The End of “Putin’s Empire?” Ontological Problems of Russian Imperialism in the Context of the War against Ukraine, 2022

ABSTRACT

Vladimir Putin seeks to build a modern Russian empire on the post-Soviet space, as confirmed by the invasion of Ukraine. In the present article, the author shows why modern Russia represents a geopolitical project called “Putin’s Empire,” and what the ideological justifications for this empire are. The author also proposes to consider what is happening as a clash of different forms of imperial orders—neoliberal democracy and the concept of the “Russian world.” The author concludes that Russia, as an empire, is in a protracted political crisis, but this does not mean the empire will disintegrate.

Acknowledgments

The author thanks the Editor-in-Chief Dmitry Gorenburg and anonymous reviewers for thorough reviewing and helpful advice. The author is also grateful to the Ukrainian people, who show their courage and fight for freedom and justice.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. For example, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s announcement of a special military operation in Syria; aggravation of US–China relations over Taiwan (including Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan); a special Israeli military operation in the Gaza Strip in August 2022; statements about the food crisis in the MENA region and other processes; protests in Sri Lanka.

2. Deepak Lal points to the fact that “the imperial pax has also historically been associated with globalization—which is not a new phenomenon—and the prosperity it breeds, for two important reasons” (Lal 2004a, 4). And here, indeed, such remarks have their place. For the Pax is more an invention of historians than of the inhabitants of the empire themselves. However, one must take into account the fact that Pax is a world in the sense that it represents the maximum level of development of the empire, in which relative autonomy of the periphery is achieved; cultural hegemony is established; and a process of self-identification of the periphery’s population with the empire takes place. These processes are, of course, the “ideal future” to which the empire aspires. But if we take into account the violent practices of empire creation and management of imperial space, we are forced to give a different interpretation of this phenomenon. That is, Pax should be defined as the ideological justification of the imperial idea, with which local (peripheral) political elites either agree or are forced to agree, above all.

3. Here it is necessary to explain the specifics of Russian modernization. Russia is characterized by a so-called secondary or catching-up modernization, that is, a change in the political system and socio-cultural structures as a response to an external challenge from more developed countries. The catching-up modernization is carried out mainly under the influence of the borrowing of foreign technologies and forms of organization of production and society. Such modernization is based on a focus on the most developed empire or the most developed state in a particular historical period.

4. The reforms of Ivan IV are very similar to those in the Ottoman Empire that were passed by the sultans Bayezid II and Selim the Grim. These reforms involved the creation of a new military organization (Janissary—Streltsy), bureaucratic structures (Divan—Prikaz), administrative-territorial units (Sanjak— Voivodship), an official and institutionalized church (the caliph in the Ottoman Empire and the tsar appointing a metropolitan).

5. Although Peter I spent a long time in Holland, which was considered the center of the world system at that time, his reforms included elements of other European states (see more in Cracraft 2003), including Sweden (military reform and civil code), England (church reform), Germany (administrative reform). The social organization, and therefore the economic system, was based on the Dutch model of capitalism. However, its implementation in Russia was ambiguous.

6. At a minimum, Russia’s geopolitical dominance over Central Asia, including Kazakhstan,Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, persists. There is also a situational alliance with China and Afghanistan (the Taliban government). In this regard, Russia’s authoritarian political regime seeks to find allies with similar authoritarian regimes to promote the idea of confrontation with the West and to find new markets for its resources to support geopolitical projects.

7. Today we can also observe that Armenia is also trying to distance itself from Russia; notably, on November 24, 2022, the prime minister of Armenia refused to sign the resolution of the CSTO Council. The reason for this decision is the unsatisfactory activities of the organization in the context of the war in Nagorno-Karabakh.