the new russian nationalismopinion. For example, a clear majority of respondents contin-
ued to see inter- ethnic relations in their province, city or town
as ‘rather good than bad’ – close to 56 per cent in 2013 and 58
per cent in 2014. Approximately the same share perceived these
relations as very good (12 per cent and 15 per cent, respectively)
or very bad (8 per cent and 6 per cent, respectively). And in both
years just over a third of the respondents considered Russian
civilisation to be unique – neither Western nor Eastern – a subject
treated in Marlene Laruelle’s chapter in this volume.
State identity: Slightly stronger and slightly more inclusive
Unlike the case with ethnic pride, we do find that pride in Russia
as a multi- ethnic state has risen, although on a scale far smaller
than the rise in support for Putin. Thus a greater share of respond-
ents in 2014 (52 per cent) than in 2013 (44 per cent) said they
were ‘very proud’ to be Russian citizens. The eight percentage
point increase is outside the margin of error yet not particularly
impressive, given the scale of events that had occurred in the
interim. The proportion of those who said they were more proud
than not to be citizens of Russia remained about the same − 44
per cent in 2013 and 42 per cent in 2014. Russians were very
proud of their state in 2014, but they had already been very proud
of it prior to the Ukrainian events.
Accompanying this finding, we can note a growing sense among
the Russian public that the strength of the state in which they
invest so much pride does not depend on ethnic Russians alone
- even though attitudes toward diversity per se and other ethnic
or religious groups did not necessarily improve. The NEORUSS
surveys assessed these views with the question: ‘Do you believe
the ethnic diversity of the population strengthens or weakens
Russia?’ In 2013, 13 per cent of the respondents said that diver-
sity strengthened Russia while 25 per cent averred that diversity
weakened it. In 2014, more than 22 per cent saw diversity as a
boon, and only about 16 per cent called it a liability for Russia.
The share of respondents who held that diversity had mixed
effects remained the same, at about 60 per cent. To an extent,
the decline in perceptions of diversity as weakness may be seen