Putinism

The Pillars of the New Russian Idea

Nikolai Berdyaev’s The Russian Idea (New York: Macmillan, 1948) is the best-known work on the subject; it deals with its religious rather than nationalist aspects. General works on the search for identity, Russia’s manifest destiny, and related subjects include Wendy Helleman, The Russian Idea: In Search of a New Identity (Bloomington, IN: Slavica Publishers, 2003); James Billington, Russia in Search of Itself (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004); Michael Lane Bruner, Strategies of Remembrance: The Rhetorical Dimensions of National Identity Construction (Columbus: University of South Carolina Press, 2002); and Marlène Laruelle, Russian Nationalism and the National Reassertion of Russia (London: Routledge, 2009). Another useful collection of texts is Geoffrey Hosking and Robert Service, eds., Russian Nationalism, Past and Present (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998).

On political-ideological developments during the last two decades, see Victor and Victoria Trimondi, Krieg der Religionen: Politik, Glaube und Terror im Zeichen der Apokalypse (München: W. Fink, 2006). On the Black Hundreds, see Walter Laqueur, Black Hundred: The Rise of the Extreme Right in Russia (New York: HarperCollins, 1993). Vadim Kozhinov, Pravda “Chernoi Sotni” (Moscow: Eksmo/Algoritm, 2006), offers a defense of the Black Hundreds. Kozhinov was a literary critic and historian but also a leading right-wing ideologist. While not a Communist, he defended Stalin against his critics—arguing, for instance, that the Stalin cult was created not in the Soviet Union, but by foreigners.

For a general overview on Russian intellectual history pertinent to the subject of this book, see Andrzej Walicki, The Slavophile Controversy: History of a Conservative Utopia in Nineteenth-Century Russian Thought (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975). Also see the comprehensive anthology edited by Marc Raeff titled Russian Intellectual History (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1966).

On issues of confabulation, the most comprehensive recent work is William Hirstein, ed., Confabulation: Views from Neuroscience, Psychiatry, Psychology and Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).

Confabulation

Vladimir Solovyov’s collected works were published in St. Petersburg between 1911 and 1914. Several anthologies have appeared in English translation, in particular Vladimir Solovyov, Politics, Law and Morality: Essays, trans. and ed. Vladimir Wozniuk (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000).

Most of Nikolai Berdyaev’s books have appeared in English, French, and other languages, including The Meaning of History (New York: Scribner, 1936). There is also a long autobiographical essay, Dream and Reality: An Essay in Autobiography (New York: Macmillan, 1951). On Berdyaev and inequality, the subject that fascinated Putin, see Marko Marković, La philosophie de l’inégalité et les idées politiques de Nicolas Berdiaev (Paris: Nouvelles Éditions Latines, 1978).

Georgy Petrovich Fedotov’s collected works in twelve volumes began to appear in Russian in 1996. Selected essays have been published in Russian in a number of volumes in France and the United States, including Litso Rossii (Paris: YMCA Press, 1976). In view of his political leanings, he is not persona grata at present in Russia.

Ilyin and Fascism

Ivan Ilyin has been frequently quoted by Putin and other current leading Russian political figures. Most of his writings were republished in Russian in recent years, including On Monarchy and Republic [O Monarkhii i Respublike] (New York: Sodruzhestvo, 1979).

The nineteenth-century Slavophile and nationalist writers most in demand in Russia at the present time are Nikolay Danilevsky and Konstantin Leontiev. Danilevsky’s classic Russia and Europe was republished in Russia in 1995 (Rossiya i Evropa, 6th ed. [St. Petersburg: Glagol and St. Petersburg University Press, 1995]), and there is a biography by Robert E. MacMaster entitled Danilevsky: A Russian Totalitarian Philosopher (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967). On Konstantin Leontiev, see knleontiev.narod.ru and the Leontiev page in pravoslavie.ru.

Russian Messianism

Russian messianism remains a hitherto neglected subject. An important early study is Emanuel Sarkisyanz, Russland und der Messianismus des Orients (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1955). Also see Leonid Kacis, Russkaja Éschatologija i Russkaja Literatura (Moscow: OGI, 2000).

On the Antichrist, the leading expert is Michael Hagemeister (http://www.phil-fak.uni-duesseldorf.de/v-geschichte-und-kulturen-osteuropas/ehemalige/dr-michael-hagemeister). Some of the relevant texts can be found in German translation in Bodo Zelinsky, Das Böse in der Russischen Kultur (Köln: Böhlau, 2008).

