Professional Affiliation

Russian-American journalist, analyst, and author

Expert Bio

Anna Arutunyan is a Russia-American journalist, analyst and author. Born in Moscow, she was raised and educated in the United States before returning to Russia as a journalist. She has covered two decades of Russian politics first as reporter and editor at The Moscow News, Russia's oldest English-language weekly, then as a correspondent and analyst. She has served as Russia’s senior analyst for the International Crisis Group, and her articles have appeared regularly in USA Today, Foreign Affairs, and other publications worldwide. She is the author of several books on Russia, including The Putin Mystique, translated into over a dozen languages, and the latest on Russia’s war in Ukraine, Hybrid Warriors: Proxies, Freelancers and Moscow’s Struggle for Ukraine. Her current project is “Rebel Russia”: an exploration of the Russian rebel and dissident movement, and how it has shaped its government, both historically and today. 

Wilson Center Project

“Rebel Russia: Book Project on the Russian Rebel and Dissident Movement”

Project Summary

This research project will challenge assumptions about Russia as a collectivist society by asking whether one of the current chief hurdles in its development is in fact unbridled individualism and social incohesion. Seeking to analyze the effects of social incohesion on civil society and the prospects of democracy-building in Russia, this project would undertake a comprehensive study of this phenomenon involving an on-the-ground investigation of specific impediments faced by political movements, NGOs, and private business in attaining their goals: whether that goal is building a playground in their community or creating a political party with a voice in the government.

Major Publications

The Media in Russia (McGraw-Hill, 2009)

Freedom, Repression and Private Property in Russia (co-authored with Vladimir Shlapentokh, Cambridge University Press, 2013)

The Putin Mystique (Interlink Books, 2014)

Previous Terms

George F. Kennan Fellow, Kennan Institute, "Only Connect: Social Incohesion, Atomization, and Individualism in Russian Civil Society," 10/07/15-01/07/16