Eva Maria Hinterhuber and Gesine Fuchs (in collaboration with Anica Waldendorf) 1
The phenomenon of Pussy Riot: an introduction
Some of the most intriguing and exciting impulses for gender-political protest in recent years have come from Eastern Europe, thereby contradicting the conventional (western) wisdom that feminism does not resonate well with Eastern values, norms and experiences. This is true for the provocative body-politics of the Ukrainian group Femen which were displayed in various contexts by diverse actors in order to protest against a wide array of patriarchal evils (for a critical account of Femen, see O’Keefe, 2014; for a comparison with Pussy Riot, see Channell, 2014). It equally applies to the oppositional Russian punk band Pussy Riot, the pictures of whose members – young Russian women in bright summer dresses and colourful balaclavas performing a
‘punk prayer for freedom’ (Pussy Riot, 2012a) who were subsequently convicted for ‘hooliganism motivated by religious hatred’ (Elder, 2012) – have gone around the world, procuring an unexpected reach for their agenda.
Anchored in Russian traditions of art activism, including certain characteristics of the Russian women’s movement as well as incorporating specific western feminist thought and practices, Pussy Riot directs its protest against the increasingly authoritarian state and its interconnectedness with an autocratic church hierarchy, questions hierarchical gender relations and, additionally, claims to criticise the current economic order. Due to the specific forms of expression they adopt, their spectacular actions and their recent history of criminal prosecution, Pussy Riot has been able to spread its political, feminist and capitalism-critical message to a national and international public.
Its impact has been mixed, although it has probably been higher on the international level than in Russia itself.
The fascinating phenomenon of Pussy Riot takes centre stage in this chapter. We are not alone in choosing it as a research subject:
Pussy Riot has sparked not only the interest of media, civil society and politics, but also that of academia. Sociology and contemporary history has placed Pussy Riot in the context of the (second) spring of Russia’s civil society on the eve of Duma and the presidential elections in 2011/2012 (Gabowitsch, 2013). Political scientists have analysed the regime’s repressive reaction against Pussy Riot as a successful attempt at stabilisation (Smyth and Soboleva, 2014), while others scrutinised strategies of media manipulation (for example, Smirnova, 2012). The Pussy Riot trial also serves as an example of the endemic problems of the rule of law in Russia (for instance Storch, 2013;
Koenig, 2014). Attention has also been paid to Pussy Riot’s ‘Punk Prayer’ in the context of state–church relations, the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) and Russian religiosity (for instance Denysenko, 2013;
Willems, 2013). Another body of mainly critical work has focused on western reactions and re-enforcements of old images of Russia in the aftermath of the Pussy Riot trial (Tochka, 2013; Steinholt, 2013;
Yusupova, 2014). Equally important are texts that contextualise Pussy Riot in contemporary art movements and the post-Soviet gender order (Steinholt, 2013; Rüthers, 2012). Last but not least, recent work has analysed the feminism of Pussy Riot and its interconnections with Russian feminist traditions as well as with the development of informal feminism (Johnson, 2014; Sperling, 2014).
We consider the insights of many of the approaches named above but classify our contribution to this volume into the latter context.
Our underlying hypotheses are the following: first, we argue that Pussy Riot implicitly takes an emancipatory standpoint in the sense that Nancy Fraser proposes: ‘a standpoint from which domination can be identified and challenged from wherever it is manifested’ (Fraser, 2013, 233). Within society and in the economy Pussy Riot identifies, criticises and challenges domination (not only patriarchal) as well as power relations in state and society in a comprehensive manner: in their context, the new state authoritarianism, the interconnection of the state and the Orthodox Church, renewed traditional gender regimes, and they also challenge the growing inequalities in the economic system. Second, Pussy Riot combines western impulses with Russian traditions of feminism and action art to produce new forms of protest.
These methods have successfully generated domestic and international publicity for their claims and demands. Third, the success of Pussy
Riot’s specific approach is that it confronts different threats in different settings, thus demonstrating that the challenges differ between the national and the international contexts.
In order to address the key problematic raised throughout this volume, namely the extent to which CSOs promote women’s emancipation, we draw primarily upon source material created by Pussy Riot itself, including lyrics, publications, blog posts and statements made by the group and its members in interviews, press releases and during their trial. Altogether, this corpus includes approximately 40 texts. Due to space limits, only actually cited sources are included in the bibliography.