On the history of the “Third Rome” concept, see Peter Duncan, Russian Messianism: Third Rome, Holy Revolution, Communism, and After (London: Routledge, 2000).

Eurasianism

On classic Eurasianism, see Otto Böss, Die Lehre der Eurasier: Ein Beitrag zur Russischen Ideengeschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts (Wiesbaden: O. Harrassowitz, 1961). The basic manifesto of the movement is explained in Peter Savitsky, ed., Exodus to the East [Iskhod k Vostoku] (Idyllwild, CA: Charles Schlacks Jr., 1996). On the takeover of original Eurasianism by Alexander Dugin and company, see Marlène Laruelle, Eurasianism: An Ideology of Empire (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), and Dmitry Shlapentokh, Russia Between East and West: Scholarly Debates on Eurasianism (Leiden: Brill, 2006). Also see Herman Pirchner, Reviving Greater Russia? The Future of Russia’s Borders with Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Moldova, and Ukraine (Washington, D.C.: American Foreign Policy Council, 2005). Wayne Vucinich, Russia and Asia: Essays on the Influence of Russia on the Asian Peoples (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, Stanford University, 1972), deals with the broader issues, not specifically Eurasianism.

Russian Nationalism

For more on nationalism during the Soviet period: Nikolai Mitrokhin, Russkaya Partiya (Moscow: Novoe Literaturnoe Obozrenie, 2003). Also see John B. Dunlop, The Faces of Contemporary Russian Nationalism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983) and The New Russian Nationalism (New York: Praeger, 1985); Alexander Yanov, The Russian Challenge and the Year 2000 (New York: Basil Blackwell, 1987); and Marlène Laruelle, In the Name of the Nation: Nationalism and Politics in Contemporary Russia (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).

The Opposition

Marc Bennetts, Kicking the Kremlin: Russia’s New Dissidents and the Battle to Topple Putin (London: Oneworld, 2014)

Oliver Bullough, The Last Man in Russia: The Struggle to Save a Dying Nation (London: Penguin Books, 2013)

Masha Gessen, Words Will Break Cement: The Passion of Pussy Riot (New York: Riverhead Books, 2014)

Ben Judah, Fragile Empire: How Russia Fell In and Out of Love with Vladimir Putin (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013)

Konstantin Voronkov, Aleksei Naval’nyi: Groza Zhulikov i Vorov (Moscow: Eksmo, 2012)

Dugin and Gumilev

Many of Alexander Dugin’s books are available in Russian and English. Among them: Konspirologiya [Conspirology] (Moscow: Arktogeya, 1992); The Fourth Political Theory (London: Arktos, 2012); and Putin vs. Putin: Vladimir Putin Viewed from the Right (London: Aktos, 2014). Many Dugin lectures are on YouTube as well as on his Web site, dugin.ru, along with a long interview with Vladimir Pozner.

Lev Gumilev has several sites on the Internet; see his portal (http://gumilevica.kulichki.net/English/) for a complete bibliography, including (among others) Drevnyaya Rus i Velikaya Step (Moscow: Mysl, 1989); Etnogenez i Biosfera Zemli (Leningrad: Azbooka-Atticus, 2013); and Geografia Etnosa (Leningrad: Nauka, 1993). Many of his books on the history of the Huns, the Khazars, ethnogenesis, and so on have been translated.

The Orthodox Church

S. L. Frank, ed., A Solovyov Anthology (New York: Scribner, 1950)

John Gordon Garrard and Carol Garrard, Russian Orthodoxy Resurgent: Faith and Power in the New Russia (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008)

Konstantin Leontiev, Against the Current: Selections from the Novels, Essays, Notes, and Letters of Konstantin Leontiev (New York: Weybright and Talley, 1969)

Christopher Marsh, Burden or Blessing?: Russian Orthodoxy and the Construction of Civil Society and Democracy (Boston: Boston University, Institute on Culture, Religion, and World Affairs, 2004)

Birgit Menzel and Michael Hagemeister, The New Age of Russia: Occult and Esoteric Dimensions (München: Otto Sagner, 2012). Hagemeister is the leading expert in this field; for a full list of his publications on The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and related topics, see his Web site, http://www.phil-fak.uni-duesseldorf.de/v-geschichte-und-kulturen-osteuropas/ehemalige/drmichael-hagemeister/.

