Online now: Digital Icons 7: Russian Elections and Digital Media

Tue Aug 14 13:12:42 UTC 2012

*Digital Icons 7*
*Russian Elections and Digital Media*
**Full issue online on http://www.digitalicons.org/

The new issue of *Digital Icons *contains 250 pages of original research
and over 100 visuals that document the Russian political process of 2011-12
and its engagement with new media and assess the overall social and
cultural impact.

At the time of the global meltdown, the ‘Russian winter’ was hugely
anticipated but never accurately predicted. Equally, the revolutionary
events of 2011-12, just like those of 1989-91, have problematized existing
theories of social engagement, political dissent and cultural production.
While there has been some critical engagement with the political events,
digital media and social and cultural change, this is the first large scale
reflection of the phenomenon.

To echo Frederic Jameson’s stance (Jameson ‘A Singular Modernity’, 2001),
the authors of this issue agree that the narrative of (Russian) modernity
is being written on the squares of Moscow and other cities in the country
and abroad, on the screens of computers and mobile phones, and most
importantly in the minds of those people who have participated—either by
voicing their opinion publicly or by reflecting on the events privately—in
the debate about the future of their nation. This future will show whether
the events will pave the way for a ‘singular modernity’ (Jameson 2001), or
will collapse into a postmodern pastiche of participatory democracy, or in
fact will break the very logic of post/modernity by imposing the stagnant
framework of Putin’s statist regime. We hope, however, that the political
events in Russia and their mediation on the global scale will provoke
debates about the nature, function and parameters of democracy as a
constitutive part of capitalist modernity (loosely, viewing the Russian
winter as part of the global crisis of capitalism and global movement of
political dissent which is taking the form of the appropriation of public
spaces and, by extension, of the public domain of exchange of meaning and
values).

We hope to contribute to this large-scale discussion by exploring the link
between the transformation in Russian society and culture and digital
media. Our main arguments are 1) as far as media are concerned, Russia has
fully entered the post-broadcast era, which calls for a new theory of media
and activism for contexts that embrace the living memory of communism; 2)
political agency is no longer structured according to the principles of the
political centre and periphery / opposition; rather, it displays qualities
of continuous and spontaneous mobilisation, and 3) while capital in its
monetary sense has not been at the centre of the political discussion in
Russia (unlike in the 1980s and later in the 1990s), issues surrounding
distribution of wealth have generated the discussion of the capital of
values, with new mechanisms of converting symbolic capital into volumes of
power already in place. As a result, the discussion in Issue 7 focuses on
the Russian transformation from broadcast to post-broadcast era, on
networked units of political dissent, on cultural production and its
political potency, and on constructing a new narrative of Russian
nationhood.

7.0 Editorial | Vlad Strukov
** **
7.1 Online Public Discussions among Russian Ordinary Citizens (Beyond
Political Mobilisation) | Yuri Misnikov
7.2 (Re)Creating the Soviet Past in Russian Digital Communities: Between
Memory and Mythmaking | Elena Morenkova
7.3 Online News and Virtual Editing (Interview with Roman Dobrokhotov,
editor of Slon.ru) | Arseniy Khitrov
7.4 BBC’s Video Hub: Working in the Post-Broadcast Era (Interview with Zoya
Trunova, BBC editor) | Vlad Strukov
** **
*7.5 Russian 2011-12 Elections and Digital Media*
7.5.1 Networked Putinism: The Fading Days of the (Broadcast) Era | Vlad
Strukov
7.5.2 ******America****’s Gaze: Old and New Media Coverage of the 2012
Presidential Elections | Robert Saunders
7.5.3 Crying Putin: Contemporary Political Iconography | Aleksandr Sarna
7.5.4 Considering Contradictions of the Winter Political Street Festival |
Dmitrii Galkin
7.5.5 ‘For Fair Elections’: Protest Activity in Social Media | Egor
Panchenko
7.5.6 ‘Computer Patriotism’ in Election Debates | Natalia Sokolova
7.5.7 Miniature Protests: ‘Nanodemonstrations’ as Media Events | Eugenia Nim
7.5.8 Internet as an Election Tool: Putin and Prokhorov | Ekaterina
Losevskaya
7.5.9 Social Media and Protest Movement in Samara: The Observer’s
Perspective | Aleksandr Lashmankin
** **
*7.6 Reports and Commentaries*
7.6.1 Social Media, Mobilisation and Protest Slogans in ****Moscow**** and
Beyond | Mischa Gabowitsch
7.6.2 ****Moscow**** as a Digital Pattern: Alexey Beliayev-Guintovt’s
Imperial Loops | Vlad Strukov
7.6.3 Networked City: Ascribing, Appropriating and Planning | Anastasia
Sheveleva
** **
*7.7 Book reviews*
*
*
*Russian Elections and Digital Media*
**
The new issue of *Digital Icons *contains 250 pages of original research
and over 100 visuals that document the Russian political process of 2011-12
and its engagement with new media and assess the overall social and
cultural impact.

At the time of the global meltdown, the ‘Russian winter’ was hugely
anticipated but never accurately predicted. Equally, the revolutionary
events of 2011-12, just like those of 1989-91, have problematized existing
theories of social engagement, political dissent and cultural production.
While there has been some critical engagement with the political events,
digital media and social and cultural change, this is the first large scale
reflection of the phenomenon.

