Control - Mass Media And Propaganda Flashcards
What does Lenin call newspapers?
‘Mouthpieces of the bourgeoisie’
Dates regarding banning newspapers
1917 = all non-socialist papers banned
Early 1920s = all non-Bolshevik papers eradicated
1917 = decree on the press
What were requirements for editors and journalists?
- must be government employees
- part of the ‘Union of Soviet Journalists’
- party members
What must be done to all articles before publishing?
Approved by Glavlit:
- GPU put in charge of monitoring all books
- professional censors employed
- purged libraries of politically dangerous books
GLAVLIT
Censorship office
- by 1928 controlled all access to economic data
Pravda
‘Truth’ - Party paper
Izvestiya
‘News’ - paper of the government
Trud
‘Labour’ - newspaper of the workers unions (most popular)
Circulation of Pravda by 1983
10.7 million
Circulation of Trud 1983
13.5 million
How were papers made accessible?
CHEAP
- posted on boards
- at workplaces
Ensured high readership
What was the guiding principle of the soviet newspapers?
Partiinost = ‘party-mindedness’
- promoting the party / ‘party-spirit’
- views that are aligned with the party, praising the party and saying the party is always right
Main things conveyed by papers:
- propaganda
- soviet achievements
- production target successes
Main things avoided/prohibited from papers?
- natural disasters
- plane crashes
- mass emergencies
What was particularly prevalent in papers in the Stalin era?
Production targets and sucessed
Example of achievement boasted about by newspapers
Aviators flying over the northpole
Example of continued censorship under Khrushchev
Kyshtym disaster - 1957
Nuclear waste storage tank explodes
200 dead
27000 left in areas exposed to HIGH radiation
NEVER REPORTED ON
Example of delayed reporting under Brezhnev
1972 Moscow Fire
Reported on at least a month after fire put out
Local newspapers (more lenience under Khrushchev)
Allowed to criticise minor bureaucrats.
Criticisms of Party Leaders not allowed.
Limits on what could report on.
How were magazines used?
Aimed at specific people (eg: farmers, teachers, children with specific hobbies)
Reported of specific topics - BUT had to carry govt. propaganda throughout
Example magazine
Red Sport - 1924
Sovetskii sport replaced it after 1946
HUGE POPULARITY: honest and accurate but had to also carry political news
Why was radio easy to manipulate?
It was a new development - no established normal or tradition of independent activity:
It was easy for them to manipulate.
When was the first important use of radio by the soviets?
1917 revolution was broadcast on radio in morse code.
When was voice radio invented
1921