Russia (2024)

By Bill Barry

I. Introduction

Russia has been backsliding in areas of civil liberties under President Vladimir Putin, especially in the realm of free speech and press. Especially after the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian government has become more restrictive of the rights of Russian citizens.  In 2023, Russia was given a score of 16 out of 100 and labeled as “Not Free” by Freedom House, an independent organization that focuses on political rights and civil liberties. This score is a three-point fall from the 19 out of 100 that Russia received in 2022. Also in 2023, Reporters Without Borders, an independent organization that analyzes and assists journalists across the world, placed Russia near the bottom of their list, ranking them 164 out of 180 countries.

II. Historical Background

The region now known as Russia, mostly located in Asia and partly in Europe, has been controlled by a wide array of governmental regime types. Russia as a state is considered to have emerged in 1478 under the Rule of Ivan III after he consolidated power and combined multiple principalities under his central command [3]. Russian power grew and the state was controlled by a series of czars starting in 1547 by Ivan IV, better known as Ivan the Terrible. The czars remained in power until 1917, when poor living conditions were exacerbated by WWI and communist revolutionaries led by Vladimir Lenin revolted. This revolution created the Soviet Union, which was a direct rival to America and the West in trying to determine the world order during the Cold War.  The Soviet Union remained as the regime until 1991, when it was finally dissolved and replaced by a democratic regime by Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin.

Yeltsin’s presidency was marked with a poor economy and embarrassment of Yeltsin’s seemingly constant intoxication, causing civil protest and unrest. In August 1999, Vladimir Putin, a former KGB officer, became the sixth prime minister in two years due to the public’s dissatisfaction with the Russian government’s handling of the economy [2]. With Yeltsin’s unexpected resignation on Dec. 31, 1999, Putin became the acting president [14]. In 2004, Putin won his second term in a landslide victory. He used his popular support to pass laws that removed the election of regional governors and switched their position to appointees. Despite this growth in power, Putin still did not have total control. Not being allowed to run for a third term, Putin endorsed his ally Dmitry Medvedev, who appointed Putin to prime minister. As prime minister, Putin led parliament to extend term limits for the presidency. Putin then ran for president again in 2012 and 2018. In both his 2012 presidential victory and his 2018 victory, Putin was accused of election fraud. In 2022, a constitutional amendment reset the term count for Putin, allowing him to likely run and serve as president for the rest of his life [8]. In March 2024, Vladimir Putin once again won the presidential election. This election extends Putin’s rule of the country to 2030 [19].

Putin’s political career has been marked with the silencing and removal of political opposition. The most notable example of Putin’s power over Russia in this regard is the treatment of Alexei Navalny by Russian officials and courts. Navalny was a Russian opposition party leader who formed the Anti-Corruption Foundation in 2011 [1]. As his party and foundation increased their political attacks and investigations of Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin, Navalny was charged with embezzlement and fraud in 2013. He received a suspended sentence and was placed on probation. In 2020, Navalny was poisoned and sent into a coma by a Soviet-era nerve agent. After being treated in Germany, he was arrested in 2021 upon his return to the country for violating parole. In 2023, he was sentenced to an additional 19 years on extremism charges. While in prison he remained a focus of media attention as an opponent to Putin. He was finally silenced when on Feb. 16, 2024, Russian authorities announced his death. Putin has denied allegations made by the West of his involvement in Navalny’s death.

III. Free Speech

The Russian Constitution protects free speech, except in areas of hate speech, under Article 29. Despite this enumerated protection, it is often not protected in practice. Freedom House claims that “authorities use an extensive surveillance system to monitor online and offline expression and identify dissidents.” Russia is given the score of zero out of four in the category of “Freedom of Expression and Belief” by Freedom House.

Abuses of free speech by the Russian government usually come from prosecution of offenders under the 2002 Anti-Extremism law [5]. Under this ambiguous law, everything from different translations of the Bible to “Mein Kamph” to satirical music videos have been banned under this legislation. Over 5,000 groups and items have been placed on a blacklist by the Russian government. This is the same law that Navalny was prosecuted under in 2021 for his political speech. The vague nature of the law gives Russian authorities immense power in prosecuting speech that is not favorable of the regime.

