Why Do Leftists Like Putin?

Why, in your view, have several left-wing political currents in Europe always struggled to recognize Russian imperialism? How does your reading differ from the various existing approaches to grasping imperialism and from competing analyses of today’s Russian policy?

Ilya MatveevWe indeed situate ourselves within the debates of today’s left. Yet within that spectrum, it is too often the case that the Russian case is not recognized as imperialism. On the contrary, our book proposes to take at face value from the outset what it is: a fully fledged imperialism.

There exists a certain paradox. On one hand, even the most superficial analysis is enough to establish the imperial character of the Russian regime. Vladimir Putin’s rhetoric repeatedly states that the aim is to recover the country’s “original lands,” but also that Russians and Ukrainians form a single people and should, therefore, constitute a single state—or, at most, two states bound as closely as possible. It is thus evident that Russia pursues an aggressive foreign policy toward Ukraine and many post-Soviet states, and one cannot deny the imperial nature of this policy.

Yet some left-wing authors argue that Russia does not export enough capital and does not fit the Leninist definition of imperialism. Others even go so far as to depict it as a victim of American imperialism ready to expand NATO eastward and, faced with incursions, Russia would merely undertake defensive actions. The outbreak of the war in Ukraine would thus be only a preventive and defensive war against NATO.

Unfortunately, there exists a whole strand of the international left that refuses to regard Russian imperialism as imperialism. It is sometimes a political stance, reflecting a reluctance to condemn the Putin regime, and sometimes a genuine theoretical blind spot. In the latter case, imperialism could only be Western; the policies of other countries could not fall under this label: they could be violent, aggressive, acquisitive, but never “imperialist” in the proper sense, for lack of a match with certain systemic economic criteria.

Our book takes the opposite view. We have found that this stance prevents too many left-wing writers, even the most informed and pertinent, from offering a correct analysis of ongoing events. I recall that on the eve of February 24, 2022, there were still groups of people who simply denied the possibility of an invasion of Ukraine, and with the greatest certainty. Among these groups were notably – and prominently – some left writers ready to loudly declare that such an invasion was impossible, unimaginable. Their reaction is largely explained by the theoretical blindness we discuss in the book: how could Russia attack if imperialism is an exclusively Western phenomenon? If only the West is aggressive, while the rest of the world merely defends itself?

When the invasion did take place, I read in Salvage, the British review co-founded by China Miéville, a fairly developed and interesting editorial analysis of the current situation, but in which Russia appeared solely as a mirror of the West. Invoking humanitarian pretexts to attack Ukraine, it would merely imitate Western practices – as in Serbia, for example. This analysis is not entirely wrong, but it implies that Russian imperialism would ultimately be of the same nature as the United States’ aggressive foreign policy.

For us, there is thus an inseparable political and theoretical problem. We therefore wanted to foreground the specificities of Russian imperialism, starting with those that distinguish it from American imperialism, in order to allow critical analyses to better recognize and combat it. 

What is the contribution of this analytical paradigm? What does it reveal about the current state of Russian policy?

Ilya BoudraïtskisIn debates about imperialism, as in the common uses of the term, there is a tendency to reduce the phenomenon to purely economic motives. In this view, imperialist aggression is analyzed through a conception of the state as “agent” or as a simple “executive committee” of the ruling class, from which it would receive a kind of “command” to redistribute external markets, carried out by military expansion. To our eyes, this classic definition of imperialism deserves to be profoundly revisited, both in light of the Russia–Ukraine war and in view of the various imperialist military adventures around the world today, notably in Iran.

By focusing on the Russian case, we undertake thus a significant revision of imperialism theory. We return to the very sources of this debate, at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, when imperialism was still contemplated along two registers: an economic register and a political register. This dual perspective implies that imperialism does not rest solely on a form of economic rationality, but also on a new political rationality of the state, which does not always – and sometimes not at all – coincide with its purely economic interests. It is enough to observe the British colonial empire’s imperialist policy: often it took on a completely irrational economic character. It is explained more by a shift of the state toward a logic of infinite expansion. We also rely on Hannah Arendt’s famous analysis of imperialism in The Origins of Totalitarianism. In this work, she draws attention to this shift in state rationality, the moment when the state’s ongoing expansion, initially a means, gradually becomes an end in itself.

From the perspective of post-Soviet Russian imperialism, it seemed useful to us to distinguish two periods corresponding to this economically rational dimension of imperialism and to this politically rational dimension, namely politically and ideologically motivated. We show that while the policy toward post-Soviet space during Putin’s first two terms can be seen as an expansionary policy promoting the interests of big Russian capital, the year 2014 marks a turning point toward a logic of a new order, which no longer can be explained solely by economic motivations. In fact, from 2014 onward, Russian capital has consistently suffered from the expansionist policy, even as the state carried out increasingly aggressive interventions in the post-Soviet space.

