speech at Moscow
Journalist Club on 10 October 2006, the papers total readership never exceeded one million, with its
customary distribution at around 100,000.
4
Zhurnalistika i mediarynok, Special Issue, October 2006.

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NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

White, the Secretary General of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ),

at least four main problems have been dened. These are, rstly, the lack of
political will to investigate the murders (as in the case of Larisa Yudina, the editorin-chief of the oppositional newspaper Soviet Kalmykia Today); secondly, lack of
coordination and cooperation between editorial oces and media holdings on the
one hand, and representatives of prosecutors and the authorities on the other;
thirdly, the lack of cooperation between the media and civil society; and fourthly,
the lack of coordination between law-enforcement bodies and investigators on the
one hand, and judicial structures on the other.
Politkovskayas dramatic death marked the symbolic end of a signicant,
energetic, and in many ways romantic period in Russian journalism, incubated
during perestroika and the advent of freedom of the press in Russia. Of course,
signicant problems were already emerging during this period. The romantic
idealism at the beginning of perestroika and the period of the early 1990s have little
in common with the media system following the 1999 elections. Ivan Zassoursky,
Elena Vartanova, and other scholars analysing this system have noted the
widespread practice of using the media in mass manipulation and have described
the phenomenon of the mediatization of politics and policy (Vartanova 2007,
p. 104; Zassoursky et al. 2006, pp. 89 96; Yakovenko 2007; Zassoursky 2004,
p. 38). Clearly, after the temptation of being the fourth power during the early
1990s, the media lost its real independence and quite quickly became a convenient
tool for elite power and structures. The journalist community changed dramatically
as well, steadily losing its dignity and independence, serving power or the oligarchs,
and forfeiting their audiences trust.
Yet at the very heart of that community, among many professionalsnot managers
or analyststhere still remained an appreciation of the real power of the free and
honest word: that is, the belief that a courageous journalist could and should honestly
inform the people, make a dierence, restore integrity to politics and help the nation. I
do not mean, of course, that all media professionals shared this idea, but many did
embrace it. For many, however, Politkovskayas death ended these illusions. Its
impact was similar, in some ways, to that of another tragic death in 2003, that of the
journalist, politician and deputy editor of the same newspaper, Novaya gazeta, Yurii
Shchekochikhin. He died from a very strange disease right in the middle of
investigating corruption in the Russian general prosecutors oce. Many observers
and journalists declared his death to mark the end of the romantic era in Russian
politics.5 Politkovskayas murder and its impact on Russian journalism and journalists
pose numerous weighty questions, which are emerging and fuelling discussion in
Russia and abroad.
The battleeld 20 years after perestroika
Does freedom of speech exist in Russia today? Is the press capable of oering
something to oppose the governments boundlessly increasing control or the pressure
5
Zhurnalistika i mediarynok, Special Issue, October 2006, pp. 1 8; Novaya gazeta, 9 and 16 October
2006; Zhurnalist 11 (2007), p. 3.

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRESS FREEDOM IN RUSSIA

1249

of the market, which is almost as strong as the states paternal concern? What future
awaits Russian journalists? These questions have been widely discussed in recent times
by the professional journalistic community, provoking heated arguments and clashes
of opinion, most of which clearly sound a pessimistic note.
Indeed, there are more than a few reasons for pessimism. Recent tragic events in
Russia and the threat of new terrorist acts have led, among other things, to an
obvious limitation of press freedoms, strengthening the already tangible state
pressure on independent publications and companies, despite the huge number of
print publications.6 The medium of television is totally controlled by the state and
broadcasts only ocial points of view. Controversial programmes have been
banished from national channels, to be replaced by empty, vulgar variety shows
and soap operas. Many journalists do not hide their conformism, fullling various
types of political and social commissions, thereby shaming the profession. The
leadership and sta of independent publications, especially those that publish
critical investigations, are constantly at risk from a variety of threats, ranging from
lawsuits to beatings and even murder. Since 1991, more than 200 Russian
journalists have died in the line of duty, and most were not working in hot spots
or war zones. The Glasnost defence foundation, the Centre for Journalism in
Extreme Situations and other organisations give dierent numbers and published a
list of 211 names.7
On the other hand, there is reason for optimism. Despite the political and
economic pressure, hundreds of courageous, independent publications in the
Russian regions tell their readers the truth; thousands of journalists understand
their duty as that of serving justice and their readers, and they actively intervene in
everyday life, defending citizens who have been deceived and deprived, and seeking
punishment for the guilty. Meeting these journalists, as I do in practically every
town I visit, I feel genuine pride in my colleagues and in Russian journalism as a
whole.
The shame and the pride of contemporary Russian journalism are both direct
consequences of our recent historya history so accelerated and contradictory that it
is hard to believe it all happened in such a short space of time. Everyones personal
recollections are contradictory as well. Over the last 20 years I have worked with three
editors-in-chief: Gennady Seleznev at the semi-liberal Komsomolskaya pravda at the
beginning of the 1980s; Vitalii Korotich at the perestroika-era Ogonek; and Vitalii
Tretyakov at Nezavisimaya gazeta in the 1990s. It is dicult to imagine that these
three personalities, and these three publicationseach of them symbolic in its own
waywere even contemporaries.
It is widely thought that freedom of speech was the rst and perhaps the only
real achievement of perestroika, and that it was only later, during the chaos of the
wild market, that that freedom was shaken, and then lost. People rarely speak
6