Our study relies on qualitative text analysis, which is well suited to exploring the intentions, ideological position and strategies of the civil society actor at stake. Structures and identification schemes provided in the texts are decisive; the authors’ intention to produce these effects comes second. In our data analysis we followed the interpretation procedure suggested by Meuser and Nagel (1991), consisting of the following five steps: paraphrasing, thematic sequencing, topical comparison, sociological conceptualisation and theoretical generalisation (Meuser and Nagel, 1991, 457–64). The outcome of this approach, especially of the last two steps, is reflected in the following discussion.
The conditions for feminist activism: the state, religion and civil society in contemporary Russia
The ‘Putin system’ and civil society
There is a broad consensus that the level of democracy in Russia has fallen steadily since the turn of the millennium (Stykow, 2010, 74f).
Under the ‘Putin system’ (Mommsen and Nußberger, 2008) ‘[t]he reforms of recent years [fortified] the autonomy of the presidential executive body, which has been consolidated as dominating not only the state apparatus and the administration, but also non-political actors’ (Stykow, 2010, 89). As a result, democratic institutions are not functioning; the Russian parliament seems to be part of the executive.
The rule of law has yet to be successfully implemented. Corruption is widespread. Due to the current legal situation the foundation of new political parties is hindered and political competition is not taking place.
The media is state-controlled (Quiring, 2006). Economic policy under Putin is assessed ambivalently, especially concerning the prominent role of raw materials. However, the fact that social inequality has reached unprecedented levels is without controversy. For example, ‘the
difference between the incomes of the richest 10 per cent of Russians and poorest 10 per cent increased from 4 to almost 17 times’ since the beginning of the market transition in 1991, and ‘one per cent of the richest people in Russia now own 71 per cent of the country’s wealth’
(Oxfam, 2014, 3, citing the Russian Federal State Statistics Service).
Fundamental socio-political reform is still missing; instead, Fruchtmann (2012, 17) sees the real success of social policy under Putin as being able to avoid social protest such as industrial action and distribution conflicts.
The attitude of the Russian state towards civil society can be described as paternalist, if not authoritarian. Increasingly, civil society groups are marginalised and perceived as ‘dissidents’ (Evans, 2006, 155). A number of contradictory laws dealing with civil society severely hamper civic activities (Lang, 2004; Hinterhuber and Rindt, 2004; Bidder, 2012). Despite these circumstances, Russian civil society experienced a new spring in the wake of the allegedly forged presidential and Duma elections in 2011/2012. The following mass protests in the capital, as well as in dozens of other cities, were said to be the biggest demonstrations since the collapse of the Soviet Union and relied on new segments of the population (for instance the middle class) that had not been active before (Siegert, 2012). Additionally, new, unconventional forms of political participation developed (such as flash mobs or mobilisation via the Russian version of Facebook, vkontakte), using new social media. The state reacted with an iron fist, with high numbers of arrests and long prison sentences. Yet under increasing pressure, the organised and the informal parts of Russian civil society are still active. Nowadays it is civil society organisations rather than political parties that are the most independent actors in Russian politics; some even see them as substitutes for strong and autonomous parties (Siegert, 2010).
The leading democracy indices (EIU, 2014) now classify Russia as an authoritarian regime. However, Russian officials do not interpret this development as a backward step in terms of democracy. On the contrary, it is presented under the guiding principle of sovereign democracy as ‘an attractive and viable alternative to the idea of the representative liberal democracy of the West’ (Stykow, 2010, 90).
A close connection: the church and the state in Russia Current relations between church and state are substantially influenced by two important developments in the twentieth century. After the Bolshevik revolution in 1917, the church was subjected to repression
to such an extent that it was brought to the brink of its existence (Bremer, 2010). In Soviet times however, collaboration between church representatives and government agencies existed, including collaboration with the KGB (Bremer, 2010). A critical reappraisal of this history is still missing.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the percentage of those who call themselves believers rose steadily (Bremer, 2010). In 2010, three-quarters of the population committed themselves to Orthodoxy. The public discourse reflects a ‘pro-orthodox consensus’ (Willems, 2012, 180). The high degree of religiosity and appreciation of the church does not mean, however, that ‘the people lead their lives according to rules of the Church’ (Bremer, 2010, 450).