To echo Frederic Jameson’s stance (Jameson ‘A Singular Modernity’, 2001),
the authors of this issue agree that the narrative of (Russian) modernity
is being written on the squares of Moscow and other cities in the country
and abroad, on the screens of computers and mobile phones, and most
importantly in the minds of those people who have participated—either by
voicing their opinion publicly or by reflecting on the events privately—in
the debate about the future of their nation. This future will show whether
the events will pave the way for a ‘singular modernity’ (Jameson 2001), or
will collapse into a postmodern pastiche of participatory democracy, or in
fact will break the very logic of post/modernity by imposing the stagnant
framework of Putin’s statist regime. We hope, however, that the political
events in Russia and their mediation on the global scale will provoke
debates about the nature, function and parameters of democracy as a
constitutive part of capitalist modernity (loosely, viewing the Russian
winter as part of the global crisis of capitalism and global movement of
political dissent which is taking the form of the appropriation of public
spaces and, by extension, of the public domain of exchange of meaning and
values).

We hope to contribute to this large-scale discussion by exploring the link
between the transformation in Russian society and culture and digital
media. Our main arguments are 1) as far as media are concerned, Russia has
fully entered the post-broadcast era, which calls for a new theory of media
and activism for contexts that embrace the living memory of communism; 2)
political agency is no longer structured according to the principles of the
political centre and periphery / opposition; rather, it displays qualities
of continuous and spontaneous mobilisation, and 3) while capital in its
monetary sense has not been at the centre of the political discussion in
Russia (unlike in the 1980s and later in the 1990s), issues surrounding
distribution of wealth have generated the discussion of the capital of
values, with new mechanisms of converting symbolic capital into volumes of
power already in place. As a result, the discussion in Issue 7 focuses on
the Russian transformation from broadcast to post-broadcast era, on
networked units of political dissent, on cultural production and its
political potency, and on constructing a new narrative of Russian
nationhood.

7.0 Editorial | Vlad Strukov
** **
7.1 Online Public Discussions among Russian Ordinary Citizens (Beyond
Political Mobilisation) | Yuri Misnikov
7.2 (Re)Creating the Soviet Past in Russian Digital Communities: Between
Memory and Mythmaking | Elena Morenkova
7.3 Online News and Virtual Editing (Interview with Roman Dobrokhotov,
editor of Slon.ru) | Arseniy Khitrov
7.4 BBC’s Video Hub: Working in the Post-Broadcast Era (Interview with Zoya
Trunova, BBC editor) | Vlad Strukov
** **
*7.5 Russian 2011-12 Elections and Digital Media*
7.5.1 Networked Putinism: The Fading Days of the (Broadcast) Era | Vlad
Strukov
7.5.2 ******America****’s Gaze: Old and New Media Coverage of the 2012
Presidential Elections | Robert Saunders
7.5.3 Crying Putin: Contemporary Political Iconography | Aleksandr Sarna
7.5.4 Considering Contradictions of the Winter Political Street Festival |
Dmitrii Galkin
7.5.5 ‘For Fair Elections’: Protest Activity in Social Media | Egor
Panchenko
7.5.6 ‘Computer Patriotism’ in Election Debates | Natalia Sokolova
7.5.7 Miniature Protests: ‘Nanodemonstrations’ as Media Events | Eugenia Nim
7.5.8 Internet as an Election Tool: Putin and Prokhorov | Ekaterina
Losevskaya
7.5.9 Social Media and Protest Movement in Samara: The Observer’s
Perspective | Aleksandr Lashmankin
** **
*7.6 Reports and Commentaries*
7.6.1 Social Media, Mobilisation and Protest Slogans in ****Moscow**** and
Beyond | Mischa Gabowitsch
7.6.2 ****Moscow**** as a Digital Pattern: Alexey Beliayev-Guintovt’s
Imperial Loops | Vlad Strukov
7.6.3 Networked City: Ascribing, Appropriating and Planning | Anastasia
Sheveleva
** **
*7.7 Book reviews*
*
*
The full issue is available online on http://www.digitalicons.org/.

For more information, please visit the website or write to the
editors: editor at digitalicons.org<http://uk.mc260.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=editor@digitalicons.org>

Digital Icons Editorial Team:
Vlad Strukov (London)
Natalia Sokolova (Moscow)
Henrike Schmidt (Berlin)
Ellen Rutten (Amsterdam)
Sudha Rajagopalan (Utrecht)

Digital Icons: Studies in Russian, Eurasian and Central European New Media
(Digital Icons) is an online publication that appears twice per year. The
journal is a multi-media platform that explores new media as a variety of
information flows, varied communication systems, and networked communities.
Contributions to Digital Icons cover a broad range of topics related to the
impact of digital and electronic technologies on politics, economics,
society, culture, and the arts in Russia, Eurasia, and Central Europe.
Digital Icons publishes articles from scholars from a variety of academic
backgrounds, as well as artists' contributions, interviews, comments,
reviews of books, digital films, animation, and computer games, and
relevant cultural and academic events, as well as any other forms of
discussion of new media in the region.

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