We thus consider that the Putin regime abandoned in 2014 this posture of “pragmatic” economic rationality, a stance that reduces the political to pure interests and is cynically amoral. This is precisely how most researchers analyzed early Putinism, that of 2000-2014. 

From that date, we moved to a new State, characterized by aggressive military expansion and by the primacy of politics over economic interests. This turning point also marks the transition from what we call a “partial ideology,” that is, a pragmatic ideology subordinating politics to mere interests, to a “total ideology,” in other words a global and coherent worldview that now shapes the actions of Russian foreign policy. 

If all this foreign policy is economically irrational, how could this conversion of the Russian elites have happened and according to what dynamics?

Ilya BoudraïtskisIt is an especially difficult transition to analyze because there were already prerequisites. Some fragments of this “total ideology” were in fact present in the 2000s. Thus the notion of the “Russian World,” which appeared from the very beginnings of Putin’s presidency. Likewise, the idea that the collapse of the Soviet Union was “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century,” whose negative consequences should be overcome as soon as possible, appeared early, as did the notion of a “Collective West” animated by projects to annihilate Russia. All these ideas were formulated in the early 2000s, particularly in Kremlin-friendly think tanks. Yet they were far from exerting decisive influence on policy decisions. That era, the first decade of Putinism, remained dominated by a cynical ideology of pure interests: an ideology, hence, in the sense of an ideological vision of reality, but which did not correspond to a well-defined theory. It was certainly not an intellectual ideology, but an ideology drawn from experience, practice, and above all from the large post-Soviet sharing of state property, the capitalistic banditry of the 1990s and the bureaucratic structures of the late Soviet era: all experiences shared by the entire ruling elite of Vladimir Putin’s generation. From these experiences emerged a practical and cynical ideology, grounded in the idea of the right of the strongest, a natural right of the strongest.

The years 2011–2014 played an important role here, with the Bolotnaya Square protests in Moscow, which represented a major challenge to the regime before Putin’s third term, then the Arab Spring, which convinced the Russian elite that the West was fomenting regime-change plans everywhere, including in Russia, and finally the Maidan events, a kind of keystone that allowed all the pieces of the puzzle to fit together. The cynical ideology that had prevailed until then received its first intellectual formulation by feeding on the whole set of conservative, reactionary and imperial ideas that had matured in the preceding years.

Ilya MatveevI would add here that the dominant analytical framework for the Putin regime for a long time has been that of kleptocracy: that is, in particular, what one reads in Karen Dawisha’s classic book, Putin’s Kleptocracy . In political science, one spoke of rent-seeking, namely the pursuit of rents, here through theft. Was this explanation founded? Of course: a significant portion of the actions of Putin’s inner circle, and Putin himself, can be explained primarily by a thirst for endless material enrichment, not to mention that corruption plays a central role in the history of the Russian regime.

But this reading immediately raises a question: if Russia is a kleptocracy, why did the Putin regime deliberately accept that its assets in the West be confiscated? First in 2014, and then far more radically with the war in Ukraine, which caused the ruling class to lose a good deal of its assets in the West. If theft is the primary motivation, why did the Russian elite consent to be dispossessed? From a strictly “kleptocratic” perspective, the logic would have been that there would never be a war. Unless, of course, it is a particularly stupid kleptocracy. Or, Putin could not have ignored that Western assets would be frozen, that all yachts, mansions and other properties of the oligarchs, the president and his close associates, would be confiscated. He could not have ignored it, but he nevertheless moved forward.

How, then, can these readings be reconciled?

Ilya MatveevI think it can be done as follows. The foundation of this kleptocratic logic is the drive to steal in order to defeat one’s enemies, to disarm them in one way or another, to recover wealth by any means, including by force. It is a takeover, a raid, in line with the notion of reïderstvo so central to the wild Russian capitalism of the 1990s–2000s. Reïderstvo is what in English is called a hostile takeover, save that it is accompanied by coercive means, musclemen, private militias, even security companies. The underlying logic is binary: either I take, or I am taken. Over time, it seems that Vladimir Putin and part of his circle ended up viewing Russia itself as a kind of actor that must either carry out hostile takeovers or suffer them. In other words, either America performs a hostile takeover of Russia, or Russia executes one on some other territory.

So is this also a question of social and political imagination?

