Talk:Russian nationalism

Excellent book on the subject


At first I had some reservations against it (perhaps influenced by the author's ethnicity), but actually it's very well researched, well informed and balanced (if not emphatic to the subject). Highly recommended. Too bad googlebooks only allows thirty-something pages to be viewed free. NVO (talk) 20:51, 17 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Um... You're saying you were sceptical to the book because the author's a Jew? Well, I'm glad quality cancels out bigotry, at least... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.156.29.181 (talk) 11:12, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Some issues
To Biophys. It has multiple issues many of which, are extremely difficult to tackle. At the moment its more like a 'Brief History of the Russian/Soviet Empire Seen as the Implementation of a Russian Nationalism Doctrine'. In other words, a classic example of a cart-before-horse case. But to turn it round would not be that easy, because one would have to think of a) Russian Nationalism doctrine definition, 2) trace it back to its origins. Both would be tricky. Uvarov’s doctrine of Orthodoxy, Autocracy, and Nationality brings up another issue because narodnost is not translated as Nationality, it's a vague concept involving "national spirit". In other words, (ethnic) Russian Nationalism won't easily be linked (although it often is) to Uvarov’s Narodnost/Nationality, because the 'national spirit' in question would imply not only Russian, but, say, Tatar (Ukranian, Yakut etc) spirit as well. As the en_wiki Orthodoxy, Autocracy, and Nationality article not unreasonably states, - "… the very fact of its existence, being Russia's first statewide political ideology since the sixteenth century, indicated the nation's brewing transition to modernity." - modernity, mind you, not nationalism in any of its form. As for the time of origins, Russian sources rather vaguely refer to these as the beginning of the XX century and vagueness here is justified. For the birth of RN is being usually linked to Black Hundreds and numerous right-wing political organizations. In each case the exact date would be different (or even unclear), and the difference here would be crucial – say, for having to deal with the issue of pogroms. Like, Black Hundreds' (more or less) official history is usually seen as confined to 1905-1917, but by the year of 1905 pogroms, mostly, have ceased, and – as some argue – largely due to the BH's influence. (Other sources, icluding Enc. Britannica see it otherwise, so different points of view should be here represented.) As for the Soviet period Russian Nationalism, this section should be re-written from the completely opposite point of view, since up until the late 1930s being a Russian nationalist would automatically mean death penalty (and up until 1970s a mere GULAG sentense). Sorry for having to use so many words, but the point to prove is, you know, demanding. I take back the 'original research' tag, though, all in all 'neutrality' would suffice. -- Evermore2 (talk) 08:50, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I think Za Boga, Tsarya and Otechestvo should be mentioned prominently in this page, although yes, "Otechestvo" also supposed to mean a Yakut in Russian Empire. I do not really see anything to object, except that Stalin did officially promote Russian nationalism during and after WWII (per sources), exactly at the same time when a lot of non-Russians were sent to  Gulag as "nationalists". Biophys (talk) 17:28, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, 'nationalism' of any ilk in the USSR was a crime. What was even worse, the term itself was a label, covering lots of totally innocent things. But when President Medvedev recently promised to 'fight' radical nationalism in Russia, stressing: "especially, the Russian nationalism", it made some of us cringe. Because it sort of harked back to the 1920s when an ethnic Russian could get a 10 years sentense merely for some casual remark as to somebody else's ethnicity.
 * Back to the main (as I see it) issue. A distinct line should be drawn between the pre-1917 non-racial Imperial Russian nationalism, which was closer to the concept of 'Russian patriotism' (mind you, otechestvo you've mentioned, means 'fatherland') but tragically excluded Jews which proved to be it's fatal flaw, and the modern-day 'purer-than-thou' ethnic RN which is plain racism. This has to be done a) according to reliable sources, b) with a modicum of understanding of what provokes this rise of ugly ethnic Russian nationalism we see nowadays, c) certainly not in the form of a high school thesis where dozens of non-related (some of them, non-) facts are thrown in together in chronological order. -- Evermore2 (talk) 08:34, 22 July 2011 (UTC)
 * If you mean that "national" policies in Imperial Russia were "non-ethnic/racial" (with exception of Jews), this is very far from reality. The Circassian genocide was the most famous example. Biophys (talk) 19:18, 29 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Much as I sympathise with your view, there was no Circassian genocide. Or, if there was, why, according to the article you've pointed to, - Georgia, thus, became the first country in the world to have recognized the Russian military campaign against the Circassians as a genocide? All imperial wars were evil and might be regarded criminal, but I very much doubt that the deeds of the British in India or the Belgians in Congo or the Spanish in Latin America would ever be classified as genocide. Because, as the aforementioned section rightly states, the concept of genocide was only adopted in international law in the 20th century. -- Evermore2 (talk) 12:54, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
 * The colonial wars were very different (e.g. wars in Middle Asia and Caucasus by Imperial Russia ), but this is not the point. Russia was a "prison of nations", exactly as Lenin said, was not it? This involved oppression of many ethnic groups, not only Jews, under the slogans of Russian patriotism. One could mention Poles as another notable example.Biophys (talk) 16:48, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Was Imperial Russia 'the prison of nations'? Frankly, that would be not for me to tell. What I know for sure is that a) dearest old Vladimir Ilych cannot be seen as an objective authority on the matter, b) even your link of choice tells the story slightly differently: "In the cliché-ridden propaganda of the Soviet era tsarist Russia was frequently dubbed the 'prison of nations'". But even if it (Russia) were indeed a prison  that would be totally beside the point. The article under discussion puts an equality sign between Russian history and Russian nationalism. If so radical a view does exist, then – a) it should be supported by reliable, non-marginal (preferably, academic) sources, b) allow for the opposing views to be here represented, as well. Otherwise it’s a POV-pushing original research. -- Evermore2 (talk) 10:07, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Sure, let's bring some good English language books on the subject, like here. Biophys (talk) 13:02, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Exactly. Chapter 11 looks like the one that can be used here as a background. Interestingly, not a mention in it of Circassian 'genocide', Jewish pogroms or the Poles-aimed late 1930s NKVD repressions. May be its just that some pages are there missing. Or may be (and that's the point I've been trying to make here) all of those things had very little to do with Russian nationalism, in the first place. -- Evermore2 (talk) 14:19, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * There are other books discussing at least some of that. Biophys (talk) 16:13, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Another fascinatingly deep/concise/well-balanced study (even if slightly dated when it comes to modern tendencies). There is an ineradicable tension between the ethnic and the imperial components of Russian nationalism - here's one crucial statement. It's just a pity that page 255 where the section 'Ethnic and imperial nationalism' begins happens here to be the last. All in all, these two books contain more than enough material for the article under discussion to be re-written. -- Evermore2 (talk) 08:22, 3 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Nothing's changed in the article except for some anon's removal of POV-pushing tag. I return it, along with the OR tag. In its present state the article should be re-named. It's content still has all but nothing to do with it's title.-- Evermore2 (talk) 15:42, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Rename to what? Current version is very much consistent with the book mentioned above . However, it probably should be merged with Radical nationalism in Russia.Biophys (talk) 18:57, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Rename to what? - The answer depends on what one thinks this article is about. Is it about 'Russian Nationalism' or 'Miscellaneous fragments of Russian history which someone regards as having something to do with Russian nationalism'? For me it's definitely the latter.
 * Current version is very much consistent with the book... (by Snyder)? Please, let us not go over and over it again. Chapter XI of the Snyder book is indeed useful. It begins with mentioning the Absolutism of the XVIII c. (which "recognised few if any elements of nationalism") and credits Napoleon with inspiring the first wave of RN. What's even better, the chapter is titled "Messianic nationalism", which I find a) very pretty)), b) being totally inconsistent with the article in its present state. -- Evermore2 (talk) 08:40, 12 September 2011 (UTC)


