Putin's Dark Ages: Political Neomedievalism and Re-Stalinization in Russia - Paperback

by Dina Khapaeva (Author)

Two decades before the war against Ukraine, a "special operation" was launched against Russian historical memory, aggressively reshaping the nation's understanding of its history and identity. The Kremlin's militarization of Russia through World War II propaganda is well documented, but the glorification of Russian medieval society and its warlords as a source of support for Putinism has yet to be explored. This book offers the first comparison of Putin's political neomedievalism and re-Stalinization and introduces the concept of mobmemory to the study of right-wing populism. It argues that the celebration of the oprichnina, Ivan the Terrible's regime of state terror (1565-1572), has been fused with the rehabilitation of Stalinism to reconstruct the Russian Empire. The post-Soviet case suggests that the global obsession with the Middle Ages is not purely an aesthetic movement but a potential weapon against democracy.

The book is intended for students, scholars, and non-specialists interested in understanding Russia's anti-modern politics and the Russians' support for the terror unleashed against Ukraine.

Author Biography

Dina Khapaeva is Professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology, USA. Among her latest books are Crimes sans châtiment (2023) and The Celebration of Death in Contemporary Culture (2017). Until 2009, she was Director for Research at Smolny College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and a professor at St. Petersburg State University, Russia.