CC BY
43UDC-323(470+571)
DOI: 10.17072/2218-1067-2020-2-98-110
COLLECTIVE ACTION: TRANSFORMATION OF ONLINE RESOURCE INTO OFFLINE ACTIVITY (A CASE STUDY OF POLITICAL PROTEST CAMPAIGNS UNDER A. NAVALNY'S LEADERSHIP)
Alexander Sokolov
Demidov Yaroslavl State University
Asiyat Kurbanova
Saint Petersburg State University
Abstract
The article considers the development of the Internet and social media as factors that create new opportunities for citizens' collective action and discovers that they provide a wide range of tools for organizing and implementing collective action - expression, community building, communication, voting, finding solutions to problems, and fundraising, and creating a critical mass of disaffected people. The potential of the Internet and social media are examined in detail through the analysis of collective actions organized by A. Navalny in 2010-2017. This study starts with an analysis of A. Navalny's independent activity in the framework of ca m-paigns for the rights of minority shareholders of large corporations and then - against corruption and nonfulfillment of official duties (RosPil, RosYama, etc). One of the first significant results of this activity was his participation in the Moscow mayoral election, resulted in him ranking second (27.24 % of the votes), which helped in the transformation of his online influence into an offline one. In the following years, he developed a lot of activities in public projects criticizing power, creating films and his YouTube channel. The study highlights specific periods of A. Navalny's career path with the most successful projects being analyzed. Quantitative analysis methods were applied during the study to confirm this assessment.The findings suggest that A. Navalny has successfully formed a social and political capital through online activity and ICT, which he managed to convert into fame and an ability to organize mass offline political actions throughout the country.
Keywords: collective action; protest; Internet; social media; civic activism; e-participation; A. Navalny.
Introduction
In Russia, social media have taken the form of a communication and coordination channel in protest campaigns, where not only information on rally arrangement and news from the scene of protest actions are quickly distributed, but also instant feedback is provided from opinion leaders and their subscribers. In this case, the information flow comes with a number of "bright" photos and infographics. The network specificity allowed the discursive field to expand. In this article, we make an attempt to find out the extent of social media popularity and usefulness in the given context. How does digital technology modify collective action in the offline environment? What factors contribute to placing limits on collective actions and their impact on the mobilization capacity of the Internet? It is assumed that the main reason for A. Navalny's success is that his supporters, who actively advocate his ideas and views, are representatives of the younger generation. In addition, the opposition figure has adapted social media for his supporters in such a way that the created platforms are currently the most accessible and fastest tools for online communication and coordination of actions in the offline environment. This explains the growing popularity of the Russian social networking service "VKontakte" and Instagram in the sociopolitical context, as well as the formation of a certain segment of the opposition movement supporters there as a tool for mobilization and development of the protest discursive field.
© Sokolov A. V., Kurbanova A. A., 2020
Advantages of Internet technologies in political campaigns
Modern mass movements cover various spheres of life, going far beyond the political sphere. There are some examples of political campaigns (B. Obama's electoral campaign on Facebook in 2008), colour revolutions, the Arab Spring events in 2011, the Occupy international movement, the Tea Party movement, protests in Turkey, Brazil and Hong Kong in 2013-2014, WikiLeaks and Anonymous movements.
These campaigns demonstrated the importance of Internet technologies in organizing and coordinating collective action. At the same time, collective action is understood as a set of actions that represent a certain system, organized by a set of individuals entering into groups, organized to a certain extent (Medina, 2007). To achieve their goals, individuals form mechanisms for action coordination, a set of action instruments and symbolic practices (McAdam et al., 1996). These actions are aimed at transformation of the social space which the participating individuals do not agree with.
Currently, network concepts are gaining popularity in the protest movement research. Scientists are conducting studies on correlation between social movements and networks. Thus, M. Diani reveals the correlation between organizations and activists on the example of environmental movements, using a network approach (Diani, 1995). D. McAdam proves that the involvement of citizens in movements is mostly carried out through network communication channels (McAdam, 2003).
Z. Tufekci compares collective action and protest organizations in the United States in the 1930s and the Occupy movement (Tufekci, 2014). She indicates significant differences in their organizational structures, expressed in an active use of Internet tools which make it easier to involve large numbers of people, who are not familiar with each other, in collective action. Z. Tufekci points out that the communication mechanism has a significant impact on organizational structures. Therefore, Internet tools become an integral element of the organizational structure of the modern collective action.
G. Brady, S. Verba and K. Schlozman state that there is a positive correlation between the ability of an individual to influence political processes and the use of digital technologies (Brady, et al., 1995). Social media have facilitated the search and dissemination of information, and therefore reduced the cost of access to it and political participation. They have provided with an opportunity both to search for information and to comment on it, discuss it at a time and place of one's choosing. Users can join social movements without direct participation in rallies and other events. As a result, digital technologies reduce costs and create significant potential for democratization of political participation.
P. McCurdy emphasizes the importance of mass dissemination of the information about these activities in the media and Internet for the protest success (McCurdy, 2012). This is how an alternative information space, which allows to actualize the issue and mobilize supporters, is being formed.
