- Hubert Walas
A Russian Paradox.
"It doesn't matter if there's nothing to put in the pot; what is important is that Russia be great." This is a frequent and, in fact, dominant description of the Russian mindset. It puts the tool of sanctions and isolation of Russia in the world into question. Since, will sanctions have an effect on such a determined nation that’s willing to make sacrifices for the sake of its superpower status? However, there is also a second view standing in complete contradiction to the first and where the highest value is comfort, the abundance of which in Russia is increasingly questioned. Let's look at the paradox of Russian society.
A July survey by the Levada Center found that despite the ongoing "special military operation" in Ukraine and the resulting sanctions on Russia, more than two-thirds of Russians believe the country is "on the right track." Only 22% hold the opposite view. Comparing these numbers, with those before the invasion - so 50% and 39%, respectively - one can see that satisfaction with their country among Russians is growing.
Surveys on the country's economic situation may look even more irrational. As many as 40% of Russians believe that a year from now life in Russia will be better than it is today. Only 27% think it will be the same and an even fewer 18% think it will be worse. While Russian exports are dying, yet 55% of Russians expect "economic improvement" within a year.
Such opinions cannot be attributed to Russians' lack of attention as 56% declare that they are following current events "closely" and 81% are "concerned about events." Nor can this be attributed to any expectation of an imminent end to the "special operation" as less than half of Russians believe the war will end within a year, while the rest think it will last longer or have no opinion.
Typically, war also causes a dramatic increase in support for Vladimir Putin, just as it did during the 2008 Georgian War and the 2014 Annexation of Crimea. Here, however, the difference is that those events were considered a triumph for Russia that were settled in a matter of days. Yet, 73% of Russians continue to believe in victory, but do not believe that the current state of the war indicates that this goal has already been achieved.
These results are an amazing example of the state of mass consciousness among Russians. Alexey Levinson, Head of Sociocultural Research at the Levada Center and Professor at the School of Economics in Moscow, believes one should be skeptical that this mindset is solely the result of propaganda which can do a lot, but has its limits. Levinson goes back to the romantic myth in which Russia is considered the leader of half the world. This myth was smuggled in by the Bolsheviks along with the idea of liberating mankind. The latter quickly disappeared, but the allure of power remained for good. During a March survey, Russians described their feelings about the war in Ukraine by often noting they "feel pride" despite that, March was the month of the Kremlin's greatest failures, but that did not matter.
What mattered was that Russia stood up to its main adversary and rival: the United States, or more broadly, NATO and the West. In Levinson's view, the Russians are not even concerned with defeating America (as if that would even be possible), but with getting the Americans to recognize Russia as an equal in military status, but more importantly, in being a world power.
So why are Russians so optimistic? There are two reasons. First, the U.S. has taken up the gauntlet that Russia has thrown down. Second, and this is particularly important, Washington is exercising restraint, thus showing that it’s "afraid of us" and so “treating Russia as an equal.”
And therefore we end up with the "Russian paradox," which according to Levinson, is the phenomenon in which the worse the everyday situation of Russians is, the more they want to identify with success at the top. Russians collectively feel a sense of satisfaction at the fact that the world order has had to adjust to their actions. In such a euphoric mood, no one thinks about how the country or even their family will survive, no one thinks about their job or salary. People are happy and positive: everything will work out somehow, because Russia is a tough nut to crack, and the whole world trembles before it.
Based on Levinson's text, an otherwise popular hypothesis could be that Russians are willing to suffer a very far-reaching reduction in their standard of living in exchange for an eventual triumph resulting in Russian glory. Famous Russian scholar Kamil Galeev, who has been predicting since the beginning of the war that the invasion of Ukraine would be the beginning of the end of the "world's last colonial empire," the Russian Federation, is of the exact opposite opinion. He says that contrary to popular opinion, Russia is not an idealistic, irrational society but an ultra pragmatic one. And it is the decline in consumption standards that is the ONLY thing that hurts or will hurt Russians. Levinson also points out at the end of his text that he is not convinced that the "superpower mentality" he describes will last long because it "seems very shaky despite its grandiosity." The sight of killed Ukrainians or even one's own soldiers, doesn't affect society as much as the sight of empty store shelves, although Galeev stresses that this is primarily about Muscovites. The province doesn't matter. "If some remote province potentially starves or freezes to death, no one will care. However, if Moscow suffers a lack of widespread consumption opportunities, it will be a much bigger blow to Putin and delegitimize his policies than anyone in the West could have imagined," says Galeev.
