The inter-regional diffusion of Russian protest repertoires in an international context, 2008 - present

Размещено на http://www.allbest.ru/

NATIONAL RESEARCH UNIVERSITY - HIGHER SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON

Master Dissertation

THE INTER-REGIONAL DIFFUSION OF RUSSIAN PROTEST REPERTOIRES IN AN INTERNATIONAL CONTEXT, 2008 - PRESENT

EMILY COUCH

Supervisor: Prof. Nikolai Petrov

Word count: 24,590

Moscow, Russia 2019



Abstract

protest repertoire region relationship

Social Movement Theory and Russia Scholarship have witnessed surprisingly little interdisciplinary dialogue. Uniting these fields, this study analyses the development of repertoire in post-Soviet Russia and its diffusion between regions. It hypothesises a hierarchical relationship between Russia's major cities - particularly Moscow and St. Petersburg - and `the regions' in which the former act as repertoire developers and brokers to the latter. It further hypothesises that international examples of protest exert significant influence on these developers/brokers. Compiling databases using opposition website namarsh.ru, the study analyses repertoire diffusion in three case studies: The 2008/9 Financial Crisis Protests, the 2011/12 Election Cycle Protests, and the 2018/19 Anti-Pension Reform Protests. Discourse analysis of textual and visual data are used to analyse the salience of inter-regional and trans-national diffusion for Russian protestors. The study finds that Russia's capitals, and international protests, do not play as significant a role in repertoire development or protestor discourse as hypothesised, with protestors tending to domesticate rather than globalise their actions. It further contends that the aforementioned case studies highlight the need to rework existing Diffusion Theory.



Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION

LITERATURE REVIEW

METHODOLOGY

CASE STUDY 1: THE FINANCIAL CRISIS PROTESTS, 2008-2009

CASE STUDY 2: THE 2011/12 ELECTION CYCLE PROTESTS

CASE STUDY 3: THE ANTI-PENSION REFORM PROTESTS, 2018-2019

COMBINED ANALYSIS: ALL CASE STUDIES

CONCLUSION

BIBLIOGRAPHY



INTRODUCTION

`The Egyptian air is good for the lungs. Do a Tahrir on Red Square.' Lena Jonson, Art and Protest in Putin's Russia (New York: Routledge 2015), p. 279.

- Pussy Riot, `Raze the Pavement', 7 November 2011

`Do you want it to be like in Ukraine? Do you want tens of people like Saakashvili to be running around public squares? Those who you've named are the same as Saakashvili, only the Russian version.' Isabelle Mandraud, `« Gilets jaunes »: Poutine n'aime pas le « dйsordre » en France, son opposant Navalny l'envie', Le Monde, 13^th December 2018 < https://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2018/12/13/poutine-n-aime-pas-le-desordre-en-france-son-opposant-navalny-l-envie_5397057_3210.html > [accessed 07 February 2019]

- Vladimir Putin on Alexei Navalny, Annual Press Conference, 14^th December 2017

1. THE COLOUR REVOLUTIONS, THE ARAB SPRING, AND THE DECLINE OF DIFFUSION THEORY

Let us begin with a well-rehearsed story: In the early 2000s, Serbia, Georgia, and Ukraine became theatres of mass protest against perceived election fraud. Each `Colour Revolution', as these events became known, `generated new cadres of revolutionaries to spread ideas and train opposition movements under other post-Communist authoritarian regimes.' Abel Polese & Donnacha Beachain, `The Colour Revolution Virus and Authoritarian Antidotes: Political Protest and Regime Counterattacks in the Post-Communist Spaces', Demokratizatsiya, 19.2 (2011), 111-132, p. 117. Belgrade became a `Revolution University' for activists from other post-Soviet countries, heralding a `new era of trans-national activism.' Polese & Beachain, p. 117. Even as the `Colour Wave' took its dying gasps in Belarus, the pattern seemed to be `exported to the Middle East' in the Arab Spring with the Jasmine and Lotus Revolutions evoking their Rose and Orange predecessors. Stephen White & Ian McAllister, `Did Russia (Nearly) have a Facebook Revolution in 2011? Social media's Challenge to Authoritarianism', Politics, 34.1 (2014), 72-84, p. 72. The lacklustre results of the Colour Revolutions and the Arab Spring, however, have tainted Diffusion Theory in Post-Soviet scholarship. The theory's declining star finds expression in Lucan Way's scathing assessment of the phenomenon during the Colour Revolutions: `A succession of cars may pull into a gas station because the drivers are emulating the cars in front of them, but it is more likely because each has run out of gas.' Way, p. 56. This study seeks to rehabilitate Diffusion Theory as an analytically useful tool in Post-Soviet Studies.