Social media are also used to express one's point of view. This political activity assumes greater involvement, greater activity in the collection and processing of information, and depth of thinking (Cho, et al., 2009). At the same time, active expression of various points of view on social media can promote the development of collective action and protest activity. This is because the statement of opinion is connected not only with the information sharing but also with its interpretation. Thus, political discussions and opinion expression on social media contribute to the formation of political debates that facilitate political education and motivate people to engage in political activity. At the same time, discussions on social media can be more targeted than face-to-face conversation, which increases their effectiveness in the process of mobilizing citizens (Berger, 2009). Constant communication and emerging experience of interaction allows us to form a collective identity on social media, which is understood as a sense of attachment to a group that takes collective action on a common topical issue (van Stekelenburg & Klandermans, 2010).
Previously, before the development of social media and online communication, such an identity had been formed only through group membership. Now group activity and communication are becoming increasingly important. Collective identities contribute significantly to the organization of collective action by opposing "friends" to "foes" (Friedman & McAdam, 1992). They also allow you to build a relationship with those you've never met in everyday life.
It is also crucial that participation in the modern collective action of social movements and protests with the use of Internet tools allows you to turn specific actions of individuals into a kind of entertainment, thereby increasing the attractiveness of participation in them. S. Valenzuela points out that social media not only creates new forms of protest but also strengthens traditional forms of protest like street demonstrations (Valenzuela, 2013).
It is worth noting the fact that if earlier the potential of the protest movement mostly depended on personal interactions, now the great part of information is transmitted to protest participants through various Internet channels, allowing them to coordinate their actions. Lauren Langman coined a term "internetworked
social movements" (Langman, 2005). In his opinion, this type of movements emerged as a result of the network society growth, and they should be understood as a current structure, not as a formalized one. Besides, online protest movements function by means of digital communication technologies.
M. Gray-Hawkins points out that the dissemination of information about certain issues on social media contributes to increasing mobilization. It is most important of all that movement participants have formed a feeling of common joint activity, and the networks in this case act as a place for expressing civic positions (Gray-Hawkins, 2018).
Considering the scientific work on studying protest movements and their mobilization, it is worth highlighting several Russian researchers. A significant contribution to the theoretical understanding of protests was made by Russian sociologist O. Yanitsky on the example of environmental movements, their composition and formation methods. The researcher understands protest as a form of political or social conflict, implying both democratic and forceful features. The scientist emphasizes that when a protest is in the phase of an intensified conflict, it is possible to observe fast diffusion of collective action due to the most active and mobilized activists' becoming less active and less involved into collective action. First of all, we can record this diffusion through online communication on social media (Yanitsky, 2013).
It is necessary to highlight the position of S. Patrushev, who considers protest as a mechanism for the formation of civil society and defines the features of civil activity forms. Actions undertaken by citizens develop new forms of civic participation. The attention is focused on the fact that civil actions represent a network in which institutional norms and values are transformed, which indicates the readiness for the transition to active political participation (Patrushev, 2009).
A. Guseynov considers protest as a way of manifestation of representatives' behavior in specific groups. A protest reflects a subjective and personal experience, which is caused by social and professional groups' losing their rights, freedoms and interests. A. Guseynov marks out coping strategies of activists, manifested in specific situations (Guseynov, 2012).
Studies on protest movements and online communications are being conducted by A. Sokolov and A. Frolov. The authors highlight some advantages of using Internet platforms and social media by civic activists. According to the authors, the Internet expands the forms of manifestation of civic activity, above all, and simplifies the mechanisms of mobilization of activists whose relations are built horizontally (Frolov and Sokolov, 2014).
It is also worth marking out the collective authorship of V. Petukhov, R. Barash, N. Sedova and R. Petukhov. The scientists note that a political agenda is formed during the protest, which is characterized by the emergence of alternative ways of communication. Considering online communication, the scientists show a low impact of social media on offline political participation of citizens. However, social media are a form of self-expression, where users are given an opportunity to exchange opinions and quickly receive information about events (Petukhov et al., 2014).
Thus, we can say that the Internet provides a wide range of tools for organizing and implementing collective action - expression, community building, communication, voting, finding solutions to problems and fundraising. Social media can reduce the cost of organizing collective action and creating a critical mass of disaffected people.
Research Methods
The study methodology is based on network institutionalism, founded by Chris Ansell (Ansell, 2008). Networks are patterns of interactions, relations within which can be both solidary and conflict. Network structures are conductors of transmission and exchange of information, ideas and resources between network participants. Thus, network structures should be considered as sets of interconnected dyadic relationships built on mutual obligations between the actors. Therefore, Chris Ansell compares networks to hierarchies. A distinctive feature of networks is that they are a "tangled" network of relationships characterized by "many-to-many relationships".
For the last 25 years, scientists have been conducting applied research that proves that social networks have become one of the main tools of mobilization in protest campaigns. This case study is aimed at specifying the key periods in the life of A. Navalny, a Russian opposition figure, and identifying the patterns of using network platforms and mobilization technologies which were created by him in the organization of protest campaigns. The most detailed analysis was conducted on A. Navalny's electoral campaign for RF presidency in 2017, despite the fact that the Central Election Commission denied the politician his participation in the elections.
