Since the attack on Ukraine, it has been obvious that the Russian state elite is pursuing neo-imperial ambitions.

Although there have been traces of this attitude in Russian state discourse for years, researchers have been primarily interested in its domestic political implications.

Polish political scientist Alicja Curanović took a different approach and focused on statements on Russia's foreign policy.

With her team at the University of Warsaw, she reviewed no fewer than 25,000 relevant texts from the years 2000 to 2018, including statements by leading Russian government politicians and diplomats, as well as minutes of State Duma and National Security Council meetings.

A targeted search was made for statements on ideas about the mission and the role of Russia in the world.

(

“The Sense of Mission in Russian Foreign Policy: Destined for Greatness!”, Routledge 2021).

In a concentrated, programmatic form, such statements were identified in only about four percent of the texts examined.

Curanović distinguishes more than a dozen roles attributed by the Russian elite to Russia in terms of its past and present universal destiny.

The country is assigned the function of a bridge builder and mediator between the civilizations of Asia and Europe.

It is also Russia's task to ensure a just world order and an international balance of power.

At the same time, Russia is also seen as the guardian of world peace and as a bulwark not only against terrorism and war, but also against attempts by the West to impose its value system globally, which has always been lamented.

The state-celebrated victory in the Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany is considered proof of the historical importance of this role.

The prevailing view is that any attempt to isolate Russia on the international stage or prevent it from taking an active part in European affairs will inevitably lead to catastrophe – as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov cited both world wars as examples in 2014.

protective power of the Slavs

From the point of view of the ruling class, Russia's role as a protective power also extends to the security of the Slavic peoples and also to that of those countries that are regarded as friends or as related in terms of civilization.

This goes hand in hand with the conviction that we not only have to defend the orthodox faith and the values ​​and traditions associated with it worldwide, but also all Russians, wherever they are - in this context we are talking about Russki Mir, the "Russian World". “.

Russia is also seen as the only force capable of bringing about a civilizationally holistic Europe and allowing it to find its true identity.

Inspired by quotes from Dostoyevsky, President Vladimir Putin claimed in 2007 that the continent could only be united if Europe's largest country, Russia, became an integral part of the European unification process.

For the Russian elite, this is linked to Russia's self-imposed commitment to the "civilizing mission" in Eurasia.

This view stems from the self-image that the Russians have always made important contributions to world culture, global technological development and environmental protection.

It is just as important to defend this “truth” against false claims from outside as it is to protect “Russian civilization” internally from foreign influences forever.

Alicja Curanović emphasizes that the Russian elite discourse - contrary to a widespread perception in the West - is extremely secular.

Any form of "messianism" is categorically rejected as un-Russian and declared a despicable feature of the West.

For example, in 2013 Lavrov accused the West of “messianic insistence” on trying to “spread its own scale of values,” and in June last year condemned Western “messianic zeal.”

According to Curanović's findings, the binding narrative of Russia's mission in the world is by no means uniform. She finds the elite consensus that the country has always been and will remain a great power all the more striking.

Curanović sees a collective psychological automatism at work here.

The ideological arsenal of Russian imperialism is habitually used.

Her term for this is “phantom narrative”.