British Expert Names Two Biggest Obstacles for Western Propaganda in Russia

A new article by a Chatham House think tank fellow offers up two obstacles for the Western media in Russia and one pundit finds a solution.

An article published in think tank Chatham House's The World Today magazine claims that the Western media needs "to come up with new ideas" to win what it calls "information warfare" with Russia.

According to the author, Keir Giles, the biggest obstacles to that are InoSMI ("Foreign Media"), a website which offers translations of foreign media articles  and the Federal Security Service's SORM system, which can track Internet activity under a court order.

When it comes to SORM, the author does not make it clear what obstacle the system creates for viewing foreign media, although he says that it is not as well-known, in his own words, "unlike similar systems in the West." Giles' article was republished by the Moscow Times daily, which is distributed in paper form free of charge in Russia.

In the case of InoSMI (a part of Rossiya Segodnya media group together with Sputnik), Giles' argument has some merit. Without being submerged in an overall Western media narrative, individual articles may appear nonsensical to readers to the point of being amusing, such as a recently translated listicle titled "5 Reasons Why the U.S. Remains the World’s Only Superpower," which includes having the world's tallest rollercoaster.

Others, including opinion and analytical articles, which can make sense to readers when they are subjected to a certain media narrative, can similarly become nonsensical or even aggravating. Aimed at a domestic audience, they are essentially part of a view of reality in which some claims are treated as fact while certain facts that do not fit the picture are ignored.

#Kremlin uses SORM to track all Internet use inside Russia, including visits to foreign media. http://t.co/4VEypEaQbr pic.twitter.com/AuRFl5gNm0

— Will Stevens (@WBStevens) August 5, 2015

When US Ambassador to Russia Will Stevens tweeted Giles' article, his audience was left confused about his motivations, asking questions about Edward Snowden.

Quality of translation also does not seem to be an issue, as even materials originally in Russian from government broadcaster sources such as Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Voice of America, Deutsche Welle and others are published.

So a solution has to be found as to how to make people in Russia watch Western media, according to Giles.

A former producer at the Gazprom Media-owned entertainment channel TNT and now a sort of crusader against Russian state media outlets, Peter Pomerantsev suggested covering more local news and creating "docu-soaps about schools or hospitals; reality shows exploring ethnic tensions."

It is not clear who would be interested in such programming in Russia, and Pomerantsev, who worked at TNT for ten years likely knows that even topics such as corruption, political favoritism and abuse of power are not taboo in Russian entertainment. It could, however, land Pomerantsev a pretty sweet gig as a senior producer if he pushes through the idea, considering that he is one of the few vocal supporters of the idea to have such a level of experience.

But even if you could make Russian viewers absorb the Western media narrative, would you really want them to? Pomerantsev brings up the case of "Estonia, where viewers who followed rival Russian and western stories about the downing of flight MH17 over Ukraine last year ended up disbelieving both sides."

And what would happen if Russians were exposed to Western media? While outlets such as Voice of America and BBC Russian Service were extremely popular in the Soviet Union because they put a twist on events in a society controlled by censorship and taboo, today they simply provide an alternative editorial position only interesting to a niche audience. If interest groups and governments want to influence Russian public opinion with media distribution, they should begin by making their goals transparent, at least to themselves.