The article in the New Yorker -- freedom of speech in Russia

[Andrey Shcherbenok]

On freedom of speech in Russia

Dear Daniel Rancour-Laferriere,

With all due respect, I have a suspicion that you derive your information
about Russia from unreliable sources. As a Russian citizen who spends
several months in Russia every year and has a lot of friends in Russia,
including journalists, I can reassure everyone on this list that calling
Putin whatever names, publicly or not, does NOT make "kontrolny vystrel" a
viable possibility. It does not mean that you cannot be killed in Russia,
you can, but most likely, it will have nothing to do with the opinion you
expressed.

It is true that it is impossible to criticize Putin on mainstream TV -- but
then, again, in what country is mainstream TV free? Criticism of Bush on TV
in the US is possible because political system in this country is so strong
and stable, that the change from Bush to, say, Kerry does not make too much
difference for the establishment. In terms of systemic danger, criticism of
Putin in Russia is analogous to the criticism of the very institution of
presidentship in the US. I have not heard much of this kind of criticism on
the US TV.

But, anyway, in Russian press people say all sorts of things all the time.
Not to mention various internet editions. Almost all critical anti-Putin
articles from the West are translated into Russian and published in the
country. You can open a major newspaper like Kommersant or even Izvestia and
read about, say, Freedom House report about the total absence of freedom of
speech in Russia -- an ironic situation, if you think about it. 

More than that, at any newsstand in a subway station in St. Petersburg you
can buy Kommersant, Novaya Gazeta, Argumenty i Fakty, Zavtra, Izvestia, etc.
The scope of opinions expressed in these sources is MUCH WIDER than those
you can obtain from a newsstand in New York subway. Nothing in the US today
can even compare with Novaya Gazeta in its radical anti-government and
anti-establishment position. Have you ever seen some easily available media
source in the US describing the US military in Iraq as a gang of bloody
murderers? In Russia you can read such a description of Russian military in
Chechnya in a newspaper purchased for 10 rubles in your local newsstand.
Echo Moskvy radio is very oppositional, and you can listen to its broadcast
in most major cities in Russia. And when it comes to book publishing,
everything is there in Russia.

Russia has serious problems with media, but not on the level of calling
Putin an Akakii Akakievich or even a bloody dictator, but on the level of
local media being controlled by local administration, which does not allow
journalists to expose the concrete corruption of concrete officials. The
main problem with Russian system of government, as I and, I believe, most
Russians see it, is that Russian "vertical vlasti" is all about making
money, every official is a businessman who cares about his or her profit
much more than about the benefit of the state. Russian state does not have
any ideology -- democratic, anti-democratic, nationalist, chauvinist, left
or right. Putin's administration would play with various ideologies
periodically to serve this or that electoral purpose, but the only real
ideology "Edinaya Rossiia" has is to stay in power and continue with their
business enterprises. 

However, this is a dull topic to report to -- "kontrolny vystrel,"
"neo-imperialism" and "bloody oppression" are much hotter.

Andrey Shcherbenok



-----Original Message-----
From: Slavic & East European Languages and Literature list
[mailto:SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU] On Behalf Of Daniel Rancour-Laferriere
Sent: Thursday, February 01, 2007 1:58 AM
To: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
Subject: [SEELANGS] The article in the New Yorker

31 Jan 07

Dear Colleagues,
The article by Michael Specter in THE NEW YORKER (29 Jan 07) does have 
its shortcomings (e.g., the Siberia/Yakutia gaffe), but the article also 
catches the general drift toward top-down control and bottom-up 
compliance which is occurring in the Russian Federation today.  Those 
who resist this trend are in danger.  In our country you can call George 
W. Bush an idiot or a shrub or whatever in the press - and survive.  But 
if in the Russian press today you refer to that country's president as 
Akakii Akakievich Putin - then the kontrol'nyi vystrel is a real 
possibility.

The gradual crackdown on the media - or the increasing willingness of 
the media (especially television) to toe the line - is ominous.  Andrei 
Norkin was cut off in mid-sentence.  Can you imagine that happening to 
Walter Cronkite?

For an insightful study of what has been going on in the media, I 
recommend the recent article in RUSSIAN LIFE (Jan-Feb 2007, pp. 28-39) 
by Alex Lupis, titled "Freedoms Found and Lost."

For the increasing xenophobia and ethnonationalism which has been 
developing under Putin, I recommend the BIGOTRY MONITOR.

For general trends in all areas of Russian society today, the JOHNSON 
RUSSIA LIST is a very rich source.


With regards,

Daniel Rancour-Laferriere
Emeritus Professor of Russian
University of California, Davis

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