Putin’s Realism against Liberal Hegemony Putin’s rise to power only changed the situation in that it introduced the principle of sovereignty, i.e., ...

Putin’s Realism against Liberal Hegemony

Putin’s rise to power only changed the situation in that it introduced the principle of sovereignty, i.e., political realism. This inevitably impacted the overall structure of liberalism in Russia, as liberal dogma denies sovereignty altogether and advocates for national states to be abolished and integrated into a supranational world government structure. Therefore, with Putin’s arrival, the most consistent and radical liberal minorities opposed him.

However, the majority (systemic) liberals decided to adapt to Putin, occupy a formally loyal position, but continue to conduct a liberal course as if nothing had changed. Putin simply shared power with the liberals — realism, military sphere, foreign policy fell to him, and everything else — economy, science, culture, education — to them. This is not entirely liberal but tolerable — after all, in the USA itself, power also oscillates between pure liberal globalists (Clinton, Obama, Biden) and realists (like Trump and some Republicans).

In 2008-2012, Medvedev played the role of a Russian liberal. When Putin returned in 2012, it provoked an outcry from Russian liberals, who thought the worst was behind them and Russia would return to the 1990s — the era of pure and unadulterated liberal totalitarianism.

But even returning in 2012, Putin, contrary to his programmatic articles published during the 2012 election campaign, decided to leave the liberals alone, pushing aside only another portion of the most odious ones.

In 2014, after the reunification with Crimea, there was another shift towards sovereignty and realism. Another wave of liberals, feeling they were losing their former hegemonic positions, ebbed from Russia. However, Putin, in his battle for the Russian world, was then stopped, and the ruling liberal elite again resorted to their usual tactic of symbiosis — sovereignty for Putin, everything else for the liberals.

🗣Excerpt: from Liberal Totalitarianism by Alexander Dugin
https://www.geopolitika.ru/en/article/liberal-totalitarianism