Shortly after the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Putin signed a law that made the discrediting of the military illegal. By December 2023, over 6,500 people had been arrested or fined for speaking against the invasion [18]. Putin has repeatedly referred to the invasion as nothing but a “special-military operation.” Anyone who disagrees with that stance on the war and expresses their opinion is subject to prosecution.

Freedom of assembly is also protected by the Russian Constitution under Article 31. But just as the protection of free speech is abused by Russian authorities, so is the protection of free assembly. As Putin has consolidated and grown his power, protests against him have occurred with little to no effect.

In December 2011, the largest political protest since the fall of the Soviet Union occurred in opposition to the election results. Alexei Navalny along with hundreds of other peaceful protesters and opposition leaders were arrested [1]. A day before the protest, Russian schools declared that Saturday a mandatory extra school day in an attempt to keep young people from attending the event [7]. With the assistance of the arrests and school order, one of the last major challenges to Putin’s rule was put out. Speech and assembly in opposition to Putin has since been more easily punished and less impactful.

In March 2022, one day of protest against the war in Ukraine led to over 4,300 arrests [13]. Constant crackdowns on speech and expression have had a chilling effect in Russia. Only those who are comfortable with risking beatings, arrests, or death speak out even though many more may agree with them. Knowing that they will likely be arrested for protesting in any form, Russian activists began vandalizing polling stations with paint and fireworks in protest of what they believed to be a rigged presidential election in 2024 [20]. At the time of this writing, eight people had been arrested. Vandalism like this is what activists have been driven to in Russia, as any other protest against President Putin has had no effect and faces the chance of the arrest of the protesters.

IV. Free Press

The Russian Constitution protects freedom of the press under Article 29. This protection carries just as little weight as the protections of free speech and free assembly. Just as political opponents and protestors have been punished or killed, journalists who do not report favorably of Putin face the same fate. Reporters Without Borders ranks Russia 164th out of 180 in terms of freedom of the press by country.

Laws have been passed since 2012 that label and prosecute journalists who publish information contrary to the narrative released by the Russian government as “foreign agents,” a designation that is difficult to dispute in Russian courts [9]. In March 2022, Russia passed a law that criminalized the spread of “fake news” and banned several major Western media outlets. The “fake news” law makes it punishable by 15 years in prison for a reporter to refer to the war in Ukraine as anything other than a “special military operation” or anything that is not in line with approved Kremlin rhetoric [4]. This crackdown on the spread of all information that is contrary to Putin’s agenda has made it nearly impossible to determine what is truthful and what is propaganda in Russia.

By September 2023, 43 journalists had been killed in Russia, with hundreds more who had been arrested, since Putin took control in 1999 [9]. Some of the reporters who had been arrested claim to have been tortured by Russian authorities before being taken to detention centers. These crackdowns being upheld by the judicial system offer Russian journalists nowhere to hide, so only those who know they will likely become martyrs continue to truthfully report on the government.

Even after the death of Alexei Navalny, journalists who are connected to him are being detained. Antonina Favorskaya was arrested in March 2024, shortly after laying flowers on the grave of Navalny [17]. Favoskaya is known for her reporting of Navalny’s trials and imprisonment. She took the last known video of Navalny before his death. She has since been charged with connection to Navalny’s “extremist” organizations. She believes her arrest is because she did her job as a journalist and covered all sides of the news. At the time of this writing, her case is still pending.

Foreign journalists are not exempt from censorship by the Russian government either. Evan Gershkovich, an American journalist, was arrested in 2023 on charges of espionage [11]. No evidence was presented, and at the time of this writing, he was still being held in a Russian prison. The United States and other leaders of the West have accused Russia of taking “hostages” by arresting Gershkovich and other foreign reporters as a way to deter Western sanctions and retaliation to the war in Ukraine.

As Putin was reelected in 2024, there are no signs that he or his government will cease the prosecution and censorship of the press in the years to come.