Protest event analysis was made to study political mobilization on the example A. Navalny's electoral campaign in 2017. The article reflects the results of the data collection and analysis. The main purpose
of the study is to create a temporary dynamics of A. Navalny's pre-election protest campaign, which is aimed at determining the number of protest actions and their types and identifying an average proportion of supporters coming to rallies. The analysis units are protest events, expressed in specific actions. The event analysis was carried out during 2017 in the regions of the Central Federal District. The study is theoretically based on classical works by C. Tilly and D. McAdam in the field of protest event analysis (Tilly, 1995), (McAdam, 1982).
Federal and regional mass media were used to collect information, and social groups of the regional offices on VKontakte were processed. The reason for choosing social media as an additional source of information was the fact that they often seek to cover large-scale actions in their materials. As a result, 257 information sources were analysed.
A. Navalny's non-profit projects: online resource formation
A. Navalny has attracted great attention of the Internet audience since 2007, when he took up small holdings of shares of large corporations with public ownership and started investigating the activities of their top management. Covering the investigations progress of such large companies as Gazpromneft, Transneft, Sberbank, VTB, etc. on his Internet blog, A. Navalny gained great popularity and an informal status of the main corruption fighter in the country.
This activity allowed him to form primary recognition and popularity. At that time, his blog audience accounted more than 50 thousand followers with more than 909 thousand comments, and the blog had been conducted by that time for 5 years1.
The next step was creation of the RosPil (eng. RusSaw) project (rospil.info) in December 2010, dedicated to combating abuse in public procurement. The project has worked according to the following plan: website users identify supposed corruption procurement tenders (as a rule, with the help of the official website of public procurement http://zakupki.gov.ru), and professional experts evaluate the competitions with regard to possible corrupt practices. The project lawyers make complaints, based on the conducted examinations, to the supervisory authorities (primarily to the Federal Antimonopoly Service) in order to cancel the corrupt procurement. Experts and users involved in the search for corrupt procurement are volunteers, while lawyers are RosPil employees, so their work is paid from the project funds. A. Navalny initially announced that he expected to cover salary costs for full-time project lawyers by means of voluntary donations from Russian citizens.
Within a year (as of December 30, 2011), the RosPil project suppressed breaches for a total of 40.4 billion rubles according to the data posted on the project website. At the same time, critics noted that the project, involving four full-time employees, drafted six complaints a month on the average. The value of the claimed amount of more than 40 billion rubles was also exaggerated, which is "the total amount of orders for which the breaches were suppressed". This figure reflected the total cost of the competitions in which the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) admitted the fact of law violation. However, only the amount of money for which the value of the order, indicated in the application, is greater than the real market value for this order is corrupt. In addition, bloggers estimated that the vast majority of the tenders investigated by the RosPil were processed only after respective corrections by the amounts that were almost the same as the original ones were made upon the FAS instruction. Thus, the amount of orders for which FAS suppressed the breaches is not related to the monetary expression of real efficiency of the RosPil.
At the same time, it is important to note that the RosPil became the A. Navalny's brand, a proof of his anti-corruption activities. It demonstrated that A. Navalny received broad public support as a public and political figure.
The second significant project of A. Navalny was the RosYama (eng. RusHole), created in May 2011, dedicated to combating the poor quality of roads. The project idea is that Internet users can upload photos of violations of GOST standards on the roadway on the website of the project (http://rosyama.ru/), and the website automatically generates a complaint that must be sent to the traffic police. In case of failure to repair the damage within 37 days, the application is submitted to the prosecutor's office. All cases are divided into several categories - a hole on the road, a worn-down road, a hole in the yard and others.
For the first year and a half, the website documented 11,152 defects, 556 of them were processed by the traffic police. 2,860 defects were fixed. Damage is considered eliminated if the user informed about its
1 Блог Алексея Навального (2011). URL: http://navalny.livejournal.com/profile (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [Alexey Navalny's blog in LiveJournal (2011), [online]. [Blog Alekseya Naval'nogo]. Available at: http://navalny.livejournal.com/profile (Accessed: 10 October 2013) (in RU).
repairing on the website. Thus, the RosYama project was a legitimate tool and an instrument of citizens' struggle for the right to move freely across their own country.
The RosPil and RosYama projects were based on totally new forms of activity for Russia - activities through the Internet, a network principle, inclusion of civic activity, openness of forms and methods of work (in general, on the crowdsourcing basis). Therefore, the projects were a logical development of Alexey Na-valny's activities which managed to become institutionalized and systematized. The projects were based on the development of technologies and reflected a well-formed public request for openness and responsibility of the authorities.
The creation and activities of the RosPil and RosYama projects were covered in various mass media unevenly. A large number of reports in the Internet mass media, as well as in the mass media that position themselves as independent (for example, on Echo of Moscow radio station) were dedicated to the projects and their author A. Navalny. At the same time, the news programme on Channel One, the largest federal TV channel, had mentioned neither A. Navalny's name nor his projects before the coverage of rallies against falsifications in the State Duma elections in December 2011.
However, it was sufficient for A. Navalny to get recognition among 6 % of the country's population by April 20111.
The first two successful projects were followed by others (RosVybory - eng. RusElection, Good Machine of Truth, RosZhKH - eng. Russian Housing & Utility Sector), which led to the creation of a nonprofit organization "Anti-Corruption Foundation" in September 2011. This organization started playing the key role in organizing various A. Navalny's activities.
