Print has always had a significant role in times of war and revolution across Europe and the current struggle between Russia and Ukraine may be no exception. Famously Lynne Truss dedicated her bestseller Eats, Shoots and Leaves to the “memory of the striking Bolshevik printers of St Petersburg” who precipitated the 1905 revolution. Printers, by virtue of the fact that they could read, were at the forefront of many revolutions in the nineteenth century and in war time have produced reams of propaganda, clandestine maps and more.
This time it could be different. Most of the legitimate and less trustworthy information and news has moved online, even if a well placed printed poster can be an arresting sight. TikTok, Instagram and Telegram are the supreme channels in this war, not print. The role that print can play therefore seems limited. But it does exist, provided that paper and board companies and packaging groups join the banks, the luxury goods companies and others in refusing to support the Kremlin, applying sanctions and using disruption of the Russian to force a change.
The country’s economy is already said to be feeling the pinch and there have been edicts against hoarding of food and FMCG goods bought from supermarkets. These products will need replenishing, which will require printed packaging on film, carton boards and corrugated boxes. Action by some of the paper groups will restrict the flow of substrates to the country and if the boxes and flexible packaging cannot be printed, it will be difficult to supply supermarkets and the vast populations that live in Russia’s cities. That country has been here before: difficulties in food distribution during the World War I helped foment popular discontent against the tsar that led to the 1917 Russian Revolution. History is unlikely to repeat itself, but print (or lack of it) may yet have a part to play in pressuring the Putin led government to change course.
Print’s role in history has changed, not gone
Print has always had a significant role in times of war and revolution across Europe and the current struggle between Russia and Ukraine may be no exception. Famously Lynne Truss dedicated her bestseller Eats, Shoots and Leaves to the “memory of the striking Bolshevik printers of St Petersburg” who precipitated the 1905 revolution. Printers, by virtue of the fact that they could read, were at the forefront of many revolutions in the nineteenth century and in war time have produced reams of propaganda, clandestine maps and more.
This time it could be different. Most of the legitimate and less trustworthy information and news has moved online, even if a well placed printed poster can be an arresting sight. TikTok, Instagram and Telegram are the supreme channels in this war, not print. The role that print can play therefore seems limited. But it does exist, provided that paper and board companies and packaging groups join the banks, the luxury goods companies and others in refusing to support the Kremlin, applying sanctions and using disruption of the Russian to force a change.
The country’s economy is already said to be feeling the pinch and there have been edicts against hoarding of food and FMCG goods bought from supermarkets. These products will need replenishing, which will require printed packaging on film, carton boards and corrugated boxes. Action by some of the paper groups will restrict the flow of substrates to the country and if the boxes and flexible packaging cannot be printed, it will be difficult to supply supermarkets and the vast populations that live in Russia’s cities. That country has been here before: difficulties in food distribution during the World War I helped foment popular discontent against the tsar that led to the 1917 Russian Revolution. History is unlikely to repeat itself, but print (or lack of it) may yet have a part to play in pressuring the Putin led government to change course.
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