V. Critical Comparison

It is difficult, if not impossible, to find any similarities between freedom of speech and the press in the United States and those freedoms in Russia. Due to the unchecked expansion of power of President Vladimir Putin, the constitutional provisions in Russia that support a free expression of ideas in Russia are meaningless.

The United States of America ranks far above Russia in lists produced by multiple independent organizations. Reporters Without Borders has ranked Russia 164th out of 180 countries and ranked the United States 45th on a scale of freedom in journalism and the media. When scoring civil and political liberties, Freedom House gives Russia a score of 13 out of 100 and they give the United States a score of 83 out of 100. In both of these studies, the United States far exceeds Russia and is seen as a free country.

Free speech is considerably less protected in Russia than it is in the United States. Article 29 of the Russian constitution prohibits speech or propaganda that “arouses social, racial, national, or religious hatred.” The is no such restriction in the United States constitution of hate speech. Russia already having limits on speech and expression in their constitution, makes it easier for Putin and his regime to punish dissidents in a way that does not occur in the United States.

During the race for the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Donald Trump called for Hillary Clinton to be arrested for the misuse of her email while in office [10]. However, none of these charges ever came while Trump was in office. In Russia, political opponents of Putin, such as Navalny, are routinely jailed. There is not an American official who has the same stranglehold on the courts as Putin has in Russia that would allow this political persecution to occur within the United States.

Censorship of the press has historically been blocked by the courts in the United States in a way that it is not in Russia. In the Pentagon Papers case, the Supreme Court held in favor of the New York Times and found that the United States could not impose censorship on the press [12]. Just because the information published by the Times on the Vietnam War was embarrassing did not make it a threat to national security. In Russia, any journalist who calls the invasion of Ukraine a “war” or any other unflattering term will be fined or jailed. The courts of Russia have not overturned any of these rulings and have no objection to the trials taking place.

VI. Conclusion

Tensions between the United States and Russia continue to grow as of the time of this writing. It seems that they will likely not thaw until after the death of Vladimir Putin. Although not yet called a second Cold War, many fear that these tensions will grow towards the scale that they were between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. for much of the latter half of the 20th century. Putin has greatly consolidated power and has turned Russia from what the West hoped would be a democratic regime in the 1990s into an authoritarian one that continually abuses free speech, free press, and the other civil rights and liberties that are appreciated in the United States.

This essay was last updated on April 30, 2024.

Works Cited

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[2] Brooks, Stefan. “Post-Soviet Conflicts: The Thirty Years’ War,” edited by Rowman & Littlefield, 2020, pg. 3-20.

[3] Bushkovitch, Paul. A Concise History of Russia. Cambridge University Press, 2012.

[4] Dress, Brad. “Here’s Who Russia Has Punished for Speaking out against the War in Ukraine.” The Hill, The Hill, 11 May 2022, thehill.com/policy/international/3484858-heres-who-russia-has-punished-for-speaking-out-against-the-war-in-ukraine/.

[5] Eckel, Mike. “‘extremism’ as a Blunt Tool: Behind the Russian Law Being Used to Shut Navalny Up.” RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty, RFE/RL, 30 Apr. 2021, http://www.rferl.org/a/russia-anti-extremism-law-blunt-instrument-navalnu-jehovahs-witnesses/31230149.html.

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[12] New York Times Company v. United States | Oyez

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[17] “Russian Police Detain Journalist Who Filmed Last Video of Alexei Navalny Alive.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 29 Mar. 2024, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/29/russian-police-detain-journalist-who-filmed-last-video-of-alexei-navalny-alive.

[18] Troianovski, Anton, et al. “How the Russian Government Silences Wartime Dissent.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 29 Dec. 2023, http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/12/29/world/europe/russia-ukraine-war-censorship.html.

[19] Troianovski, Anton, and Nanna Heitmann. “With New Six-Year Term, Putin Cements Hold on Russian Leadership.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 18 Mar. 2024, http://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/17/world/europe/russia-putin-election.html.

[20] Wong, Vicky. “Russia Election: Arrests for Vandalism as Ballot Boxes Targeted in Putin Vote.” BBC News, BBC, 15 Mar. 2024, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68576817.