5 pages research paper

Introduction:

Social media has revolutionized various aspects of life, including communication, journalism and politics. The thesis explores the impact of social media on politics and journalism, focusing on impact of social media on politics in Russia during the reign of Vladimir Putin from 2012 to 2017. Russia, one of the leading internet consumers in Europe, have embraced social media politics. Evidence from the 2011-2012 political protest and the 2014 Ukrainian conflict indicate the extent to which Russian utilize social media for political communication, political engagement and participation, and political protest. Additionally, the protest and army conflict in Crimea show how Putin regime is, not only controlling the social media, but also use social media to legitimize the regime and also wage a propaganda war against Ukraine and the West. Despite the current social media control in Russia, there is great opportunity for utilizing social media to increase political engagement, participation and efficacy.

Background:

In the background of the ever reducing fully functioning public discourse and suppressed media freedoms in Russia, the prospects for the active participation in public relations role in building a fully functioning society is dreary. In the current Russian public sphere, there is enormous control and artificially constructed such as online via trolls. Until recently, the Internet and social media played a critical role in prompting political participation and engagement in Russia, achieving an important societal role of promoting engagement, mobilization, and building coalition, and contributing to the discourse within the Russian public environment. For many years, the Russian Web, collectively known as Runet, has been extensively unregulated. As a result, online activism played an important role in the emergence of the protest movement in Russia in 2011-2012. Online political engagement in Russia is facilitated by the existing social media landscape, which includes a variety of local and western social networks including, Vkontakte.ru, (46.6 million users) Odnoklassniki.ru, MoiMir, (Russian language photo sharing and social platform with 16.6 million users), Russian language blogging platform LiveJournal (15.2 million) and Russian language Twitter with 7.7 million users (“Socialnie Seti Rossii,” 2016).

Lens/Approach:

My research will be considered by a Russian citizen, in my view, backed up by information from political magazines, newspapers, articles and books. For my part, I want to show how much social networks have a strong influence on politics and at the same time the flow of information is controlled by state structures. Moreover, using examples of vivid political conflicts in Russia during the reign of Vladimir Putin.

Research Methodology:

In my work, I use only secondary research. My resources are internal channels, articles, but I also use foreign resources to consider the opinion of international experts. As a result, form an objective point of view.

Literature Review:

Media censorship and press freedom across many political regimes for a long time have been the subject of interest in academics and many scholars have tried coming up with research on the issued as Sussman Leonard said in the Journal of Government Information 545.

Murley Bryan and Chris Roberts mention on the Media Convergence Conference, Provo, UT., that the new advent of social media tools has revolutionized how information is consumed, threatening the traditional world of the newspaper, government, corporation organization.

Sokolova Natalya wrote in her book Theory and practice of social development (30-33) about traditional form of a newspaper, people had to wait to read the news. Currently, citizen journalism has swept across the world and today's audience chooses what to read and contribute to content and opinion leading to some journalism’s main factors: transparency, honesty, and opinion.

Shamilov Aleksey said (Journal of Siberian Federal University: Humanities and Social Sciences (2012): 970-977).

Former Soviet Republic has also embraced censorship. In Russia access to information from the internet during the reign of Vladimir Putin is blocked selectively through blacklisting certain web addresses and Internet traffic scanning for banned keywords.

When President Putin ascended into power in 2000, he started controlling the main stream media. It is alleged that in the year 2001 and the year 2002, he started controlling the mainstream media by controlling two leading TV channels, Now First Channel and NTV and obviously the government broadcaster, Now Rossiya 1 (Ognyanova Katherine. Management and Participation in the Public Sphere (2015). He influenced major mainstream media by appointing editors and directors (OpenNet). The Managing Director of VGTRK, which is the biggest government media, which owns Rossiya 1, Rossiya 2. It is believed that there is an agreement between the Kremlin, the founder/owner and the editor-in-chief and Even Aleksey Venediktov, the editor-in-chief of Echo Moskvy, which is referred as last remaining independent radio station in Russia but it is controlled by Puttin. (Jackson Camille " Problems of Post-Communism(2016) ).

Importance & Potential Impact:

In a closed regime, such as Russia, manipulated elections in 2011 created opportunities for ostentatious propaganda campaign to marshal domestic groups to support the government and ritualistic avowal of the regime aimed at all citizens. In the face of opposition, Russia government use extensive reach of social networks to counter-mobilize it support base. These groups include groups that benefit directly from government patronage and ordinary citizens who are motivated by nationalism or ideology. Domestic support for the Russian government is not just an illusory artefact of oppression, but also a reflection of reality popularity achieved from anti-west ideology and nationalism.

In general I think my research will be very useful for ordinary users of social networks, use the Internet for a more vivid expression of their political position, influence the course of politics in the country, and raise the level of legitimacy.

Conclusion:

Social media has enabled citizen groups to mobilize and hold governments and politicians accountable as witnessed before, and increased public participation in democratic processes. It has the potential to reconnect citizens with democratic institutions, including public representatives, political parties, and leaders in new and dynamic ways. Ideology issues and the urge for Putin to propagate a “strong” Russia” have supported the persistent social media control in Russia. Despite the current social media control in Russia, there is great opportunity for utilizing social media to increase political engagement, participation and efficacy. It is evident that social media has transformed the way Russian engage with their political leaders. Social activism and political protest have found novice platforms in social media.

Bibliography:

Alexanyan, K. Social Networking on Runet. Digital Icons: Studies in Russian, Eurasian and Central European New Media, 2009; 1, 2, pp. 1-12.

Kushin, M. J., & Yamamoto, M. Did social media really matter? College students' use of online media and political decision making in the 2008 election. Mass Communication and Society, 2010; 13 (5), 608-630.

Lawrence Alexander, ‘Social Network Analysis Reveals Full Scale of Kremlin’s Twitter Bot Campaign’, Global Voices, 2015.

Woodly, D. 2008. New competencies in democratic communication?, Blogs, agenda setting and political participation. Public Choice. 2014; 134: 109-123.

Xenos, M. A., & Moy, P. Direct and differential effects of the Internet on political and civic engagement. Journal of Communication, 2007; 57, 704–718.