Authoritarian Regimes Like Putin’s have Made Significant Progress in Resolving Feedback Problem, ‘Notes in the Margins’ Telegram Channel Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – One of the axioms of political analysis is that authoritarian regimes will fail because in their efforts to suppress media freedom, they will lose feedback from the population and thus, in ignorance, act in ways that will ultimately undermine their ability to remain in power.
    But the Notes in the Margins telegram channel argues that contemporary authoritarian regimes like Putin’s have made “significant” progress in overcoming this problem by means of their creation of nominally independent but in fact state controlled institutions (t.me/ZNP_edu and rosbalt.ru/news/2025-03-20/telegram-kanal-zametki-na-polyah-kak-rabotaet-monitoringovyy-avtoritarizm-5266916).
    While this arrangement is not a perfect replacement for a free and independent media, the telegram channel suggests, it does represent “significant progress” by such regimes “in solving the problem of feedback.” And thus, it means that talk about the need for balance between medi affiliated with the state and independent media “completely disappears.”