Finding a Meeting Point for Soviet Television

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Finding a Meeting

Point for Soviet

Television

MA East-European Studies Professor: Sudha Rajagopalan Course: MA Thesis

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Index

- Introduction 2

Chapter 1: Culture of Propaganda - 1.1: The Birth of the Propaganda State 5

- 1.2: Culture and Education 6

- 1.3: Media and Propaganda in the post-Stalin Era 8

Chapter 2: The Infrastructure of Soviet Television - 2.1: Origins of Soviet Television 10

- 2.2: The 1950s 11

- 2.3: The Sixties and Seventies 13

Chapter 3: Policies on Soviet Television - 3.1: The Early Soviet State: From Glasnost to Complete Control 16

- 3.2: Policy during the Thaw 17

- 3.3: Policy during the Era of Stagnation 20

Chapter 4: Soviet Television Content - 4.1: Television Content and Channels 23

- 4.2: News Programs 25

- 4.3: Entertainment 27

Chapter 5: Television consumption - 5.1: The Soviet Audience 31

- 5.2: Viewer Letters 33

- 5.3: Surveys and Viewing Habits 34

Conclusion 38

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Introduction

Television is one of the great inventions of modern science in the twentieth century. It has captured millions and millions of viewers over the years with both educational and entertaining content, greatly surpassing other sources of information like newspapers and radio. Television today has become an integral part of households in the modern world and it is difficult to imagine a world without it. The Soviet Union was no exception and television took the country by storm in the first decades after the Second World War. The mass media in the Soviet Union has traditionally been used as an instrument to mobilize the Soviet citizen and television would prove to be no exception. The media outlets in the Soviet Union act as agents of agitation for enforcing economic, social and political policies, to translate the ideology into reality. Television was a dominant force for integration. It was a new medium that ultimately attempted to help forge a national consciousness and a national culture. This research will focus on the impact of television on the Soviet society and how state and citizen tried to find a meeting point on what television ought to bring. What started as an experimental, hardly accessible way to transmit low quality images developed rapidly into an enormous political, cultural and social institution in the Soviet Union after the Second World War.

The main focus points of this research are to examine to what extent Soviet television was used as a propaganda tool by the state, with what sort of content it attempted to influence the Soviet subjects´ attitude towards life in the Soviet Union, and how television was consumed by the Soviet citizen in the period 1953-1979. To what extent did Soviet television constitute a meeting point between Soviet state and citizen in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s? Meeting point here means the agreement between Soviet state and citizen on what Soviet television ought to contribute to the Soviet society. Finding and analyzing this changing meeting point will be the red thread throughout this thesis. The transition phase, from the first modest impact in the 1950s until emerging as a massive political and cultural organization in the 1970s is the focussed time period in this research. During this period the infrastructure and influence of the Soviet media outlet had grown explosively, particularly starting to develop in the late 1950s. The role that television played in this period changed completely as well. What started as a new low key experimental technology progressed to be the main tool of propaganda and mass

indoctrination for the Soviet authorities. This development would not halt after the 70s, but the process after 1980 merits its own analysis and will not be researched in this thesis.

Hopefully this research will provide a detailed and accurate description of the Soviet

leaderships’ management of television as well an insight into the Soviet citizen’s taste for TV products and programs. Could the development of the television infrastructure highlight the Soviet regime’s failure to further establish Communist ideology and values? Was Soviet television merely a tool of propaganda? To what extent did it have its desired effect on the Soviet subject? These are some of the sub questions that are related to the main research question and will be analyzed as well. I will be looking at five aspects of Soviet television to answer these questions. Firstly providing background information on both the tradition of propaganda in the Soviet Union and the structure and development of Soviet television. Secondly looking at policy making from a state point of view. Thirdly looking at the actual content that was made and what purpose it served for the Soviet authorities. Finally this

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research will study the reception, from a Soviet citizen’s point of view, of these programs and television as a whole by looking at audience surveys, viewer letters to editors and other similar sources.

So how was the television network structured in the Soviet Union?

The State Committee for Television and Radio Broadcasting had control over both the Central Television Studio and the radio. The Central Television Studio was the technical and

administrative core of the Soviet television network. The most developed television broadcasting station in the Soviet Union was Central TV which was based in Moscow. Transmissions from Moscow Central TV could send long and medium waves to not only Moscow but also other nearby networks.1_{The Central Television studio was built on the foundation of the Moscow}

Television Center and the first editorial boards came into place in 1951. Television still had a small status in the Soviet media system and the question of the television’s relationship to the Soviet political system and to methods of mass mobilization were not as clear and settled as it would be in the following decades.

The thesis will consist of five chapters to ultimately come to a satisfying conclusion. The first chapter will provide background information for the tradition of propaganda in the Soviet Union. How did the Soviet Union emerge as one of the biggest propaganda states in history? What tools did the Soviet leaders use to mobilize the Soviet citizen towards an ideal communist society? I will argue that the Soviet Union has a long tradition in using propaganda as a weapon of indoctrination. This will provide the necessary background material to understand why television ultimately became the Soviet leadership's’ main device to control and shape the Soviet subject.

The second chapter will give an historical overview of the development of Soviet television in a chronological order. This part will look at the technical and practical challenges that television in the early Soviet state faced. The first mentions of Soviet television originate from the early 1920s, continuing to make progress in the 1930s before broadcast was being stopped in the 1940s due to the Second World War. How did Soviet television develop from a novelty item to an absolute necessity in the following post war decades? How was the television framework structured? What factors played a role in the rather slow start of Soviet television? How could the millions of the Soviet populace be reached by this new and exciting medium? And how did the Soviet Union’s television development measure up against other rival countries? The technical progress of television, its structure, the satellites, the financial commitment from the state and television, and broadcasts stations will be at the center of this chapter.

The third chapter will focus on Soviet television policies. This part will be examined from a state point of view. The different media and television policies will be analyzed in the historically ordered time frames of the Soviet Union. A brief dig into the past of early glasnost in the 1920s and Stalin’s dictatorship. Then a more detailed analysis of the Thaw under Khrushchev and finally the Stagnation era with Brezhnev in charge. This chapter will follow the change of attitude that the Soviet leadership had considering television. Although the new medium had the

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financial backing of the state and was received with enthusiasm it was not until the later parts of the 1960s that the Soviet authorities really tried to shape it into a tool of propaganda. Why were the leaders of the Soviet Union so reluctant to seize on this new technology? What discussions and assessments needed to be made? How did television finally become a tool of mass

indoctrination in the 1970s?