Academic discussion of Diffusion primarily considers the phenomena in the trans-national context outlined above. This study contributes to the literature by considering it as an inter-regional process within one country. At the time of writing, seven years have passed since the onset of Russia's `Snow Revolution' in which Russians protested the State Duma election results, and Vladimir Putin's re-election to a third Presidential term. Julia Ioffe, `Snow Revolution', The New Yorker, 10^th December 2011 < https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/snow-revolution > [accessed 08 February 2019] As RFE/RL's Brian Whitmore writes, ruling elites claimed `that opposition to his [Putin's] rule was confined to a few privileged and spoiled malcontents among urban elites' and that `the "real" Russians in the provinces […] still loved their leader.' Brian Whitmore, `Why These Protests Were Different', RFE/RL, 27<sup>th</sup> March, 2017 < https://www.rferl.org/a/why-these-protests-were-different/28394224.html > [accessed 07 February 2019] The capitals/regions dichotomy is also present in academia. Vladimir Gel'man, for example, writes that the 2011/12 protests were only `mass' in Moscow and St. Petersburg while the few in other regions were merely `symbolic.' Vladimir Gel'man, `Cracks in the Wall: Challenges to Electoral Authoritarianism in Russia', Problems of Post-Communism, 60.2 (2013), 3-10, p. 8. Mikhail Dmitriev and Daniel Treisman sum up the divide as between `the politicised vanguard' of Moscow and St. Petersburg and the `quiet majority' in the regions. Mikhail Dmitriev & Daniel Treisman, `The Other Russia: Discontent grows in hinterlands', Foreign Affairs (September/October 2012) < https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russian-federation/2012-09-01/other-russia > [accessed 07 February 2019]

2. HYPOTHESES

Clearly, the regime's assertion that only Moscow and St. Petersburg protest is inaccurate. Nonetheless, there are empirical foundations for the hypothesis that Russia's capitals may act as `brokers' in the Diffusion process, adopting international repertoires and transmitting them to other Russian regions.

2.1. Economy

In 2016, The World Bank published a report concluding that Moscow and St. Petersburg are the leading regions in economic development, while the south accounts for the majority of lagging regions. The capitals are also the top two recipients of Foreign Direct Investment inflow. Karlygash Dairabayeva, Michael J. Ferrantino, Alberto Portugal?Perez & Gabriela Schmidt, `Export Competitiveness and FDI Performance across the Regions of the Russian Federation', The World Bank: Policy Research Working Paper, 7821 (2016) < http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/407151473792036946/pdf/WPS7821.pdf > [accessed 10 February 2019], p. 11-12. According to the Institute for Urban Economics (2015), Moscow's Gross Metropolitan Product per capita was 969 thousand roubles, and St. Petersburg's 755 thousand roubles. Anon., `Economies of Russia's cities and metropolitan areas, Issue 1: Do metropolitan assets work towards the development of cities?', The Institute for Urban Economics < http://www.urbaneconomics.ru/en/MetropolitanRankingIUE2017 > [accessed 08 April 2019]

2.2. Internet Connection

Nagirnaya (2015) charts the development of internet in the Russian regions from 2005 to 2013, finding that `The spread of the Internet in Russia is based on the principle of hierarchical diffusion of innovations (from the centre to the periphery).' A.V. Nagirnaya, `Development of the Internet in Russian Regions', Regional Research of Russia, 5.2 (2015), 128-136, p. 129. At the turn of the century, Moscow and St. Petersburg held the dominant shares of Russia's internet users. However, now they account for only 11% while rural regions exceed them by 25%. Nagirnaya, p. 129. Nonetheless, the capitals remain the main generators of sites: In 2012, they accounted for 42% of all sites in the `.RU' domain. Nagirnaya, p. 133.

These studies show a significant correlation between economic development and internet penetration. Moscow and St. Petersburg continue to occupy dominant positions in the former category. While rural regions have exceeded them in the quantity of internet users, until recently the capitals produced the majority of internet content.

From this data, it is possible to make the following hypotheses:

· If a region's population enjoys economic prosperity, then they are less likely to be preoccupied with `hand-to-mouth' issues.

· If they are less preoccupied with these issues, they have more time to engage in activities not directly related to survival, such as protests.

· If they have more time to engage in political protests than less economically developed regions, there is a greater chance that they will innovate protest repertoires.

· If Moscow and St. Petersburg enjoy greater internet penetration, then it is more likely that their populations are aware of international protests.

· If Moscow and St. Petersburg produce the majority of internet content, the greater the probability of `broadcasting' their political actions to other regions.

3. PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The study takes `Diffusion' to refer to both a theory and an empirical phenomenon. It thus seeks to answer the following questions:

a) To what extent do Russia's capitals - Moscow & St. Petersburg - lead the development and diffusion of protest repertoire, and how salient are international examples of protest in these processes?

b) How useful is Diffusion Theory in the analysis of Russian protest, and do case studies of the latter allow us to develop and interrogate the former?

The study finds that Russia's capitals do not play as significant a role in the development and diffusion of protest repertoire as hypothesised, and that Russian case studies demonstrate the continued salience, but also the weaker aspects of, Diffusion Theory. It contends that Diffusion is not only a process, but also a discourse that creates imagined communities across regional and national borders. The study illustrates that Russian protestors tend to favour domestic, rather than global, framing but that the trans-national context nonetheless implicitly shapes the contours of their actions, and those of the regime.