According to the Russian Ministry of Culture and Mass Communications there are over 50,000,
including a great number of highly active private publications.
7
Zhurnalistika i mediarynok, Special Issue, October 2006; Zhurnalist 11, 2006, pp. 3, 5 7; Centre for
Journalism in Extreme Situations (www.cjes.ru); Glasnost Defence Foundation (www.gdf.ru). Sites
last accessed 1 August 2007.

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NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

about the fact that the very birth of that freedom in the noise and frenzy of the
late 1980s was not unblemished. The concept of freedom at that time was vague,
indistinct, and associated not so much with the democratic principles of respect for
minorities and the right to independent views as it was with an impetuous desire,
bordering on anarchy, to take liberties. The independent press, which began to
form as a result of the complex and dramatic process that was called perestroika,
was not only the daughter of the liberal discussions of the 1980s, but the
granddaughter of the longer traditions of Soviet journalism. That journalism, as is
obvious today, despite the strict control and total censorship it operated under, was
not all that bad. After all, the architects of perestroikas press emerged from Soviet
journalism, bringing with them its best traditionsservice to the reader, belief in
human beings and moral priorities.
According to the philosopher Mikhail Kapustin there were not two cultures in the
USSR (the exploiters and the exploited, as Lenin had claimed), but three: the ocial
(the culture of automatons), the oppositional (dissident), and the culture that
balanced between them, which comprised the majority of the best literary, musical and
other artistic creations (Kapustin 1989, p. 49). The same may be said of journalism.
Between the ocial line of Pravda and the samizdat Chronicle of Current Events were
the liberal Literaturnaya gazeta, Yunost, Sovetskaya Rossiya under Mikhail
Nenashev, and Komsomolskaya pravda under the editorship of Boris Pankin. These
papers published the best minds of the era, and educated their readers in civic
awareness, appealing for a better life and awakening a yearning for justice and truth
that ltered through the Aesopian language to which the Soviet eye was accustomed.
In fact, all the main tenets and ideology of perestroika were formulated latently in the
Soviet liberal press.
That press demanded that the truth be told about our tragic past, that its crimes be
evaluated and that we cleanse ourselves of lies, denitively rehabilitate the victims of
the repression, and call corruption and stupidity by their real names. It demanded
respect for human rights, talent and independence. All of this completely corresponded with the high moral standards current among the journalistic community of
the liberal pressthere was an unwritten ethical standard that journalists honoured as
something sacred. Yea-saying propagandists seeking promotion and ready to curry
favour were not respected by the community.
A critical aspect of the Soviet press was its connection with readers. Newspapers
whose print runs were counted in the millions (17 million for Komsomolskaya
pravda, 20 million for Trud, the newspaper of the professional unions) received
hundreds of thousands of letters every day. People wrote to them about everything.
Trusting neither the courts nor Soviet organisations, they often appealed to
newspapers as a last resort for help in establishing the truth. And the newspapers
were often able to helpto get people their jobs back, to have them released from
jail, or to re-establish justice in situations where people had suered injustice.
Moreover, a resolution of the Central Committee required that there should be a
response by the authorities to issues raised in the press, and this ensured the
eectiveness of these interventions. Journalists were respected, as a colleague of
mine once learned when he lost all his money and documents somewhere in
Siberia; people were happy to feed and house him at their own expense and to pay