The fourth chapter will delve deeper into the actual content that was on display on Soviet television. I will be focusing mainly on the programs that were created by the state with the goal to mobilize and educate the Soviet citizen. It is, however, hard to ignore the enormously popular television game shows that emerged the entertainment genre, there will be some attention to those programs as well. The argument in this chapter is that the Soviet leadership put great effort into turning the television into a tool of propaganda. It used both news programs to inform and educate as well as art content promoting Soviet culture. Here one can see that even the entertainment shows are, although to a lesser extent, trying to educate and mobilize the Soviet citizen and fit in the larger picture of the Soviet propaganda machine.

Some Soviet programs that really played an important role in their respective fields, such as Vremya and KVN, will get extra attention.

The final chapter of this thesis will focus on the way television was consumed by the Soviet audience. This chapter will first try to establish who the Soviet audience was and how their appetite for television developed. Secondly surveys, sociological research and reader letters will help figure out what kind of content they watched and enjoyed the most. Finally we will look at the important variables dividing the Soviet audience, something the Soviet authorities had to consider, and answer the question why they watched certain shows more than others. As it is impossible, due to the limited size of this research, to incorporate all major surveys and studies on Soviet audience viewer habits in this chapter I will choose a select few that are

representative for the majority of them. I will argue that, despite the Communist Party’s best efforts, television was largely consumed as a means of entertainment and relaxation.

To come to a satisfactory conclusion it is important to make use of a large number of diverse sources. I will be drawing on the excellent overview books and works of Soviet media specialists such as Kristin Roth-Ey, Christine E. Evans, Ellen Mickiewicz and many more. For the final chapter of this research I will use survey information, for example from Boris Firsov’s admirable Television in the USSR, as well as viewer letters to editors and television stations for a better understanding of the Soviet subject in this matter. I will make my own interpretations of the primary sources that are discussed in the secondary literature to finally conclude to what extent the meeting point of Soviet television between state and subject has shifted in the first three decades after the Second World War. The hypothesis of this research is that not only the state, but also its viewers, had a notable influence on the shifting meeting point of Soviet television.

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In this chapter I will give an understanding of how the Soviet propaganda state came to be. The Soviet Union has, throughout its history, used culture and education as tools of propaganda for social control. The focus will then shift to the role of the media to lay the groundwork to work towards television, the main focus of this research. The argument in this chapter is that the Soviet Union has a long standing tradition of molding the Soviet citizen through the means education, culture and the mass media. The development of the Soviet propaganda

infrastructure will be the main focus of this first chapter. From here we can start to understand why television had such potential. It was an ideal technology for the Soviet leadership to bring across their ideas and shape the Soviet subject.

1.1 The Birth of the Propaganda State

In 1917, before Lenin and his followers rose to power and created the Soviet Union, it was already clear that the Bolsheviks were skilled propagandists. The Bolsheviks had, despite their enemies controlling the newspapers, convinced a large segment of the Russian people of their cause.2_{The Bolshevik leaders, especially Lenin, were well aware of the importance of winning}

peasant support. This proved challenging, because of both the large number of illiteracy among the people and disrupted communications. It would require increased efforts to mobilize all the people, especially those in the countryside. It was against these odds the Bolsheviks ultimately proved to be successful.

When the Soviet Union was born, following the October revolution in 1917, and the Soviet press came into being one could speak of a historically unprecedented situation. A situation where the press was created and protected by a one-party revolutionary state. 3_{The Bolsheviks had}

battled censorship of the press under the Tsar’s regime but now faced the decision on what to do with the non-Bolshevik press. With the success of the socialist movement at stake, extreme steps were taken and the free press was once again suppressed. Communism was motivated by ideological engagement and implemented through the imposition of ideas, culture and education. 4_{There would be no more room for other ideas. As Lenin wrote in his famous piece}

What Is To Be Done: ‘’To belittle socialist ideology in any way, to turn aside from it in the slightest degree means to strengthen bourgeois ideology.’’5_{The freedom of press was made} into a practical issue and during this transitional phase from Tsarist autocracy to a socialist society it is understandable extreme measures had to be taken. Even though the leadership announced that the limited freedom of press would only be temporary until the transition phase was completed, Stalin rose to power in the second half of the 1920s and limited the freedom of press even further. It was during Stalin’s leadership that the true Soviet propaganda state would take form. The USSR under Stalin’s leadership became, at its core, a propaganda state. Culture in the Soviet context was always looking to educate, train, motivate and mobilize the Soviet 2 Peter Kenez, the Birth of the Propaganda State; Soviet Methods of Mass Mobilization 1917-1927, Cambridge [etc.]: Cambridge Univ. Press (1985) p. 51

3 Ibid, p. 35

4 Laura Engelstein, ‘Culture, Culture Everywhere: Interpretations of Modern Russia, across the 1991 Divide’, in Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, volume 2, number 2 (Spring 2001) p. 374 5 Vladimir Lenin, ‘’What is to be Done?’’, Lenin’s Collected Works, Foreign Languages Publishing House,

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people. At the same time the Soviet Union was also trying to prove to audiences worldwide that the Soviet culture was superior to all other cultures.

Propaganda was intensified in the 1930s, when Stalin’s Soviet Union turned into a terror state. This period was characterized by great purges in politics, the army and the church. The ordinary people lived in fear of the secret police and millions of people were sent to the gulag labour camps. Anything that reflected badly on Stalin was censored and a cult developed surrounding his persona. This resulted in an increasing Russification of the USSR, a growing industry due to forced labour and a propaganda state that was fueled by fear. 6

The Soviet people were bombarded throughout their lives with messages meant to convince them of the legitimacy and moral integrity of the Communist regime’s policies. Education and mass culture were used as its main indoctrination tools. And should this not convince the Soviet subject then the regime was perfectly capable of intimidating the rebellious groups into

submission to the political order.7_{The Soviet Union also used important figures in the fields of}

art, cinema and writers to serve as role models for the general population. These individuals embodied values such as production, patriotism and strong leadership. It was a period where the average citizen, although many not without doubt, responded positively to this mobilization, as we can read in Jochen Hellbeck’s research of Soviet diaries, memoirs and interviews.8_It

seemed that for the majority the coercive system indeed facilitated the acceptance of the persuasive efforts by the state as normal, and the role of the ideal citizen as desirable. 9

1.2 Culture and Education

The Bolsheviks traditionally used culture as a political tool. A so called ‘’Cultural Revolution’’ took place after the Bolsheviks cemented their place as the leaders of the Soviet Union from 1928-1931.10_{This period saw a radical utopianism in the sociocultural sphere that was different}

from the policy plans before and after these years. One could say it was a necessary part of the transition into a socialist state. Compared to the sudden and violent political revolution in 1917, the Cultural Revolution was a more steady ideological transformation in which Leninist cultural traditions and principles were respected.11

