4. The Internet strategy of the Russian federation government

History of the Internet as a tool of political communication has no deep roots in Russian public institutions. Nevertheless, it is possible to say that all known forms of the Internet political communication are practiced by the Russian government agencies. Among them the various forms of the Internet use to establish and maintain relations with the media, the creation of the official websites of state institutions, the development of online services etc. should be mentioned.

Various scholars disagree about, when state authorities have engaged in its Internet activities for the first time. The most common belief is that “the first time when the Internet use as a tool of political power in Russia, became known after the famous press conference of Boris Yeltsin in May 12, 1998 (Почепцов, 2001). Several other authors mention that since 1996 there were attempts to create the Russian segment of the Internet for the public authorities of the Russian Federation - Russian Government Internet Network (Network RGIN) (Кулик , 2003).

However, online conferences became one of the most popular forms of political communication in the Russian Internet (Песков, 2002). The first initiative of online conference with Boris Yeltsin belonged to the MSNBC Company and the provision of technical part was entrusted to FAPSI (Иванов, 1998). During this conference Yeltsin was asked about 3000 questions and only 14 replies were received. The press conference was widely published in press and electronic media (Иванов, 1998). At the same time the opinion of the Internet user’s community on this conference was quite controversial. Some people express the opinion that communication between Yeltsin and the Internet users was a profanation, since the president was not looking at the monitor and respond to questions was posed by telephone (Иванов, 1998).

Nevertheless a useful initiative of President Boris Yeltsin was picked up by other government officials: Sergei Kiriyenko and Yury Luzhkov in the same year (Чеснаков, 1999). On March 6, 2001 online conference was held by President Vladimir Putin, who repeatedly resorted to this method of communication with the public during his term (Чеснаков, 1999). First Putin Internet Conference lasted about an hour. During this Conference he was asked about 20 thousand questions relating to various aspects of contemporary Russian politics and some aspects of personal life of the president. Putin answered only 20 questions but rated the action as "a very promising form of communication" (Чеснаков, 1999). On March 5, 2007 the first and the last web conference were held by the third president of Russia Dmitry Medvedev (Быков, Халл, 2011).

Obviously, these online conferences proceed as a "live" political feedback with the audience. In addition, they allow withdrawing the touch of “semi-official” communion.

Following the government officials at the federal level a new form of political communication has been actively used at the regional level. For example, the governor of St. Petersburg Valentina Matvienko continued this tradition in 2004 (Комаровский, С., Мараховская, М., 2001).

In addition to online conference public officials hold meetings with representatives of the Internet community in the “off line mode”. For example, on December 28, 1999 president Putin met with the representatives of the Russian Internet community (Иванов, 2002). It was dedicated to the creation of the website of the Russian Federation Government where the prime minister`s leading article “Russia At The Turn of The Millennium" was presented. Putin's meeting was very successful for the progress of certain political image “but it should be noted that it was prepared in advance” (Иванов, 2002; p. 10). Following the logic of his predecessor, former President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev met with the representatives of the Russian Internet community at April 29, 2011 (Быков, И.А. Халл Т.Э., 2011).

The beginning of the Internet conferences coincided with a period of active creation of various public authorities’ web sites. In December, 1999 the official website of the Russian Federation Government was opened at www.government.ru (Иванов, 2002). Multi-portal "Official Russia» (www.gov.ru) is among the 100 most often "quoted" “Runet” sites – has its links at 1400 sites (Иванов, 2002). At present time, almost all state authorities at the federal level have got their own Internet resources. The site of the President of the Russian Federation - kremlin.ru - is the first to be noted among the other state web sites. It combines both the latest programming technologies, as well as competent content. President Putin has also the primacy in the creation of a specialized website about the president for kids - kids.kremlin.ru. We should also mention the site of the Moscow Government (www.mos.ru) as an example of high-quality web site. In May 13, 2010 the first sites with Cyrillic domain were launched: президент.рф and правительство.рф (Быков, И.А. Халл Т.Э., 2011). In September, 2011 Russia has overtaken Germany in the number of the Internet users and for the first time won first place in Europe (Быков, И.А. Халл Т.Э., 2011). All above mentioned factors have influenced the idea of creating “e-government” in Russia.

