Since the onset of Russia’s military actions in Ukraine, one of the key questions discussed by academics, politicians, and the wider public has been whether Russians genuinely support their government’s course. On the one hand, President Putin’s approval rating surged after the war began, and many expressed declarative support for the war. This may indicate a sense of unity among Russians rallying round their flag and leader. On the other hand, this support is far from consistent; it is marked more by negative than positive emotions and lacks a clear image of the enemy, challenging the conventional “rallying round the flag” explanation for war support in Russia. Based on existing survey data and original qualitative research into how Russians perceive the conflict, this paper explores the complex nature of war support and critically assesses the applicability of the “rallying round the flag” approach in the Russian context.
This article analyzes the transformation of Russia’s social contract following the 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Prior to the invasion, scholars characterized the Russian social contract as a mutual non-interference agreement or an authoritarian bargain in which economic prosperity or aspirations of national greatness were exchanged for political disengagement. In the aftermath of the invasion, however, the regime initiated a recalibration of this contract to preserve legitimacy under wartime conditions. While the revised social contract retained the core logic of exchanging loyalty for stability, the regime sought to sustain performance legitimacy by shielding the majority from the direct costs of war, while displacing its burdens onto specific marginalized groups, excluding them from the renewed agreement. The emergence of the “Put’ Domoy” movement highlights the fragility and exclusionary nature of this new arrangement. Ultimately, the revised social contract reflects a transformation in how authoritarian legitimacy is managed in times of war – less through shared ideological commitment, and more through a fragmented and selective distribution of costs, risks, and rights. This paper draws on existing surveys and secondary analyses of the effects of the war on Russian society, including three Public Sociology Laboratory studies based on an extensive dataset of in-depth interviews on war perceptions and resistance in Russia, collected between 2022 and 2024.
The 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia has had a significant impact on the various networks of Russian-speakers residing abroad, leading to the rise of distinct and even conflicting diasporization projects. In Germany, a diverse population of Russian-speaking migrants—including ethnic German resettlers from the post-Soviet space, Jewish migrants, new economic migrants, political migrants, and people who came via other trajectories—faced a pivotal moment that forced many of them, along with their descendants, to redefine their identities and affiliations, often within completely opposing political frameworks. In this paper, we focus on one of those diasporization projects that is intertwined with a politicized Russianness, aligned with pro-Kremlin and nationalist narratives, which draws on a mix of Soviet nostalgia, imperial aspirations, conservative values, and a reactionary stance against the West. We define this project as an illiberal one and maintain that this identity formation has been facilitated by hybrid media platforms like Telegram, where pro-war narratives are circulated and reinforced. By examining this pro-war diasporization project, the paper contributes to the broader discussion on how diasporas are constructed in the context of inter-state conflict, albeit at a distance. It reveals the active role the emerging communities play in shaping and sustaining hegemonic discourses that resonate with Russia’s current geopolitical ambitions. The findings provide insights into how diasporas are formed and transformed in response to critical global events, highlighting their role as both agents and arenas of political struggle, while paying attention to the agency of post-Soviet migrants in reshaping the diasporization projects.