A. Navalny's crowdfunding projects: the experience of online fundraising
A. Navalny became a pioneer in using the crowdfunding tool for public and political activities In Russia. Having started in 2011, he is still the main player in the field of political crowdfunding who implemented the most visible and successful campaigns for mass fundraising and provision of long-term financing for his anti-corruption project "RosPil".
The following criteria can be used to analyze A. Navalny's crowdfunding campaigns: the amount raised, the time of fundraising, the average amount of money raised per day, the fundraising mechanism, the number of donators, the average amount of donation. All data for analysis were obtained from open sources - Internet blogs of the fundraising campaign organizers, as well as blogs of their partners.
Fundraising for the RosPil was the first large-scale campaign of political online fundraising In Russia and set an example for subsequent actions to raise money for political purposes. It was implemented through Yandex.Money payment system.
The campaign was launched on February 2, 2011 and immediately was a significant success - about 1 million rubles were donated for the first two days. This process was extremely active throughout February 2011; however, there was a decline in the donation activity from the first days of the action. For example, about 2.5 million rubles were raised for the first five days of the project, 5.2 million rubles were raised for February 2011, 3.7 million rubles were raised during the rest of the period (until March 2012). It is important to note that the first month of the campaign brought more money than the whole subsequent period. The average amount of money transferred to the RosPil account per day was about 200,000 rubles in the first month, while the entire period of fundraising recorded 22,900 rubles per month.
13,790 people made donations during the first three months. This suggests that the RosPil project really received massive support from the public. This is confirmed by the average amount of a donation of 485.52 rubles, which is actually affordable for any Russian citizen.
Reports on the amount and expenditure of funds raised were posted on A. Navalny's personal blog and the RosPil website. It should be noted that reports were not posted regularly. This allowed A. Navalny's opponents to assert that he intentionally hid information and appropriated the RosPil funds.
The success of raising funds for the RosPil project showed that the practice of political fundraising is relevant and has a high potential in the Russian environment. A. Navalny used efficient resources for his fundraising campaigns - his personal popularity and authority as an anti-corruption campaigner, posting of information about the action on his personal blog (about 50,000 subscribers), as well as a high protest potential of the Internet audience.
1 Протесты и Навальный (2017). URL: https://www.levada.ru/2017/07/17/protesty-i-navalnyj (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [Protests and Navalny (2017), [online]. [Protesty i Naval'nyj]. Available at: https://www.levada.ru/2017/07/17/protesty-i-navalnyj (Accessed: 15 February 2018). (In Russ.).
In total, the project raised 10 million rubles - an unprecedented amount for the Russian crowdfund-ing, for the entire period of the first fundraising from February 2011 to December 2012, from which 9.3 million rubles were spent. Thus, by the end of 2012, the RosPil project had only 751 thousand rubles left to cover current expenses - salaries of employees, tax payments and Yandex.Money fees.
Therefore, A. Navalny decided to initiate a new fundraising campaign to finance the RosPil project 2 years after the first fundraising campaign. Like in the first campaign, Alexey Navalny chose his personal blog in LiveJournal, where he was one of the most popular bloggers of the Russian speaking segment of the Internet, as a platform to launch the call for raising funds.
The next campaign for RosPil financing started on December 19, 2012. Along with the use of Yandex.Money system, the organizers arranged fundraising through PayPal international system, which allowed transferring funds from abroad.
The list of possible tools for making donations still included a bank transfer and a debit card transfer.
Like in the first campaign, the most intensive flow of donations falls on the very beginning of the fundraising. Therefore, in the very first 4 hours since Navalny had published the call for fundraising, 1,216,953 rubles were transferred to the RosPil accounts. Such rates significantly exceeded the results of 2011, when it took two days to raise the first million rubles. The first 4 hours recorded 1,272 money transfers, and the average amount of a donation was 957 rubles1. It should be noted that this indicator is more than two times higher than the same indicator in the 2011 campaign.
During the first day of fundraising, the project managed to raise about 3.5 million rubles. At the same time, most of the money (over 2 million rubles) were donated through PayPal international system2.
During the first week of fundraising, the RosPil project managed to raise about 7.4 million rubles3. In total, 11 million rubles were raised for the entire fundraising period until April 1, 2013 (slightly more than for 3 months)4. Thus, the same trend is observed as in the first campaign. Extremely intensive fundraising on the first days after the start waned and had a relatively modest dynamics in the subsequent period. In total, about 8.250 donators took part in raising funds, which is less than 60 % of the number of sponsors for the first RosPil campaign (about 14,000). Greater results of the campaign are explained by a significantly increased average amount of donation.
The success of A. Navalny, raising funds for the RosPil anticorruption project, was determined by the well-timed appearance of this project. A request for a new interactive way of political life participation emerged under conditions of growing political protest and social tension and a special role of the Internet as a growing platform for political discussions. A. Navalny satisfied the request of the Internet audience for an interactive political agenda and invited to participate in his activities.
Project "Against the party of crooks and thieves": the first political online action
A. Navalny's activities took a political form due to his active speeches against the political leadership of the country, his struggle against the United Russia party and participation in numerous protest campaigns.
