Evolution of Tech-Assisted Repression in Putin's Russia

Abstract

This thesis is an examination of the evolution of tech-assisted repression in Putin's Russia. The thesis uses a novel analytical framework called the T.E.A. table framework, which organizes repression into three categories: techniques (the repressive acts themselves), effects (short-to-medium term individual and communal effects), and arcs (large-scale societal shifts over long periods of time). This framework is "tested" against two influential texts in the study of non-democratic politics: The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt and Totalitarian and Authoritarian Regimes by Juan Jose Linz. The following chapters look at the techniques, effects, and arcs of television-based repression, social media-based repression, and finally artificial intelligence-based repression. As these technologies have been introduced, there has been a consisted trend toward centralization, control, and increasing the granularity, or the personalization and adaptability, of repression.