Paradoxes of journalistic profession: Russia in the Context of BRICS Kaarle Nordenstreng and Svetlana Pasti 1 st International Conference on Journalism Studies, June 27-29, 2012 Santiago de Chile

22 BRICS as a New Framework BRICS as an acronym for five countries: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa Countries of big populations and growing economies: 30 percent of the world’s land mass 42 percent of the world’s population By 2050 they would constitute the largest and most influential economies in the world 2

33 BRICS as a New Framework A growing political influence of BRICS group in the world An effort to avoid dominant Western perspective, including ‘transitology’: export of Western model of modernisation Search for new avenues in research of media systems and journalism profession 3

44 New Project Media Systems in Flux: The Challenge of the BRICS Countries Funding by Academy of Finland, , Focus on theoretical concepts of - media system - role of media and journalists in democracies - freedom and independence of media Empirical mapping of - citizen participation in and through media - professional orientation of journalists - education of journalists 4

55 Russia: 1 st Paradox: Profession On the one hand, journalism is a dangerous job: over 300 killed, majority in home cities On the other hand, journalism is fashionable occupation: growth of journalism schools, number of applicants, many from wealthy families Journalism as PR and show business, where big money moves and personal career advancement is achieved, especially in large cities 5

66 2 nd Paradox: Media Market On the one hand, Russian media market is ranked 10 th in the world by economic indicators On the other hand, nearly 80% of the press consists of non-market publications affiliated closely with financial-industrial groups or state-owned organizations with financing from regional and local budgets 6

77 3 rd Paradox: Marriage of Liberalism and Authoritarianism On the one hand, the same logic of commercialization, concentration, convergence as in the West - the triumph of the liberal model On the other hand, the authoritarian approach of the government: “instrumentalization of media” and “market authoritarianism” 7

88 4 th Paradox: Democracy vs. Job On the one hand, deterioration in quality of democracy with decline of media freedom On the other hand, job satisfaction among majority of journalists 8

9999 Russia in World Audit Democracy Russia occupied place 134 – between Yemen and Chad out of 150 countries Democracy rank in last 13 years from place 106 to 136 Press freedom rank 130 (without press freedom) Corruption rank 127 – twice worse than China’s (61) and what Russia had 10 years back (76)

10 Editorial Autonomy Decline,

11 Satisfaction Increase Who were satisfied with their jobs increased in 2008 (72%) in comparison to 1992 (62%) Number of independent reporters decreased from 60% in 1992 to 20% in 2008 Main constraints in the work in 2008 were the local authorities and the editorial bosses 11

12 Two Main Trends of Russian Media System Etatization Increase of state capital and mixed capital (state & commercial) in media market Commercialization Economic interests prevail in media and professional thinking of journalists 12

13 Etatization Negative impact on Political independence Positive impact on Personal satisfaction - obvious guarantees against market uncertainty At the same time it does not impede Commersialization Typical journalist - conformist with two identities: 1) loyal staff employee and at the same time 2) market freelancer (second job) 13

14 Third Trend of Russian Media System New trend emerging from social networks (Vkontakte, Facebook) using digital media and feeding protest movements Forced to change agenda of online media Civil society together with online media contributes to politically independent journalism Alternatives: to associate with the obedient (satisfied) mainstream media or with protesting (non-satisfied) online media 14

State Capital Traditional Media Civil Society New Digital Media Russia, 2011-

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