In early 2001, "on the initiative of the Department of Government Information of the Government of the Russian Federation a special website - www.e-government.ru - has been created” (Иванов, 2002). The creation and development of governmental websites in Russia was not always been easy. For example, "the creation of the service of the Russian Ministry of Taxes and Duties (www.nalog.ru) looks like a “sophisticated mockery” of taxpayers. Downloading the software, filling out and printing tax blank resulted in the fact that the "advanced” taxpayer has to re-fill the form manually with a calculator in the corridors of the Ministry" (Иванов, 2002; p.23). It is obvious that the implementation of "raw" Internet solutions undermines the credibility of the new means of communication. Despite the fact that all federal agencies have their own websites the level of their design and navigation cannot be called high and doesn`t meet modern requirements. "The biggest problem of federal ministries` websites is a low frequency of updating information" (Иванов, 2002; p.25). To deal with this and many other problems, in 2002 a special federal program "Electronic Russia" was adopted, designed for the period of 2002-2020. Under this program the vast majority of state government agencies at the federal level today have their own websites. "The program aims to create conditions for democratic development, improving the functioning of the economy, public administration and local self-government through the introduction and dissemination of mass information and communication technologies, providing rights to seek freely, to receive, to transfer the information, expansion of training in Information and communication technologies and training of advanced users" (Федеральная целевая программа "Электронная Россия”, 2002). Among the expected outcomes of implementation of this program should be allocated:

• Creation of “e-government” infrastructure, providing access to information about activities and services of public authorities in electronic form, electronic inter-agency collaboration and a unified state control over the impact of public authorities, which will reduce the administrative burden on organizations and individuals and give annual savings of up to 10 billion rubles;

• Providing a guaranteed level of public authorities transparency, higher levels of trust and collaboration, reducing time spent on the implementation of Russian citizens of their constitutional rights and responsibilities;

• Improving efficiency and quality of decisions, reducing costs for the organization for administrative and management processes in government;

• Development of long-term project target of the state program "Information Society (2011 - 2020 years)" aimed at the continuation of the Russian Federation formation of “e-government” in 2011 - 2020 years (Федеральная целевая программа "Электронная Россия”, 2002).

Website on rendering public services www.gosuslugi.ru was launched at December 15, 2009. At this moment its services have been used by 1.5 million people, which are 6% of the total population of Russia (Быков, И.А. Халл Т.Э., 2011). Now it is possible to say, that www.gosuslugi.ru web site is on the “Transactions conducting” stage according to the Дрожжинов classification (Дрожжинов, 2002). To attract more users and expand the list of services negotiations are ongoing at the state level to implement the “eGov 2.0” technology (Быков, И.А. Халл Т.Э., 2011). Compared to the “eGov 1.0” technology, “eGov 2.0” has several advantages:

1. The presence of social, professional and amateur communication with citizens;

2. Content and services mixing;

3. Provision of services to citizens, they have created themselves;

4. Full transparency and the right for users to manage content services and regulations by themselves;

5. Involvement of citizens in public administration;

6. Improving democracy and openness of society;

7. Use the open source software, created by many users;

8. Web Oriented Architecture (Дрожжинов, 2002).

As it is possible to see, “eGov 2.0” technology could make the Internet a tool for direct democracy. Thus, can be conclude that there is clearly defined intention by the Russian government and the President of Russian Federation to create a political regime that is more democratic and open to the public than the current one.

According to the official statistics of the leading Russian search system Yandex, by April 2010 the Internet audience in Russia was 39.7 million people (34% of the population) (Крупин, 2010). Such indicators have caused concern on the part of the scientific community in the world. Thus, in October 2010 Harvard University published a study of Russian blogosphere (Etling, B. et al., 2010). This work is mainly concerned problems of the structural characteristics of political and public affairs blogging in the Russian Internet (RuNet) in comparison with others in the world (Etling, B. et al., 2010). Nevertheless, some conclusions of Harvard University group closely related to this work. Researches allocated four major groups of discussed topics on the Internet:

• Politics and Public Affairs (including news-focused discussion, business

and finance, social activists, and political movements);

• Culture (including literature, cinema, high culture, and popular culture);

• Regional (bloggers in Belarus, Ukraine, Armenia, Israel, etc.);

• Instrumental (paid blogging and blogging for external incentives) (Etling, B. et al., 2010).

Political/public affairs bloggers cover a broad spectrum of attitudes and agendas and include many who discuss politics from an independent standpoint, as well as those affiliated with offline political and social movements, including strong “Democratic Opposition” and “Nationalist” clusters. Evidence of political and social mobilization as well was found. The Russian blogosphere is a space that Russians use to communicate about matters they understand to be of public concern and that potentially require collective action or recognition. Many of the most politically attuned bloggers use the platform to serve as a watchdog on elites and the government. More than this, popular political YouTube videos focus on corruption and abuse of power by elites, the government, and the police (Etling, B. et al., 2010).

Implementing a method of generalization, the following conclusions take place: According to the official statistics the leading Russian search system Yandex, by April 2010 the Internet audience in Russia was 39.7 million people (34% of the population) (Крупин, 2010). Politics and Public Affairs (including news-focused discussion, business and finance, social activists, and political movements) constituted one of the major groups of discussed topics on the Internet (Etling, B. et al., 2010). But, at this moment www.gosuslugi.ru services have been used by 1.5 million people, which are 6% of the total population of Russia (Быков, И.А. Халл Т.Э., 2011). The question here is – why only 6% from 34% of active Internet users enjoy the advantages of “e-government” in conditions of active implementation and support of these technologies by the government. This question forms the research part of this work.