Russia, polls | Recent Poll: Majority Support President Putin’s War in Ukraine

SENTRALEN, OSLO (Nettavisen): Russian opinion (public opinion) about the war in Ukraine was one of the topics discussed at the Nupi conference in Russia this week.

Margarita Zavadskaya is a senior researcher at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. She presented her findings from the “Panel Study of Russian Public Opinion and Attitudes” project.

Their recent poll shows that Putin’s war efforts in Ukraine are still supported by a majority in Russia.

– If we ask if they support it

Putin has consistently called the Ukraine war a special military operation ever since the February 2022 invasion.

” /> in Ukraine, 54 percent answer that they support the war. The rest are divided between the categories “I don’t know”, “no support” and “refusal to answer” , Zavadskaya told Nettavisen.

The findings are based on telephone interviews with a representative sample of about a thousand respondents in Russia last week.

– There is still a high amount of political support for what is going on in Ukraine. On the other hand, it is not 80 percent support at all, she says.

– We see that there is a relatively large number of people who are lazy. They hesitate to give a definitive answer. They say “I don’t know” or refuse to answer, says Zavadskaya.

– Is 54 percent support a credible figure, Zavadskaya?

– Yes, I would say it is very believable. We see no trace of people lying when it comes to guesswork. There is no systematic evidence for it. But if we give them the opportunity to give more comfortable answers, they prefer to choose those, she says.

– They are not lying in the sense that they say “I do not support the war, but say that I support the war”. That is not true. But, if they can avoid the question, they might go for it, says Zavadskaya.

– Childhood’s view of the war

Svetlana Erpyleva is a researcher at the University of Bremen in Germany. She has participated in a research project where in-depth interviews were conducted with Russians about their opinion on the war in Ukraine. The in-depth interviews were conducted in three rounds in 2022 and 2023.

– We focused on those we call “non-enemies”. These are all that support the war or justify the war. Everyone is not against war, says Erpyleva to Nettavisen.

Erpyleva says that the respondents still had negative feelings related to the war.

– Most people want the war to end, but they want Russia to win. They don’t have a definite idea of ​​what “victory” should be, but they fear that the war will be lost, she says.

Erpyleva says that the respondents needed to justify the war effort from a moral point of view.

– They present the war as a natural disaster, that it is terrible, that it kills people. It is a rather childish view, as they are trying to justify the war, says Erpyleva.

– Largest measurement buyer

Timothy Frye is a political scientist and professor at Columbia University. He says that the Kremlin is clearly very interested in Russian opinion (public opinion), as they are the country’s largest consumer of public opinion data.

– They pay close attention to public opinion in Russia, says Frye at the Nupi conference in Russia.

– One could argue that public opinion is not that important because the high casualty figures in Russia do not seem to have any particular effect on Russia’s behavior, he says.

Western estimates put the Russian loss figure at 115,000 killed and 500,000 wounded, writing The Keeper.

The Economist wrote this summer that between 462,000 and 728,000 Russians were killed, wounded or captured. The Economist cited documents from the US Department of Defense.

Frye points to American research on public opinion and war to explain why the high numbers of Russian casualties in the Ukraine war seem to have no effect on Russian public opinion.

– The research showed that the American public was willing to accept defeat as long as they believed that the war was moving in the right direction. But as soon as it became legitimate to criticize the war, especially the Vietnam issue, people began to question whether the war effort was worth it, and whether the the impact of a heavy loss, says Frye.

– Today, most Russians think they will win. So the Russians may be saying yes to the loss while it is believed that as long as the Russian military is successful, they are willing to sustain those losses, he says.

A balance between two risks

President Vladimir Putin won 87 percent of the vote in March this year – a presidential election deemed undemocratic by international election observers.

Frye raises the question of whether Russian public opinion has any significance for self-determination like Russia.

– It is not true that Russian politicians are so responsible that they fear that if they choose a policy that the majority of Russians do not like, they will be removed from power, says Frye.

The Columbia professor says Putin is “too strong to lose power, but too weak to govern effectively.”

– He always balances between two possible challenges. One comes from the elite and the other from the masses. Autocrats can be overthrown in a coup by the elite or they can be overthrown in a revolution by the people, he says.

– It is difficult to solve these two challenges at the same time. Addressing one of these threats makes the other more likely. In that sense, public opinion is important, Frye says.