4. STRUCTURE OF THE STUDY

The structure of the rest of the study is as follows:

Chapter 1 will review the existing literature on social movements and contentious action, define key concepts such as `Diffusion' and `Repertoire', and highlight the intersection between these and studies of protest in Post-Soviet Russia in order to demonstrate the surprising lack of dialogue between the two.

Chapter 2 will outline the Methodology, explaining its underlying theoretical assumptions, the rationale behind a qualitative and discourse-based approach, and presenting the three case studies forming the body of this study.

Chapter 3 analyses the 2008/2009 cycle (Financial Crisis);

Chapter 4 analyses the 2011/2012 cycle (`For Fair Elections')

Chapter 5 analyses the 2018/2019 cycle (Anti-Pension Reform).

Each case studies are divided into DATA and DISCUSSION & ANALYSIS.

Chapter 6 offers a combined analysis of all three case studies.

The final chapter draws on this analysis to provide tentative conclusions to the study as whole, and suggests further avenues of research.



LITERATURE REVIEW

1. INTRODUCTION

This section offers an overview of the literature, establishing the study's theoretical framework and key definitions. Its central contention is that there has been little dialogue between Protest and Social Movement theorists and Russia scholars: While the former tends to exhibit a `Western' bias, the latter often neglect to situate their findings within broader theoretical frameworks. Firstly, this section will turn to Protest and Social Movement theory: How have scholars defined these phenomena, and what are their underlying theoretical assumptions? Secondly, it will discuss the intersection of these theories with Regime Theory in both the International and Russian contexts. Finally, it will turn specifically to Diffusion Theory and its subcategory - Repertoire.

2. PROTEST & SOCIAL MOVEMENT THEORY

Charles Tilly's From Mobilisation to Revolution (1978) and Sidney G. Tarrow's Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics (1994) are the most significant monographs offering comprehensive theories of social movements and mobilisation. Both posit resource- and opportunity-based models. Tarrow writes that Collective Action `results from changing combinations of interests, organisation, mobilisation and opportunity'; Charles Tilly, From Mobilisation to Revolution (New York: McGraw-ill, Inc., 1978), p. 7. Tilly, that Contentious Action occurs when `when patterns of political opportunities and constraints change.' Sidney G. Tarrow, Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 28-29. Borrowing from Rational Choice Theory, Tarrow defines `contentious action' as `Collective action […] when it is used by people who lack regular access to representative institutions, who act in the name of new or unaccepted claims, and who behave in ways that fundamentally challenge others or authorities.' Tarrow, p. 7. He defines a `Social Movement' as contentious action `based on dense social networks and effective connective structures' which `draw on legitimate, action-oriented cultural frames.' Tarrow, p. 16.

Neither Tilly nor Tarrow integrate Russia or Eastern Europe into their theories. However, Tilly acknowledges his focus on the `modern West' and that his conclusions may not apply universally. Tilly, p. 10. Despite his study's geographical bias, Tarrow offers a useful lexicon for analysing contentious action, including the terms `modular repertoire', Tarrow, 148. `cycle of contention', Tarrow, p. 199. `mobilising structures'. Tarrow, p. 30.

The multi-authored volume Social Movements and Organisation Theory (2005) expands, but does not alter, Tarrow's theory. The most salient additions are Campbell's definition of `mechanisms' as `processes that account for causal relationships among variables', John L. Campbell, `Where do we stand? Common mechanisms in organisations and social movements research', in Social Movements and Organisation Theory, ed. by Gerald F. Davis, Doug McAdam, W. Richard Scott, Mayer N. Zald (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 41-68 (p. 42). and Smith's notion of `multi-issue organising frames.' Jackie Smith, `Globalisation and Transnational Social Movement Organisation', in `Social Movements', pp. 226-248 (p. 234).

Karl-Dieter Opp's Theories of political protest and social movements: a multidisciplinary introduction, critique and synthesis (2009) is the most recent monograph offering a comprehensive analytical framework. Karl-Dieter Opp, Theories of political protest and social movements: a multidisciplinary introduction, critique and synthesis (London: Routledge, 2009), p. 41. In contrast to Tarrow and Tilly, Opp adopts a Rational Action perspective, criticising Constructivist theories for their lack of conceptual clarity regarding `opportunities' and `resonance'. Opp, p. 244. He argues that the former are not an objective reality, but rather `changes of the political environment that changes the expectations of success.' Opp, p. 171. He defines Resources as `goods (i.e. everything has utility) which individual or collective actors can control.' Opp, p. 139. Opp's central contention is that the causal and conceptual rigour of RAT improves upon existing Constructivist approaches.

A deficiency in Tilly and Tarrow's studies is the lack of clarity regarding the exact definitions of, and distinctions between, the terms `collective action', `contentious action', and `social movement'. Opp addresses this issue by introducing the term `Protest', defined as `joint (i.e. collective) action of individuals aimed at achieving their goal or goals by influencing decisions of a target.' Opp, p. 38. Opp offers a more lenient definition of `Social Movement' than Tarrow, defining the phenomena as a `collectivity of actors who want to achieve their goals by influencing the decisions of a target.' Opp, p. 40. He posits a continuum between a protest group - i.e. those who engage in the process defined above - and a Social Movement, arguing that a protest group can be more or less like a Social Movement depending on the formality of its organisation. This study will use the terms `protest / protest group' as defined by Opp.

