Roots of Russian Soft Power: Rethinking Russian National Identity

Abstract

The end of the Cold War heralded a new era as Western soft power was at its zenith in Eastern Europe and regional states accepted and institutionalized a new Euro-American ethos. In contrast, Russian soft power was at its lowest point as the Soviet Union imploded, leaving fifteen newly independent states. While Russia was still the most powerful nation in the region, it lacked competence to deploy soft power and was unable to culturally influence its neighbors. Russia had to regain its footing and sought to redefine its own national identity prior to being able to build and project its soft power. Thus, Russia turned inward to nineteenth century works in philosophy and literature while Western soft power and expansionism continued to draw closer to Russia's borders. As Moscow regrouped, it created institutions to spread its message both regionally and globally and expanded its communication prowess. Russia realized that while its national identity might be grounded within its Slavic roots and Russian exceptionalism, the only way it could effectively counter Western soft power was to point out the hypocrisy of American and European governmental policies. Rather than generating a positive projection of cultural and political attractiveness, Russia fought the spread Euro-American soft power by directly challenging it and showed that the Western political ethos ultimately was self-contradictory and also worked to destroy traditional values.