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Propaganda and Challenges to the Russian Regime
April 4, 2017 Moscow is trying to maintain an image of strength.
By Xander Snyder
A bomb was detonated on a Russian subway train Monday afternoon, killing at least 11 people
and injuring dozens. As of this writing, no one has claimed responsibility for the attack. The
impact on President Vladimir Putin’s government will heavily depend on who orchestrated the
bombing. If it was a Chechen group, for example, it could hurt Putin’s credibility. This is because
early in his first presidency, Putin established a popular base by invading and violently
suppressing Chechen separatists. A Chechen resurgence has the potential to make Putin look
incapable and weak, which are unacceptable qualities for a Russian leader. One known
consequence of this attack, regardless of the perpetrators, is that the Russian government will
try to spin it to the Kremlin’s advantage. This speaks to the deeper question of how the Kremlin
controls information.
Growing Skepticism
The bombing is important but represents a small blip amid a number of challenges facing Putin.
The economy is declining and the opposition is growing in organization and power. Both of these
developments present ongoing threats to the regime. To influence public perception of its
increasingly weak position, the Russian government will try to control how the media reports
this week’s attack. This is not new – Russia has long used different forms of propaganda as a
tool to sway popular opinion. However, Russian citizens’ response to government-directed
information is changing, from begrudging toleration to growing skepticism.
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Emergency services personnel and vehicles are seen at the entrance to Technological Institute metro station in St. Petersburg
on April 3, 2017. OLGA MALTSEVA/AFP/Getty Images
Geopolitical Futures discussed in a prior piece how the effectiveness of propaganda relating to a
regime’s international activities weakens and can dissolve entirely when its message no longer
bears a semblance to reality. For example, Putin has appealed to Russian nationalist identity by
projecting an image of strength abroad. Russia’s intervention in Syria was effective in bolstering
support for Putin because it made Russians proud of their nation’s might, and it partially
restored the country’s image as a global power. Putin’s portrayal of Russian military strength
matched up, at least somewhat, to reality. Propaganda related to domestic issues, however, has
been more difficult to deliver. The Russian government’s strategy of maintaining social stability
by invoking nationalist sentiments is proving increasingly problematic as the country’s economic
situation deteriorates.
The unauthorized March 26 protests organized by opposition leader Alexei Navalny signal a
disconnect between how Russia’s domestic conditions are being presented in propaganda and
the reality experienced by most Russians. The concept of Russian strength, dependent at least
partly on the perception of a healthy economy and stable institutions, is difficult to square with
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ongoing financial challenges, such as cuts in pensions and other declining social services, and
the persistently corrupt political environment. That these protests occurred in 99 cities across
the country – many of which are relatively poor, conservative and dependent on central
government handouts – is a sign that this dissatisfaction is not restricted to the most
progressive strata of Russian society.
Lessons from the Past
The rich tradition and history of propaganda in both the Soviet Union and Czarist Russia reveal
two things about the country. First, it is difficult to rule a country that spans 11 time zones and is
vulnerable to invasion. Second, Russians have an impressive ability to unify and endure in
extreme situations if given a sufficiently convincing message to unite behind. Propaganda was
used in the Soviet Union to siphon off incoming information from the West to unite against an
ideological enemy. In World War I, Czar Nicholas II encouraged purchases of war bonds to
defend against the invading Germans despite social upheaval that was destabilizing Russia.
The use of propaganda in Russia grew following the 1904-05 war with Japan. After the Russian
military moved east to confront Japan, space was created for an anti-regime movement that
opposed a number of political and economic issues that had developed over the previous five
decades, such as unserviceable taxes placed on peasants’ small land lots. The czar’s
mishandling of the war further fanned the flames of revolution. Russia was losing and decided to
speedily conclude the war with Japan, moving its military back to the west to put down the
rebellion. In 1905, Russia’s still-intact military was able to restore order (which was not the case
in 1917 after the Russian military had been devastated). But to diffuse the ire directed at the
czarist government, the regime encouraged anti-Semitic propaganda that either blamed Jews for
aiding the war effort or stoked pre-existing fears of Jewish control of industry. Two famous
examples of propaganda from this period include “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” a fake
document that supposedly recounted a meeting of Jews conspiring to take over the world, and
the demonization of Jacob Schiff, a Jewish banker who extended a loan to Japan in 1904 to aid in
its war effort against Russia.