So what was Soviet culture exactly? As the Communist Party’s 1961 program promised, Soviet culture would be truly global, absorbing all the best that has been created by world culture. All distinctions between mental and manual labor would be erased and manual laborers would be elevated in their cultural-technical level to the level of people who perform mental labor. This 6 Stephan J. Lee, Russia and the USSR, 1855-1991: Autocracy and Dictatorship, Psychology Press (2006) p. 105

7 Gayle Durham Hollander, Soviet Political Indoctrination: Developments in Mass Media and Propaganda

Since Stalin, New York [etc.]: Praeger (1972) p. 5

8 Jochen Hellbeck, ‘Working, Struggling, Becoming: Stalin-Era Autobiographical Texts’, Russian Review, Vol. 60, No. 3 (Jul., 2001), pp. 340-359

9 Gayle Durham Hollander, Soviet Political Indoctrination: Developments in Mass Media and Propaganda

Since Stalin, New York [etc.]: Praeger (1972) p. 6

10 Sheila Fitzpatrick, Cultural Revolution in Russia, 1928-1931, Bloomington [etc.]: Indiana Univ. Press (1978)

11 Sheila Fitzpatrick, ‘Cultural Revolution in Russia, 1928-1931’, Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 9,

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would mean that the intelligentsia would cease to exist because by then every Soviet person would have joined its ranks. Communism would provide all Soviet people with both the opportunity and the capacity for cultural achievements on a daily basis.12_{The vision was that}

ultimately Soviet culture would prove to be a sovereign superior culture to the rest of the world. Soviet culture emphasized art as its highest rank. Fine arts, especially literature, were standing above the other cultural products, and even though the Soviet propaganda machine tried to bring across the idea that there was no distinction between mass and elite culture, masters and masterworks were keystones of the Soviet’s cultural identity.

The education system underwent a great deal of change during the cultural revolution, in practice, schools and universities started using selective entrance measures to exclude all students that did not conform to the socialist ideals. Bourgeois intellectuals and non-state specialists were continuously harassed and discrimination on grounds of social origin and party status was practiced as well.13_{Essential to Stalin’s leadership in the late 1920s and 1930s were}

policies of state building and industrialization which would ideally lead to the creation of a culturally shaped united Soviet population. One of the goals was that everyone should know the Russian language and a government decree in 1938 made the Russian language and literature obligatory in all non-Russian Soviet schools. 14

The schooling system was further reorganized to focus on the educating and training of

engineers, agriculture specialists, technicians and skilled workers, they were in highest demand to bring the economic plans to a success.15_{Here we can see how already at the end of the}

1920s the education system was transformed into one of the main tools of propaganda and that education, together with culture, inspiration and mobilization was the way to realize the brilliant future for the Soviet Union.

Through cultural participation and education, either voluntary or enforced, the Soviet citizens were shaped. Projects were constructed precisely in a way to involve the people in activities that molded their attitudes and perceptions.16_{The scope of this Bolshevik cultural engineering of the}

people was across the board and spread to all corners of Soviet society. From physical training, radio, press, television, cinema, museums and festivals to antireligious campaigns, the Soviet people were shaped by the propaganda machine.17_{To achieve maximum industrialization, one}

of the main goals of the Soviet Union to turn itself into a superpower, one must first achieve a high level of rationalization, which in turn was unthinkable to achieve without raising the cultural level of the people.18_{There was a stable ideological and bureaucratic framework, with}

censorship organs and professional organizations (like the Writers’ Union), that organized, 12 Kristin Roth-Ey, Moscow Prime Time: how the Soviet Union built the media empire that lost the

Cultural Cold War, Ithaca: Cornell University Press (2011) p. 3

13 Sheila Fitzpatrick, Cultural Revolution in Russia, 1928-1931, Bloomington [etc.]: Indiana Univ. Press (1978) p. 83

14 Peter A. Blitstein, ‘Separate Schools: Gender, Policy, and Practice in Postwar Soviet Education’,

Social History, 01 May 2013, Vol.38(2), p. 278

15 Sheila Fitzpatrick, Cultural Revolution in Russia, 1928-1931, Bloomington [etc.]: Indiana Univ. Press (1978) p. 37

16 Laura Engelstein, ‘Culture, Culture Everywhere: Interpretations of Modern Russia, across the 1991 Divide’, in Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, volume 2, number 2 (Spring 2001) p 376. 17 Ibid, p. 377

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administered and, most importantly, controlled the Soviet culture.19

1.3 Media and Propaganda in the post-Stalin Era

The Second World War and its aftermath began to pose further important questions for the Soviet Union. After the death of Stalin in March 1953 the Soviet Union ushered into a new period. Nikita Khrushchev gradually rose to power and shockingly denounced Stalin’s dictatorial rule and the personality cult that surrounded him on the 20th Party Congress in 1956.20_It

became a turning point in the Soviet Union as a whole, a period historians and political scientists refer to as ‘’The Thaw’’. The primary means of mobilizing the population had shifted from coercion to persuasion, and this applied to the media as well. Through demonstrating the Soviet superiority, the Soviet people were now influenced to conform instead of forced by an iron fist. That did not mean the Khrushchev relinquished any power. Instead of dominating and regulating the Soviet citizen through terror, there was a new emphasis on intervenience.21_{If the}

state intervened enough in daily life the idea was that future communist citizens would eventually voluntarily regulate themselves, at which point the State would wither away. The promoting of the television was part of that policy. Soviet society was developing in a more modern direction, towards some kind of moderate totalitarianism. 22_{Since the Soviet regime}

could only partially control how the Soviet citizen was consuming television, by limiting access to Western programs for example, it could not force them to watch the ideologically and politically driven programs.

It was in this context the development of Soviet television grew explosively.

Khrushchev, and later on Brezhnev, increasingly emphasized the right of all Soviet citizens to leisure and pleasure and the television would play an important role in that development.23

The focus now is on the post-Stalin period, where the ‘’ideal’’ type for Soviet culture that was forged in the 1930s, initially remained largely intact. It was in the first three decades after the Second World War that the Soviet Union built a true media empire.