Donatella della Porta and Massimiliano Andretta's Globalisation from Below: Transnational Activists and Protest Networks (2006) builds on Tarrow's discussion of Social Movements, expanding the concept to a transnational context. They define a `Global Social Movement' as a `supranational network of actors that define their causes as global and organise protest campaigns that involve more than one state.' Donatella della Porta & Massimiliano Andretta, Globalisation from Below: Transnational Activists and Protest Networks (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006), p. 18. They distinguish Social Movements from Organisations, defining the former as structured bodies with formal membership, and the latter as `loose, weakly linked networks of groups and individuals who feel part of a collective effort.' Della Porta & Andretta, p. 62. Della Porta and Andretta focus on the protests at the 2001 G8 Summit in Genoa and the 2002 European Social Forum in Florence. Thus, like Tilly and Tarrow, their work also exhibits a Eurocentric bias. However, it remains useful because it elucidates the international context in which Russian interregional dynamics occur.

The multi-authored Non-Western Social Movements and Participatory Democracy: Protest in the age of Transnationalism (2017) is the only volume that attempts to redress the Western focus of Social Movement studies, presenting examples from countries such as Russia, Turkey, Brazil, and India. Ekim Arbatli, `Introduction: Non-Western Social Movements and Participatory Democracy in the Age of Transnationalism', in Non-Western Social Movements and Participatory Democracy: Protest in the age of Transnationalism, ed. by Ekim Arbatli & Dina Rosenberg (New York: Springer, 2017), pp. 1-10 (p. 2). The volume, however, does not fulfil its potential as it eschews the interrogation and updating of existing SM theories for specific explanations within case studies.

In sum, Tarrow, and to a lesser extent Tilly, remain the foundational theorists of Social Movements: Subsequent studies tend either to add or alter their Constructivist frameworks rather than rejecting them wholesale.

3. Regime Theory & Protest

The previous subsection addressed the lack of reference to Russia in Social Movement and Protest theory. However, in the confluence of this scholarship with Regime theory, Russia holds greater significance. Graeme B. Robertson's The Politics of Protest in Hybrid Regimes: Managing Dissent in Post-Communist Russia (2011) analyses the protest patterns resulting from Russia's `Hybrid regime'. A `Hybrid Regime' is defined as a regime `in which at least some legitimate and public political competition coexists with an organisational and institutional playing field that renders this competition unfair.' Graeme B. Robertson, The Politics of Protest in Hybrid Regimes: Managing Dissent in Post-Communist Russia (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011), p. 6. In these conditions, protest patterns are determined by `Organisational ecology', `State mobilisation strategies', and `Elite competition.' Robertson, p. 6. He contends that protest in Hybrid Regimes is more likely to be a display of `dignity', `worthiness', or `numbers' than direct action. Robertson, p. 23.

Alison D. Evans (2013) and Tomila Lankina (2015) also examine the impact of regime type on protest patterns. However, while Robertson examines hybridity at a national level, Evans and Lankina examine regime type at a local level. Evans concludes that regions with hybrid governments experience a greater intensity of protests, Alison D. Evans, Protest in the Provinces: Patterns of contention in Post-Soviet Russia (PhD, 2014, University of Pennsylvania), p. 29 while Lankina differs slightly by claiming that regions with `comparatively open political systems' are leaders in protest activism. Tomila Lankina, `The Dynamics of Regional and National Contentious Politics in Russia: Evidence from a New Dataset', Problems of Post-Communism, 62.1 (2015), 26-44, p. 32. A flaw in Lankina's study is that, while she acknowledges that protests frequently combine grievances, she claims to categorise them by `core issue'. Lankina, p. 31. Her categories include: Political, Economic, Social, Legal, Ecological, and Cultural. Lankina, p. 31. Often, however, it is difficult to ascertain a single `core' issue, with the aforementioned spheres often bearing equal significance - a problem that this study will address. An omission from all three scholars' work is an analysis of repertoire, as all focus on numerical frequency rather than protest forms and strategies.

Different from the above studies, but also worth noting, is Kostantin Ash's article `A Game-theoretic Model for Protest in the Context of Post-Communism'. Ash posits protest as a `repeated sequential game' with two players: The Opposition and the Government. Konstantin Ash, `A game-theoretic model for protest in the context of post-communism', Communist and Post-Communist Studies, 44.1 (2011), 1-15, p. 12. At the beginning of each game, the Opposition can choose to protest or not to protest, with the Government updating its perception accordingly. Ash's article is significant because it is the only study to develop a generalisable theory of protest based solely on Eastern European data. Ash builds his model using regression analysis of indicators from sources such as Freedom House and the World Bank, p. 12.

