Censorship, Denunciations, and Silence Mode in Russian Academia: Informal Intimidation and Direct Pressure on Scholars

Abstract

The article identifies the mechanisms reinforcing a culture of politically motivated silencing in academic institutions, explores the strategies and actors employed in maintaining silence, and presents their implications for the anthropology of bureaucracy in a context where censorship, denunciations, and punishment prevail. The article is based on unstructured in-depth interviews with Russian academics affected by their antiwar stance and on cases of ideological pressure on academics in various Russian-language spaces as seen in the media (e.g., a lecture, a statement on a media platform, a social media post, or a scholarly publication), as well as on the analysis of documents related to persecution (complaints/denunciations, ethics commissions’ findings, dismissal orders). The research demonstrates, on the one hand, how, in the first 22 months after February 24, 2022, the Russian academic community has reverted to self-censorship and “silent mode,” and, on the other, how university officials punish noncompliance, whether due to external pressures or through internal preventive purges, so as to avoid potential confrontations with the country’s security services.

Article in English