A significant blow to this welfare state is the potential wave of tourist visa bans initiated by Estonia. Critics have pointed out the frailties of the collective punishment, while defenders have pointed out that a tourist visa is a privilege, not a right. According to Galeev, tourism is a barometer of Europe's proper attitude toward Russia in the eyes of the Russian public. The visa ban is a small, but further blow to the comfort of Russians, primarily the mishmash of Moscow and it is on this that the legitimacy of the central government lies.
Another significant event from this perspective was the devastating attack on the Crimean base of Saky near Novofyodoriivka. The event was accompanied by localalized social panic and a large exodus of Russians from the popular vacation area. The effect of such events is not immediate, but it is a big punch to the Kremlin's war machine and its perception in Russia. According to Alexey Arestovych, Zelensky's now-famous advisor, such events overlap until they reach a critical mass and cause the war to one day become unpopular in Russia. According to Arestovych, this psychological shift and the threat of internal unrest will one day cause Russian troops to withdraw. The attack on Crimea is another crack in the collective comfort of Russia's middle and upper classes. In this context, it is a view similar to Galeev's.
Continuing the theme of the Crimean attack, Arestovych, unlike his April prediction, this time has no doubts about the overall trend of the war. The enemy is being destroyed as planned, weapons are arriving as planned, sanctions are being implemented as planned, and most importantly, the aggressor will be ousted as planned, he says. World leaders are now focused on discussing what to do with a defeated Russia, for this creates a whole new spectrum of problems. Therefore, Russia, according to Arestovych, is trying to bring about the best solution from its point of view, namely a ceasefire. He is echoed by a pro-Russian blogger from the Lugansk People's Republic, Andrey Morozov, known under the pseudonym Murz, who predicts a revolt in Russia due to the gross mismanagement of resources by the leadership and their inability to grasp reality. Murz sees this as a copy of the collapse of Tsarist Russia in 1917 and predicts a similar collapse of the intelligentsia, that is the current Moscow elite.
Meanwhile Galeev, in his thoughts on the collapse, or rather "decolonization of Russia," continues the theme of internal divisions between the core and the provinces, which we have already discussed in one of our previous videos. Galeev believes it will be a long war of attrition, but in his opinion, it is Russia that will crack first. The Russian regime consists of, as he calls it, "the courtiers and the barons." The courtiers in this sense, are Moscow elites, the barons, the authorities of the various provinces. In this duopoly, the court is stronger when the regime is strong and the barons when the regime is weak. Meanwhile, support for the war among the provincial authorities - the barons - is negligible, as most of them lose from it, and the local population would sooner blame the local administrator for their misery than Putin, who is considered impeccable and never guilty of anything. Nevertheless, the provinces do not lose equally from the war. Which regions of Russia are hit hardest?
First of all, the industrial basin on the Volga - Tatarstan, Samara, and Ulyanovsk - these regions benefited greatly from foreign investment. Now, factories in these regions are at a standstill. The North, headed by Arkhangelsk, was similarly dependent on foreign investment. It is also Russia’s northwest, and main window to Europe, which has suddenly been slammed shut. There is a noticeable correlation in which the more complex a region's economy is, the more that region loses from the ongoing war. According to Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian President's office, an additional one million Russians have lost their jobs since the start of the war, an increase of 33% or from 3 to 4 million people. One can assume that this is primarily in the aforementioned regions and Moscow.
However, there are exceptions. Food producers, which are primarily in Russia's southern regions, are winning from the war. Not only did they earn more on grain prices, but they were also caught up in the plundering of the Ukrainian harvest. However food prices, which were soaring a while ago, are now falling and are, in many cases, at "pre-war" levels so the favorable economic situation of the south is also in question.
On the battlefield, for the time being, we have yet to see any immediate signs of the strategic shift that Arestovych mentioned which would definitively show a change in trend in favor of the Ukrainians. The initiative on the front, according to the friendly Rochan Consulting, continues to be on the Russian side. There are also reports that Russia is mobilizing and recapitalizing its defense industry and that this will make up for deficiencies in Western technology with civilian technologies imported via third countries such as China or Turkey.
What the future will bring remains unknown. When analyzing such a complex matter, it is impossible not to resort to simplifications and to intuition which is a product of our knowledge and experience. Arestovych, in predicting a Russian invasion in 2019, did not have a crystal ball and yet he was disturbingly accurate in predicting the development of events. Does this mean that his and Galaev's predictions will also now be confirmed? Not at all. Nevertheless, they point to essential flashpoints that may or may not lead to the "collapse of the world's last colonial empire." And this should be watched carefully.
