Andreas Umland is a lecturer at the National Taras Shevchenko University of Kiev and a former visiting fellow at Harvard's Weatherhead Center for International Affairs.  He compiles an online discussion, "The Russian Nationalism Bulletin."

Question: What are the roots of current Russian nationalism and what are the main ideas on which it rests?

Umland: The roots of current Russian nationalism are obviously threefold: pre-Soviet, Soviet and post-Soviet. For instance, the idea of Moscow as the “Third Rome,” or of a special Russian mission in world history that nowadays is again gaining popularity, goes back several centuries. Russian nationalism had been, contrary to what many in the West believed, an important element of Soviet ideology since the 1930s. Reminding developments in Moscow in the early 19th century when the Slavophiles applied German nativist thought to Russian conditions, today many important ideas in various Russian nationalist agendas are imported from the same West that these ideologies ardently condemn.

Question: What accounts for what some consider Russia's nationalist resurgence?

Umland:There are a number of factors that account for today’s nationalist resurgence. Among them is an application of modes of thinking learned in Soviet schools and universities to post-Soviet conditions – a Manichean world-view which sharply distinguishes between “us” and “them.” What has changed are the basic definitions of “us” and “them” – although a number of Soviet stereotypes, for instance, about the United States have survived glasnost.

The most important factor in nationalism’s recent resurgence is, probably, that the Kremlin’s political technologists have discovered nationalist ideas – whether directed against neighboring nations or the West – as tools suitable to reconfigure general political discourse. In the Kremlin’s new world, Putin is not competing with alternative programs or parties. Putin’s opponents are not socialists, liberals or representatives of other Russian political movements. Instead, Putin is confronted with Chechen terrorists, Estonian fascists, Georgian russophobes, Ukrainian neo-Nazis, American imperialists, Western conspirators, and, in general, various non-Russians’ desire to destroy, divide or, at least, humiliate Russia. In Russia’s new atmosphere of paranoia, it is only logical that those opposing Putin are not acknowledged to constitute legitimate (not to speak of useful) political opposition. Instead, they are represented as a “fifth column” of the West, as traitors who are, in Putin’s words, skulking around foreign embassies like jackals.

This has made politics an easy game for the Kremlin: If the government is busy to defend the country’s pride and integrity, one cannot expect it to observe all niceties of mass media independence, pluralistic public debate, or fair party competition. Instead of discussing what is best for the country, the opposite side needs to be checked whether it is working for the enemy or not. In a way, the Kremlin, the seat of the Presidential Administration, has become the Lubyanka, the building that hosted the KGB.

Question: To what extent is more radical nationalism on the rise and how strong is it as a force in modern Russia's political development?

Umland: The radical wing of Russian nationalism has been, naturally, rising together with the movement as a whole. Both the Kremlin and mainstream public discourse demonstratively condemn manifest expressions of xenophobia and racism. Yet, the extremists, whether active in the neo-Nazi skinhead movement or publishing in high-brow conspirological journals, are part and parcel of the xenophobic hysteria that much of Russian society has recently gotten into. A fear among specialists observing the rise of Russian nationalism now is that the Kremlin could lose (or, perhaps, is already losing) control of the beast it has created. Russian nationalism might transform from a political technology tool into a societal force that will be beyond the limits of manipulation by the cynics in the Kremlin.

Question: How does the far right in Russia differ from similar movements in Western Europe?

Umland: The main difference between Russian and Western forms of nationalism is, perhaps, that, in the West, the societal and political mainstream of a given country more or less clearly distances itself from that country’s – sometimes, also rather strong – nationalist movement. While the Russian mainstream is quick to condemn racist violence, its relationship to the world view standing behind such violence is more ambivalent. An example: many authors who, in the West, would be regarded as being far beyond the pale of permissible discourse, such as Aleksandr Prokhanov or Aleksandr Dugin, are esteemed participants in political and intellectual debates. The bizarre, pseudo-scientific ideas of the late neo-racist theoretician Lev Gumilev are required reading in Russia’s middle and higher schools.

Question: What has been the Russian government's role in addressing the more extreme forms of nationalism in the country? 

Umland: In recent years, the government has started to persecute racist violence more actively than before. This is not the least, one suspects, because the growing skinhead movement is damaging Russia’s international reputation. For instance, extreme nationalism has already made Russia an unattractive study destination for dark-skinned international students who are regularly beaten and, sometimes, killed. However, the government deals only with the symptoms. To get to the root of the problem, the whole logic of current Russian politics, briefly explained above, would need to be changed – something that even a well-meaning ministerial bureaucrat can, obviously, not do.

Question: If current processes continue, ten years from now, what will the picture look like in terms of nationalism and xenophobia? 

Umland: If one extrapolates Russia’s development during the last eight years into the future, than we will not only witness a second Cold War. The Russian Federation might become something like a new apartheid state where foreigners and non-Slavic citizens are treated separately from white citizens of Russia by governmental and non-governmental institutions. Some observers do not hesitate to speak of a “Weimar Russia” comparing post-Soviet conditions to those in inter-war Germany. That Russia becomes fascist is not likely yet, but that it becomes more tolerant seems even less probable. The Kremlin needs to change fundamentally the way it defines Russia’s relationship to the outside world and to take resolute action against the already considerable infiltration of various social institutions (schools, universities, youth movements, editorial boards, etc.) with radical nationalism. If this does not happen, the Russians will be a lonely people and Moscow an isolated international actor, in the new century.