Ilya MatveevAbsolutely. The imagination has developed in that direction. And Vladimir Putin keeps confirming it to us. Remember his remark about “orcas and polar bears” in front of teachers. He said that at the North Pole, orcas “ram into bears in packs” and “eat them like small fries.” It was meant to explain to children why we are carrying out the special military operation. Faced with the threat of a hostile takeover by orcas against the bears, the latter would have to strike back. The one who strikes first is the only survivor, while the others are devoured. When this logic becomes systematic, it takes the form of what we call a “total ideology.”

Thus, when the United States announces that they do not intend to devour or conquer anyone, but to find a compromise, how does Vladimir Putin view it? He sees only a lie, another deception, with no other end than to seize control of Russia. And this perception calls for only one reaction: pretend to negotiate, lie constantly as one suspects the opponent to do, but to better prepare a direct action, an intimidation that will clearly show the opponent that Russia is ready to do anything.

Starting from this logic, one begins to understand how the Russian elite could decide to undertake such actions. One must display strength and defend interests, otherwise one will be devoured, destroyed, annihilated. Vladimir Putin constantly speaks in these terms. All his speeches fit into an existential rhetoric, whatever the topic: he cannot discuss artificial intelligence without linking it to the survival of Russia; likewise with the invasion of Ukraine.

This is where the last element comes into play when explaining the motives that would drive the West to lie and deceive Russia in order to devour it more effectively. At that moment, the works of ideologues such as Ivan Ilyin or Aleksandr Dugin prove useful. They provide theories explaining why the West hates Russia so much. And one thus becomes able to wrap the simplistic idea at the heart of all Russian policy into theoretical constructions: either you devour, or you are devoured.

Ilya BoudraïtskisLet me also note that when we talk about the core of an ideology, we often assume it to be doctrinal and coherent. But the relationship between what we call the “first-tier ideology” and the “second-tier” one is built in a quite different way. There exists among the Russian elite a belief: that there are laws of nature – which would also be laws of history, this confusion erasing the line between nature and history – from which we draw our most vital lessons. These “truths of life” thus are meant to be confirmed by everything that follows. The theses of Duguin, Ilyin or Solzhenitsyn thus derive their validity from the very fact that they teach nothing fundamentally new. One does not learn anything from reading Duguin’s volumes; one only finds confirmation of a worldview already established, but which had not yet received adequate intellectual and rhetorical shaping. 

At the same time, one better understands the nature of the real influence of Duguin or other ideologues. They are not seen as thinkers who originated anything original, as masters of thought, but at most as those who teach Putin what he had already understood without expressing it explicitly. In this sense, their role is secondary, without being merely secondary, since this intellectual component ends up gaining real importance at a certain stage.

Why is Ukraine precisely occupying this central position in Russia’s imperialist policy? What place do ideological motives play?

Ilya BoudraïtskisThere are a whole range of reasons. First, socio-economic reasons that render Russian aggression a continuation of processes already set in motion in the 2000s regarding relations between Russia and Ukraine. But there is also a political and ideological component linked to the fact that, within this imperial imaginary, Ukraine truly appears as part of historic Russia. According to this logic, Ukraine’s internal processes, Ukrainian domestic policy, are seen as a reflection or an anticipation of Russia’s own future. That is why the Maidan events were perceived as an act that belonged, in a sense, to Russia’s foreign policy: an advance of the West toward Russia’s borders – not only militarily, but also in a mental, political-imaginary sense – and a challenge posed to the Russian regime inside the country. In that sense, there was no clear boundary within this ideological conscience between Maidan and the Bolotnaya Square protests, since all of it fell under one and the same process, a kind of informational and mental war waged by the West against Russia, based on the implantation of “false values.” And the very idea of Ukraine’s independence constitutes a “false value” just as the idea that the Russian Federation should also experience transparent elections and a political alternation.

