Putin and the Return of History

After the collapse of Soviet communism, the West convinced itself that liberal democracy would be the dominant system of governance. However, in February 2022, Vladimir Putin proved it is unwise to make such predictions. In the early years of Putin’s presidency, he appeared to commit himself to friendship with the West.

But the Putin of those years is unrecognisable today - an autocratic nationalist, dedicated to repression at home and anti-Western militarism abroad. So, what happened? Was he lying when he proclaimed his support for freedom, democracy and friendship with the West? Or, was he sincere? Did he change his views at some stage between then and now? And if that is the case, what happened to change him? Putin and the Return of History examines these questions in the context of Russia’s thousand-year past, tracing the forces and the myths that have shaped Putin’s politics of aggression: the enduring terror of encirclement by outsiders, the subjugation of the individual to the cause of the state, the collectivist values that allow the sacrifice of human lives in battle, the willingness to lie and deceive, the co-opting of religion and the belief in Great Russia’s mission to change the world.