4. DIFFUSION

4.1 General Theory

In spite of numerous publications, there are no real divergences in Diffusion Theory. Doug McAdam's seminal publication Political Process and the Development of the Black Insurgency (1985) was the first major study to apply the concept of Diffusion - which had been the preserve of Cultural Studies - to Social Movement analysis. Doug McAdam, Political Process and the Development of the Black Insurgency (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985), p. 47. Examining the spread of the Black Civil Rights Movement in the United States, McAdam names leaders, McAdam, p. 132. existing organisations and their members, McAdam, pp. 125-128. communication networks, McAdam, p. 136. and interpersonal links as the mechanisms by which the movement diffused. McAdam, p. 139. Oddly, McAdam does not offer his own definition of Diffusion, leaving the reader to infer that it is the process by which a `new cultural item' (i.e. a Social Movement) is disseminated throughout an aggrieved population. Nonetheless, McAdam's work provides the foundation for subsequent studies.

Tarrow expanded the concept, introducing the concept of Scale Shift in which contention diffuses to different levels of the polity. Tarrow, p. 193. Like McAdam, he does not offer his own definition of Diffusion, simply stating that the process results from `people's decisions to take advantage of opportunities that have been demonstrated by other groups' actions'. Tarrow, p. 192. In 2001, McAdam, Tarrow, and Tilly authored Dynamics of Contention in which they define Diffusion as `any transfer of information across existing lines of communication.' Doug McAdam, Sidney Tarrow & Charles Tilly, Dynamics of Contention (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), p 68.

Givans, Roberts & Soule's volume (2010) is the only publication to take Diffusion as the sole object of analysis. They define Diffusion as the `function of connections between different organisations and other mechanisms of strategic innovation.' Rebecca Givan, Kenneth M. Roberts & Sarah A. Soule, `Introduction', The Diffusion of Social Movements: Actors, Mechanisms, and Political Effects, ed. by Rebecca Givan, Kenneth M. Roberts & Sarah A. Soule (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 1-16 (p. 10). They contend that both Behavioural - i.e. tactics and repertoires - and Ideational phenomena - issues, goals, and targets - can be diffused.

Crucially, in Chapter 11, Tarrow outlines three Diffusion subtypes: Sidney Tarrow, `Dynamics of Diffusion: Mechanisms, Institutions, and Scale Shift', in `Diffusion of Social Movements', pp. 204-220 (p. 209).

1) Relational Diffusion: `The emulation of new forms of contention on the part of actors with pre-existing relationships of trust, intimacy, or regular communication to those who have initiated those forms.'

2) Non-Relational Diffusion: `The emulation of new forms of contention on the part of actors who learn, through impersonal means such as the media, of the actions of those who have initiated those forms.'

3) Mediated Diffusion: `The emulation of new forms of contention on the part of actors with no pre-existing ties to those who have initiated those forms through the intervention of third parties who maintain relationships of trust with both initiators and adopters.' Tarrow, `Dynamics of Diffusion: Mechanisms, Institutions, and Scale Shift', in `Diffusion of Social Movements', pp. 204-220 (p. 209). He refers to the intervention of third parties as `brokerage'.

It is worth noting that, in his original publication, Tarrow put forward a fourth category:

4) Trans-national Diffusion: `The spread of similar forms of action and similar claims across borders.' Tarrow, p. 235.

And its attendant concepts of^:

(4.1) Domestication: When an international issue is made domestic e.g. most European contention involves people protesting against own governments in response to EU directives. Tarrow, 251.

(4.2) Global framing: The framing of domestic issues in broader terms. Tarrow, 252.

These terms, as suggested in the Introduction, will be central to this study's analysis.

Having sketched the major publications analysing Diffusion within Social Movements, it is now worth acknowledging a number of useful, if less significant, additions to the theory. In 2012, della Porta & Tarrow introduced the term `Interactive Diffusion': the `reciprocal adaption between police and protestors.' Donatella della Porta & Sidney Tarrow, `Interactive Diffusion: The Coevolution of Police and Protest Behaviour with an Application to Transnational Contention', Comparative Political Studies, 45.1 (2012), 119-152, p. 142. In 2013, Karrie Koesel & Valerie Bunce contributed the concept of `Diffusion-proofing': The way in which authoritarian regimes share anti-diffusion techniques with one another. Karrie Koesel & Valerie Bunce, `Diffusion-proofing: Russian and Chinese responses to waves of popular mobilisations against authoritarian rulers', Perspectives on Politics, 11.3 (2013), 753-768, p. 759. In 2014, Cecelia Walsh-Ruso introduced the term `Constructed Similarity': The process in which adopters create idea of identity `Similar or analogous to transmitters.' Cecelia Walsh-Ruso, `Diffusion of Protest', Sociology Compass, 8.1 (2014), 31-42, p. 36. In 2015, Lesley Wood added the term `Deliberation' - defined as the process in which a group identifies with previous users of a tactic, abstracts the innovation from its original context, and adapts it for their own context.' Lesley Wood, `Waves of Protest - Direct Action, Deliberation, and Diffusion', Canadian Review of Sociology, 52.1 (2015), 22-37, p. 35. Studying the Arab Spring, Bamert, Gilardi & Wasserfallen (2015) introduced the notions of `Bounded Learning' and `Cognitive Shortcuts', arguing that other MENA countries wrongly assumed that they possessed favourable conditions for success to the same degree as Tunisia and Egypt. Justus Bamert, Gabrizio Gilardi, Fabio Wasserfallen, `Learning and the diffusion of regime contention in the Arab Spring', Research & Politics, 2.3 (2015), 1-9, p. 2-3.

