Modern Russian Journalism and its Soviet Heritage

Modern Russian press is a particular symbiosis of both propaganda machine and vibrant modern media system, with all the pitfalls that such a modern system implies. The former is an extremely savvy, elaborate and thoughtfully monitored system, while the later is bold and full of experimentation, yet with tacit censorship and self-censorship and a weak and corrupted economical basis. Russia lacks quality journalism of Western standards, but it also lacks such important characteristics like entrepreneurship, and independence from political and financial influences. As a result, the only kind of journalism that is flourishing is tabloid journalism. The main "yellow" paper in Russia, Tvoy Den, increased its circulation by 20% last year and its owner and editor-in-chief plan to organize journalism courses for future employees. The present situation in Russian media has its historical roots but we could trace, of course, some new phenomena unknown to Soviet media. The recent conflict with Georgia demonstrated the resilience of the propaganda machine and the poverty of Russian journalism.

In his lecture Professor Altunyan will present some "lessons" for the future of Russian journalism. Following his presentation, there will be a moderated roundtable discussion.

Alexander Altunyan is an Associate Professor and Deputy Dean at the Faculty of Journalism, International University in Moscow. His main areas of interest are Political Journalism, Political Text Analysis, Theory of Journalism and the History of Journalism.