State and church representatives emphasise that Russia is a ‘secular’
state (Willems, 2012, 181) and both sides seek partnership, mutual aid and assistance (Willems, 2012). However, the preamble of the 1997 law on religion emphasises that Orthodoxy has played a central role in Russian history as well as in the development of Russian culture and spirituality (Willems, 2012). Accordingly, the Russian Orthodox Church ‘has access to virtually all state institutions; partly relations between Russian Orthodox Church and the State are governed through formal agreements, in part, they simply exist in fact’ (Bremer, 2010, 448). The Russian Orthodox Church emphasises ‘the loyalty of the church and the believers to the State’ (Bremer, 2010, 449). The Church leadership, namely the head, Patriarch Kirill, evaluated the authoritarian developments under Putin as the restoration of order after the chaotic 1990s. It is ‘Russia’s modernisation in accordance with “traditional Russian organisation principles of society” which distinguishes itself from “Western individualism”’ (Willems, 2012, 185). Conversely, ‘[f]
or the Russian State the Church represents an institution that gives it legitimacy’ (Bremer, 2010, 448) and is a symbol for Russia’s greatness.
Gender relations in Russia
Gender relations face a lot of challenges in today’s Russia. In contrast to the Soviet era, women have basically disappeared from institutional politics (Kraatz and Zvinkliene, 2003; Cook and Nechemias, 2009).
Horizontal and vertical gender segregation in the labour market is high and care work is unequally divided between men and women.
Women suffer from both old and new forms of sexualised violence, such as domestic violence and trafficking in women (Khodyreva and Tsvetkova, 2000; Karbstein and Hinterhuber, 2003). Neo-traditional gender stereotypes dominate in public discourse. The Soviet model
of emancipation – namely gainful employment for all and possibly the socialisation of household chores – has been discredited; this had already started in the last years of the Soviet Union (Zdravomyslova and Temkina, 2005) when the model was accused of responsibility for the ‘feminisation’ of the state, for emasculating men, suppressing birth rates and even ecological disaster (Bloemsma, 1993). The media spread contradictory westernised ideals of femininity and the Orthodox Church propagated restorative women’s roles and family models (Cheauré, 2010).
Russia’s women’s movement, however, has a long and rich tradition, and during the last two decades women’s organisations were founded all over the country (for a discussion of the spectrum, see Hinterhuber and Strasser-Camagni, 2011). In the 1990s and at the beginning of the millennium, the Russian women’s movement achieved some notable successes in networking, but also in influencing legislation.
However, given the lack of implementation, such political successes are primarily symbolic (Hinterhuber and Strasser-Camagni, 2011).
But optimism evaporated in the Putin era and the small movement was partly demobilised (Cheauré, 2010). After Perestroika, Russian feminism has increasingly shifted towards an empirically fruitful, yet politically confined academic gender studies discourse (Gabowitsch, 2013). The women’s movement is thus neither rooted in Russian society nor does it have a broad impact.
Pussy Riot: feminist ‘anti-Putinism’
In contrast, the explicitly feminist punk band Pussy Riot was founded at the end of September 2011 by about a dozen women in their 20s (Windisch, 2012). In interviews (Tupikin, 2011; Khomenko, 2012) the group members named the Arab Spring, and especially the strong participation of women within it, as inspiration for the founding of the group, and described their political activism as motivated by ‘anti-Putinism’. Pussy Riot focus their attention on developing critiques of the political structures and their entanglements with the Russian Orthodox Church, alongside the existing Russian gender regime, as well as criticism of the current (global) economic system.
Since October 2011 (before the aforementioned election period) the members of Pussy Riot have staged performances in public places without prior notice, thus reminiscent of flash mobs. The chosen
‘stages’ included metro stations, the roof of a bus and Red Square (Gabowitsch, 2013, 189). They are always masked and wear their typical outfits of brightly coloured leggings, shirts and balaclavas. After
the performances videos are released on YouTube. Members of Pussy Riot would also regularly express their opinions in interviews, blogs and via Twitter.
With these actions, members of Pussy Riot broke the rules from the beginning. Nevertheless, reactions to their performances initially remained cautious, and neither civil nor criminal charges were brought against them. However, this changed with the so-called ‘Punk Prayer’, an illegal concert performed in the Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow, the centre of the Russian Orthodox Church, on 21 February 2012, staged to protest against the imminent re-election of Putin as President of the Russian Federation. Given the patriarchal foundation of both the State and the Church, the gender political bias of the action gave the protest an additional explosive force. On the initiative of church representatives, the prosecutor’s office initiated an investigation (Gabowitsch, 2013). Three members of the band, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Aljochina and Ekaterina Samutsevich, were arrested in March 2012. In the same month, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, sharply attacked Pussy Riot in a sermon. Surprisingly, he did not justify his reproach of blasphemy with religious arguments, but stressed ‘Putin’s important role and the role of the Church in Russia’s military successes’ (Gabowitsch, 2013, 209).