Being on-air on the Finam FM radio station on February 2, 2011, A. Navalny said, "I think very poorly of the United Russia party. The United Russia party is a party of corruption; it's a party of crooks and thieves"5. This phrase has become firmly associated with the ruling party and gave the name to a whole set of projects on the Internet.
A massive campaign against the "party of power" was launched on the RuNet after the lawyer Sh. Gorganze threatened to sue A. Navalny for his value judgment. In response to these threats, A. Navalny
1 Мой отчет (2012). URL: http: //navalny.livejournal.com/759855.html (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [My report. 19.12.2012 (2012), [online]. [Moj otchet]. Available at: http: //navalny.livejournal.com/759855.html (Accessed: 10 October 2013). (In Russ.).
2 Снова отчитываюсь (2012). URL: http: //navalny.livejournal.com/760146.html (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [My report, again (2012), [online]. [Snova otchityvayus']. Available at: http: //navalny.livejournal.com/760146.html (Accessed: 10 October 2013) (In Russ.).
3 Снова отчитываюсь о ходе сбора денег на РосПил (2012). URL: http: //navalny.livejournal.com/762845.html (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [Again, I report on the RosPil money collection (2012), [online]. [Snova otchityvayus' o hode sbora deneg na RosPil]. Available at: http://navalny.livejournal.com/762845.html (Accessed: 10 October 2013). (In Russ.).
4 Данные по счету 41001859832724 (2012). URL: http: //yaudit.org/41001859832724 (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [Information on the account 41001859832724 (2012), [online]. [Dannye po schyotu 41001859832724]. Available at: http://yaudit.org/410 01859832724 (Accessed: 10 October 2013). (In Russ.).
5 РосПил, освоение. Государство, криминал, бизнес. Каким будет финал? (2012). URL: http: //yaudit.org/41001859832724 (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [RosPil, development. The state, crime, business. What will be the final? (2012), [online]. [RosPil, osvoenie. Gosudarstvo, kriminal, biznes. Kakim budet final?]. Available at: http://finam.fm/archive-view/3626 (Accessed: 10 October 2013) (In Russ.).
conducted a survey on his LiveJournal blog, in which 96.6 % of the 39,467 voters agreed with the statement that the United Russia party is a party of crooks and thieves1. A. Navalny's point of view was supported on the Internet; this confirmed the existence of such an opinion in society. Thus, A. Navalny became a mouthpiece of sentiments and opinions of the Russian society.
Involvement of citizens and interactivity of the information campaign was supported by a competition of posters (February 2011, 378 applications) and music videos (September 2011, 116 applications). The prepared video "Let's call the crooks and thieves on their Manifesto-2012", uploaded by A. Navalny, had more than two million views on Youtube.
The Yandex statistics for February 2011 recorded 62,312 queries for the phrase "party of crooks and thieves". The query was growing in popularity closer to the State Duma elections. Yandex recorded 90,016 queries in November 2011 and 96,225 queries in December 2011. After the election, the frequency of queries for the phrase went down sharply: in January 2012, there were slightly more than 11,000 queries. Later A. Navalny announced a vocal, music and visual contest "Your song is ended" and a competition of pos t-ers against Vladimir Putin, a candidate for the RF presidency. In March 2012, A. Navalny's blog launched a project "A Good Propaganda Machine", which, according to the organizers, was aimed at "effective p o-litical struggle against the power of crooks and thieves" by disseminating reliable information (writing posts, banners, participation in discussions, sticking campaign posters, etc.).
The organization and successful implementation of the project "Against the party of crooks and thieves" allowed A. Navalny to strengthen his status of the opposition movement leader and to become one of the leaders of the "For Fair Elections" rallies in December 2011 - early 2012. In general, A. Navalny's project was the first impetus to a subsequent large-scale wave of Internet campaigns, various exposés, and, as a result, street protests. In addition, social media and LiveJournal were the main tools in the campaign "against the party of crooks and thieves". Various competitions of posters, video and music were used. The competition format made it possible to invent the most original ideas for counter -campaigning.
The results of the State Duma elections in 2011 showed a 15 % decrease in the United Russia party's rating (from 64.3 % in 2007 to 49.3 %), which can be considered, among other things, as a result of the project implementation. The project worked less efficiently at the presidential election in 2012; however, in this case the participants and supporters of the project managed to factor into the percentage of those who voted for V. Putin. The "For Fair Elections" rallies, which began immediately after the State Duma elections, can be called a consequence of the entire Internet campaign "Against the party of crooks and thieves". Protest sentiments that were maturing on the Internet were put into action offline, in the streets of Moscow, St. Petersburg and other cities of Russia.
Results of a study conducted by the Levada Center show that the campaign "Against the party of crooks and thieves" and the protests of 2011-2012 resulted in A. Navalny's recognition rating growing six times - to 35 % (June 2012). A. Navalny became the only Russian who entered the Top-100 most influential people of the world according to Time Magazine of April 19, 2012.
The first independent offline experience in mobilizing citizens (the Moscow mayoral election and foundation of the Progress Party)
In the summer of 2012, A. Navalny's team started the process of founding the People's Alliance party (the Progress Party since February 2014). A. Navalny's non-profit projects formed a basis of this foundation. The founding congress of the party was held in Moscow. On December 15, A. Navalny and his colleagues from the Anti-Corruption Foundation joined the Central Council. However, the Russian Ministry of Justice did not register the party. The second congress also did not help eliminate the faults noted in the comments of the Ministry of Justice and obtain a registration. In November 2013, A. Navalny was elected chairman of the party. Seven attempts had been made to register the party by 2018, but all of them failed.