The Soviet Union had the world’s most comprehensive broadcasting network and radio

ownership was widespread. The Soviet authorities took great care to present a dignified cultural portrait. Ballets, poetry, World War II films all served as evidence of the great cultural power in the USSR. 24_{The Soviet Union tried to give an alternative to the ,what they perceived as, the}

soulless and exploitative culture of the capitalist West. Thanks to the high visibility of political 18 Sheila Fitzpatrick, Cultural Revolution in Russia, 1928-1931, Bloomington [etc.]: Indiana Univ. Press (1978) p. 37

19 Kristin Roth-Ey, Moscow Prime Time: how the Soviet Union built the media empire that lost the

20 Reino Paasilinna, Glasnost and Soviet Television, Audience Research, YLE - Finnish Broadcasting Company (1995) p. 14

21 Susan Reid, 'Cold War in the Kitchen: Gender and the De-Stalinization of Consumer Taste in the Soviet Union under Khrushchev', Slavic Review, Vol. 61, No. 2 (Summer, 2002), p. 217

22 Reino Paasilinna, Glasnost and Soviet Television, Audience Research, YLE - Finnish Broadcasting Company (1995) p. 32.

23 Christine Evans, Between Truth and Time: a History of Soviet Central Television, New Haven: Yale University Press (2016) p. 3

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content, the broad scope of penetration of political content in Soviet society and the great intensity and internal consistency of political indoctrination the Soviet propaganda machine was running at full speed.

One important change to the way propaganda worked during the post-Stalin period was the development of the media technologies and institutions. The new television technology, the development of radio and, to a lesser extent, the print media gave it a wider reach and a bigger platform to indoctrinate the masses. Even though other cultural spheres deserve equal attention as well, like literature and book publishing, theater, dance, painting, classical music, sports and choir singing, this research will be focusing on the new, exciting and potentially biggest

propaganda tool of them all during this period, the television. As we have seen in this chapter, propaganda to achieve social control was always an important part of the Soviet Union since its emergence in 1917, and now thanks to the postwar media boom the Soviet culture had gained an unprecedented imperial scope and reach.25_{At the same time the new media gave the}

opportunity to change the Soviet’s mass culture formation and alter how culture was produced, marketed and consumed. A problem, however, was that due to the incredibly growth of these media industries in the sixties and seventies, controlling and administering them became

increasingly difficult and time consuming. This meant, with more and more people involved, that there was more space between the lines for content that appeared to contradict the big-picture ideological and economic goals. 26

The Soviet state was enthusiastic about the potential and new possibilities of the new media’s development, as we can see in the financial investments the Communist Party made. The Soviet authorities saw a way to encourage engagement with Soviet mass culture although it proved challenging to control the way how Soviet citizens consumed it. Most of what was brought to the Soviet audiences was Soviet made and ideologically correct.

Media consumption kept rising in the seventies and beyond with the Soviet people embracing the new technologies and embracing the content as well. Sociological research shows that people were devoting more time and money than ever before to mass media. The Soviet people proved to be most enthusiastic about the latest addition to the media empire, the television. I will now look at the development of the television infrastructure to see how it found a home in the Soviet Union.

Chapter 2: The Infrastructure of Soviet Television

The Soviet Union has been a propaganda state from the beginning and media was one of their main indoctrination tools. In this context the focus will shift to the development of television in the post-war decades. To understand how television ultimately advanced to become the biggest 25 Ibid, p. 12

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and most popular media technology in the Soviet Union one has to understand where television came from and under which circumstances it could grow. This chapter provides a background in chronological time order to give an understanding of the development Soviet television. The focus will be on the technical aspects of television and which challenges the state and its citizen had to overcome to give TV a home in the Soviet Union.

2.1 Origins of Soviet Television

Television in the Soviet Union was born during the first half of the 20th century.

As early as 1930 a mechanical system for transmitting images on radio waves was developed by the television laboratory of the All-Union electro technical institute in Moscow. These televisions only had 30 lines of definition and operated at a frame rate of 12.5 frames per second. Television with sound followed in 1934. The first sound telecast was broadcasted in May that year when Ivan Moskvin, national actor of the USSR, recited Anton Chekhov’s short story ‘’The Malefactor’’. Although the quality of the image of the broadcast was considerably low, it generated a huge response from the viewers and the All Union Committee for Radio Fixation and Broadcasting decided to establish a television department.27_{Despite low quality}

images and difficult accessibility television quickly grew more popular and the first television center was built in 1938, the Shabolovsky Moscow Television Center. Regular broadcasts in Moscow and Leningrad, although still with an experimental character, followed in 1939. The central press, still dominated by newspapers and radio, regularly reported on the new medium’s development to add to the excitement. Even though Soviet television undeniably started to make an impact on society, one should keep in mind only around 400 television sets were used in the country in 1940.28_{This was still a small number compared to other power houses like the}

United States and the United Kingdom.

During the Second World War television broadcasts were temporarily stopped. The Soviet Union had suffered huge losses and had to reconstruct the political and economic Soviet sphere of influence. This interrupted the development of the TV infrastructure.29_{The first reinstated}

transmission that was broadcasted after the war was on May 7, 1945, with regular weekly broadcasts following in December that year. Outside broadcasting, referring to any television program which is broadcast from a location away from the studio, started in 1948 and

substantially expanded the possibilities of Soviet television further. This progress could be seen in the airplay of a football match from the Dynamo stadium in Kiev in 1949. 30

The first long range television broadcast was transmitted in 1950, from Moscow to Ryazan. Television technology started to put formidable new opportunities on the table but it was not until the second half of the 1950s that the new television technology first took hold in the

27 Vera Ivanova, ’History of Russian Television, 26 July 2012, Russia-Infocenter, http://russia-ic.com/culture_art/theatre/1538#.WVgdtYjyjIV, accessed 10-05-2017

28 Julian Graffy, Hosking, Geoffrey, Culture and the Media in the USSR Today, University of London, London (1989) p. 7

29 Anikó Imre, ; Havens, Timothy. ; Lustyik, Kati., Popular Television in Eastern Europe during and since

Socialism, New York : Routledge (2013) p. 33

30 Alan M. Ball, Liberty's tears : Soviet portraits of the "American Way of Life" during the Cold War, New York: Oxford University Press.(2016) p. 258

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USSR.31

One of the reasons for the slow television development in these years, compared to other rival countries, was that it suffered from a great amount of technical issues in the early days. Television sets continually broke down, reception was often poor and reparations inconsistent and difficult. Judging by the many letters of complaint viewers criticized the wavy, unclear images, whistles and hisses and other objects that made their way onto the camera. Early Soviet television consisted almost completely of live broadcasts and viewers watched the productions fail again and again. Combine this with the slow progress of electrification in the country and the expense of creating transmission devices the television was off to a slow start.

