ethnicity & nationhood on russian state- aligned tvChannel 1 and Rossiia are well aware of their responsibility to
support state diversity management policy. This was particularly
visible in relation to migration issues, where in 2010 and 2011
they differentiated themselves from other media outlets by exer-
cising restraint. A crude anti- migration campaign that the broad-
casters, particularly Rossiia, waged following Putin’s re- election
as president proved short- lived, as a wave of anti- Caucasian riots
across Russia in the summer and autumn of 2013 prompted a
return to more careful reporting.
Notwithstanding the constitutional commitment to multi-
confessionality, both channels consistently promoted Orthodoxy
as an unchallenged pillar of Russianness transcending national
and religious identities. Benefiting from the Eurasianist think-
ing underpinning elements within official rhetoric, Islam received
more attention than other ‘traditional religions’, although nothing
to rival that accorded to Orthodoxy. The hysteria about ‘radical
Islam’ prominent since our recording period finished was fore-
shadowed in reactions to the terrorist attacks on the Moscow
metro and at Domodedovo International Airport in 2010 and
2011 respectively. Major incidents such as the Vladikavkaz
bombing were rarely reported in terms of ethnic or religious con-
flict, despite the popular importance attributed to such factors.
One of several paradoxes that we noted was the dual function
played by the emphasis placed on Western Europe’s failure to
handle migration flows and ethnic tensions, and the perceived
crisis within European multi- culturalism. For while Russia’s
diversity management approach could be presented in a more
positive light, the deadlock in Europe also provides an alibi for
the strong measures that Russia itself has been forced to take with
respect to its own problems in the area of inter- ethnic relations.
The contradictions we have identified and the unpredictable
terrain we have mapped are cast into sharp relief when juxta-
posed with television news coverage of inter- ethnic relations in
present- day Western Europe, and also that of the preceding Soviet
period. In each case we can speak of similarities and differences.
Thus, while the baton of Soviet state television’s obligations as an
instrument of Kremlin policy has been passed to its post- Soviet
successor, the relationship between policy and broadcast output