 * The "radical nationalism" articla deals with topic of chauvinism and racism rather then the movement for a nation-state. A merger will make the article disproportionate, giving too much weight to recent and minor media agenda instead of encyclopedical overview of the topic. Instead of learning about "all the Russias" and slavophilia, a reader would be overwhelmed with media noice about street gang fights and hooliganism blamed on hate crimes. Oppose.Garret Beaumain (talk) 19:12, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That depends on source. For example, this book considers chauvinism and even allegedly fascism to be a part of nationalism (e.g. "Black Hundreds"). Saying that, there is nothing wrong with keeping these sub-articles separately. Biophys (talk) 00:58, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Russian nationalism isn't that homogenous
I think telling Russian nationalism as a homogenous nationalism is not a way to understand the multifaceted role of Russian nationalism. Russia has nearly 200 different ethnic people, a population that of 150 million people and over 150 million other undocumented people, given the vast and porous Siberia which Russian authorities rarely bother with. Russian nationalism can be either ethnic nationalism or either multi-racial nationalism. I am not fond of Russian nationalism, but I am not going to bias in this issue. You can criticize but I stand firm with my opinion. ZaDoraemonzu (talk) 14:05, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

Nationalism during the Soviet epoch references
I'm concerned about some of the recent edits to the section on Soviet epoch that made it essentially unverifiable.

In this edit by an IP address, a "p. 85" was added to the Vihavainen's chapter, however, p.85 or adjacent pages don't appear to support any of the sentences in the paragraph. (I've added a link to archive.org scan of the book for anyone who'd like to verify.) This edit also added two references, the latter of which doesn't have a page number and references a 500 pages book.

Later, there were a few edits by User:Gim709 such as this one that introduced statements phrased incredibly vaguely. Because of the references that were added, its almost impossible to verify such additions in the sources.

I find these edits highly problematic as they essentially made the entire paragraph unverifiable. In case if they're sourced, they need to be referenced correctly using specific inline references placed near the sentence (or a group of sentences if its one source). PaulT2022 (talk) 22:18, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

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