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRESS FREEDOM IN RUSSIA

1251

for his ticket back to Moscow out of respect for the newspaper and the journalists
work. Not surprisingly, during perestroika many journalists began to be elected
deputies to the Congress of Peoples Deputiespeople believed that these
impassioned writers were capable of providing direction for the country. Of
course, this was an illusionneither writers nor musicians nor journalists, even
those motivated by the noblest of impulses, were capable of solving all the practical
tasks facing us.
All in all, perestroika was a time of great illusions, of utopias born of the Soviet era.
The iron curtain had excited unhealthy fantasies and surrealistic ideas about the
surrounding world, often as a counterweight to aggressive, Soviet propaganda. Thus,
the decaying West seemed a paradise to many; a market economy seemed a guarantee
of prosperity for all and wealth for the most talented; freedom seemed the opportunity
to criticise Stalin without being punished, and to read Playboy. That is how many
serious, literate people understood it, including editors-in-chief and progressive
journalists. And on television, the USA was no longer represented by the capitalist
hell of the ruins of the South Bronx8 but by the sparkling shop windows of Fifth
Avenue and beauty contests. In essence it was the same old propaganda as before, only
with a plus instead of a minus sign. The freedom of the perestroika era press was
strictly limited by our own prejudices and imagination.
Beginning in 1985, the main heralds of the presss renewal were the weeklies.
Literaturnaya gazeta continued and further promoted the line it had already begun.
With Korotichs arrival as editor at Ogonek and Egor Yakovlevs at Moskovskie
novosti, these publications were transformed unexpectedly from propagandistic
Soviet publications into radical ones. The weeklies competed in the pointedness of
their criticisms, in lling in historys blank spots or lacunae, and in the originality
of their judgments. It would be no exaggeration to say that the main idea of this
triumvirate up until 1989 (supported widely by all levels of the population) was
socialism with a human face. Ogoneks publication of Bukharins pre-death notes
was a symbol of the peak of these hopes and expectations (Bukharin 1989, p. 12).
It coincided with the fall of the Berlin wall, with the rst, relatively independent
elections to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR (with the dissident Academician
Andrei Sakharov addressing the deputies), and with the historic decision to
liquidate article 6 of the Soviet Constitution, which armed the leading role of the
Communist Party.
It was a time of hopes, and a time of unprecedented enthusiasm; there was a surge of
creativity and journalistic euphoria. The favourite joke among journalists of Ogonek
was Who will they come to get rst if things go back to the old ways?. This relative
freedom came unexpectedly. No one was accustomed to it, and the feeling of novelty
and adventure excited ardent supporters of change as well as retrogrades; the level of
polemics rose, political newscasts and the most recent publications of literary journals
were discussed around the clock by academicians and collective farm workers alike.
This continued right up to the famous putsch of 1991, when the White House became
a symbol of democracy for three days, and the faces of the young and old people
8
The backdrop of the South Bronx was famously used in Valentin Zorins reports from New York
for the ocial Russian TV news bulletin Vremya.

1252

NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

gathered around it were unbelievably beautiful and inspired. Our magazine, like many
liberal publications, was closed by the authorities for several days; we prepared for
underground publication, tried to stop the soldiers around our building, rushed back
and forth between the White House and the editorial oces, and felt that we were part
of history being made right before our very eyes. None of us will ever experience that
again. And no one who lived through that time will ever forget it (Azhgikhina 1999,
p. 132).
The market caught the press unawares. I remember that in Ogonek in 1990 we sued
for the right to manage our own budget independently. Our ideological opponents
were published by the same publishing houseowned by Pravdaon the money made
from our popularity; their journalists received much higher salaries, in keeping with
the practices of the Soviet press economy. We won the casethe rst in the history of
the USSRand we seriously supposed that independence would bring economic wellbeing to the magazine. However, the rst decrees of the market period set such high
prices on the use of state printing facilities that we had to completely forget about
prosperity. Many publications were obliged to immediately nd sponsors, most often
in the guise of that very same state. For the rst time, many people saw an unexpected
side of the market.
The post-Soviet independent press dates from 1991, when the new law on the press
appeared (before the new Russian Constitution) and guaranteed freedom of speech
and the right of journalists not to be forced to write against their convictions. Every
citizen had the right to register any form of mass media. In 1992 alone more than 400
publications and companies were registered, that is, more than one newspaper,
magazine or radio station a day! Needless to say, only a few survived. Beginning in
1991, thousands of non-professionals rushed into journalism, which immediately
lowered the fairly high standards of publications and broadcasts; tabloid journalism
appeared (and ourished); our rst pornographic magazines materialised, as did
ladies magazines. As part of the tendency that is sometimes called the post-Soviet
patriarchal renaissance, society joyfully threw the idea of womens active participation
in the countrys life onto the dust heap of history. The Western press became accessible
and its clones arrived in Russia, capturing market space and putting down roots;
native publishers tried to copy the Western models and turned their backs on
traditional forms, more and more often sliding toward the tabloids. Entertainment
value replaced popularity in the eyes of editors-in-chief and quality lost its value
these phenomena were also the result of the perverse understanding of freedom that
was current at the time.
After 1991 the weeklies lost their former signicance, and newspapers moved to the
foreabove all, new ones such as Kommersant, an ambitious, avant-garde project
designed to form a new class,9 and NG, which more than the others inherited the
liberal and intellectual traditions of the best Soviet periodicals. During the putsch of
1993 and the election campaign of 1996, NG was the only national press organ that
dared to protest against the reigning point of view. It came out against the tank attack
on the Russian parliament and against the Vote or Lose campaign that supported
Yeltsins bid for the presidency when he had almost no support in the polls. The
9

The concept of the New Russian rst appeared in its pages.

