Russian Society in the Time of Uncertainty: a Repertoire of Muffled Voices

Beyond official propaganda and under the threat of random censorship, the Russian grass-roots society is divided into a variety of politically meaningful voices of virtual communities, small marginal groups, and individuals. They position themselves in relation to the current war and the political regime. How can we study these groups? How adequate is the picture we get, given the censorship, self-censorship, distorting scripts of Internet bots, etc.? In spite of these complications, we will try to draw profiles of a few groupings or publics, thus attempting to zoom and partly reveal an uncertain picture of sentiments and attitudes.

Sergei Shtyrkov will talk about the group called “Citizens of the USSR”, a politicized New Age movement representing a mix of conspiracy theories and “legalist millennialism,” seeing itself in opposition to the current regime (and its war in Ukraine), and proposing a spiritual alternative to the entire system of modern society and knowledge. Alexandra Arkhipova will present an interview-based analysis of the voices of those people who face a hard choice between “I can’t keep quiet and I’m afraid to act,” thus showing how Russians are engaging in indirect, silent protest against the war and how the authorities are responding. Alexander Agadjanian will try to present an overall mapping of various types of attitudes revealed either through surveys or through a variety of more or less loosely-structured, semi-muffled voices.  

Participants:
Alexandra Arkhipova, Laboratoire d'Anthropologie Sociale, EHESS;
Sergei Shtyrkov, Groupe Société, religion, laicité, EPHE;
Alexander Agadjanian, Chercheur invité, CERI  

Moderator:
Kathy Rousselet, Sciences Po-CERI

Language of the event will be English

L'événement est organisé par le groupe "Mondes post-soviétiques" du CERI, en partenariat avec le séminaire "Autoritarisme, guerre et mobilisations dans l’espace postsoviétique" (CERCEC-EHESS).

Responsables scientifiques de l'événement : Vera Ageeva, Alex Agadjanian, Juliette Faure, Gilles Favarel-Garrigues, Denys Gorbach, Elisabeth Miljkovic, Renata Mustafina, Kathy Rousselet, Ioulia Shukan, Tatyana Shukan, Victor Violier