Russian broadcasting to foreign audiences and globalization of media markets: the three competing models of ‘Russianness’

• In Event: Russia: The Need for the Holistic Media Policy

Abstract

In recent decades the traditional system of state-based broadcasting to foreign audiences has undergone significant enlargement and qualitative changes. One of the major trends is opening language-based services for various world regions, while there is also targeting the ‘same-language’ audiences abroad. Both broadcasting models are perceived as the channels of soft power. Today, unlike in other countries (and unlike a decade ago), the Russian state-affiliated TV channels that broadcast abroad target both Russian-speaking and English-speaking audiences.

However, currently in Russia there might be identified not two, but three models of communicating messages, represented by: 1) the English-speaking ‘Russia Today’ and its services; 2) rolling news channels in Russian like Vesti 24; 3) ‘foreign versions’ of in-Russian channels. The paper argues, though, that neither the goals of shifting the agendas for international audiences nor the goals of ‘gathering Russians’ are fulfilled by any of these channels, thus leaving the space for more sophisticated policy of broadcasting to audiences abroad.

Authors

• Anatoly S. Puyu, NAMMI - National Association of Mass Media Researchers

• Svetlana S. Bodrunova, St.Petersburg State University