The indictment against the three women of Pussy Riot referred to the excitation of religious hatred according to Article 282 of the Russian Criminal Code and to severe ‘hooliganism’ according to Article 213 (von Gall, 2012). The charge itself was characterised by vague wording. In the course of the trial, all legal remedies were rejected, and remand was extended several times (Amnesty International, 2012).
Legal scholars in Russia and abroad sharply criticised the judgement itself (Amnesty International, 2012). After nearly six months in custody, the three women were finally convicted and sentenced to two years in labour camps for ‘hooliganism motivated by religious hatred’ (Elder, 2012). Thus, the court focused on the alleged insulting of the religious feelings of believers. The criticism of the ruling regime that Pussy Riot had expressed in its performance was ignored. The group subsequently appealed against the judgement and filed a lawsuit against Russia at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Because a security guard had overwhelmed Samutsevich at the start of the performance in the cathedral, her appeal was upheld. However, the applications for parole for Aljochina and Tolokonnikova, both mothers of small children, were rejected, and the two women were imprisoned in different labour camps. As far as possible, both continued to spread their political convictions within prison and to the outside world,
for example through hunger strikes. Aljochina used a hunger strike to protest against not being allowed to participate in a hearing and Tolokonnikova used it to protest against the detention conditions in the labour camp. Moreover, Tolokonnikova also protested through her public correspondence with the prominent Marxist philosopher Slavoj Žižek (Tolokonnikova and Žižek, 2014). The other members of Pussy Riot were also not silenced, as they organised support and accompanied the whole process from trial to jail with critical publications.
In December 2013, after 21 months of detention, Aljochina and Tolokonnikova were released during an amnesty launched by the State Duma shortly before the beginning of Sochi Winter Olympics.
Following their release (and in response to their experiences in prison) they founded Zona Prava (www.zonaprava.com), an NGO monitoring the rights of inmates, as well as MediaZona (www.zona.media), a news portal dealing with human rights, prisons and the judicial system. In an open letter written in February 2014, the other members of Pussy Riot stated that this new focus no longer conformed to the original aspirations of the group: feminism, separatist resistance, fighting against authoritarianism and a personality cult, and they stated that Tolokonnikova and Aljochina were no longer members of Pussy Riot.
Nonetheless, both of them appeared together with the group in Sochi, where they found themselves attacked by Cossack security personnel and temporarily arrested by the local police. In quoting their attackers, Pussy Riot performed the song ‘Putin will teach you to love the motherland’ immediately afterwards on the site, again distributing the corresponding video clip via the internet (Williams, 2015).
These more recent activities suggest a shift in the focus and form of Tolokonnikova and Aljochina’s activism; the artistic performances of the collective seem to be losing weight in comparison with their legal protection activism carried out by journalistic means. The most recent published video to date, ‘I can’t breathe’, differs in many ways from the previous ones. This video is performed exclusively by Aljochina and Tolokonnikova without the typical balaclavas, but also differing from their previous performances in terms of the style of music, the language used (English instead of Russian) and the focus – racism in the American police force – on a subject outside of their home country (Williams, 2015).
Strong reactions have accompanied the group since its foundation:
with their performance of the ‘Punk Prayer’, and the criminal charges brought against them, Pussy Riot caught the attention of the media both in Russia and beyond its borders. In Russia, the population seemed to be on the side of the political and religious authorities:
according to surveys nearly two-thirds of the population assessed their action as ‘hooliganism’ or even as a targeted attack on the Orthodox Church (Levada). For the general Russian public, Pussy Riot’s protest was not easy to understand as a meaningful and feminist protest, mainly due to an ‘informational vacuum’ (Yusopova, 2014, 605). Even opposition actors, while denouncing the trial and imprisonment, judged the forms of protest as idiotic or as a failure (Yusopova, 2014, 606). However, many within the Russian civil society defended the group, including human rights organisations as well as anonymous supporters who appropriated the symbolism of the group in mass protests. Moreover, Russian lawyers described the trial as a ‘judicial scandal’ (Die Tageszeitung, 2012). Genri Reznik, president of the Moscow chamber of lawyers, publicly accused the court of contempt of law (www.novayagazeta.ru/politics/54157.html). Even within the Russian Orthodox Church there was criticism, ranging from the lower levels to prominent Orthodox officials (Willems, 2012).
In the international context, the repressive reaction of the state led to
In the international context, the repressive reaction of the state led to