Capturing Russian Media Influence in Central Asia

The research I am presenting here is an ongoing project that I am doing with my colleague Marat Raimkhanov. Since the Ukrainian crisis, there have been a large number of statementsboth in the US and Europe, as well as in Central Asia itself, about the Russian media influence inthe region. And indeed sociological surveys that collect public opinion in the former Sovietstates show a group of three countries—Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan—largely sharingthe same world perceptions as the public opinion in Russia. This parallel is less visible inUzbekistan.

Even if compared to many other post–Soviet countries, Uzbek public opinion canstill be considered as closely aligned with the Russian one, and we have almost no informationfor Turkmenistan.

However, one does not know what the level of this Russian media influence is, which portions ofthe public opinion it is exerted on, which specific issues it is focused on, or how to interpret it.Paradoxically, very little research has been done on Central Asian media. The few studies wehave were mostly done in the 1990s and were devoted to the issue of freedom of press. But wehave almost no work on state–controlled media, which shapes the majority of public opinion. Sowhat I would like to do here is to discuss with you the kind of data we have, the difficulty intrying to capture this Russian media influence, and to give you some preliminary findings. We have some good indirect data of what we guess can be interpreted as Russian mediainfluence in the region. For example, the Integration Barometer published every year by theEurasian Development Bank shows that in 2014, during the Ukrainian crisis, the number ofpeople in Kazakhstan supporting integration with Russia suddenly increased–showing supportfor the Russian perception of the crisis while at the same, it notably dropped in Kyrgyzstan showing a more polarized public opinion. We have other kind of more direct data. Recently,BBG and Gallup published a series of surveys done over the whole post–Soviet region.

Thesesurveys show without ambiguity that in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Tajikistan, a majority ofthe public opinion considers the Russian media to be highly reliable, significantly more thanWestern media.Marat and I are thus trying to unpuzzle this Russian media influence in the region, and today Iwill specifically discuss the Kazakhstani case. Russian media dominates the Kazakhstanitelevision space: the most popular television channel is First Channel–Eurasia, 20% of which iscontrolled by the government of Russia; the most popular show on TV is Russian (Pole chudes)and most popular miniseries are Russian; and almost 50% of channels transmitted throughcable networks are Russian. Russia also dominates the Kazakhstani internet space the mostpopular services are Russian—along with the Kazakhstani radio space the two most popularradio stations, Radio Retro and Russian Radio, are Russian. Finally, it also dominates a largepart of the Kazakhstani print pressin particular, Komsomols’kaia pravda and Argumenty ifakty which are widespread throughout the country. However, once we notice this dominationof Russian media in Kazakhstan, it still leaves us with more questions than answers. I will brieflydiscuss several of them.

First, can we really dissociate a ‘television versus Internet framework,’ as it has often beenstated? We usually tend to separate the TV as being state controlled, and the Internet as beingfree. But both display more or less the same views: Internet is just amplifying what is said onTV, for better or for worse. Obviously on the Internet one can find non–mainstream narrativeswhich are not available on television, but still, both mediums are in fact sharing much more of

their worldview than we would imagine. Second, it is not because people read Russian newspapers or watch Russian TV that they accepteverything; they may display critical distance. However, we have very few tools to measure thiscritical distance. Third, we often do not know exactly what is coming from Russia, and what is‘genuinely’ Central Asian. Sharing perception is not an evidence of a unilateral Russian influenceover Central Asia. Fourth, sometimes the information available is so general that we don’t knowwhat is produced in Russia, and what is produced in Central Asia in Russian language.

That’s animportant difference, because it means in the second case we should be able to identify mediaactors in Central Asia, and not only in Russia.Another point I want to raise is that we assume that what is published in national languages isless pro–Russian than what is in Russian, but we have only anecdotal evidence to demonstratethat. Another assumption is about the role played by labor migrants in spreading Russianperceptions. We have some information showing that households with migrants working inRussia are often more pro–Russian than the average. At the same time, we do not have studiesdiscussing how migrants manage fears of street xenophobia and discrimination in Russia whileat the same time promoting Russian perceptions.So what does that mean? It means that we have limited tools to capture this Russian mediainfluence.

What I would like to do now for the remaining time I have is discuss what Iconsider to be the critical elements and variables to study in order to offer a more nuanced viewon this media influence.First, we can suppose that generations matter, but surveys are contradictory on that issue. Someshow that older generations are sharing more with Russia than new ones due to their obviousshared Soviet past; others show that the younger you are, the more statistically likely you are tobe pro–Russian. So that seems to be kind of a difficult variable to work with.Second, the line of divide between urban and rural populations is a key one for the whole region.However, here too it is difficult to demonstrate that urban populations would be more pro–Russian, and rural populations less—because the latter live in a Kazakh speaking environment.Some surveys show the contrary: rural populations are more supportive of Russia, of its strongleadership and its ‘law and order’ narrative, while urban populations, parts of which followWestern media, are more critical or distant. As I said, the difference between Russian andnational languages is still an unknown variable. No scholars have been studying how a specifictopic is discussed in parallel in Russian and in national languages. The fourth variable, one that I consider to be crucial, is that Russian media influence should bestudied topic by topic. Russian media has been successful in shaping the Central Asian publicopinion mostly on foreign policy and worldviews issues: in stating that the liberal order is anillusion, that everything is geopolitical, that the United States has hidden hands behind every bigworld event, that history is made by ‘civilizations’, and that Russia offers at least a balance orpossible alternative to the US/liberal order.

This explains why Central Asian public opinionlargely supported the Russian perception of the crisis in Ukraine, as well the anti–NGO andother ‘foreign agents’ laws, which are framed by media in this ‘civilizational’ language.However, Russian media has failed, partly or largely, to produce a narrative for domestic,Central Asian, issues. Questions related to Central Asian history and Russia’s place within it, onnational identity, Central Asian public opinions even if they share many aspects of the currentSoviet nostalgia—are much more critical than what the Russian media would like them to be.

The same goes for seeing Russian society and the Russian economy as a model for the future;here, too, the success is more limited than what the massive investment by Moscow in Russianmedia soft power was hoping for.

To conclude, I think we see a growing paradox among Central Asian societies of course a deeperanalysis should offer a dissociated view country by country. We see a rising number of people,especially young, feeling unsatisfied with the way Russia interacts with Central Asia and withwhat they interpret as Russia’s sentiments of (post–)colonial superiority. The growing number ofpeople identifying themselves as Muslims plays a role in it, while at the same time they shareRussia’s worldviews and perceptions of its role in the world. Consequently, it is crucial todevelop new analytical tools to capture the critical distance that people have toward media.

Marlene Laruelle and Marat Raimkhanov

http://www.asiapacificmagazine.com/capturing-russian-media-influence-in-central-asia/