Russian nationalisms. Govern, mobilize, contest in Russia at war, by Eugène Berg (Le Monde Diplomatique, November 2024)

Since the 19th century, two main currents have coexisted within Russian nationalism. The “state-imperial” tradition is based on a desire for domination over varied spaces and diverse populations at the heart of a vast political entity, defined sometimes as a state-civilization, sometimes as an empire. The second, “ethnocratic” – which we found for example in the pen of the dissident writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn – is based on an ethnic vision of the nation and a desire to favor the interests of the component within the State. Russian (nearly 80% of the population). If President Vladimir Putin advocated partnership with the West during his first mandate, in the 2010s, against a backdrop of tensions with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), he increased references to the State -civilization, sometimes presented as Russia’s own path, or as the guardian of traditional values, while the West has entered a phase of moral decadence. The author, however, puts into perspective citizens’ support for this official nationalism, which has become ever more vibrant since the start of the war with Ukraine.