While propaganda was less common in Russia before 1905, the need for it grew following the
Emancipation of the Serfs in 1861, which came about partly as a result of Russia’s defeat in the
Crimean War in 1856. For hundreds of years, the Russian nobility were divided through both
geographical separation and a governmental power structure that resulted in almost complete
dependence on service to the czar. Until the 18th century, all male nobles were required to
serve lifelong careers in either the military or civil service. The czar also tightly controlled new
land grants and the transfer of intergenerational wealth. While the nobility owned serfs, they did
so at the czar’s pleasure through service grants and relied directly on the czar’s control of the
military to prevent any uprisings against them.
Russia’s defeat in the Crimean War exposed a great disconnect between the image of strength
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projected by Imperial Russia and its actual capacity to muster resources from its serf-based,
agrarian economy in a confrontation against industrialized powers. Serf revolts increased during
and after the war, leading Czar Alexander II to declare that it was “better to abolish serfdom
from above than to wait until it will begin to abolish itself from below.”
This was an emancipation more in name than in practice. Former serfs were unable to move
from their newly “given” plots of land and were also responsible for paying taxes. These
changes kept the serfs tied to a single location and beholden to the local aristocracy, which was
in charge of tax collection after the emancipation. It was a move meant to diffuse the pressure
from liberal sentiments without actually granting any new freedoms. Nonetheless, freeing the
serfs required that the nobility accept the serfs’ new legal status and hand over parts of land
that they had previously considered exclusively theirs. It also placed greater responsibility on
the central government in managing the peasantry, thereby creating the need for more direct
messaging to sway mass opinion.
Controlling the Message
Today, the regime’s challenge isn’t sending directed messages to the Russian people but
preventing the dissemination of unwanted ones. The government tightly controls Russian media
and social media platforms like VK.com and OK.ru, which have tens of millions of users.
However, Navalny was still able to create a video that received 15 million views and was used to
turn out approximately 70,000 protesters across the country. Navalny’s intercity volunteer
networks were able to quickly exploit the attention the video received and transform it into
physical action. The protests revealed that this political infrastructure was better developed than
the government had previously recognized and was able to turn calls to action from mere
annoyances into more serious threats to the regime.
Last week, the Russian Education and Science Ministry announced a new social media campaign
to encourage “moral and patriotic upbringing” among young people. This is just one program
funded by the growing Russian state budget for patriotic education. However, people willing to
publicly challenge the Putin government are beyond the point where “patriotic education” can
be wholly effective, which is why the government is focusing more of its efforts on Russia’s
youth. Approximately 80 percent of the growth in the 2016-2020 budget is in Ministry of
Education programs. The Russian government is trying to inculcate greater loyalty to the state
among young people who have not yet been exposed to conflicting political ideas. For the
previous generation, an appeal to unity could be made by referring to the chaos of the postSoviet 1990s. But Russia’s young adults did not live through these times and therefore cannot
compare their current political dissatisfaction to those from a prior era.
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(click to enlarge)
A regime that feels threatened will resort to more overt forms of repression to control a
particular group that has become resistant to its propaganda. This can be done with detentions –
approximately 1,000 demonstrators were arrested in Moscow alone during last week’s protests –
or other forms of intimidation. For example, two of Navalny’s local coordinators in the Siberian
city of Tomsk were sealed into their apartment from the outside on the same day that Navalny
arrived in town for a rally. As propaganda becomes less effective, and as groups not influenced
by propaganda grow, the use of physical violence will increase. This will be a sign that the
Russian government is struggling to maintain its grip on power and needs a more immediate
method to suppress dissent.
Of course, Russia isn’t unique. All countries use forms of propaganda. But despite Russia’s
substantial efforts in constructing state-approved media channels and alternatives to Western
social media platforms, its propaganda efforts are beginning to fail. How Russia manages the
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coverage of the metro bombing will heavily depend on who ends up claiming responsibility for
the attack. Regardless, that coverage will be managed amid an environment in which Russia’s
propaganda efforts are becoming less impactful. The recent protests are an indication that a
turn to more violent methods of repression will be coming.
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