the new russian nationalismchief patrons who also wield popular support are more likely to
be seen by other networks as likely winners, making these other
networks more likely to join them, which in turn makes them
seem still more likely to win. Patronalistic networks, therefore,
tend to coordinate around patrons that have the most popular
support, although primarily after a sitting president starts to be
seen as a lame duck for other reasons.
The most successful patronal presidents thus tend not only to
be popular, but also to pay intense attention to their standing in
public eyes. Public support is a critical stabiliser of their regimes.
When they wield it, the key networks in the president’s system are
likely to see defection to the opposition as particularly unprom-
ising, as the president could likely win an election even if the
political machine falls apart. But when they lose popular support,
elites looking ahead to the future are more likely to start hedging
their bets and to break rank when a crisis emerges, especially one
linked to succession or other sources of lame duck syndromes.
This has surely been the case for Putin, whose regime is known for
its intense attention to his ‘ratings’ in public opinion (Treisman
2011a).
This, then, is where Russian nationalism has the opportunity
to play its greatest role in influencing Russian state policy and
rhetoric. The next question we must ask is to what extent has
Russian nationalism played such a role? Has nationalism been a
prominent source of the high public approval ratings that have
been characteristic of Putin’s time in high office, stabilising it?
The sections that follow address this question, beginning with his
rise to power to his late 2000s peak, then examining his regime’s
domestic political crisis in 2011–12, and concluding with a look
at the period since that crisis.
The role of nationalism in Putin’s political machine
This chapter’s overarching argument is that while Putin has cer-
tainly sounded themes that fit under one definition or other of
‘nationalist’, as examined elsewhere in this volume, up until 2014
these were not the most important parts of his public appeal.
If anything, Putin represented a relatively moderate voice on