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRESS FREEDOM IN RUSSIA

1253

popularity of the newspaper Moskovskii komsomolets rose dramatically, and under the
leadership of Pavel Gusev it became the rst nationwide tabloid.
Television began to develop energetically after 1991, assimilating new forms,
actively engaging with society and participating in business and political life; new
radio stations popped up like mushrooms; companies and programmes carried on a
lively discussion in which the position of their owners became more and more
evidentand economic censorship became a reality. By around 1996 the entire system
of the press had acquired an almost Soviet-like stability; it was divided among the
empires of the oligarchs, and increasingly reected the interests not of society, but of
nancial-political groups. No trace of the former romanticism remained. For many
journalists their profession had become a business. They competed for choice
commissions and journalism was transformed into PRbasically the same old
propaganda, which was not always very selective about the means it used.
The election campaign of 1999 had tragic consequences for the profession and the
publics attitude toward it. The distinctive features of the period were the war between
Berezovskiis and Gusinskiis empires broadcast daily on ORT and NTV, respectively;
Sergei Dorenkos aggressive programmes, bordering on denunciations and provocations; and the widespread reliance on kompromat or mudslinging accusationsall this
shocked the public. Trust in journalists had never been so low in the countrys
historyaccording to opinion polls in 2000, more than 70% of Russians did not
believe the reports of Moscow journalists (Yakovenko 2007).
The beginning of the new century brought a new turn of eventsthe growth of selfcensorship. The strengthening of the governments vertical line of power, the battle
against terrorism, the states attack on civil freedoms, and the interests of business
unrelated to the state reminded many people of the Brezhnev period of stagnation.
The virtual liquidation of independent television deprived millions of Russian citizens
of the opportunity to hear a range of opinions about events in the country and the
world. Though discussion remained on radio, in the print press and on the Internet,
the audience for those media is not that large. For largely economic reasons the
majority of Russians prefer television news. During the Soviet period each family on
average subscribed to between ve and seven publications: a party newspaper, local
paper, youth magazine, womens magazine and a literary, sports or popular science
publication. Today, however, in some regions there is only one subscription per 50
families, and even then it is usually to the local paper, which covers news of the region.
The state has a basic monopoly on the news; it owns approximately 80% of all the
press. Besides the state, the main players in the press are the corporate giants
Profmedia, Svyazinvestbank and Gazprom (the partially state-owned gas company).
The largest circulation among newspapers is Komsomolskaya pravdas Sunday
supplement, which has turned into a tabloid paper.10 Quality oppositional
publications such as NG have small circulations and are not well known in the
provinces. The regions have their own empires, including independent companies such
as Alta press and Provintsiya, whose inuence is increasing, although 80% of the
advertising money still remains in the capital. More than 7,000 raion newspapers
10
The Sunday supplement has a circulation of 2.8 million, compared with their daily circulation of
700,000.

1254

NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

(founded largely in the 1920s) are mostly controlled by local authorities, and their fate
is not entirely clear yetthe new law on the reform of local self-government does not
dene their status and conditions for their nancial autonomy do not exist everywhere
(Yakovenko 2006, p. 54).
The potential growth of independent media depends above all on the development
of the media market, including that of the regions, and on the level of engagement of
the journalistic community. Unfortunately, it is still too early to speak of serious
professional solidarity among journalists. Russias journalists are not rich: the average
salary is the equivalent of about $100 a month, a paltry sum even for poor regions, and
the salaries of regional journalists are much lower. One result of this low pay has been
a sharp rise in the number of women in the profession. According to the Russian
Journalists Union, as many as 80% of journalists today are women; many are the
directors of a regional and local press, and some have manifested rare courage and
principles. The editor of the opposition newspaper Sovetskaya Kalmykiya, Larisa
Yudina, who died at the hand of hired killers, has become a symbol of journalistic
integrity, and the prestigious Vopreki prize was named after her. The Russian
Journalists Union, the largest organisation of journalists in the country, is ghting for
freedom of speech and greater integrity in the media market, as well as defending the
rights of journalists.
The 20 years that have passed since perestroikas blast of fresh air have taught us not
to believe in quick promises and not to deceive ourselves with eloquent phrases. They
have taught us to renounce illusionsand, one would like to believe, have turned us
toward practical actions. The naked freedom that suddenly confronted Russian
journalists has begun to acquire a proper appearanceat least in some publications
and radio broadcasts, and on Internet sites that attract more and more readers and
listeners. An era of civic journalism, which rushes to aid the humble, and restore
downtrodden justicean era of journalism for the peoplewill come to Russia,
despite everything. It is impossible not to believe this when one looks back on the
stormy and dramatic years since perestroika, with all their overthrown idols, phantoms
and mirages. Societys need for such journalism is too strong, and the desire of very
young journalists to practise precisely this kind of journalism is obvious. I see it in the
students at the journalism department in Moscow University, in my young colleagues
who work in the regions and who will not leave corrupt ocials or the powers that be
in peace. These are colleagues who prefer the more traditional values of the Russian
intelligentsiacivic service and loyalty to truthto those of mass culture. I would like
to believe that these young people will look at the world without the rose-coloured
glasses and surrealistic spectres of perestroika, and will break through the bastions of
the predatory market and administrative interdictions just as grass pushes up through
the asphalt.
300 years of Russian censorship
It is no exaggeration to say that the 300 years of the Russian press that our country
celebrated ve years ago were also 300 years of Russian censorship. Our rst
newspaper, Sankt-Peterburgskie vedomosti, established in January 1703, was published
exclusively for state purposesit included the Tsars Decrees, mandatory for all state

