An Imperial Mindset

Defeat for Putin wouldn’t be enough to radically change Russia’s trajectory.

(Photo by Sefa Karacan/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)

Watchers of Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine often discuss how victory or defeat should be defined for each of the parties. Ukraine has a clear definition of its victory: the liberation of the whole territory occupied by Russia since 2014. We know this will be extremely difficult to achieve, but Ukraine’s recent successes on the battleground have made it look more feasible than before.

However, if we want to know how the outcome of the war will influence the global international order, it’s a definition of Russia’s defeat we are in a greater need of. Russian defeat is not only a question of territorial gains and losses: the question is whether the country ceases being a serial disruptor of international order and a deadly menace to its neighbors. This means that Russia needs to become post-imperial.

Many people have put their hopes in regime change to achieve this. For example, some sane Russians could rid themselves of a dictator whose reckless behavior has led them into trouble. This may happen through a popular protest movement fueled by anti-mobilization sentiment, an elite coup led by pragmatists in Putin’s immediate environment, or something else we cannot imagine at this point. 

But while the downfall of Putin would certainly bring about significant changes within Russia, it will not be enough to turn it into a post-imperial state. It might have been Putin’s personal decision to invade Ukraine—but it was a decision made possible by a set of attitudes and ideas widely shared in Russia. Truly lasting change will require a fundamental shift in the mindset and attitudes of Russian society and its elites. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen any time soon.

To understand why, we need to look to history. The last time Russia genuinely changed was following the Perestroika reforms of the late 1980s, which restructured the USSR’s stagnant economy. As someone who spent the first half of my life in the communist Soviet Union, I can attest that by the time Gorbachev started his fateful reforms, the ideology of communism had already been deeply discredited even within Russia’s ruling elites, not to speak of the wider public. The ideological vacuum was largely filled by a near-cult of the free, prosperous, and “cool” West. Russians who wanted change had some idea of the alternative: becoming more like Americans. This meant that the demise of communism proved relatively easy, even if unexpected.

Changing Russia’s current mindset will be more difficult than giving up on discredited communist delusions in the Perestroika time. Putin’s ideology has captured the hearts and minds of the critical mass of Russians with a curious mélange of nostalgia for past imperial grandeur and a partly-real, partly-affected “post-colonial” ressentiment against the global domination of the liberal West. The pattern of invading neighboring countries that climaxed in the ongoing Ukraine war suggests that Russians were never satisfied with their post-Cold War status. The soft power of the liberal and prosperous West will not be sufficient to overcome that.  

We can draw a second historical parallel: World War Two and its aftermath. Putin and Hitler both acted on a widely shared resentment against the national humiliation brought about by defeat on the international stage, and were possessed by a passion to revise its results. What the outcome of World War One was for Hitlerism, the outcome of the Cold War was for Putinism.

More important, however, is the question of whether Russia’s behavior after a possible defeat in the current war may be similar to that of Germany. After World War Two, Germans collectively accepted painful territorial losses. In stark contrast with their earlier refusal to come to terms with defeat in World War One, they recognized that it was their own momentous blunder of embracing Nazism that was responsible for their catastrophe. Why did Germans act the way they did? I think there are two major explanations.

The first is a purely military one. Germans started a war of conquest and lost, with their country being fully occupied by the victors. This was fair according to primordial rules of war which even the Nazis could not contest: If you start a war and lose, you are at the mercy of the victors. This contrasted with the outcome of World War One, where the Germans barely experienced war on their territory. They had a point when they resented being assigned exclusive blame for having started the mess.

Secondly, after World War Two the defeated Germany found a dignified place within the new international order. The creation of NATO and the European Economic Community (later the European Union) was crucial. Being an indispensable member of both these organizations, Germany could respect itself without being a threat to others. In fact, it became so stable and prosperous that it made many other nations—including some of those to whom Germany lost the war—envious.   

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Listen to Shashank Joshi on How the War in Ukraine Will End.

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Neither of these conditions pertain to Russia in 2022. First of all, it’s hard to foresee Russia’s military defeat being comparable to that of Germany or Japan in World War Two, with foreign powers occupying all of the country. Even if Russia did experience such a defeat, Germany and Japan were special cases: we know from experiences like Iraq and Afghanistan that being occupied by democratic powers is far from sufficient for becoming a liberal democracy.

A bigger problem is that, unlike Germany after World War Two, it will be very difficult for Russia to find a place in the world that would be acceptable for its national self-esteem. Before the war, Russia’s economy and institutions did not allow it to become either a true member of the global elite or an alternative center of power like China. It could only desperately punch above its weight—by invading Ukraine—without a chance of ever being truly satisfied. These underlying conditions will not disappear: in fact, they have been made worse as a result of the invasion. Russia will not become a true member of the international elite any time soon, though it may face a choice between being a poor relation of the West or becoming a junior partner of China. In either case, ressentiment will remain.

The most promising path for change in Russia is some kind of transformation originating from within. There are some hopeful signs, such as the difference between the new breed of Russian liberals and the older generation of Perestroika democrats. While the older democrats did generally embrace Western liberal values, they were at least ambivalent about the loss of empire, and they only accepted it very reluctantly. This stance had been pregnant with a project of a revanche from the very beginning. By contrast, the new Russian liberals are much more aware of the dangers of ressentiment. Many of them understand that in order to become democratic or simply decent, Russia should accept being post-imperial. Some version of a post-imperial ideology in Russia may therefore come from that corner.

But again, there is little reason to hope that this group will succeed in influencing Russia’s path in a meaningful way. Liberals are far from being politically influential; it is too much to hope that the war experience will dramatically increase their standing.

In short, we should all hope that Russia will one day change. But for now, at least, the evidence is clear: Even if the war in Ukraine continues to deteriorate for Putin, the factors that make Russia an imperial threat will remain.

Ghia Nodia is professor of Ilia State University and Chairman of the Caucasus Institute for Peace, Democracy and Development.

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