We don’t want others’ lands, unless they are ours. Putinist Ideology and the End of the Taboo on Land Grabs.

One success from the end of the World War Two was thought to be making land appropriation taboo among European nations. Even though there were such cases after 1945, the social consensus assumed that these kind of actions belong to the past. This was evident in reactions to the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014. US Secretary of State John F. Kerry called it a “19th century act”. However, it was bloodless and hence still allowed the European public to believe that this was an exceptional event and not a harbinger of a paradigmatic shift. Until 2022 military aggression motivated by a land grab had been unthinkable to the majority of Europeans. Most probably territorial annexation was not the main reason behind Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine and yet it has become one of the most tangible results of the war and a factor which will significantly affect future peace talks. The change of thinking about territorial integrity shows in the Russian discourse. It fits into the bigger phenomenon of Putinism (understood as an ideology) and its social appeal. The grievance about the unfairly lost “Russian lands” due to the fall of the USSR helps the Kremlin present the aggression on Ukraine as a just war aimed at righting the wrongs of the past. The lecture highlights the territorial aspect of Putinism by analysing the narrative about historical territories which has gained visibility in the Russian official discourse since 2022.

Alicja Curanović is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Political Science and International Studies at the University of Warsaw. She holds a PhD in political science. Her main research interests include Russian foreign policy; religious factor in international relations; identity and status, messianism in politics. She has conducted research i.a. at Harvard University, Columbia University, Stanford University, NYU, University of Helsinki, the Russian State University for Humanistic Studies and MGIMO. Her articles appeared in i.a. "International Relations", "Problems of Post-Communism", “Politics and Religion”, “Nationalities Papers” or “Religion, State and Society”. Her latest monograph – “The Sense of Mission in Russian Foreign Policy: Destined for Greatness!” (Routledge 2021).