‘Russia isn’t a country of Putins!’: How RT bridged the credibility gap in Russian public diplomacy during the 2018 FIFA World Cup
| Author | Alistair Willis,Marie Gillespie,Rhys Crilley,Vitaly Kazakov |
| DOI | 10.1177/13691481211013713 |
| Published date | 01 February 2022 |
| Date | 01 February 2022 |
| Subject Matter | Original Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/13691481211013713
The British Journal of Politics and
International Relations
2022, Vol. 24(1) 136 –152
© The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/13691481211013713
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‘Russia isn’t a country of
Putins!’: How RT bridged
the credibility gap in Russian
public diplomacy during the
2018 FIFA World Cup
Rhys Crilley1, Marie Gillespie2,
Vitaly Kazakov3 and Alistair Willis2
Abstract
In the context of deteriorating relations with ‘Western’ states, Russia’s state-funded international
broadcasters are often understood as malign propaganda rather than as agents of soft power.
Subsequently, there is a major credibility gap between how Russian state media represents itself
to the world and how it is actually perceived by overseas publics. However, based on the study
of RT’s coverage of the Russian hosted FIFA 2018 World Cup and the audience reactions this
prompted, we find that this credibility gap was partially bridged. By analysing over 700 articles
published by RT, alongside social media and focus group research, we find that RT’s World Cup
coverage created an unusually positive vision of Russia that appealed to international audiences.
Our study demonstrates how state-funded international broadcaster coverage of sports mega-
events can generate a soft power effect with audiences, even when the host state – such as Russia
– has a poor international reputation.
Keywords
audience research, FIFA World Cup, football, public diplomacy, Russia, RT, soft power
Introduction
On 21 March 2018, in a Foreign Affairs Select Committee at the British Parliament,
Member of Parliament Ian Austin articulated his concerns about the upcoming FIFA
World Cup in Russia, suggesting that ‘Putin is going to use it in the way Hitler used the
1936 Olympics’ (Austin quoted in Wintour, 2018). Austin was disquieted that the tour-
nament would be used to deflect public attention from human rights abuses in Russia
1University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK
2The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
3The University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
Corresponding author:
Rhys Crilley, Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Glasgow, The Adam Smith
Building, Glasgow G12 8RT, UK.
Email: Rhys.crilley@glasgow.ac.uk
1013713BPI0010.1177/13691481211013713The British Journal of Politics and International RelationsCrilley et al.
research-article2021
Original Article
Crilley et al. 137
and its actions in Ukraine, Syria, and the United Kingdom, where the former Russian spy
Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia had recently been poisoned. When asked what he
thought about the upcoming tournament, the then British Foreign Secretary, Boris
Johnson, stated that Austin’s comparison was ‘certainly right’ and that ‘Putin glorying in
this sporting event’ was ‘an emetic prospect’ (Johnson quoted in Wintour, 2018). These
comments reflect not only British elite attitudes towards the Russian state at the time but
also a disdain at the prospect of Putin wielding influence by exploiting this sports mega-
event (SME).
Such accounts dovetail with the argument that the Kremlin is doing ‘the opposite of
what is needed for soft power creation’, where instead of making Russia attractive to
international audiences, Russia’s aggressive and controversial foreign and domestic poli-
cies result in negative and hostile perceptions abroad (Grix et al., 2019b: 54; see also
Hudson, 2015). Russian state-sponsored campaigns to engage with international publics
– public diplomacy – are increasingly viewed as propaganda rather than as a genuine
effort to foster a productive dialogue (Van Herpen, 2015). Russia’s public diplomacy
efforts therefore suffer from what Rawnsley (2015) has referred to as a ‘credibility gap’.
Consequently, SMEs, conventionally envisioned as tools of national image promotion
abroad, are primarily understood as instruments of domestic political legitimation in the
context of contemporary Russia (Grix et al., 2019b; Orttung and Zhemukhov, 2017). Yet
the question of the significance of international communication in the context of Russian
SMEs should not be dismissed as categorically as it often is (Nye, 2014).
Existing academic research has produced some insights into how Russia has attempted
to promote a favourable image to world audiences through its previous SME, the Sochi
2014 Olympics (Grix and Kramareva, 2017; Hutchings et al., 2015; Kramareva and Grix,
2018; Tenneriello, 2019). However, despite recent preliminary studies (Makarychev and
Yatsyk, 2020), surprisingly little is known about Russian political communication efforts
and their effects during the 2018 World Cup. This is with respect to (a) how Russian state
actors engaged international audiences, (b) how these audiences interpreted Russia-
sponsored communication at the time of the SME, and (c) what effects such efforts may
have had in shaping international perceptions of Russia.
In this article, we address this gap. We analyse how a Russian state-sponsored interna-
tional media network RT – formerly Russia Today – reported the 2018 World Cup and
examine public reactions to this coverage. We choose to focus on RT because it is Russia’s
foremost state-funded international broadcaster with an audience of millions across mul-
tiple new media platforms as well as on television across Europe, the Middle East, and
North and South America. While this may not provide an overall sense of Russian soft
power in its entirety, an analysis of RT’s media reporting and audience responses can
provide an insight into how one of the most prominent ‘soft power tools’ or, in different
interpretations, ‘propaganda weapons’ of the Russian state represents Russia to interna-
tional audiences (Hutchings, 2020: 284).
RT is often portrayed as a pariah among international broadcasters, yet the network
confidently internalises and reappropriates this status (Yablokov, 2015), attracting diverse,
albeit modest, international audiences (Mickiewicz, 2017). Rawnsley (2015: 276) observes
that typically, the network’s ‘gaze is not on Russia, but rather is fixed on presenting a criti-
cal representation of the US rais[ing] serious doubts about its role in “public diplomacy”
and suggest[ing] a more ideological and propaganda-based approach to international
broadcasting’. At the time of the 2018 World Cup, RT’s usual tendency to focus on nega-
tive representations of Western institutions (Miazhevich, 2018) was replaced by salient
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