Media and Public Relations Research in Post-Socialist Societies

This book tracks the birth, development, and contemporary expansion of media and public relations research in post-socialist societies. Contributors illuminate the current state of the academic fields of communication and media studies and their pertinent explorations in several countries in East-Central Europe and Central Asia.

Media and Public Relations Research in Post-Socialist Societies tracks the birth, development, and contemporary expansion of communication research, with a focus on public relations and media research in post-socialist societies. This collection illuminates the current state of media and communication studies in Eastern Europe, Central Europe, and Central Asia. Contributors discuss and demonstrate various issues of disciplinary roots and tensions, institutional constraints, study development, and contemporary status. This book also illustrates diverse types of traditional and contemporary communication studies from humanities and social science perspectives, ranging from linguistics to health communication. This collection focuses on both traditional and modern scholarship that has arisen due to international scholarly efforts, the advent of technology, and national research interests. Readers will have the opportunity to intellectually discuss the conceptual, theoretical, and practical issues that have occurred within the past twenty years regarding public relations, mass communication, and media studies in post-socialist societies. The analyses in this book lead readers to consider potential resolutions to some of the current dialectical tensions that are affecting post-socialist communication studies and contemplate how reflecting on these tensions informs the broader field of communication worldwide.

Acknowledgments

Preface

Introduction

Part I: Public Relations and Political Communication

Chapter 1: Public Relations in Russia: Formation, Etatization, and Calcification

Sergei A. Samoilenko & Elina Erzikova

Chapter 2: Public Relations Education in Kazakhstan: Competency-Based Approach

Bagila Akhatova

Chapter 3: Political Communication in Croatia: The Critical Assessment of the Field

Marijana Grbeša & Domagoj Bebić

Chapter 4: Political Communication and the Public Sphere in Russia

Oleg Kashirskikh

Chapter 5: Relations with the Stranger: Government, Business, and Society in a Post-Soviet City

Olga Filatova, Elena Lebedeva, & Yuri Misnikov

Part II: Mass Media

Chapter 6: Communication and Media Studies in Hungary (1990 – 2020)

Gabriella Szabó

Chapter 7: The Impact of Political, Legal, and Economic Factors on Media Development in Russia (2000-2020)

Dmitry Strovsky

Chapter 8: The Influence of the Russian Media on the Kyrgyz Press

Elira Turdubaeva & Katja Lehtisaari

Chapter 9: Russian Media Studies in Transition

Elena Vartanova & Denis Dunas

Part III: The Internet and Social Media

Chapter 10: Social Media and Convergence in Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia

Andrej Školkay, Veronika Vighová, Igor Daniš, Gergö Hajzer, & Tomasz Anusiewic

Chapter 11: Linguistics 2.0: Internet Research in the post-Soviet Space

Olena Goroshko & Liudmyla Salionovych

Chapter 12: The Role of Internet User-Generated Content in Exposing Corruption and Ageism in Slovak Health Care

Marta N. Lukacovic, Deborah D. Sellnow-Richmond, & Monika Ďurechová

Conclusion: The Characteristics and Dynamics of Dialectical Tensions within Media, Public Relations, and Communication Studies in Post-Socialist Societies

About the Contributors