32_{It was against all odds that Television studios put out any programming at all. The following}

decades, however, saw television grow spectacularly, both in quality and quantity. 2.2 The 1950s

Once the Soviet regime had made its choice for television, as could be seen in its big

investments in television technology across the 50s and following decades, the development and influence was accelerated rapidly. The broadcast format was expanded from solely social and political broadcasts to, among others, serialized television programs, TV-sketches and reports.33_{Television presenters became the face of the TV screen and experienced national}

love and recognition from the audiences. The Soviet regime started to recognize the potential of the television, not only did they see a potent symbol of Soviet scientific prowess, it was also an industrial product that promised knowledge and pleasure to millions of people, becoming an integral part of the so called socialist ‘’good life’’. The reach of Soviet television was still limited because it relied on relay stations and cables, but with the introduction of satellite TV in 1959 an enormous audience could be reached, an audience that could be walled off from the non-Soviet world. It is here that the Soviet leaders saw huge possibilities.

The television was still a novelty item in the Soviet Union during the 50s with only one in twelve-thousand people on average owning a set in 1950.34_{Yet many foreigners that visited the Soviet}

Union after Stalin’s death were surprised by the relatively large TV technology presence in a country that was plagued by shortages and poor distribution after the war.

For example, American journalist Marguerite Higgins noticed that the USSR was still coping with food shortages, quality of basic clothing and shelter problems but remarkably had a great number of television antennas atop the small houses in Moscow.35_{But to put this in a global}

perspective, these numbers fell short compared to the United States, with two thirds of

American households already in possession of a television set in 1955, the biggest player in the 31 Kristin Roth-Ey, Moscow Prime Time: how the Soviet Union built the media empire that lost the

32 Lori Maguire, The Cold War and Entertainment Television, Cambridge Scholars Publishing (2016) p. 10

34 Kateryna Khinkulovam, ‘’Hello, Lenin? Nostalgia On Post-Soviet Television In Russia And Ukraine’’,

Journal of European Television History and Culture, 01 November 2012, Vol.1(2), p. 96

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world when it came to TV development. The Soviet Union ranked fourth in the world in the late fifties, a considerable achievement when looking at its huge population. There was no doubt that TV development was on an explosive rise.36

As mentioned earlier, the Central Television Studio was the technical and administrative core of the Soviet television network. Central TV in Moscow, the most advanced television broadcasting station, offered four hours of programming a day, with other stations broadcasting less regularly and fewer hours in the late 1950s. The average daily volume of television broadcasting grew exponentially from 15.4 hours in 1955 to 510 hours in 1965, with programs offered by the Central TV Studio at the center. 37

Not only the leaders of the regime were excited for this new technology but also the Soviet citizens seemed wild about television. In the 1950s we can see that consumers, scientific hobbyists and local political elites all played their part in pushing TV development forward.38

This excitement was further encouraged by the improving accessibility of the television. Whenever prices were raised on luxury goods, for example in 1959, not only were televisions excluded, the price was even lowered. 39_{Television was made accessible for people of almost}

all salary levels, professional activities and educational backgrounds. Even though the cost of television in the 1950s was still relatively expensive, the Soviet citizen eagerly invested in the new technology. Television manufacturing factories had trouble to keep up with the high

demands and waiting lists were getting increasingly long. This enthusiasm for television did not, however, translate into effective management and it did not answer the question on how

television should be used. At the same time, leading figures in the established fields of cinema, dance, theater and literature seemed less interested in the new medium.

It was clear that the Soviet leadership put a great deal of energy and financial commitment into the diffusion of television transmission. This policy faced multiple obstacles, The USSR

encompassed an immense landmass, eleven different time zones and extreme mountainous terrain. Connecting the whole of the USSR through cables and relay stations was an impossible task. This meant that the use of satellites was absolutely necessary to fulfil this project and find a home for television in the Soviet Union.40_{As the reach of Soviet television was expanding, so}

too did the infrastructure and contents of broadcasting. For example, the number of TV stations in the USSR grew dramatically in a short period of time. In 1955 there were just 9 stations, in 1958, 12. But by 1960 the number had increased greatly to 84.41

2.3 The Sixties and Seventies

In the 1960s, especially after the launch of satellite TV in 1959, television continued to rapidly 36 Ibid, p. 181

37 Frances Gayle Durham, Radio and Television in the Soviet Union, Cambridge, Mass. (1965). p 57 38 Kristin Roth-Ey, ‘’Finding a Home for Television in the USSR, 1950-1970’’ , Slavic Review, Vol. 66 (Summer 2007), p. 280

39 Ibid, p. 283

40 John Downing, ´The Intersputnik System and Soviet Television´, Soviet Studies, 01 October 1985, Vol.37(4), p.468

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acquire huge amounts of popularity amongst the people of the Soviet Union. Satellite

technology linked the far-flung regions in Siberia, the Far East, central Asia and the far north to Moscow. Soviet Central Television still only had two channels in 1960. The first channel

broadcasted around 10 hours every day of the week and the second channel for three hours. There were around five million television sets at the beginning of the decade, about 19 per thousand inhabitants, with the amount of television sets per family doubling from 1965 to 1970. To put this into perspective, France had 41 television sets per thousand inhabitants and the United States 310.42_{Soviet broadcasting, due to infrastructural and technical reasons, had}

relatively few broadcast hours and a limited audience in 1960 and was still behind the other powerhouses of the world.

As the novelty of the new technology had died down by the mid-1960s, the USSR’s strong financial commitment to television remained. According to the head of Soviet broadcasting from 1964 to 1970, Nikolai Mesiatsev, the Soviet government ‘’spared no expense on the

development of mass broadcasting’’ even though there was still considerable poverty in the country. 43_{The Soviet regime steadily expanded production and promoted the consumption of}

the domestic television. To keep up with the increasing demand for television in the 1960s, the Soviet Union had to make changes to the production system.

It was a common practice in the USSR to standardize manufacturing processes as well as the unification of circuit units and their centralized production. Television was no exception.44_This

was done to make the production equipment for mechanization less complex and attain

maximum unification and effectiveness throughout the country. Existing factories would increase the rate of production by boosting their input to see that the increasing demands for television systems were met.

In 1965, after satellite broadcasting from the Molniya satellite began, there were already approximately 100 program centers for television broadcasting in the Soviet Union. Together with over 250 relay stations, this covered an area populated by more than 90 million people. Fifty large cities were regularly receiving Moscow Central programs.45_{Thanks to the Molniya}

satellite system the all-Union broadcast channel, Central Television Channel 1, could reach all eleven Soviet time zones by 1967.46_{Orbita, the satellite of distributing television programs on}

the network of land reception stations was created in 1967, the same year regular colored broadcasting started in Moscow.47_{The deployment of these satellites made a huge impact on}

the development of television, making it more and more accessible for all the citizens of the Soviet Union.