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1255

ocials, and informed readers about the will of the state. Censorship was born
together with Russian journalism and developed alongside it, becoming increasingly
sophisticated. Yet the history of Russian journalism is a long record of overcoming
censorship. Soon after the Sankt-Peterburgskie vedomosti appeared, Moskovskie
novosti (Moscow News) was launched under the aegis of Moscow University. It became
the disseminator of not only scientic ideas, but also of free thought; and it elaborated
artistic methods of thwarting censorshipmainly by means of a clever Aesopian
language and allegory.
Censorship in Russia was ocially abolished only twice: for a few months in the
spring of 1917 by Decree of the Provisional Government, and in 1991 by the rst
Russian Law on Media, which established freedom of the press and the right of
journalists to refuse to write against their own principles and values. However, the
ocial elimination of preliminary censorship (later on, formally secured by the
Russian Constitution) did not guarantee its complete disappearance in reality. Alexei
Simonov, president of the Fund for Protection of Glasnost, has identied several types
of censorship in Russia today: that of the publications owner; that of the editor-inchief; nancial and political censorship; the personal opinion of the editor of a
department; and self-censorship (quoted in Zassoursky & Bogdanov 2007, p. 12). This
is by no means a complete list.
From the very beginning of the active anti-terrorist campaign in Russia the
government introduced a new Doctrine of Informational Security. Like similar
documents in other countries, this doctrine restricts freedom of speech in the coverage
of anti-terrorist operations. The reasoning is that open broadcasting from the site of
an attack allows terrorists to adjust their plans and to learn about those of Federal
Security forces. In fact, the Doctrine has marked the beginning of a new epoch in the
struggle for freedom of speech by ocially restricting that freedom. The Secretary
General of the RUJ, Igor Yakovenko, has repeatedly stated that today the Russian
media are working not in compliance with the Law on Media, which had been
approved by many leading experts in Europe, but in compliance with the Doctrine of
Informational Security.11
The Russian media are increasingly becoming a part of the global media, and not
only in terms of the media market, although there are more and more international
players in the Russian eld, as well as Russian investments in international projects.
According to an analysis of the globalisation of mass media conducted by the
American publication The Nation,12 and by supporters of freedom of expression in the
media, the globalisation of media has some distinctive characteristics: the monopolisation of media; the disappearance of many independent smaller and mediumsized enterprises, which have been taken over by international mega-corporations; and
a concentration of capital as a result of monopolisation. A consequence of these
developments is a simplication of content, with infortainment replacing elaboration
and analysis, as well as investigation and serious programmes and texts. Nicols (2004,
p. 64) has called contemporary news power shorthand or power stenography
11

See, for example the RUJ (www.ruj.ru) report by Yakovenko on the 26th IFJ congress in Moscow
in 2007, available at: http://www.ruj.ru/congress/index.html, last accessed 1 August 2007.
12
As reported in the documents for the 25th IFJ congress in Athens in 2004 (www.ifj.org).

1256

NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

meaning that as a prime news item, a trip by President Bush to his ranch has virtually
the same ranking as President Putins visit to a military parade or a demonstration of
the Russian youth movement Nashi.
Reduction in the nancing of analytical programmes and international press oces
results from concentration of capital, aimed at quick prot. The other consequence is a
decrease in value of journalistic work. The deterioration of journalists status is a
worldwide phenomenon and their former roles as genuine pursuers of truth and as
creators of public opinion have been reduced to that of an ordinary employee, lacking
both the publics respect and social protection. Many Western analysts have reported
on this development,13 which unquestionably is prevalent in Russia, with the addition
of several national peculiarities. The anti-terrorist campaign caught the Russian media
unaware, unprepared and in disarray, without any strategy for protecting their
interests and integrity under the pressure of state power. Unsurprisingly, the
reimposition of direct censorship of the media was swift and comprehensive.
During the tragic events in Beslan in September 2004,14 our colleagues and readers
were shocked by the removal of one of the most outstanding editors of IzvestiyaRaf
Shakirov. The papers owners considered inappropriate the publication of some
materials and photographs that did not correspond to the ocial version of those
events. Formally speaking, the state authority had nothing to do with Shakirovs
dismissal since the decision was made by the owner (the Interros company), but the
signicance of this move was obvious to everybody. The Caucasus issue has also
involved another scandalous case: when Leonid Parfenov, a most stylish and highly
rated TV reporter, lost his job because he attempted to broadcast an interview with a
wife of a Chechen leader.
The elimination of analytical programmes on NTV at the beginning of the twentyrst century leaves no doubt about the comprehensive verticalisation of the national
broadcasting networks. This term is used in the professional media as an analogue to
the power verticalone of the main sticks of Putins policy. That policy
immediately extended to the media, which underwent re-structuring, acquiring a
more powerful management and losing the independence of regional branches and
programmes. The years 2005 2006 witnessed the forced unication of the proprietors
of the press and privatised TV channels.
The replacement of the owner of the traditionally oppositional Novaya gazeta in the
summer of 2006 has also started to have an impact on that papers content (although
not obviously upon rst glance). The range of topics has narrowed down, some
features are omitted, and even the writing style has changed. Alexander Lebedev, the
main investor, has assumed the stance of a soft owner, demonstrating tolerance to the
newspapers policy, but at the same time he regularly writes open letters to the editor
on the front page and expresses disagreement with the coverage of oppositional
initiatives, such as the marsh nesoglasnykh (dissenters march) in Moscow and other
13

Report by Yakovenko on the 26th IFJ congress in Moscow in 2007 for RUJ (www.ruj.ru); see
especially http://www.ruj.ru/congress/index.html, last accessed 1 August 2007.
14
On 1 September 2004 a group of Chechen separatists took hostage over 1,200 school children and
parents in School No. 1 in the Ossetian town of Beslan. On the third day gunre broke out and during
the ensuing storming by the Russian special forces over 334 civilians were killed.