Ilya MatveevNot to mention that Ukraine is also the node where Russian imperialism meets Russian nationalism. For Ukraine is not simply a distant imperial march that would be controlled for its resources or any purely instrumental aim—such as containing a Western invasion. Ukraine is perceived as part of the Russian nation, a nation with three heads, as had already been read in pre-revolutionary theories. In other words, it is viewed as an essential component of Russian power itself. If Ukraine is removed from this equation, the entire edifice of what its admirers call “historic Russia” collapses. In this irreducibly nationalist imaginary, the Russian nation includes, one way or another, the Ukrainian nation, not necessarily in the form of one and the same nation, but at least within a unitary national logic. And that is why, when Ukraine becomes completely hostile to Russia, it is Russia itself that is lost, that becomes, in a way, foreign to itself. Ukraine thus becomes a last stand, as Andrei Tsygankov wrote as early as 2015 in an article on Crimea. He correctly argued that, in this view, losing Ukraine would mean losing everything, losing Russia itself. Without Ukraine, there would be no Russia; there would only be a “Federation of Russia,” something Vladimir Putin finds dubious and indeterminate. If he believes the collapse of the Soviet Union was “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe” of the 20th century, it is because the Soviet Union coincided with historic Russia. Yet that is not really the case for the Russian Federation and would be even less so if Ukraine became a hostile state. An Ukraine that is friendly to Russia, as Belarus is today, would perhaps be acceptable: the three-headed nation could still endure in a fractured form. But a hostile Ukraine, joining NATO or where “foreign geocultural values, debauchery and the satanism that rules in the West” prevail, would spell the loss of Russia. This is precisely the source of Putin’s obsession with Ukraine and that of many of his close aides.

In practice, one might wonder why the frontier with Ukraine should hold such a specific importance. Even if, suppose, Ukraine joined NATO (which has always been, and remains, a near-zero probability), how would the Ukrainian border be different from that of the Baltic states, NATO members on Russia’s border? Why refrain from deploying nuclear-armed missiles in the Baltic states?

The same remark applies to the Ukrainian market: why would it represent a vital interest for the Russian economy? Why push Ukraine to join the customs union with Russia, which was precisely Maidan’s starting point and the events that followed? Maidan began because of Russia’s aggressive moves, undertaken as early as 2013, when it sought to force Ukraine to join what became the Eurasian Economic Union. Yet numerous economic studies discussed in our book show that even if Ukraine had indeed joined this customs union, this decision would not have fundamentally altered the Russian economy. It did not prevent Russia from making it a matter of principle, a national priority, an obsession.

Why?

Ilya MatveevAgain, this obsession is explained by the nationalist imagination that without Ukraine, Russia ceases to exist. Without Ukraine, there would be nothing but an empty structure, the ultimate symptom of a historical defeat. Moreover, Vladimir Putin is convinced that there exists a historical continuity of the Russian state, of that great historical Russia that has always included Ukraine, that has existed for a thousand years and risks ending. This logic leads him to believe that to maintain control of Ukraine, he must be prepared to sacrifice anything. This is the source of his radicalism, of his stubborn refusal to negotiate in a conflict that has stalemated for a long time and benefits no one. This objective is absolute. Without Ukraine, it is the end of everything. It would thus not merely be a personal defeat, but the end of a millennial Russian civilization.

Do we currently see cracks in the Russian system?

Ilya MatveevThe most important trend today lies with the Russian population. They have never fully embraced the imperialist and nationalist logic championed by Putin. His 2021 piece on the unity of Russians and Ukrainians already conflicted with what, and more fundamentally, with what the vast majority of the Russian population believes to be the case. Overall, the population identifies Russia with the Russian Federation. The notion of a “historic Russia” and of Ukraine having existential significance is far from dominant among people, both before the war and today.

The war itself enjoyed a degree of support, but in fact it was fairly limited. Polls conducted with various methodologies confirm that Russians are rather opposed to the war, favor negotiations including mutual concessions, and do not want to participate themselves – especially in recent times. When asked about their willingness to go to the front, more and more Russians answer negatively, whereas the social norm previously pushed them to answer “Yes, if called.” Today, even that reply has changed. In short, the war has never been popular and it is becoming less so. The population is fatigued by the daily hardships the war imposes and by the tragedies it generates – the loss of loved ones, relatives, friends.

If the Duma elections had no chance of producing anything interesting, given that these elections are perfectly controlled, a certain form of politicization nonetheless emerges. In this repressive environment, there is no opportunity to openly express discontent, but there is no real support for the regime either. Hence, Russian society’s palpable frustration seeks outlets.

That is why everyone suddenly clung to the Iabloko party, a formation that has always been weak and marginal. A survey showed that nearly 24% of the population said they would vote for this party which, since the 1990s, has never exceeded 10% in national elections. That Iabloko could gather 24% of voting intentions is simply inconceivable. If this is the case, it’s because Iabloko has become the symbol of the anti-war position. It is therefore not surprising that the party was removed from ballots, excluded from the electoral process, as any crack in the system could immediately unleash all the accumulated discontent.

Are the reactions seen in Armenia, Azerbaijan or some Central Asian countries signs of a weakening of Russian imperialism?