44 A.Y. Bratebart, Television receiver production in the U.S.S.R., Journal of the British Institution of

Radio Engineers, 08/1959, Vol.19(8), p.521

45 Frances Gayle Durham, Radio and Television in the Soviet Union, Cambridge, Mass. (1965) p. 9 46 Christine Evans, Between Truth and Time: a History of Soviet Central Television, New Haven: Yale University Press (2016) p. 48

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Construction on the massive Ostankino television tower project started in 1963. The project would provide for ten main television studios and would be able to broadcast 50 hours a day.48

The Ostankino tower project was completed in 1967, marking the 50th anniversary of the October revolution. Today, it is still one of the tallest and most imposing buildings in the world. It would become a symbol of the progress the Soviet Union had made in television development. The Ostankino tower would serve as the central TV hub of the whole of the Soviet Union. In the following years the Ostankino tower would be put into operation and a great deal of Moscow-based programming followed.

The 60s also gave way for extra television channels. After the second Moscow channel was added in February of 1956, a third educational channel and even a fourth channel were added in respectively 1964 and 1967. On the first of January, 1968 the Soviet Communist Party’s main voice, the newspaper Pravda (truth), met its first real rival, a new television evening news program, Vremya (time). Vremya would become the premier Russian television news program for the following decades.49_{It was the first time that the main news was broadcast in a new}

format and, more importantly, at a fixed time. Vremya is a notable example, a mandatory program for all channels in all regions. Many other popular Soviet television programs like Wildlife, Club of Armchair Travelers, A blue spark, Good night kids and KVN originate from the 1960s. Chapters three will have more on Soviet programs.

By the 1970s Soviet television had developed into a massive, cultural and social institution. Daily volume of broadcasting had already grown steadily and the majority of Soviet homes had access to television, roughly 25 million households at the beginning of the decade, this number quickly rising to 35 million in the following years.50_{In the early 1970s Soviet broadcasting}

signals reached upwards of approximately 70 percent of the Soviet population.

Production peaked from 1976 when the Soviet Union started to produce over 7 million TV sets every year. While television still ranked third after radio and newspapers as the major source of information on current affairs in the 1960s, it became clear TV was the major source of

information in the 70s.51_{Throughout the 1970s the Soviet Union accelerated its investments in}

broadcasting. For example, the planned budget for radio and television was 1,314.4 million rubles in 1979, which was almost four times bigger than the budget for 1967.52

New radio-relays, cable lines and satellite connections, including new connections to

international satellite networks, considerably enlarged the Soviet television’s reach as never before.

48 Frances Gayle Durham, Radio and Television in the Soviet Union, Cambridge, Mass. (1965) p. 11 49 Christine Evans, Between Truth and Time: a History of Soviet Central Television, New Haven: Yale University Press (2016) p. 4

51 Julian Graffy, Hosking, Geoffrey, Culture and the Media in the USSR Today, University of London, London (1989) p. 7

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Television had reached a certain institutional maturity in the 1970s. Satellite broadcasting was well established, Soviet television was relatively secured from the non-communist world and the Soviet citizen saw the television as their preferred leisure activity. Television was effectively mobilized, standardized and centralized to become the leading source for propaganda, culture and entertainment in the 1970s. The most important imagined audience for the Central

Television’s programming was the less-educated mass viewer, a trend that was started in the early 1960s.

Central Television in the 1970s, still the major producer of television content in the Soviet Union, consisted of ten broadcasting head offices, each responsible of creating programs for the following profiles: news, propaganda, cinema, theater, literature, music, sports, children’s programs and more. The programs were first reviewed by the head of the profile section who signed it, followed by the editor in chief of the head office and finally it had to be approved by both the head of production and the head of broadcasting. This structure of vertical control was applied in all the different departments of Soviet television and generally used throughout Soviet society. Important programs were even further controlled at every step of its production phase. Republic and regional broadcasts and productions were structured in similar fashion, albeit on a smaller scale but still with a high level of control by the party elites. The Soviet television

infrastructure has progressed explosively in the decades after the Second World War, the next chapter will focus on the development of the Soviet television policies.

Chapter 3: Policies on Soviet Television

This chapter will analyse the Soviet policies on television. What are the problems that arose because of the enormous growth and spread of the media and new technologies that became available? What constituted the meeting point of television from a perspective of the Soviet state? The view of what television ought to contribute to Soviet society has changed throughout the post-Stalin decades. Different Soviet leaders have subjected television to different kinds of

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policies and this chapter will delve deeper into that. I will argue that the Soviet propaganda machine was notably hesitant to incorporate television in its arsenal of indoctrination tools. This hesitancy is especially visible in the fifties and first half of the sixties. It was only after 1965 that the Soviet regime started to seize on the television’s huge propaganda potential. This chapter will start with a background on Soviet media policies followed by a detailed analysis of television policy under the different Soviet leaders.

3.1 The Early Soviet State: From Glasnost to Complete Control

At the birth of the Soviet Union, before television had made its way to the citizens’ households, Soviet mass media under Lenin was characterized in the early 1920’s by glasnost, a Soviet policy of open discussion of political and social matters. Lenin put forward a number of

proposals to realize this glasnost in the field of Soviet media, including the idea that to develop the media in the right direction, complete and truthful coverage of all areas of life should be covered as well as the comparison of the results of work from the different strata of society. Glasnost was supposed to be a continuous means of control by those in the press of the work of the administration.53_{In his political struggle with bureaucracy, Lenin used the term glasnost in}

the early years of the Soviet Union to argue that everyone should have a voice and the power to battle corruption.54_{´´Write, speak, shout aloud of the failings and illogicalities of the Soviet}

system. It is not simply a right, but the duty of every member of the republic´´ said Lenin as he tried to find a place for the Soviet media.55_{Glasnost had emerged as a state policy in Soviet}

media matters in the first year of the 1920s and the media then had an important role in the struggle against rival factions and competing political groupings. Towards the mid-1920s the structure and functions of the mass media had taken a considerable shape. In 1922, all media was nationalized and put under the direct or indirect control of the Bolshevik party and the communist ideology. That same year a heavily centralized censorship was introduced and conflicting political groups were abolished. 1922 marked the end of the time of early glasnost in the sphere of Communism. It can be argued that Lenin's influence in the Soviet political life ended that year, even though he died two years later.