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRESS FREEDOM IN RUSSIA

1257

cities. These marches took place in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Nizhnii Novgorod and
Samara and gathered dierent political opposition groups ranging from Drudaya
Rossiya led by Garry Kasparov to national-bolsheviki led by Eduard Limonov. The
marches took place in Moscow on 18 December 2006 and 14 April 2007, in St.
Petersburg on 3 March and 15 April, in Nizhnii Novgorod on 24 March and 28 April,
and in Samara on 18 May.
The beginning of election year 2007 was marked by a new replacement campaign
in the mediaa few top managers of companies have been red, including even the
head of the loyal, apolitical radio channel Mayak 24, which produced more than 20
analytical programmes on social and cultural issues, problems of inter-ethnic relations,
science, health and education. At the beginning of January the channel closed down all
the analytical programmes and talk-shows, replacing them with informational
propaganda and entertainment programmes. Angry phone calls from listeners and
complaints by journalists had no eect. The same tendency can be observed in other
media. Informational space, it seems, is being prepared for the upcoming elections as a
site for propaganda unchallenged by any opposing views.
At the same time, an aggressive wave of propaganda is gathering force. The absence
of discussion and exchange of opinions has created a uniform informational space
recalling the Soviet period. The recent survey by the Public Opinion Fund15 shows that
half of the population watches national channels One and Rossiya, 32% watches
NTV, and about one-third of Russians watch regional channels. Regional TV has
practically lost its independence after the reorganisation of 2005; the departments of
the VGTRK (state TV and Radio Company) have lost their independence and private
TV stations can hardly compete with the state giant.
In the regions, direct censorship and violations of the Law on Media and the rights
of journalists have become common practice. The Fund for the Protection of Glasnost
and the Centre of Risk Journalism of the RUJ issue weekly reports about dozens of
such cases.16 The spread of state censorship is also directed at protests against such
violations. For example, in June 2006, the Saratov newspaper Saratovskii Reporter
and its chief editor, Sergei Mikhailov, were brought to trial in a Volzhskii local court
for having printed a sharp critique of the governing party, United Russias (Edinstvo)
role in undermining the dignity and reputation of Russian journalism. Regional party
representatives demanded that the journalist pay R500,000 or promise to stop
criticising United Russia until the end of the year. This episode led to a street
demonstration and the publication of a letter by the 14 chief editors of newspapers in
the Saratov region.17
Similar events and strikes also took place in Arkhangelsk and Altai. Unfortunately
however, it is not realistic to expect a genuine, widespread journalists movement to
protect journalists rights. Russian trade unions are rather weak, and journalists
15

Quoted in the report on the 26th IFJ congress in Moscow in 2007 for RUJ, available at: http://
www.ruj.ru/congress/index.html, last accessed 1 August 2007.
16
See online reports for the Centre for Journalism in Extreme Situations (http://www.cjes.ru/
bulletin/) and Glasnost Defence Foundation (www.gdf.ru).
17
S. Zimina, Bunt na ploshchadi Stolypina, Zhurnalist 8 (2006), available at: http://www.journalistvirt.ru/2006/8/17.php, accessed 15 July 2007. Please note that content of the print and online versions
of Zhurnalist varies.