Jonathan Sutton, ed., Orthodox Christianity and Contemporary Europe (Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2003)

Mikhail Vostryshev, Patriarch Tikhon (Moscow: Molodaya Gvardiya, 1995)

The Radical Right

A great amount of right-wing extremist literature has been produced during the last fifteen years. Among the successful practitioners is Nikolai Starikov (http://nstarikov.ru/en/), a St. Petersburg TV producer widely acclaimed as a master of conspirology second only to Alexander Dugin. Since about 80 percent of the Russian public receive information on domestic and foreign affairs from television, the contribution of producers and writers such as Starikov and Mikhail Leontiev should not be underrated. Maxim Kalashnikov has written bestsellers entitled Voina s Golemom (Moscow: AST, 2006) and Putin Inkorporeyted (Moscow: Eksmo/Algoritm, 2013). The weekly Zavtra (formerly Den) is the mouthpiece of this camp.

Foreign Policy and the Petrostate

Anders Aslund and Michael McFaul, Revolution in Orange: The Origins of Ukraine’s Democratic Breakthrough (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2006)

Marshall Goldman, Petrostate: Putin, Power, and the New Russia (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008)

Thane Gustafson, Crisis Amid Plenty: The Politics of Soviet Energy under Brezhnev and Gorbachev (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991)

______. Capitalism Russian-Style (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999)

______. Wheel of Fortune: The Battle for Oil and Power in Russia (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2012)

Per Högselius, Red Gas: Russia and the Origins of European Energy Dependence (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)

Edward Lucas, The New Cold War: The Future of Putin’s Russia and the Threat to the West (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008)

Jürgen Roth, Gazprom—Das Unheimliche Imperium: Wie Wir Verbraucher Betrogen und Staaten Erpresst Werden (Frankfurt: Westend, 2012)

David Satter, Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003)

Angela Stent, The Limits of Partnership: U.S.-Russian Relations in the Twenty-first Century (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014)

Jonathan P. Stern, The Future of Russian Gas and Gazprom (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005)

Strobe Talbott, The Russia Hand: A Memoir of Presidential Diplomacy (New York: Random House, 2002)

Dmitri Trenin, Post-Imperium: A Eurasian Story (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2011)

______. Getting Russia Right (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2007)

The Oligarchs

David E. Hoffman, The Oligarchs: Wealth and Power in the New Russia (New York: Public Affairs, 2001)

Richard Sakwa, Putin and the Oligarchs: The Khodorkovsky-Yukos Affair (New York: I. B. Tauris, 2014)

Stalinism and Re-Stalinization

Veniamin Kolkovsky, 1953: Likvidatsiya Stalina (Moscow: Eksmo, 2013)

Maria Lipman, Lev Gudkov, and Lasha Bakradze, The Stalin Puzzle: Deciphering Post-Soviet Public Opinion (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2013)

Sergei Minakov, 1937: Zagovor Byl! (Moscow: Eksmo, 2010)

Konstantin Romanenko, Pochemu Nenavidiat Stalina?: Vragi Rossii Protiv Vozhdia (Moscow: IAuza-press, 2013)

Nodari Aleksandrovič Simoniâ, Istoriografiâ Stalinizma (Moscow: Rosspén, 2007)

Putin and Putinism

Many biographies of Putin have been published during the last decade. The English-language ones are on the whole superior to the Russian, most of which either belong to the genre of hagiography or are strictly polemical. Among the books by American and British writers, the following ought to be mentioned:

Anna Arutunyan, The Putin Mystique: Inside Russia’s Power Cult (Newbold on Stour, UK: Skyscraper Publications, 2014)

Peter Baker and Susan Glasser, Kremlin Rising: Vladimir Putin’s Russia and the End of Revolution (New York: Scribner, 2005)

Karen Dawisha, Putin’s Kleptocracy (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2014)

Masha Gessen, The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin (New York: Riverhead Books, 2012)

Luke Harding, Expelled: A Journalist’s Descent into the Russian Mafia State (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)

Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy, Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2012)

Richard Sakwa, Putin: Russia’s Choice (London: Routledge, 2004)

Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, The New Nobility: The Restoration of Russia’s Security State and the Enduring Legacy of the KGB (New York: Public Affairs, 2010)

Dimitri Trenin, Integratcia (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Foundation, 2006). See also his other books and articles published by the Carnegie Foundation.

The best of the books on Putin’s early rule by Russian authors are those by Lilia Shevtsova, especially Putin’s Russia (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2003); Vladimir Putin, First Person (New York: Public Affairs, 2000) is a series of interviews with Russian journalists on his early life.