Ilya BoudraïtskisObviously, we are witnessing a weakening of Russia’s hegemony in the post-Soviet space. Beyond Russia’s economic power and inherited economic links, this hegemonic hold also rested on a shared cultural heritage. Yet, since Russia converted the cultural question into a military expansion argument, as soon as it made the Russian language, once a tool of soft power, into a military justification, claiming that the Russian army would be legitimate to intervene wherever Russian speakers live to “defend” their rights, it is clear that there is nothing left of this particular hegemony. Thus, states like Kazakhstan, where a relatively sizable Russian-speaking population remains near Russian borders, are increasingly concerned about their territorial integrity. They seek additional security guarantees by forging relations with other centers of power.

A similar phenomenon occurs in the South Caucasus, where the question of Russian economic influence becomes a direct pressure factor. We thus witness a definitive disintegration of the post-Soviet space as a domain of non-military Russian hegemony inherited from the Soviet Union.

In the context of significant European elections, notably in France, under what terms would it be pertinent to place the question of Russian imperialism at the center of debates?

Ilya Matveev There are two options to consider. First option: Russia represents a threat; therefore we must protect ourselves somehow. Politically, this places the left before difficult dilemmas. Indeed, what does this mean in practice? Should we support the military sector, promote militarization? If so, in what form, given that we are talking about arms industries and that the left has always supported demilitarization? It is a difficult question at all levels. Second option: there is no Russian threat; this is just a scare tactic used by the ruling class to justify the removal of social gains for French or European workers. 

In our view, the correct option is unfortunately the first. For Europe, the Russian threat is real. Perhaps not directly for France, but for Europe as a whole, which Putin regards as his foe. His aim is to fracture European unity to force each country, taken in isolation, to consent to all possible concessions in negotiations with Russia, including on the military front. This could, for example, lead to expelling from NATO all the countries that joined since the 1990s, or to a general reduction of European armed forces, or even to a Russian military presence in some Eastern European countries. In short, a radical revision of the whole world order.

Can we simply wave this away? We think not, and our book argues that it is impossible to ignore the Russian threat, just as it is impossible to avoid the debate on militarization. To oppose it blindly would reproduce the mistake already made once, before February 24, when people repeated that the invasion of Ukraine was simply impossible. Having learned from that past, we have every reason to take the Russian threat seriously and to refrain from dismissing any proposal to strengthen European defense as a nonsense imposed by the dominant parties.

Europe will have to reinvent its place in the world. At present, it remains too dependent on the United States, a quintessential imperialist actor, as we have recently seen in Iran. Europe keeps getting drawn into the United States’ adventures, while its own security depends on it. It must strengthen its own security to become independent from this dependence. 

More broadly, it seems to me that Europe is an imperialist actor only insofar as it remains subordinate to the United States. If some imperialist remnants from a long history have not disappeared, notably those of France in Africa, it seems to me that European imperialism exists mainly within a transatlantic framework. A truly independent Europe could become something else entirely, breaking away from imperialism itself. 

Ilya BoudraïtskisAt the same time, our book seeks to break with trends toward exoticizing Russia that dominate most public debate, in other words with the idea that Russia carries within it a millennial history of “eastern despotism,” which would express itself today in Vladimir Putin’s actions. Just as we must reject the idea that Russia has been particularly harmed after the collapse of the Soviet Union and would simply be seeking to recover its due. In reality, we show that this process of ideologization is by no means unique. It results, on one hand, from the conjunction of historical circumstances specific to the Russian case and the country’s own regime’s evolution, but it also reflects broader global tendencies.

Similarly, the description of the Putinist ideology and the link between its two levels (the articulation of extreme cynicism with messianic and other “traditional values”) is not unique either. One could connect many processes observable in Europe. 

In this regard, the rise of the National Rally in France, the AfD in Germany and other European far-right parties is explained less by a Kremlin attempt to instrumentalize them to fragment the European Union than by the weight of common ideological representations that objectively align them with Putin’s Russia. Putin’s foe is thus not merely the Union as a project—military, economic or political—but also as its ideological carrier of values deemed “foreign,” values which, from Putin’s perspective, would be “hypocritical,” because they would mask an authentic reality made of natural or historical laws, according to which each truly sovereign country, each real “predator,” would be entitled to obtain its due and achieve its own ends. 

Ultimately, Vladimir Putin’s objective, as he envisions it, is to restore to each major European nation its authentic sovereignty. Countries like Germany or France would thus be called to become truly sovereign again. Conversely, those that cannot claim genuine sovereignty, such as most Eastern European countries, should become what they have always been at heart, namely colonies of a great nation. This logic indeed sits at the core of Russia’s foreign policy and today fits into the broader dynamic of the rightward turn and the rise of the far right occurring in Europe and elsewhere in the world.