1258

NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA

usually appeal to the Grand Jury of the Russian Union of Journalists or call the
hotline of the RUJ, but do not orchestrate large-scale protests. Journalists are not
allowed to establish trade union branches in the majority of the national media,
although such policies are unocial, of course, and in the biggest national broadcast
company, VGTRK journalists are ocially prohibited from even talking about
company policy and working conditions (according to a clause in their employment
contract). A further way of controlling journalists is by dividing their income into a
symbolic ocial salary (called a white salary) and an unocial editors monthly
subsidy which they receive as a bonusa regular practice in Russia for many
years now.
In March 2007 Kommersant Daily received a warning from the national agency in
control of media and culture (Rosokhrankultura) for having mentioned on its pages
Eduard Limonovs unregistered party (the radical NBPNational Bolshevik Party).
This episode surprised many since the well-known lawyer Pavel Astakhov and other
experts had found nothing illegal in the publication. There are no restrictions on
mentioning the CPSU or the German Nazi party in the press, so such a notication
looked quite strange in the circumstances. Yet warnings of this sort are not a new
development. In recent years there have been several attempts in the State Duma to
introduce legal restrictions on erotic productions and violence on TV. At the same
time the voices in support of state censorship are growing louder and more insistent
every day. This phenomenon is linked to fundamentalist and nationalist tendencies in
society, as well as the increasing aggressiveness of the Orthodox Church.
One of the most dramatic episodes demonstrating the power of such forces was the
court trial of participants in the art exhibition Beware! Its Religion at the Sakharov
Centre in Moscow in 2003. The artists came under attack from fundamentalist
fanatics, and after the intervention of the second most inuential gure in the Russian
Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Kirill, they were legally prosecuted and publicly
denounced for insulting the feelings of believers. The trial lasted for more than a year.
This blatant case of injustice and dogmatism, which violated the principles of freedom
of conscience and freedom of expression, increased awareness of the growing fascist
tendencies in our society that have been described by the Moscow philosopher Mikhail
Ryklin (2006). Many editors today do not dare to even mention the Orthodox
Churchs violations of law or abuses of power, assuming that immediate revenge for
such a critique will ensue in the form of tax inspections or legal suits in defence of
honour and dignity.
Moreover, laws against religious intolerance, which is widespread in Russia, are
sometimes used as a tool to prosecute the independent media. For instance, the
independent Volgograd region newspaper Nash Region and the Volgograd city
newspaper Gorodskie vesti were closed down for publishing two cartoons about
Mohammed borrowed from Western media. Both episodes constituted a violation of
media law and censorship. The National Ombudsmans annual report in 2007 included
a long list of similar cases in the Russian regions.18 At the end of 2006 the Glasnost
Defence Foundation published a new Glasnost map of the Russian Federation,
18
Centre for Journalism in Extreme Situations, Bulletins, available at: http://www.cjes.ru/bulletin/,
last accessed 1 August 2007.

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRESS FREEDOM IN RUSSIA

1259

according to which the medias freedom of expression exists in only 21 regions; in 43

regions that freedom is limited; and in 17, the media lacks any and all freedom.19 The
law protecting reputation, honour and dignity has become a useful instrument of
control over the press. As a rule, public ocials demand no less than the equivalent of
$1 million as compensation. There were 5,000 suits of this sort in the last two years.
Some individuals le suits against several media simultaneously: for instance, Vladimir
Zhirinovskii brought actions against 147 newspapers at the same time, but did not pay
a kopek for legal costs, whereas the newspapers had to spend their money and waste
their time in these procedures. Novaya gazeta alone had to go through more than 50
trials, with demands of up to $2 million in reparation. A well-known case associated
with Alfa bank against Kommersant Daily accused the paper of reporting about the
banks secret negotiations and demanded $10 million. Fortunately, the bank failed in
this attempt and a skilful lawyer won the case for the paper.
Of course, all these episodes promote what is a very old kind of censorship that has
been revived in recent years: namely, self-censorship, which exists in all media
and challenges the very notion of freedom of expression. According to a survey conducted by RUJ in 2005 2006, more than 80% of Russian journalists at both national
and regional or local levels faced dierent forms of censorship in their everyday work,
and almost all admitted to self-censorship in their writing and broadcasting
(Yakovenko 2006). What also militates against the development of freedom of
expression is the lack of self-regulation in the media, and the inability to understand
that self-regulation is the only realistic way of establishing quality media discussions
and protecting ethical standards in the profession.
Lack of respect for journalists as professionals is another problem, and one that is
quite new in Russian history and its traditions. The humiliation of journalists, the
belittling of their image, and ridicule of their role in society started quite some time
ago. On 2 October 2000, the ex-minister of the press in Yeltsins administration,
known throughout the world as a media tycoon (owner of the largest advertising
company on TV), said in an interview on Radio Mayak: If a ministers wallet is stolen
in the metro, its considered a threat to freedom of speech; if he slips and breaks an
armthen thats an attack on him.20 One might compare these words with those of
President Putin at a memorable press conference where he praised the President of
Israel for his sexual prowess. When challenged on account of his sexism, he blamed
journalists, implying that they had misrepresented his comments. He also quoted a
saying from his KGB past, noting that his KGB colleagues used to joke: Journalists
were invited to peep, but they started to eavesdrop. It was shown live on all Russian
TV stations on 1 February 2007 and newspapers and websites reported it on 2
February 2007.21 These words reminded many of his highly inappropriate statement
on the day of Anna Politkovskayas funeral, when he said that her death caused more
damage to the country than her articles.22
19

Editorial: Glasnost Map, Zhurnalist, June 2007, p. 25.

Mikhail Lesin, Radio Mayak, 2 October 2000.
21
For example, on www.strana.ru and www.ntv.ru, last accessed 1 August 2007.
22
Quoted in Nina Ognianova, Getting Away with Murder in the Former Soviet States, CPJ Reports,
2006, available at: http://www.cpj.org/attacks06/europe06/eur_analysis_06.html, last accessed 1 August
2007.
20

1260

NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA
Incomparable Mister President!