It is important to note that the need for registration required establishment of regional offices at least in a half of the regions of the country. Thus, A. Navalny started creating his offline network of supporters and actually functioning groups of activists throughout the country. These cells became the basis for founding A. Navalny's head offices in 2017.
1 Единая Россия подает в суд (2011). URL: http://navalny.livejournal.com/553708.html (дата обращения: 10.10.2013). [United Russia filed a lawsuit (2011) [online]. [Edinaya Rossiya podaet v sud]. Available at: http://navalny.livejournal.com/553708.htm! (Accessed: 10 October 2013). (In Russ.).
Along with the party foundation, A. Navalny took part in the Moscow mayoral election which took place on September 8, 2013. In fact, it was the first time A. Navalny began a large-scale offline activity -meetings with voters in the yards, agitation at metro stations. His propaganda cubes, actively used during the street campaigns in 2017, became symbolic. Cubes were also actively used by other political actors during street events. It is important to note that the technology of cubes has been actively used in Ukraine during the elections since the 2000s. A. Navalny has successfully applied it in the Russian politics.
A. Navalny managed to convert his online potential, the level of fame and his experience of work with the electorate via the Internet into a real support of voters. According to the election results, the winner was Sergey Sobyanin (51.37 %), while oppositionist Alexey Navalny (27.24 %) ranked second. The Moscow mayoral election allowed A. Navalny to boost his recognition rating to the level of 51 % among the country residents. As a result, he became a federal-level politician who successfully mobilized supporters and formed the information agenda.
A. Navalny's all-Russian actions in 2017: increasing offline activity
A. Navalny began gradual development of a new line of activity - investigations with uploading videos on YouTube. The key investigation of 2017 was the one against Chairman of the Government D. Medvedev ("Don't Call Him Dimon"). According to the initiator and his supporters, this film investigates corruption In Russia. According to his opponents, such campaigns serve exclusively for promotion and are unsubstantiated.
The video had over 21 million views. This is one of the best results for the modern RuNet and proves the efficiency of Internet tools in the dissemination of political information. The role of the Internet in these events is at least one of the most significant, if not the key one. First, it is connected with the fact that a subsequent offline campaign of 2017 (rallies, collection of signatures and coordination of location, time and forms of holding the events) was prepared on the Internet. Social media were the main tool at this stage. They gave the organizers of anti-corruption actions an opportunity to create a large-scale wave that involved many large cities. The leaders and supporters communicated on the created social media, which helps to improve communication between the participants. Information on upcoming events in the regions was published on the official social media pages beforehand, calling the citizens for participation in these events. Besides, social media pages were used to organize propaganda in social media through posting of campaign materials and products.
Results
The author took part in analysis of A. Navalny's offline collective actions in 2017 in the Central Federal District of Russia (18 subjects of the Russian Federation, 650,205 km2 or 3.8 % of the country's territory, 9.3 million people or 26.77 % of the country's population). Collective actions organized by A. Navalny in 2017 had two trends - anti-corruption and pre-election. The authorities authorized electoral campaign actions more often than anti-corruption ones. During 2017, the most significant mass actions were anti-corruption rallies that took place on March 26 and June 12, as well as the "anti -Putin" protests on October 7.
The key and the most popular action was an all-Russian campaign on March 26, 2017, held almost immediately after the video "Don't Call Him Dimon" was shown. In addition, the largest number of unauthorized actions falls on this period of time. As the study results show, the majority of the March protest actions were not authorized by the authorities and received wide coverage in the mass media (Table 1, p. 106).
The anti-corruption campaign (spring - early summer) mostly resorted to rallies. March 2017 saw the largest number of rallies organized (52 % of the total number for the whole year). Rallies were organized and held in June, October and November from 11 to 19 % (Table 2, p. 106). In the pre-election (autumn) period, A. Navalny mainly organized pickets, cubes and street events. The largest number of pickets falls on October (50 %). From June to September, the main means of agitation were cubes (17-22 % of all offline events). In September and December, the organizers used street events most of all, actively involving their supporters. It should be noted that at the beginning of the year, volunteers were involved in the work of the regional headquarters and were later engaged in maintaining social media pages and coordinating supporters to hold actions in the regions. It is also worth pointing out that the campaign has a well -formed structure. Considering the protest activities, we see that there was a specific timeline for each action.
It is important to mention that meetings of initiative groups for nomination of A. Navalny to the RF presidency were held in December in four regions (Belgorod, Voronezh, Moscow and Yaroslavl).
