The Russian Idea in Question

Politics, Philosophy, and Religion under Putin

Clemena Antonova, George Pattison

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Edition: 1
• Year: 2026
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Russian History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781978762466
• Index: History

This book approaches 'the Russian idea' as a problem, a myth, a paradox, and a trope rather than an ideology. 'The Russian idea' has been central to spiritual, religious, and humanistic projects and, at the same time, it has been used, with equal success, in illiberal, anti-modern, and anti-democratic projects, including as a justification for war-from Dostoevsky through to the present-day.

In the face of challenges of any single definition, the collection brings together theologians, historians, literary scholars, political theorists, and art historians to focus on different aspects of this complex concept and uncover the sometimes irreconcilable tensions at the heart of it.

The selection of topics and figures is occasioned by Putin's own speeches and policies, with the addition of religious and cultural themes that are salient in contemporary Russian neo-imperialist thinking. A special case is that of Anti-Semitism, insofar as Putin seems not to have pursued this aspect of Russia's political heritage (manifest in both Tsarist and Soviet eras), although elements of this have been aired by public figures. Under the broad umbrella of Russian Studies, the work is fully inter-disciplinary, with contributors representing a range of academic disciplines, including political theory, literary studies, history, philosophy, theology, and aesthetics.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle Page
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 The Political Philosophy of Putin’s Speeches
• 2 The Importance of the State in Russian Thought and Contemporary Political Rhetoric: Its Genealogy and Its Legacy in the Twenty-First Century
• 3 The Weaponization of Orthodoxy
• 4 Leo Tolstoy and the Russian Idea
• 5 Dostoevsky’s Russian Ideas
• 6 Ivan Ilyin: A Dream of Russia
• 7 Berdyaev: A False Friend?
• 8 Eurasianism: Imagining Russia as the “Anti-Imperial Empire”
• 9 The Icon as Russian Idea: De-historicizing the Image and Reversing the West
• 10 The Shapeshifting Other: Intersections of Antisemitism and Islamophobia in Contemporary Russian Orthodox Discourse
• Concluding Reflections
• Index
• About the Contributors
• eCopyright