At the Turning Point to Repression

Abstract

The murder of Boris Nemtsov in February 2015 means that Russian activists know that they may be killed because their public activity is not to the liking of some powerful actor. As the Kremlin has increasingly painted Russia as a country at war, it has created an attitude of emergency state legitimacy in which criticism of the authorities has become a crime. The labeling of some NGOs as foreign agents is part of a continuing trend toward increasing restrictions on civil society. Defense of traditional values and morality has been part of this trend toward increasing repression, which may result in the loss of all protections for activism and free expression.

Notes

English translation © 2016 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC, from the Russian text, “Na repressivnom povorote: pochemu ‘nezhelatel'nykh elementov’ v Rossii stanovitsia vse bol'she.” Published with the author's permission. Maria Lipman is chief editor of the journal Kontrapunkt. Translated by Stephen D. Shenfield. Color versions of one or more of the figures in the article can be found online at www.tandfonline.com/mrup.