Respect for journalists, which always functioned as an indicator of the nations

public morals in the Soviet Union and Russia, has dropped to an unprecedented
low. Never before have journalists been blamed so much for corruption, bribetaking, dishonesty, and even collaboration with enemy intelligence services. Nor
have they been subjected before to the ridicule and grotesque representation that was
evident at Putins press conference on 1 February 2007.23 During that event women
irted with the president, openly admiring him and one journalist from the provinces
prefaced her question with the bizarre address Incomparable Mister President!.
Many viewers and professionals saw this episode, with its fawning and disregard for
serious issues, as symbolic of the countrys disturbing condition. Journalists inviting
Putin to pay them a visit, stupid questions, frivolous words, sensationalism, and a
lack of interest in peoples genuine needs and concernsthese were all signs that this
was a show prepared and designed in advance by political PR producers. The press
conference had little to do with the real situation in journalism and stood out in
contrast to Putins press conference of the previous year, which had addressed bona
de issues.
At the same time, at a meeting of the Human Rights Committee in the spring of
2007, Putin had positive things to say about journalists. Replying to questions by Ella
Pamlova and Alexei Simonov about journalists who had been killed, Putin declared
that journalists who work honestly should be under the states protection. Those were
the rst positive words about journalists in the seven years of his presidency, and it
made an impression on the profession.
The professional landscape is chaotic and contradictory now, and many newcomers,
prominent TV and newspaper reporters, have no concept of a civil duty which entails
protecting ordinary people and sacricing personal gain. Many young journalists
prefer to make money and are prepared to do what it takes, without much hesitation.
But at the same time many journalists in Russia still think about dignity and real
freedom. National contests conducted by the Russian Union of Journalists gathered
hundreds of courageous authors from all over Russia. Even after the closure of
Internews, a couple of international projects continue to operate, teaching journalists
professional skills, methods of independent investigation and the main principles of a
free media.
On 17 December 2006, ve women journalists from Moscow media companies
organised a voluntary action to commemorate journalists who had been killed. The
dreadful murder of Anna Politkovskaya prompted us to summon people to Pushkin
Square in the city centre. Many media outlets covered this event. Only one newspaper
described the killing as a drunken brawl.24 This shameful editorial in Komsomolskaya
pravda (a propagandist tabloid reecting both the ocial position and the worst of

23
See Claire Bigg, Russia: Putin Press Conference Low on News, High on Charms, Radio Liberty/
Radio Free Europe, 1 February 2007, available at: http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2007/02/
1ecf2ec4-b70d-4e3d-9fa9-15cefb2692b6.html, last accessed 1 August 2007.
24
Marshiruyushchshie na kostyakh, Editorial, Komsomolskaya pravda, 15 December 2006.

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRESS FREEDOM IN RUSSIA

1261

boulevard pop culture) was, however, criticised by the well-known journalist Pavel
Gutionov and others, labelling the Komsomolskaya pravda article as immoral and
shameful. This gives cause for some hope.25
Another cause for hope is the holding of the IFJ World Congress in Moscow in late
May 2007. We journalists believe that dialogue with colleagues all over the world will
lead us out of longstanding isolation and help us to better understand our
opportunities and ways to resolve our problems. It is important to maintain hope,
and not to continue our old tradition of blind optimism in the midst of hopeless
situations, but to nd realistic ways of solving our diculties.
Conclusion
It is all too obvious that the golden age of a new Russian independent media has
ended. In fact, we never had real freedom, dened as responsible choice. We
experienced a great battle with censorship, ideological pressure, a sort of civil war in
the media, and grand illusions of happiness without serious work or knowledge of
democracy. On the one hand, romanticism failed, for its representatives did not
achieve real results and lost power, inuence and even the trust of the population. On
the other hand, I think that wethat is, journalistshave learned enough to jettison
our illusions and now have a chance to start working again in a new atmosphere, with
a clearer vision of the political and economic situation. We can fruitfully analyse the
last decades using the contemporary tools of the international journalist community
and its practices. Total control of the media is impossible, for new media are
developing at a fantastic rate, and especially the development of digital media holds
out a promise for many committed journalists. It is important to see dierent trends
and forces in the Russian mediaand in Russia as a whole; the experience we have
gained should help us to avoid a simplication of the situation which is harmful and
dangerous. Media are a global phenomenon, and Western media should not be pitted
against its Russian counterpart in black and white terms. It is possible for a Russian
journalist to watch Gleb Pavlovskiis propaganda show on Russian TV with
scepticisma scepticism with which that same journalist may also read serious
articles in Western media about new Russian dissidents such as Russias former
prime minister, Mikhail Kasyanov, notorious for corruption, or the leader of the
United Civil Front party (Obedinennyi grazhdanskii front), Garri Kasparov. Real
dissidents and ordinary people never trust such opponents of the Kremlin, for they
represent not the Russian people, but simply dierent elites. People would like to trust
independent mediaand they could have such media if journalists and society at large
were ready to work towards that goal. I hope to live long enough to witness this
moment.
Russian Union of Journalists, Moscow

25

See Zhurnalist 12, 2006, and Azhgikhina and Grishina (2007, p. 56).

1262

NADEZHDA AZHGIKHINA
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