Far-right politics in Russia

In contemporary Russia, the far-right scene spans a wide spectrum of political groups, authors, activists, political movements, skinhead subcultures and intellectual circles.[1][2] The mainstream radical right that is allowed or supported by the government to participate in official mass media and public life includes parties such as the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) and Rodina as well as far-right political thinkers such as Aleksandr Dugin and Lev Gumilev.[1] Other actors of Russia's far right include skinheads and political movements like the Movement Against Illegal Immigration and contemporary successors of the Pamyat organization.[1]

Some of the main radical right-wing groups and figures in contemporary Russia had become active in politics before the dissolution of the Soviet Union.[3] Alexander Dugin and Vladimir Zhirinovsky started their political career in the 1980s.[3] Zhirinovsky's LDPR and Dugin's Eurasia Movement and Eurasian Youth Union and affiliated organizations remain fixtures in Russia's far-right scene and, since 1991, were joined by many other parties and networks.[3]

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, radical right-wing ideas have shaped Russia's political system, public discourse, domestic and foreign policies, and intellectual life.[3][4]

History

Gorbachev years

With the relaxation of Communist party control over public life during Mikhail Gorbachev's rule from 1985 to 1991, extreme right-wing groups began to openly organize, hold meetings and publish newspapers and journals.[5] Their views had largely been formed before Gorbachev's perestroika.[5] Their political and ideological frame of reference was the Black Hundreds movement which consisted of antisemitic and ultranationalist organizations and was best known for organizing Jewish pogroms in the Russian Empire during the early 20th century.[6]

The best known far-right organization of the perestroika period was Pamyat.[7] The group began its political activity in 1985, holding meetings and demonstrations at state premises and propagating its main idea that the global Jewish population had conspired against Russia.[8] The group's leader Dmitri Vasilyev read aloud excerpts from The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, claiming that the course of history proved their authenticity.[8] While many members of Pamyat adhered to Russian Orthodoxy and had sympathizers in the hierarchy of the Russian Orthodox Church, some members of the far-right rejected religion in favor of paganism.[9] Pamyat's pagan branch centered around the figure of Valery Yemelyanov.[9] He and other representatives of the Russian neo-pagan movement argued that Christianity has a negative influence because it was founded by Jesus — a Jew —, an idea echoing Nazi ideology.[9] A 1987 book on paganism by Boris Rybakov which was published by the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union helped boost the development of politicized paganism with antisemitic overtones in Russia.[10]

In 1987, several official magazines including Nash Sovremennik and Molodaya Gvardiya started publishing The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and other antisemitic literature by Russian writers the majority of whom did not belong to Pamyat but sympathized with the organization and expressed similar views.[8] Russian authorities did not oppose the publishers and distributors of antisemitic and often purely fascist literature as the law enforcement and Communist party leadership reportedly had many sympathizers in their ranks.[10] Representatives of the Leningrad City Communist Party Committee and police attended meetings of Pamyat from 1987 to 1988, where organizers called for a ban of marriages between Russians and non-Russians and for the deportation of all Jews.[10] The adoption of the Soviet press law in 1990 which relaxed state censorship led to the proliferation of even more extreme publications that focused almost entirely on the Jewish question and published excerpts from works by Nazi ideologists. Several magazines including the monthly of the Defense ministry, Voenno-Istorichesky Zhurnal, published Mein Kampf.[11]

Yeltsin years

The far-right played an important role in Russian politics during Boris Yeltsin's presidency.[12] The collapse of the Communist system in 1991 created new social and political circumstances that boosted the proliferation of far-right groups and ideas.[13]

The disintegration of the Soviet Union led to migration flows across the borders of the newly created post-Soviet states.[14] Far-right groups effectively exploited the resentment of the population of the Russian Federation towards forced migrants and refugees.[14] Russian National Unity and its leader Alexander Barkashov agitated against people from the Caucasus and Central Asia and alleged that Russians would need to "defend" themselves against the newcomers.[14]

The sense of national humiliation and injured imperial pride were a breeding ground for far-right views.[15] Whereas the other Soviet successor states believed that they had gained something as a consequence of the Communist collapse, that is, their independence, Russians viewed the dissolution of the Soviet Union as a loss of an empire and their central place therein.[15] As an expression of hurt imperial pride, the Vice President of Russia Alexander Rutskoy and other nationalists argued that the territorial borders of Russia are not the same as those of the Russian Federation and that Russians could not give up their claim to territories conquered since the 16th century that now lay beyond the borders of the Russian Federation.[15] The idea that Russians should enjoy a special role on the territory of the former Soviet Union became a key element of Yeltsin's foreign policy.[15]

Themes

An important theme of the Russian far-right has been so-called Russophobia.[11] It is based on the belief that the Western world and internal groups driven by hatred for everything Russian have conspired and striven for centuries to harm Russia.[11] A 1989 publication by Igor Shafarevich titled "Russophobia" garnered much attention.[11] In the essay, he argued that the course of Russian history was characterized by the desire of "Little people" — here he singled out mostly Jewish members of the intelligentsia — to malign "Great People", that is, the majority of the Russian population.[16][17]

Notes
  1. Arnold & Umland 2018, p. 582.
  2. Varga, Mihai (2008). "How Political Opportunities Strengthen the Far Right: Understanding the Rise in Far-Right Militancy in Russia". Europe-Asia Studies. 60 (4): 561–579. doi:10.1080/09668130801999854.
  3. Arnold & Umland 2018, p. 583.
  4. Van Herpen, Marcel (2013). Putinism: The Slow Rise of a Radical Right Regime in Russia. New York City: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 105–108. ISBN 978-1-349-44873-9.
  5. Tolz 1997, p. 179—180.
  6. Tolz 1997, p. 179.
  7. Tolz 1997, p. 180.
  8. Tolz 1997, p. 181.
  9. Tolz 1997, p. 182—183.
  10. Tolz 1997, p. 183.
  11. Tolz 1997, p. 182.
  12. Tolz 1997, p. 178.
  13. Tolz 1997, p. 185.
  14. Tolz 1997, p. 185—186.
  15. Tolz 1997, p. 186—187.
  16. Rossman, Vadim Joseph (2002). Russian Intellectual Antisemitism in the Post-Communist Era. The University of Nebraska Press. pp. 166–170. ISBN 978-0-8032-4694-2.
  17. Dunlop, John (1994). "The 'sad case' of Igor Shafarevich". East European Jewish Affairs. 24 (1): 19–30. doi:10.1080/13501679408577760.

References
  • Arnold, Richard; Umland, Andreas (2018). "The Radical Right in Post-Soviet Russia". In Rydgren, Jens (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of the Radical Right. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. pp. 582–607. ISBN 978-0190274559.
  • Tolz, Vera (1997). "The Radical Right in Post-Communist Russian Politics". In Merkl, Peter H.; Weinberg, Leonard (eds.). The Revival of Right Wing Extremism in the Nineties. New York: Routledge. pp. 177–203. ISBN 0-7146-4676-8.
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