The New Russian Nationalism Imperialism, Ethnicity and Authoritarianism

the ethnification of russian nationalism

It would not be an exaggeration to say that it was at that juncture that

Russians, for the first time in decades, became really conscious of their

national identity. Now, it suddenly appeared that they belonged not

to a great multinational empire transcending ethnicity but to a smaller

Russian state. The fact of being an ethnic Russian, formerly just taken

for granted, became salient overnight... And it was at this juncture

that ethnic Russian nationalism came to the fore. Russians began to

feel that they were left all alone, that they were not Rossiyanie, but

Russkie, a purely ethnic community... Ethnicity became a sanctuary

for people lacking other outlets for self- fulfilment. This is the first, and

major, cause of the rise of Russian nationalism. (Mirsky 1997: 165–6,

emphasis in the original)

According to Mirsky, the fourth quadrant in my matrix, hitherto
inhabited by a few quirks only, suddenly became the abode of mil-
lions of Russians. At first, however, ethnic solidarity was eclipsed
by another stronger sentiment, Mirsky asserts: the feeling that all
these nations, regardless of their ethnic background, belonged to
Russia. This was the basis for the new nation- building project
launched by the Eltsin Administration in the 1990s (Mirsky
1997: 165–7). The third quadrant, characterised by non- ethnic,
Russian Federation- focused nationalism, for a while attracted
many Russians.
In Mirsky’s view, post- Soviet Russian nationalism has moved
through three stages in a remarkably short time – from a subdued
feeling of Russianness overshadowed by an overall Soviet loyalty,
via a rossiiane period, marked by non- ethnic loyalty to the
Russian Federation, to a ‘genuine Russian ethnic nationalism
with chauvinistic overtones’ (Mirsky 1997: 167). While Mirsky’s
observations are important and basically astute, I think he errs
on two accounts. First, the two varieties of Russian Federation-
focused nationalism should not be seen as stages in which one
supplants the other, but as coexisting phenomena. The ethnic
orientation has indeed grown stronger over time at the expense of
the state- centred variety, but this development, I hold, came after
Mirsky published his book in 1997. Second, Mirsky downplays
the enduring strength of the Soviet- focused varieties of Russian
nationalism (the ‘empire- oriented’ axis in my matrix). Indeed,