Five years on, Putin consensus faces Ukraine strain

Perceived wisdom has it that the longer a war goes on, the less enthusiastic a public becomes for continuing the conflict. After all, it is ordinary citizens who tend to bear the economic and human costs.

And yet, as the war following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 enters its fifth year, the attitude of the Russian public remains difficult to gauge: Just over half of Russians, according to one recent poll, expect the war to end in 2026; yet a majority say that should negotiations fail, Moscow needs to “escalate” with greater use of force.

As observers of Russian society, we believe this ambiguity in Russian public opinion gives President Vladimir Putin the cover to continue pushing hard for his goals in Ukraine. Yet at the same time, a deeper dive into the Russian public’s apparent support for the war suggests that it is more fragile than the Russian president would like to believe.

Putin’s social contract

From Day 1 of the conflict, Western strategy has been predicated on the belief that economic sanctions would eventually cause either the Russian elite or its society to persuade Putin to abandon the war.

This, in turn, is based on the assumption that the legitimacy of Putinism rests on a social contract of sorts: The Russian people will be loyal to the Kremlin if they enjoy a stable standard of living and are allowed to pursue their private lives without interference from the state.

The Russian economy has been struggling since 2014, so many analysts believed that this social contract was coming under strain even before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. However, after four years of war, the combination of exclusion from European markets and a tripling of military spending has led to economic stagnation and mounting pressure on living standards.

One problem with the social contract approach is that it tends to downplay the role of ideology.

It is possible that Putin’s “Make Russia Great Again” propaganda resonates with a significant part of the Russian public. Polling has consistently placed Putin’s approval rating above 80% since the beginning of the Ukraine conflict.

Of course, the validity of the results of polls in an authoritarian society at war cannot be taken at face value. Yet, one shouldn’t rule out that some of that support is genuine and rests not just on a stable economy but also on popular endorsement of Putin’s pledge to restore Russia’s power and influence on the world stage.

Rallying Russians

Some scholars point to a “rally around the flag” effect. There was an apparent surge in Putin’s approval rating after the use of military force against Ukraine in 2014 and 2022.

It is hard to tell whether the surge in support for Putin reflects a genuine shift in opinion or just a response to media coverage and what people perceive as the acceptable response.

The Kremlin has tried to hide the costs of the war from the public: concealing the true death toll and avoiding full-scale mobilization of conscripts by recruiting highly paid volunteers. It is also trying to keep the economy stable by drawing down the country’s reserve funds.

That leaves open the question of whether the “Putin consensus” will break down at some point in the future if the costs of the war start to hit home for a majority of Russians.

The problem with polls

The consensus view among observers is that a small minority of Russians oppose the war, a slightly larger minority enthusiastically support the war, and the majority passively go along with what the state is doing.

There are still some independent pollsters conducting surveys in Russia that report a high level of support among respondents for the “special military operation” against Ukraine, with figures ranging between 60% and 70%.

A number of researchers have pointed out the difficulty in getting an accurate snapshot of Russian public opinion, given that the polling questions might make the respondent fearful of being accused of breaking laws that penalize “spreading fake news” and “discrediting the army” with a lengthy prison sentence.

The Levada Center, which is still regarded as an independent and relatively reliable pollster, conducts its interviews face to face in people’s homes but has a very low response rate. Polls conducted online, in return for monetary rewards, can try to find demographically balanced respondents, but the problem of wariness about giving answers that are critical of the regime remains. In Russia’s current political environment, refusing to answer or giving a socially acceptable response is a rational strategy.

Some scholars, such as those associated with the Public Sociology Laboratory, which looks at public sentiment in post-Soviet states, still conduct fieldwork inside Russia, sending researchers to live incognito in provincial towns and observe social practices involving support for the war.

Their ethnographic research finds little evidence for a “rally around the flag” effect in provincial Russian society. Other analysts have turned to digital ethnography of social media as an alternative source of insight. But analysts unfamiliar with the local and digital context risk mistaking performative loyalty for genuine belief.

‘Internal emigration’

Most Russian citizens try to avoid political discussion altogether and retreat into what is often described as “internal emigration” – living their own lives while keeping interactions with the authorities to a minimum.

This practice dates back to the Soviet period but resurfaced as political repression increased after Putin’s return to the presidency in 2012.

There is no doubt that there are many fervent war supporters in Russia. They are quite vocal and visible because the state allows them to be – such as the military bloggers reporting from the front lines.

Apart from looking at opinion polls and social media, one can also probe the level of genuine support for the war by looking at everyday practices. If popular support for the war were enthusiastic, recruitment offices would be overwhelmed. They are not.

Instead, Russia has relied heavily on financial incentives, aggressive advertising, prison recruitment and coercive mobilization. At the same time, hundreds of thousands of men have sought to avoid conscription by leaving the country, hiding from authorities or exploiting legal exemptions.

Symbolic participation follows a similar pattern. State-sponsored Z symbols continue to dominate public space – the letter Z is used as a symbol of support for the war, in slogans such as “Za pobedu,” which translates to “for victory.” But privately displayed signs of support have largely disappeared.

Humanitarian aid to be sent to soldiers on the front lines or occupied Ukraine is often collected through schools and churches, where participation is shaped by social or administrative pressure. But many participants frame their involvement as helping individuals rather than supporting the war itself.

Reality vs. lived experience

High-profile propaganda products frequently fail to resonate. Music charts and streaming platforms in Russia are dominated not by patriotic anthems but by an eclectic mix of songs about personal relationships, such as Jakone’s moody ballad “Eyes As Wet As Asphalt,” songs in praise of “Hoodies” and even a catchy Bashkir folk song.

Book sales show strong demand for works such as George Orwell’s “1984” and Viktor Frankl’s Holocaust memoir “Man’s Search for Meaning,” suggesting that readers are searching for ways to understand authoritarianism, trauma and moral responsibility rather than celebrating militarism.

And instead of watching the state-backed film “Tolerance,” a dystopian tale of moral decay in the West, Russians are streaming the “Heated Rivalry” gay hockey romance.

Putin’s campaign to promote what he sees as traditional values appears not to be cutting through. Divorce rates are among the highest in the world – and birth rates continue to fall.

Heading into the Ukraine war’s fifth year, the gulf between the Kremlin version of reality and the lived experience of ordinary Russians remains. It echoes a pattern we have seen before: In the final decade of the Soviet Union the Kremlin became increasingly out of touch with the views of its people.

History will not necessarily repeat itself – but the masters of the Kremlin should be conscious of the parallels.

Peter Rutland is professor of government, Wesleyan University and Elizaveta Gaufman is assistant professor of Russian discourse and politics, University of Groningen

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.