Table 1
General characteristics of actions in the Central Federal District in 2017
Types of action January February March April May June July August September October November December w
Rallies 33 1 0 10 0 0 0 12 7 0 63
Pickets 1 0 0 2 2 1 0 19 6 7 38
Demonstrations 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 2
Cubes 0 0 4 11 14 12 14 3 6 0 64
Street events 0 0 0 1 10 6 25 12 15 19 88
Meetings of initiative 10 10
groups
Authorized 13 1 4 19 23 19 36 35 33 35 218
Unauthorized 22 0 0 5 3 0 3 12 1 1 47
TOTAL 35 1 4 24 26 19 39 47 34 36 265
Average
number of rally participants 12910 150 4350 1680 350 400 250 125 330
Table 2
Types of actions in the Central Federal District in 2017
Rallies Pickets Demonstrations Cubes Street events Meetings of initiative groups
Belgorod Region 2 1 0 1 6 1
Bryansk Region 1 5 0 7 5 0
Vladimir Region 3 6 0 10 1 0
Voronezh Region 1 3 0 7 7 1
Ivanovo Region 2 1 0 10 0 0
Kaluga Region 2 1 0 3 1 0
Kostroma Region 2 4 0 3 7 0
Kursk Region 3 3 0 1 2 0
Lipetsk Region 1 1 0 7 0
Moscow 3 2 1 1 15 1
Oryol Region 2 6 0 1 7 0
Ryazan Region 2 1 0 3 5 0
Smolensk Region 3 0 0 4 5 0
Tambov Region 2 2 0 0 10 0
Tver Region 1 1 0 2 4 0
Tula Region 2 1 0 0 0 0
Yaroslavl Region 3 1 0 11 4 1
Considering the regional specificity of the actions held, it is worth noting that: 1) most of the rallies were organized in Moscow, Yaroslavl, Vladimir, Voronezh and Bryansk regions; 2) Vladimir, Orel and Bryansk were the leading regions in terms of organization of the pickets; 3) street actions were regularly held in 16 regions, where propaganda materials (cubes) were distributed. Moscow accounts for the majority of rally participants. In particular, 57 % of all participants of the rallies of March 26 in the Central Federal District were Moscow residents (Table 3), followed by Voronezh (7 %), Ivanovo (5 %) and Vladimir (4 %) by the number of participants. This can be explained both by the Moscow population size, by Navalny's work experience in this region and by the specificity of the social composition of the Moscow residents. Remote regions demonstrated a decrease in the number of the rally participants.
Table 3
The number of protesters in 2017 (where the UA stands for an "unauthorized rally" and a stands for an "authorized rally")
Date March 26 April 9 June 12 October 7 October 27 October 28 October 29 November 12 November 29
Belgorod Region 200 UA 30 A
Bryansk Region 250 UA
Vladimir Region 500 A 300 UA 330 A
Voronez h Region 860 A
Ivanovo Region 650 A 350 A
Kaluga Region 300 A 350 A
Kostrom a Region 400 A 300 A
Kursk Region 150 A 200 A 400 A
Lipetsk Region 300 A
Moscow 7300 UA 1800 UA 1350 UA
Oryol Region 300 UA 50 A
Ryazan Region 375 UA 400 A
Smolens k Region 300 UA 450 A 125 A
Tambov Region 175 UA 250 UA
Tver Region 400 UA
Tula Region 450 UA 50 UA
Yaroslavl Region 150 A 500 A 250 UA
12,910 150 4,350 1,680 350 400 250 125 330
A. Navalny organized more than 35 rallies in the Central Federal District. The most massive were the March rallies (63 % of participants from the annual values). The second most massive rallies took place on June 12 (21 % of participants from the annual values). The average number in the regions varies from 250 to 350 people. The beginning of the year saw the prevalence of unauthorized forms of events. There was an increase in the proportion of authorized forms since April. They were prevailing until December 2017. The largest part of the unauthorized activities of the 2017 campaign falls on March (47 % of the actions), a significant number of them was also observed in October (26 %) and June (11 %).
An increase in the number of authorized events falls on the period of September through December. In this period, pickets and cubes were actively used, which were organized to support A. Navalny during the ongoing electoral campaign in the regions. At the same time, most of the rallies held in the Ivanovo, Kaluga, Kostroma and Kursk regions were authorized.
The autumn saw the beginning of establishment of A. Navalny's campaign offices for the RF presidential elections throughout the country. It should be noted that he was not registered as a candidate. However, the offices were opened in 81 regions of the country. The campaign offices became the organizational basis for mobilizing the masses and conducting various offline events. During the autumn electoral campaign, A. Navalny organized rallies in his support and visited five regions of the Central Federal District (Ivanovo Region, Kursk Region, Tambov Region (unauthorized), Tver Region, Vladimir Region).
Using Internet tools is a key element in informing and mobilizing citizens in A. Navalny's campaign. Mass anti-corruption rallies and their large-scale coverage in the mass media allowed A. Navalny to get to a new level of recognition - 55 % among the Russian population. The highest level of recognition of Alexey Navalny is among Moscow residents, where he has been recognized by 88 % of the survey participants. Almost 2 million people have subscribed to A. Navalny's accounts on the Internet.
Conclusion
Harnessing the Internet potential in organization of public initiatives is their important feature and a means of increasing the working efficiency. Openness and freedom of communication are characteristics that make the Internet an indispensable tool used by sociopolitical actors. Using the Internet allows you to ensure the speed and targeting of communication. Thus, using the Internet is a factor of increasing political actors' efficiency.
