I wrote a short explainer for the Oxford series, where experts answer a hundred questions on world politics. My topic is: “Can Putinism survive Putin?” (Spoiler — yes, of course).
CAN PUTINISM SURVIVE PUTIN?
- Whether we like it or not, we are living in the Putin era. Over the past quarter-century, Vladimir Putin has transformed his country and the world to a greater extent than any other contemporary leader. Moreover, Putinism as a type of politics has become an international phenomenon, anticipating since the early 2000s the emergence of a new type of authoritarian leadership based on resentment, nostalgia, populism, and political manipulation — figures such as Erdoğan and Orbán, Modi and Xi, Netanyahu and Trump come to mind.
Should these characteristics be attributed to Putin’s personal character and biography, including his rise from the social margins of Leningrad through the KGB career ladder to the highest state office, and his peculiar experience combining a security-service mentality with criminal notions inherited from the murky 1990s in St. Petersburg? This raises an even broader question: what role does a leader play in determining a nation’s historical trajectory? What was Hitler’s role in shaping Nazism in Germany — or was it instead a product of German social, cultural, and geopolitical evolution, a problem of delayed modernization intensified by the humiliating defeat in World War I — meaning a historical process that Hitler merely led by riding the wave of German resentment? Was Stalinism a product of Stalin’s imagination, or was it similarly the result of Russia’s delayed modernization complicated by the collapse of an empire? A personalist regime emerges at the intersection of national culture, historical trends, political institutions, and personal ambitions, while figures such as Hitler, Stalin, or Mao concentrate all these factors.
- Similarly, Putinism is an objective phenomenon, a result of Russia’s long-term evolution, the unfinished collapse of the Russian Empire in 1917, the Soviet Union in 1991, and Russia’s incomplete transformation from an empire into a nation-state. In this sense, Putinism is a product of a century-long decline of Russian civilization; its political and propaganda machine skillfully orchestrated the country’s traumatized historical memory, its sense of victimhood, and nostalgia for superpower status. Putin built a coalition of elites and interests and strengthened groups within society that benefit from war and confrontation with the West: essentially, he turned war into the perfect political and ideological instrument for reshaping society and the elite, reinforcing an ideology of revenge and existential confrontation with the West.
- Therefore, as an objective and long-term phenomenon, Putinism is likely to survive both the war in Ukraine and Putin himself. The war may end, Putin may die or leave office, but Putinism as a combination of institutions, beliefs, discourses, and practices will remain in place. This includes:
– a ruling class deeply involved in the war and benefiting from it, while being subjected to Western sanctions. The most likely scenario for a post-Putin transition of power would probably be a “collective Putin” consisting of younger loyal technocrats who would preserve the key parameters and interests of the current regime;
– a huge military, security, and military-industrial sector with all its supply chains (together with families and dependents, this amounts to nearly 20 million people, or 15% of the population);
– a fragmented and intimidated elite that feels “betrayed” by the West and is incapable of political action;
– a disappointed and embittered population, including more than 1 million veterans of the “special military operation,” traumatized by the war and criminal practices of the Russian army.
- It will be extremely difficult to dismantle this military, administrative, social, and ideological machine formed by war and hostility toward the West — unless Russia suffers a crushing defeat comparable to that of Germany and Japan in 1945, involving elements of external occupation and governance, which under any circumstances is practically impossible.
For Russia to change, it will have to undergo a profound internal transformation, including the dismantling of the very foundations of Russian statehood: the traditional autocratic and monocentric nature of governance, the role of security services, the connection between power and property, disregard for the rule of law, imperial ideology and great-power obsession, and a submissive Orthodox Church.
The end of communism in 1991 did not destroy this system — on the contrary, Putin consolidated and modernized it. The end of the war in Ukraine and Putin’s departure are also unlikely to bring this system to an end. It will continue to exist, destroying Russia from within and threatening its neighbors and the entire world.