This subsection illustrates that Diffusion Theory has little predictive power: It does not allow scholars to accurately `predict' whether a) a new repertoire will emerge and b) whether it will be adopted by another group. Instead, its power is explanatory as it provides a deeper understanding how empirical phenomena occur.

4.2 Russia & the Post-Soviet Space

Strangely, Diffusion has received little attention from Russia and Eastern Europe scholars. Lincoln A. Mitchell's monograph The Colour Revolutions (2012), Lincoln A. Mitchell, The Colour Revolutions (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012) and articles by Thomas Ambrosio (2007), Thomas Ambrosio, `Insulating Russia from a Colour Revolution: How the Kremlin Resits Regional Democratic Trends', Democratisation, 14.2 (2007), 232-252. Stefanie Ortmann (2008) represent the trend within the Russia/Eastern Europe field to only discuss Diffusion insofar as it did not occur: That is, the way in which the Kremlin insulated the country from the `Colour Revolution' wave. Stefanie Ortmann, `Diffusion as discourse of danger: Russian self-representations and the framing of the Tulip Revolution', Central Asian Survey, 27.3-4 (2008), 363-378. Indeed, Way dismisses the concept even within the Colour Revolution context, stressing its relative lack of importance compared to the strength of elites, and the extent of their ties to the West in determining mobilisation. Lucan Way, `The Real Causes of the Colour Revolutions', Journal of Democracy, 19.3 (2008), 55-69, p. 60. Stephen White (2014), White & McAllister Regina Smyth & Sarah Oates (2015) Regina Smyth & Sarah Oates, `Mind the Gaps: Media Use and Mass Action in Russia', Europe-Asia Studies, 67.2 (2015), 285-305. examine the role of Social Media in Russian protest but neither article analyses these platforms as Diffusion mechanisms.

5. REPERTOIRE

Once again Tarrow provides the theoretical foundations, defining Repertoire as: `not only what people do when they are engaged in conflict with others but what they know how to do and what others expect them to do.' Tarrow, p. 39. He distinguishes `Old' from `New' Repertoires, the former being `parochial' and `particular'; the latter `cosmopolitan' and `modular'. Tarrow, p. 41. Modular Repertoire, he writes, refers to actions or strategies that can be used in different sites, for different goals, and against different targets. Tarrow, p.39. He identifies four types: Tarrow, pp. 113-114.

1) No repertoires: Forms of contention that fail - i.e. make no impression on popular memory.

2) Weak repertoires: Forms that develop amid special circumstances, change when circumstances change.

3) Ritual political performances: When performances lose original meaning but are preserved for symbolic reasons.

4) Strong repertoires: Performances that retain original meaning in popular memory and continue to have purchase in popular politics.

Braithwaite, Maves & Kucik's 2015 study on the spread of non-violent conflict between autocracies builds on these theories by examining the influence of a country's protest history (i.e. repertoire) on its emulation of foreign examples. They find that foreign mobilisations are more likely to trigger emulation in countries lacking their own recent history of protest. Alex Braithwaite, Jessica Braithwaite, Jessica Maves & Jeffrey Kucik, `The conditioning effect of protest history on the emulation of non-violent conflict', Journal of Peace Research, 52.6 (2015), 697-711, p. 698. Their conclusion is particularly interesting as it prompts enquiry into the role that foreign examples play in Russian protest, and what dynamic they bring to interregional diffusion.

6. Conclusion

This chapter has offered an overview of the literature on Social Movements, Diffusion, and Repertoire, elucidating the key theoretical concepts that this study will employ. Firstly, it reviewed the foundational publications on Social Movement theory; Secondly, it turned to the confluence of SM theory and Regime Theory; Thirdly, it sketched the contours of Diffusion Theory; and, finally, defined the concept of Repertoire. Although McAdam was the first to use Diffusion Theory in a Social Movement context, the study will refer most frequently to Tarrow since his work provides the most useful lexicon. The following page features a graphic made by the author which visualises the theoretical framework(s) outlined above, illustrating how new repertoires emerge, and how their Diffusion operates on both an inter-regional and trans-national scale.

FIGURE 1 COMPOSITE DIFFUSION MODEL

Created by author based on literature review

METHODOLOGY

1. INTRODUCTION

The study's methodology is two-fold, drawing on both Empirical and Constructivist / Discursive methods. This chapter contends that Diffusion is both an objective phenomenon and a fundamentally subjective concept that lends itself to qualitative, rather than quantitative, analysis. Firstly, it will present and evaluate the relevant data sources; Secondly, it will justify the use and selection of case studies; Thirdly, it will outline the scope of the study; and, Fourthly, it will examine the suitability of discourse analysis.

