The Myth of Eurasia: Why Russia Can’t Shed Its Imperial Delusions

Foreign Affairs | Ayşe Zarakol

Russian President Vladimir Putin has framed the war in Ukraine as a civilizational struggle against Western hegemony, leveraging nineteenth-century Eurasianist ideology to legitimize authoritarian governance and ongoing imperial expansion. In *The Steppe and Its Empires*, historian Michael Khodarkovsky highlights how early modern Russia shared militarized bureaucracies, universal monarchical claims, and ambiguous territorial borders with major steppe empires including the Ottomans, Safavids, and Qing.

However, attributing contemporary Russian foreign policy exclusively to Eurasian historical legacies oversimplifies a complex heritage. Russian statecraft continuously integrated Western European administrative and military models alongside Asian traditions, while severe domestic despotism like Tsar Ivan IV’s 1565 *oprichnina* purges reflected distinct internal political innovations rather than standard Eurasian governance norms. Ultimately, historical determinism cannot fully account for current Kremlin aggression, which strategically weaponizes imperial narratives to maintain internal regime control, justify regional geographic isolation, and reject rules-based international legal constraints.

Comment

Russian statecraft uses civilizational narratives to shield autocratic power from external norms and legitimise territorial expansion. During the October 2022 Valdai International Discussion Club address, Moscow explicitly framed its war against Ukraine as a counter to Western cultural hegemony rather than a standard inter-state conflict. This conceptual framing allows the Kremlin to redefine military aggression in Eastern Europe as defensive civilizational preservation.

By embedding Eurasianist ideology into formal state doctrine, Moscow institutionalises perpetual friction with rules-based international mechanisms. Consequently, the 2023 Foreign Policy Concept ensures that any future diplomatic resolution over the Donbas will be rejected internally as a violation of Russia's civilizational mandate.

Strategic Question for Discussion

How does the formal codification of Eurasianism in the 2023 Foreign Policy Concept restrict Moscow's operational flexibility when negotiating territorial concessions in the Donbas?

The trajectory indicates that binding sovereign legitimacy to civilizational identity severely limits diplomatic manoeuvrability. Moscow's structural reliance on Eurasianist doctrine transforms pragmatic territorial bargaining into an existential threat to regime continuity, making sustained military stagnation preferable to negotiated compromise.

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