When Putin goes, will Putinism persist? Russians debate.
For Russians, ideology looms as all-important in political discourse.
Since the collapse of the USSR, a state in which ideology regulated everything from foreign affairs to personal life, some Russians have searched hard for a new “Russian idea” to animate national existence and impart a sense of belonging and purpose. Many others push back at any attempt to impose an official ideology, which they view as the bane of Russian history.
But Vladislav Surkov, the Kremlin’s once-foremost ideologist, last week argued in a newspaper article that the political regime set up by Vladimir Putin is itself a complete ideology – a “Putinism” – that can survive any challenges, even the loss of its founder.
And in doing so, Mr. Surkov
Russia’s ‘deep nation’‘Not an ideology’A simplified proto-fascist state?