2. DATA SOURCES

2.1. Namarsh.ru

The primary data source for the study is the Russian-language website namarsh.ru. Launched in March 2007, the website is funded by opposition figure Garry Kasparov, founder of the pro-democratic United Civil Front and the anti-Putin Other Russia coalition. Julia Pettengill, `The Russian opposition: A Survey of Groups, Individuals, Strategies, and Prospects', Henry Jackson Society, 2012 < http://henryjacksonsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/The-Russian-Opposition-Julia-Pettengill1.pdf > [accessed 05 February 2019] The website draws on a network of regional correspondents, press, and online reports with the aim of accurately reporting all protest incidents across Russia. Such incidents range from small-scale actions, such as Pussy Riot's punk prayer, to large-scale demonstrations. The website records only what administrators deem `genuine protest events.' Thus, events organized by the ruling United Russia party or pro-government youth movements, such as Nashi, are excluded. The study's use of namarsh.ru owes a debt to the work of Tomila Lankina. Lankina's database collates all articles from 2007 to December 2016, categorising them by location, number of participants, and type. Lankina Russian Protest Event Dataset < http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/90298/ > [accessed 05 February 2019] A significant omission from the database, which Lankina's 2015 article acknowledges, is the absence of repertoire analysis. Lankina, p. 32.

Articles and photographs from namarsh.ru are used to assemble chronologies of protest cases, and as a source of visual and written discourse. Case Study 3 is an exception as it also draws on articles from U.S.-funded Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty because it reports significant events unrecorded by namarsh.ru. The aim of the study is to chart the appearance and spread of innovations in protest repertoire. I define `innovation' and `development' not as an entirely new act/performance, but rather as an act/performance that is new within a case. I will then analyse subsequent articles and reports to chart its diffusion to other locations, and how protestor and regime discourse represents this diffusion.

Lankina's 2009 article points out that the primary deficiency of namarsh.ru is that the varying activity levels of regional correspondents means that it is likely that protests events in some regions may either be under or over reported. Tomila Lankina & Alexey Savrasov, `Growing Social protest in Russia', Russian Analytical Digest, 60.9 (2009) 69, p. 6. Nonetheless, the website provides a reasonably accurate portrait of the general temporal and spatial trends in protest activism. Lankina & Savrasov, p. 4. An additional obstacle is that many articles refer to the sister website of namarsh.ru - kasparov.ru - which, at the time of writing, is blocked in the Russian Federation.

Each Case Study has three sections: Firstly, a table including all collected data; Secondly, graphs visualising the results of this data; and, thirdly, discussion of these results and analysis. Each analysis section begins by applying the diagram on p.23, and then scrutinises the discursive data. The graphs depict regional protest frequency, the distribution of repertoire type, and the distribution of protest organisers. Repertoire type is comprised of the following categories:

1) Conventional: Defined as marches, rallies, pickets when no additional detail is given.

2) New & Repeated: Either forms OTHER than marches/rallies/pickets, OR conventional form + new and defining element.

3) Stand Alone: Protest forms that are not repeated within a cycle.

4) Unknown: When namarsh.ru does not report protest form.

2.2. News reports & Social media

In addition to namarsh.ru, this study will also draw on online news reports. A limitation is that the majority of news sites to which I refer, such as The Guardian and Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty, are Western and, thus, may seek to exaggerate the extent or significance of protest events. The study will also draw significantly upon Social Media content, primarily from Facebook, VKontakte, and Twitter. Statuses, tweets, and photographs from these platforms falling within the time frame of each case study will supplement the visual and discursive data from namarsh.ru. Further detail on discursive data is given in the fourth section of this chapter.

2.3. Semi-structured Interview

The study also uses discursive data collected during a semi-structured interview with Oleg Stepanov, the Director of Alexei Navalny's Moscow Head Quarters. Mr. Stepanov was selected for three reasons: Firstly, Navalny and his team have played significant roles in two of the three Case Studies so it is pertinent to speak to a significant participant in these initiatives. Secondly, as Director, he has unique insight into the overall modus operandi of Navalny's Team. Thirdly, as Director specifically of Navalny's Moscow HQ, he provides relevant perspectives on the relationship between the Capital and other Russian regions.

The interview was conducted in the Russian language in a location of the interviewee's choosing. It consisted of approximately fifteen open-ended questions, beginning with questions regarding Mr. Stepanov's personal experiences, and subsequently expanding towards more abstract questions regarding inter-regional dynamics between Navalny's HQs, and the influence of international protests on Russian protests. The semi-structured format was selected because it elicited more natural responses from the interviewee, thus facilitating detailed discourse analysis.

This methodology has been approved by the UCL Research Ethics Committee under the Project ID: 15123/001.