After Lenin died the subsequent power struggle put Stalin in charge of the Communist Party. At the end of the 1920s, Stalin and his associates created an all-encompassing plan for the liquidation of the glasnost media policy. The Soviet media was from that moment on

characterized by a heavily ideology oriented propaganda machine that was controlled on all levels by the party. The Soviet state without glasnost turned throughout the next three decades into an anti-democratic state. A so called dictatorship of the proletariat, where the proletariat ironically had no power and the First Secretary of the Party became the dictator of dictators.56

In the years between 1922 and 1956, Stalin imposed a strict censorship in the media and suppressed the intelligentsia. His rule was absolute and he isolated the Soviet citizens from the rest of the world. State secrets were handled by the General Directorate for the Protection of 53 Reino Paasilinna, Glasnost and Soviet Television, Audience Research, YLE - Finnish Broadcasting Company (1995) p. 21

54 Ibid, p. 12 55 Ibid, p. 21

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State Secrets in the Press, also known as Glavlit, and censorship was handled by a variety of Party controlled organizations, with Gosteleradio in charge of censoring the radio and television broadcasts. The structure and operation of Gosteleradio remained a deep secret until the end of the Soviet Union. It had complete control over Soviet broadcasting, with programming content monitored by the KGB.57_{Pre-revolutionary publications in all fields were destroyed, edited or}

confiscated by the KGB and replaced by the art style of socialist realism. Realistic images and texts of the emancipation of the proletariat, loyalty to the Communist Party and a bright socialist future became the standard for art publications in all fields. It was in this context that Soviet television had to find its place in the Soviet society after the death of Stalin in 1953.

3.2 Policy During the Thaw

After Stalin died and Khrushchev denounced him during the 20th Congress of the Communist Party in 1956 we see a shift in the media policies of the Soviet Union. It was the first time in almost 35 years that the Party leadership had been subjected to this kind of criticism and it was experienced as a big shock. Khrushchev’s leadership led to a distinct revival of the glasnost policy in the media. The revamped press and media during these years were characterized by the restoration of a certain openness and the more vivid character of information.58

The limited normalization of the social climate in the Soviet Union was one of the reasons for this to happen. This proportionate resurrection of openness was noticeable in the press, as could be seen in two of the main newspapers Komsomolskaya Pravda and Izvestia. The material that was published changed greatly and the structure of papers were also altered. 59

The Thaw gave way to a relative liberalization in the fields of art. The style of socialist realism evolved. The comedy genre was able to return, although there would still be tensions about what could be laughed at, and characters were able to become human beings again instead of ideological symbols. Life as has it was presented under Stalin could now be slightly and subtly questioned.60

The people of the Soviet Union understood that there was a choice to make when it came to television. Television still had a small status after the death of Stalin and was still part of the Glavradio department, which was the head of radio in the Soviet media. More and more people in the Soviet Union started to have access to a television. From a state point of view early Soviet television was in many ways still the terrain of young creative intellectuals. Most people in the 1950s that studied to be directors, actors, journalists and cameramen did not see

television as a serious field of employment.61_{Television had not yet broken through to the top of}

the Soviet culture’s table of ranks. Back then it was not clear what role television would play in the Soviet Union’s political tradition and how it would add further to the mobilization of the Soviet people to the Communist ideals. Even though the Soviet regime chose to invest heavily into 57 Gladys D. Ganley, Mikhail and the Multiplying Media, Harvard University (1994) p. 5

59 Ibid, p. 28

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television technology, there was no decision made on what belonged on the screen and who should be responsible for the programming. Television granted formidable opportunities and was quickly developing into becoming an ordinary feature in Soviet daily life, but the leadership had yet to decide how these investments should be used and administered.62_{Television, like}

other Soviet art forms, was a place for the exploration of cultural and political play in the post-Stalin era. The difference between television and the other fields of art is, however, that television is ideally positioned to address the social, political and cultural challenges of the Soviet state. Television was located right in the home of the Soviet citizens and compellingly visual.63_{Until the second half of the 1960’s Soviet communication policy makers thought that}

they were successful in accurately assessing the efficacy of their system.64_{They were confident}

that they understood the Soviet audience and that they could evaluate them properly so that they could create the fitting content to mobilize the audience further. Soviet policy makers assumed that only a lack of cognitive skills would prevent a viewer from being persuaded by the message that was to be an evident truth.65_{The Soviet communications policymakers were}

convinced they made the right content and the Soviet subjects had little impact on what should be on television. The calculations on what television ought to bring was solely driven by the state during this period. Here the meeting point of Soviet television was what Soviet authorities thought it should be with little input from the populace. After 1965, they realized that they did not have all the answers and large scale sociological researches and surveys were conducted to begin to understand the Soviet audiences.

Before the second half of the 1960s, the leaders of the Soviet Union were disorganized,

uncreative and divided when it came to television. The reluctance of propaganda professionals to seize and use this new technology is notable but not entirely unsurprising. Most party

secretaries, including Khrushchev, were still nestled in the apparatus’ old traditions. These traditions were based on oral and personal techniques of communication, like lectures, rallies and question-and-answers sessions. Television was, in a way, anonymous and impersonal, viewers could easily turn the television off or fall asleep or simply don’t pay attention. This habit of a personal approach in communication needed to be broken before television could reach its full potential.66_{This indecisiveness from the top gave consumers, scientific hobbyists and local}

political elites relative freedom to develop the television forward in their own way. Television during the Thaw, in the Soviet context, was more successful as a symbol than as a reality. The modern standard of home-based broadcasting after the Second World War was not a good fit for the Soviet Union. Its political, cultural and social practices demanded a different approach. Television was met with a certain ambiguity, on the one hand it was a technology that could directly inject political awareness and culture into the Soviet homes but on the other hand, how could it be certain it was consumed in that way? Would the effect of television be misplaced? 62 Ibid, p. 200

63 Christine Evans, Between truth and time : a history of Soviet Central Television, New Haven: Yale University Press (2016) p. 2

64 Ellen Mickiewicz, ‘’Policies in the Soviet Media System, Proceedings of the Academy of Political

Science, Vol. 35, No. 3, The Soviet Union in the 1980s (1984), p. 115

65 Ibid, p. 114

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Would television draw the people away from the concert halls and communal activities? The Soviet leadership was not yet convinced.

The era of television in the Soviet Union reached its enduring form in the 1960s. Soviet television’s search for new ways of engaging the people and imposing authority intensified dramatically in the second half of the 1960s. It started to shape itself as truly a mass medium in the second half of the 1960s as Soviet consumption levels increased in the post-Stalin era. With personal income and consumption levels rising sharply in 1965.67_{Soviet television was to be}

highly educative and cultural, these were the priorities. Central Television favoured broadcasting with educative and cultural shows above programs that would do well on commercial television. For example, classical concerts, adaptations of literature works and theater enjoyed a great deal of attention and coverage. 68

So what were the critical aspects of how the Soviet Union should use television from a state point of view? First of all was the political mobilization, Soviet television needed to develop into method of mass mobilization, shape the Soviet citizen into a model communist. Secondly, the television should deliver culture directly to the masses, to educate and raise the ‘level’ of the people. This responsibility was to be carried out by the professionals in the established arts of literature, film, theater and dance. This aspect had a slow start since these professionals initially showed little enthusiasm for the new technology.69_{Finally, at the bottom of the priority list,}

television needed to entertain.

