Inside Wartime Putinism: Ideology, Elites, Regions and Society during Russia’s War of Attrition

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 has reshaped Russian politics, society and the economy profoundly. What was planned as a quick campaign has degenerated into a grinding war of attrition. Has the war hardened Putin’s regime into a rigid ideological dictatorship — or does it remain pragmatic, ad hoc and essentially flexible? This colloquium brings together leading experts to examine the nature and degree of Russia’s wartime transformation. The façade of elite unity behind the Putin regime conceals divergent interests; displays of loyalism may be excessive and counter-productive. Russia’s model of centre-region governance – “delegative authoritarianism” – also conceals major problems behind de-politicised loyalist regional heads. On the societal level, qualitative fieldwork shows support for the war is not uniform or monolithic; bottom-up patriotism and approval of regime performance are are more pragmatic and contingent than ideological or militarist. At the same time, in wartime conditions more “dovish”– and de-escalatory – sentiment is not present in the information space, which is awash with moralised and maximalist visions of victory. Part of the Norwegian Research Council-funded 3-year project “The ideological production, policy outcomes and practices of wartime Putinism (WARPUT)”, this colloquium explores several of the above strands in Russia’s transformation amid ongoing uncertainties about the war’s outcome and the regime’s continued resilience. To learn more about the WARPUT project, please visit the project's web page: https://www.nupi.no/en/projects-centr... 00:00 Introduction: Alexey Yusupov, FES-Zentrale Berlin 03:51 Russian Elites: Beyond the “Elite Defection” Debate Alexander Libman (Freie Universität Berlin) 24:00 Moscow and the Regions: Delegation, Depoliticization, and the War Irina Busygina (ZOiS) 47:26 Restricting Popular Political Imagination: The Uses of Official Ideology in Russia Ilya Matveev (University of Bremen) 01:31:03 Justice over Peace: Moralised War Support and the “Party of War” Matthew Blackburn (The Norwegian Institute of International Affairs)