3. SCOPE: WHAT KIND OF PROTESTS?

Lankina aggregates protest events into six categories: Political, economic, social, legal, ecological, and cultural. Lankina, p. 31. The Russia-based Committee of Citizens' Initiatives uses similar - but more complex - categories: Social guarantees, labour rights, corruption in the government/ law enforcement, economic rights, housing & environmental issues, interethnic relations, politics, and foreign policy. Anon., `KGI experts present the results of monitoring socio-economic and political tensions in the regions over the last three years', Komitet Grazhdanskikh Initsiativ, 20<sup>th</sup> June 2018 < https://komitetgi.ru/analytics/3797/ > [accessed 05 February 2019] As Lankina acknowledges, protests frequently combine issues. Lankina, p. 31. The purpose of her database, however, required categorising events by `core' issue. A related problem is the tendency of Western scholarship to focus on pro-democratic protest. Arbatli et al., p. 2. As Robertson writes, `Not every “revolution” is a democratic revolution.' Robertson, p. 13. In order to overcome both the need for simplistic categorisation and the pro-democratic focus, this study analyses not protest events but rather protest cycles. Tarrow defines a `Cycle of Contention' as:

`A phase of heightened conflict across the social system, with rapid diffusion of collective action from more mobilised to less mobilised sectors, a rapid pace of innovation in the forms of contention employed, the creation of new or transformed collective action frames, a combination of organised and unorganised participation and sequences of intensified information flow and interaction between challengers and authorities.' Tarrow, p. 203.

The phrases highlighted in bold are those particularly pertinent to the notion of `protest cycles.' The cycles I have selected as case studies are

1) 21^st December 2008 - 31^st January 2009: Financial Crisis Cycle

2) 4^th December 2011 - 7^th May 2012: `For Fair Elections' Cycle

3) 14^th June 2018 - 1^st February 2019: Anti-Pension Reform Cycle

These protest cycles circumvent the aforementioned obstacles because they are ideologically heterogenous, including a broad spectrum of political actors from Communists to Nationalists, and encompass a wide range of grievances and demands.

Cycles were selected for the similarity of their case conditions: Firstly, all are prompted by a specific event or policy decision; and, secondly, all include opposition to the federal government. The decision to limit the selection of protest cycles to those occurring in the last ten years was primarily prompted by online data availability. Namarsh.ru, for example, began in 2007 while VKontakte and Twitter were both launched in 2006. Additionally, articles written before the first protest cycle are frequently no longer available on news websites. These considerations excluded, for example, the 2005 protest cycle prompted by the monetisation of benefits.

There are, however, a number of flaws in the chosen cases. Regarding the 2008-2009 cycle, the tariff arrived in the midst of general economic discontent prompted by the federal government's handling of the 2007/8 Financial Crisis. It is, therefore, difficult to identify the end of the cycle. Moreover, this cycle is significantly shorter than the later cases, thus rendering the data available for analysis unequal to that of the second and third cases. The 2011/12 cycle also lacks a clear `end' since the slogan, and groups bearing the name, `For Fair Elections' exist to the present day. Concerning the 2018/19 cycle, the primary problem is that it is unclear whether this cycle is complete. There is, therefore, a lack of academic literature on the topic. The date - the 1^st of February 2019 - is purely arbitrary, and simply reflects the time of writing. Overall, then, the selection of protest cycles raises ontological questions of how SM scholars delineate groups of protest events.

4. THE LIMITATIONS OF A POSITIVIST APPROACH TO DIFFUSION

4.1. Scope Conditions

The scope conditions of Diffusion Theory are extremely broad since it applies not only to the spread of Social Movements and protest tactics, but also to the spread of ideas in any sector. Rogers (1983), for example, analysed the diffusion of technological innovations while social scientists - in the subsequent decade - examined the diffusion of welfare policies between U.S. states. Della Porta & Tarrow, p. 123. Most broadly, `Diffusion' applies to all empirical phenomena in which ideas emerge and spread. Nonetheless, as highlighted in the Literature Review, the majority of publications developed Diffusion Theory using only American and European data. It could, therefore, be said that classic Diffusion Theory operates on the assumption of `Western social conditions' - although, these are never made explicit by scholars. The first purpose of this study is, therefore, to unite Social Movement and Russia scholarship by using case studies from the latter to critique and develop the former.

4.2. Variables

As illustrated by Figure 1, Diffusion is a process not a result. The `Independent variable' label may apply to any of the diagram's causal factors, while the `Dependent variable' is the adoption of a newly emerged idea/tactic by another group: The values of this variable could either be binary (adopted/not adopted) or non-binary (adopted by how many groups?). The `Intervening Variable' is the emergence of a new repertoire. Diffusion itself is not a variable - one cannot speak of `How much Diffusion? - but rather an umbrella term for the processes which are set in motion by the Intervening Variable. Problematically, many of Tarrow's causes - particularly `cultural shift' - are diffuse, and thus difficult to measure empirically. For this reason, this study does not focus on `why' certain repertoires do/do not emerge and are/are not adopted. Nonetheless, it is useful to sketch a broad model of the Diffusion process for particular cases as background for the primary repertoire analysis. Accordingly, each case study takes one example of repertoire, and applies the composite model in Figure 1.

The application of Tarrow's causal factors would require a comprehensive analysis of each from the emergence of Post-Soviet Russia in 1991 to the present day. That is, charting each `cultural', `organisational' etc. shift during the 29-year period. Such analysis is beyond the scope of this study. This limitation provides yet another reason why the study uses a limited number of case studies, and examines the emergence of new repertoire within these specific case studies rather than attempting an analysis of all repertoire in Post-Soviet Russia. The Independent Variables outlined above will not, therefore, be an analytical focal point.