Media construction of Russia’s image among the former Yugoslavia states citizens in 2014-2023

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Anna Yu. Dombrovskaya

Doctor of Sociology, Professor at the Department of Political Science, Director of the Center for Political Studies of the Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social Sciences and Mass Communications of the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia; ORCID 0000-0002-2015-2349

e-mail: an-doc@yandex.ru
Marijana Sundic

Postgraduate student at Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social Sciences and Mass Communications of the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia; ORCID 0009-0008-9880-1936

e-mail: marijuana.sundic9@mail.com

Section: Media Text in a New Technological Environment: Digital Transformation of Communication

The article presents the results of the media analysis of the image of Russia in the states of the former Yugoslavia and the study of the formation of the image of the Russian Federation in the minds of the national audiences of Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia in the period from 2014 to 2023. Special attention is paid to the identification of the connection between the information behaviour of Serbs, Montenegrins and Croats and their ideas about the Russian Federation. The empirical research model includes discourse analysis of publications about the Russian Federation by leading traditional and new media in the countries of the former Yugoslavia (units of discourse analysis are the dominant method of constructing a way of representing Russia, target audience, target attitude and context of narratives about the Russian Federation); Analysis of the structural characteristics of the flow of information about Russia generated by the most popular media among the national audiences of the states of the former Yugoslavia; a mass survey of the citizens of Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia on their perception of Russia and its place in the modern geopolitical space. The main result is to obtain empirical evidence of a change from the rational strategy (based on rational argumentation) of the official media aimed at the audience of the countries of the former Yugoslavia to irrational techniques (emotional stereotyping, value subordination and primitivisation) in shaping the image of the Russian Federation. A connection between the strategy of the information behaviour of the citizens of the former Yugoslavia and the semantic constructs reflecting the image of Russia in their minds was identified. The main results of the study are the development, based on the empirical data obtained during the analysis, of measures to improve the image of Russia in the official and informal media environment aimed at national audiences of the countries of the former Yugoslavia. The article presents the substantive and procedural aspects of the technology of positive image of the Russian Federation, overcoming stereotypes and a priori destructive attitudes towards Russian foreign  policy in the minds of citizens of the former Yugoslavia as part of the Western community and as representatives of nations with common historical roots and socio-cultural similarities with Russian society.

Keywords: media, social media, image of Russia, Serbia, Montenegro, Croatia, discourse analysis
DOI: 10.30547/vestnik.journ.3.2024.3662

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To cite this article: Dombrovskaya A. Y., Sundic M. (2024) Media v konstru- irovanii obraza Rossii v soznanii grazhdan stran byvshey Yugoslavii (2014–2023 gg.) [Media construction of Russia’s image among the former Yugoslavia states citizens in 2014-2023]. Vestnik Moskovskogo Universiteta. Seriya 10. Zhurnalistika 3: 36–62. DOI: 10.30547/vestnik.journ.3.2024.3662