It was in 1960 that the leaders of the Communist Party made their first public entrance into the debate about television’s purpose and future. An official decree was issued that same year: ‘’On the Future Development of Soviet Television’’. According to this decree, which was issued remarkably late considering the investments by the Soviet authorities, there were over four million television sets in the Soviet Union and about seventy TV centers and broadcasting towers which reached a territory encompassing seventy million people. 70_{The decree further set}

out the expectations for the Central Television and other local television studios as well as other Soviet organizations that needed to cooperate further with the new television technology. Some of these expectations included regular appearances by Party officials on television and the expansion of the television’s audience.71_{The decree in 1960 was clearly one of the first steps}

into the direction of what would become a heavily controlled and censored television environment in the 1970s.

3.3 Policy during the Era of Stagnation

After Khrushchev departed in 1964 the Soviet Union ushered into a new political era, one that would be characterized by historians and political scientists as the era of stagnation. Leonid 67 Philip Hanson, The Consumer in the Soviet Economy, London [etc.]: Macmillan (1968) p. 53

69 Sarah Oates, Television, Democracy and Elections in Russia, London: Routledge (2006) p. 64 70 Christine Evans, Between truth and time : a history of Soviet Central Television, New Haven: Yale University Press (2016) p. 40

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Brezhnev came to power and the Soviet Union started a period of negative economic, political and social effects. This period did, however, see television triumph over newspapers and radio in becoming the leading source of information and entertainment. What would, on the one hand, become a stagnant era economically and socially became an innovative period for television. The TV had long lost its status as a luxury item and was now considered a necessity in Soviet households. The ability to enjoy a relaxing evening in front of the television came to be viewed as a right. Brezhnev himself had stated that ‘’The Soviet person has the right to relax in front of the television after a day’s work’’.72

Television increasingly became the dominant source for information and Gosteleradio and Central Television launched an extensive program of sociological audience research in the beginning of 1964-65 to maximize viewership. The Soviet leadership realized the viewing public was expecting to be satisfied, entertained as well as educated so they tried to best understand the viewer and create a television schedule which maximized viewership. This research culminated into the evening news show Vremya in 1968. It sought to find a balance between conveying a political message and to entertain and attract viewers. Audience demands, a lack of popular legitimacy and competition from television in foreign countries all pushed television professionals across the Soviet Union to become better at entertaining their viewers. This new self-understanding among the creative brains behind Soviet television allowed Central

Television to adapt to the political environment after 1968 while at the same time still

maintaining the identity they matured in the 1950s.73_{The second half of the 1960s proved to be}

an exciting time for television, a time where the state conceded a part of its absolute control for the sake of the viewer's expectations. Here we see the meeting point of Soviet television shifting with the people influencing the direction of what television should bring to society. This would, however, change quickly in the following years.

Slowly but steadily the Soviet leadership was turning the new television technology into a means of control and propaganda. On January 7, 1969, the secretariat of the Central

Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) adopted a confidential decree, stating that there had to be an increase in the responsibility of leaders of press, radio and television organs and of cultural and artistic institutions with regard to the ideological and political level of publications and repertory.74_{Ideas and expressions on television that were}

foreign to the ideology of socialism were increasingly restricted. The control over production was tightened and the responsibility put on editors increased. The Soviet leadership finally

determined what to do with this new technology. The State Committee for Television and Radio Broadcasting was led by Sergei Lapin from 1970. A significant figure in this field, he would remain in charge for fifteen years and play an important role in the transformation of the

television into an ideological tool. He was a true representative of the regime and his leadership would be characterized by the creation of a centralized system of television broadcasting. In this 72 Anikó Imre, ; Havens, Timothy. ; Lustyik, Kati., Popular Television in Eastern Europe during and since

Socialism, New York : Routledge (2013) p.18

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new centralized system the local committees were directly subordinate to the federal structure.75

The system rigorously controlled all stages of production and broadcasting. Live programming was minimized by new recording technology, reduced to only some televisionized news broadcasts and some official sport events. Under Lapin’s strict control entertainment television was limited and in some cases, like rock music broadcasts, even blocked. 76_{Sergei Lapin’s}

arrival as Gosteleradio chairman can be seen as a turning point in the world of Soviet television. It marked the end to the ‘’golden years of national television’’ as Roth-Ey describes it and the beginning of the stagnation of national television.77_{Lapin is considered a legendary figure in}

Soviet broadcasting by former television professionals, and he is spoken of with loathing and respect. He symbolized party-state power and boosted the TV’s finances and prestige. On the other hand he was infamous for his strict control and his smothering of creativity. Days after his arrival roughly 10 percent of all employees at Gosteleradio lost their jobs, including eight of the twelve heads of editorial groups. This purge set the tone for the new chairman’s reign. The seventies would see the regime make television the top priority in the field of media and take back control of what television ought to bring. This is clear from the reports in Soviet

professional journals and we can also see that in the salaries. Employment in television earned you more money than comparable jobs in other fields of media.78

The control on production was severely tightened and it was clear that the stakes, and the penalties, for the personnel would be higher. Foreign productions in the USSR, unsurprisingly, were strictly selected. In 1973 only five percent of all programming on the Central Television’s first channel was imported. This number would only grow with a mere three percent in the following decade. 79_{Foreign productions were subjected to another type of control, another}

round of preliminary selection. This selection was made by the Department of International Relations (GUVS) and was based on several criteria, politically and economically motivated, with the country of production playing a huge factor. Television productions from the Western world had little chance of making the cut. There were some exceptions though. For example, the Soviet Union had relatively normal political relations with Finland and France which resulted in modest exchanges with the Finnish and French television producers. The Soviet leadership had little choice though, the growth of television audiences was quickly outpacing domestic production capabilities and the viewers started considerably demanding imported productions.80

The first Western series to be shown in the Soviet Union were from the BBC, The Forsyte Saga. A study conducted by UNESCO in 1973, however, showed that almost all television productions that were imported to the Soviet Union came from the communist world.81

75 Ibid, p.19 76 Ibid, p. 19

78 Author Unknown, ‘Soviet Television, A New Asset for Kremlin Watchers’, 09 October 2014, CIA-Gov, https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/DOC_0005827379.pdf, accessed 25-05-2017

80 Anikó Imre, ; Havens, Timothy. ; Lustyik, Kati., Popular Television in Eastern Europe during and since

Socialism, New York : Routledge (2013) p. 20