Chekist, Statist, Imperialist
Notes on Vladimir Putin’s Self-Image
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
Vladimir Putin is a model representative of the Chekist world view. This view is characterised by friend-foe thinking, paranoia, and xenophobia, as well as a fixation on the authoritarian power-state as a prerequisite for Russia’s status as an imperial great power. By this logic, the employment of “active measures” and the use of violence, including murder, to assert one’s own interests are legitimate. Analysis of early sources shows that there never was a “liberal Putin”.
(Osteuropa 11/2022, pp. 111–126)