A. Navalny can serve as an example in this regard. He is a popular politician in Russia. He has gained this popularity largely due to a smart Internet campaign which included investigations, protection of citizens' rights, a mass use of social media to mobilize their supporters, maintain direct communication with them and organize actions using the power of social media. Having become known as a blogger investigating corrupt schemes in large state-owned companies, A. Navalny has turned into a significant politician with a high level of recognition who is able to organize numerous offline actions throughout the country.
The Internet platforms created by A. Navalny are the key mechanism for mobilizing the masses of the population. The presence of a large amount of information, distributed through the Internet platforms, contributes to formation of common interests and participants' unification for collective action. The anti-corruption mass rallies, held In Russian cities and dedicated to Anti-Corruption Foundation investigations, were not authorized by the authorities in most cases.
Using the protest event analysis in the study contributed to the collection of factual information, shown to form a picture of the development of the protest movement in a specific timeframe, visualizing peaks and recessions in the political mobilization.
Thus, we can say that A. Navalny demonstrated an effective strategy of accumulating the online capital which he managed to transform into offline collective action. He formed an efficient symbiosis of tools to implement the collective action, based both on online and offline elements: 1) social media, blogs, Internet advertising; 2) creating a pool of supporters in the regions of Russia; 3) street agitation (mass rallies, cubes, pickets); 4) production and distribution of propaganda materials; 5) financial support (crowdfunding and sponsorship acquisition).
As the study shows, there is a prevailing number of protest actions based on online forms of supporters' mobilization. The effectiveness of online protests is ensured by the formation of an identity that unites citizens, based on specific problems affecting their interests. As a result, the opposition figure of A. Navalny is a living proof of the fact that it's possible to organize a protest across the whole country efficiently by means of mass media and digital resource even without a well-established organizational structure that would organize this protest. Foremost, this suggests that with the development of protest movements in the country, the political field starts being transformed, strengthening the role of extra-parliamentary actors.
Acknowledgment
This article was prepared as part of a study funded by a grant from the President of the Russian Federation for a state support of young Russian scientists MD-855.2020.6 "Mobilization and demobilization in modern practices of protest activity"
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Информация об авторах
Соколов Александр Владимирович - доктор политических наук, доцент, заведующий кафедрой социально-политических теорий Ярославского государственного университета им. П. Г. Демидова. E-mail: alex8119@mail.ru (ORCID: 0000-0002-7325-8374. ResearcherlD: C-5767-2018).
Курбанова Асият Ахмедовна - магистрант Санкт-Петербургского государственного университета. E-mail: kurbanovaasyat@mail.ru (ORCID: 0000-0002-6474-1401. ResearcherlD: C-5767-2018).
Статья принята к печати: 15.04.2020
КОЛЛЕКТИВНЫЕ ДЕЙСТВИЯ: ТРАНСФОРМАЦИЯ ОНЛАЙН-РЕСУРСА В ОФЛАЙН-АКТИВНОСТЬ (НА ПРИМЕРЕ ПРОТЕСТНОЙ АКТИВНОСТИ А. НАВАЛЬНОГО)
А. В. Соколов
Ярославский государственный университет им. П. Г. Демидова
А. А. Курбанова
Санкт-Петербургский государственный университет
Аннотация
Статья посвящена анализу развития Интернета и социальных сетей как фактора, предоставляющего новые возможности для организации коллективных действий граждан. Сделан вывод о том, что Интернет предоставляет широкий спектр инструментов для организации и осуществления коллективных действий: выражение собственного мнения, формирование сообществ, коммуникация, голосование, поиск решений проблем и сбор средств. Социальные сети могут снизить затраты на организацию коллективных действий и создание критически значимой массы недовольных людей. Первоначально А. Навальный вел свою общественно-политическую деятельность в рамках традиционных общественно-политических организаций: Молодежного движения «ДА!», партии «Яблоко» и ряда других. Однако в их рамках не смог добиться значительных результатов. Данное исследование начинается с анализа самостоятельной деятельности А. Навального в рамках кампаний по защите прав миноритарных акционеров крупных корпораций, а затем продолжается кампанией по борьбе с коррупцией и невыполнением служебных обязанностей (проекты «РосПил», «РосЯма» и др.). Одним из результатов данной активности стало участие в выборах мэра г. Москвы, в которых он занял 2-е место (27,24 % голосов избирателей). Это был первый знаковый результат А.Навального по трансформации своего онлайн потенциала в офлайн. В следующие годы он развивает большую активность в общественных проектах, критике власти. Формируется новая знаковая форма - видеофильмы и использование Youtube-канала.
2017 г. был ознаменован организацией значительного количества коллективных действий офлайн. Только в Центральном федеральном округе России (по авторскому исследованию) было проведено более 257 массовых уличных акций. Также важно отметить, что если ранее А. Навальный участвовал в организации офлайн акций в партнерстве с другими субъектами, то в 2017 г. он стал самостоятельным организатором уличных акций. Это подтверждает примененный в ходе исследования количественный анализ.
Тем самым можно говорить, что А. Навальный успешно сформировал общественно-политический капитал посредством онлайн активности и ИКТ, который он смог трансформировать в высокий уровень личной известности и способность организовывать массовые офлайн действия по всей стране.
Ключевые слова: коллективные действия; протест; Интернет; социальные сети; гражданская активность; Интернет-активность; А. Навальный.
