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Belarus – where society is deprived of power but not agency

"I was terrified and scared but more than ever before I felt that I am a Belarusian and I could not stay home. I can’t say that I felt exactly like a soldier preparing to die while protecting the Homeland, but a similar feeling overwhelmed me then." These are the words of one of the female protestors who took part in a street demonstration in Minsk on February 27, 2022. According to different estimates, between 1,000 and several thousand Belarusians came out to protest against the start of the war in Ukraine and against the referendum on constitutional change in Belarus.

Essay by Alesia Rudnik January 18, 2023

Self-Censorship among political bloggers in Belarus and Russia To make yourself heard, with minimal risk to yourself and your loved ones, that is the challenge

Awareness of potential political sanctions can stop social media users from expressing critical and open political views for the sake of personal security. This essay focuses on political bloggers in Belarus and Russia as political opinion leaders who have become more frequent targets of these regimes in recent years. The essay presents the results of a survey on perception and practices of self-censorship conducted among 61 well-known political bloggers in Russia and Belarus and discusses them in relation to the theory of the spiral of silence.

Essay by Alesia Rudnik October 8, 2020