the new russian nationalismPopular Russian ethnonationalism
From recent survey results Boris Dubin (2014: 15) claims the
nationalism of the majority in Russia today is state- oriented and
not ethnic. It is difficult to see how he draws that conclusion, since
much of the survey results that he himself cites point in another
direction. Thus, for instance, 66 per cent supported (more or
less strongly) the slogan ‘Russia for Russians (russkie)’ while 61
per cent expressed negative attitudes towards people from the
Caucasus and immigrants from Central Asia (Dubin 2014: 9, 12).
The Romir survey conducted under the auspices of our project in
May 2013 also confirmed that ethnocentric and xenophobic atti-
tudes are strong among the Russian public. When we asked the
same question about the slogan ‘Russia for Russians (russkie)’,
we found slightly less support than Levada but still quite high:
59.3 per cent. Again, it should be emphasised that the meaning of
the term russkie is in flux; in certain contexts it is understood as
encompassing more than just ethnic Russians. When asked about
this, 24.9 per cent of our respondents explained that to them
russkie meant ‘all citizens of the Russian Federation’, while 30.0
per cent indicated ‘mostly but not exclusively ethnic Russians’.
Only 39.0 per cent meant ‘ethnic Russians only’. The elusive
quality of the word russkie must be taken into account in inter-
preting such survey results.
Even so, some of the responses in the Romir survey must be
characterised as remarkably ethnocentric, even ethnocratic: for
instance, as much as 73.9 per cent agreed ‘fully’ or ‘basically’
with the statement that ‘Russians (russkie) ought to be given pri-
ority at appointments to higher positions in the state’. Even more
remarkable was support for the view that ‘the Russian (russkii)
people ought to play the leading role in the Russian (rossiiskii)
state’: 47.4 per cent agreed fully, in addition to another 34.6
per cent who basically agreed. These attitudes are incompatible
with a civic nation- state idea in which all citizens have equal
opportunities.
These ethnocentric attitudes were accompanied in the 2013
Romir survey by deep scepticism towards migrants and other
people perceived as culturally alien. A figure of 60.5 per cent of