The History of the Russian Doctrine of Sovereignty: From Stalin to Putin

The presentation will present the results of a study that examined how Russian doctrine of sovereignty has evolved from the Soviet era to the present day. The research made it possible to understand: 1) how and why in Marxism-Leninism, the doctrine of sovereignty began to take shape; 2) the characteristics of the Soviet doctrine of sovereignty in the Stalin era and how it developed in the Brezhnev era; and 3) the similarities and differences between the Soviet doctrine of sovereignty and how sovereignty is understood in modern Russia. The research argued for the baselessness of attempts to draw parallels between Putin’s understanding of sovereignty and Schmitt’s theory. It is also demonstrated that the modern Russian doctrine of sovereignty was developed by rethinking and advancing Soviet doctrine. The presentation will conclude by examining how the doctrine of sovereignty justifies Russian attempts to establish hegemony in the post-Soviet space.

Denys Kiryukhin is a researcher at Lund University. His scientific interests focus on the social and political development of post-communist states, history of ideas, the politics of memory, theory of justice and political philosophy. He worked at the Hryhoriy Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy (NAS, Ukraine), where he wrote and defended his PhD thesis. He also completed internships at the Catholic University of America and the Free University of Berlin. Kiryukhin is the author of The Discourses of Justice in Historical Context (Kyiv: Stylus, 2021). He is also a co-author of several books, among them Transnational and Transatlantic Fascism, 1918–2018: The Far Right in East Central and Southeastern Europe (London, New York: Routledge, 2026), Re-Imagining Space and Society in Central and Eastern Europe: New Geographies of Politics, History and Culture after 1989 (Oldenbourg: De Gruyter, 2026), Ukraine in Crisis (London, New York: Routledge, 2017). His articles have appeared in journals such as Russian Politics; Studies in East European Thought; Ideology and Politics and European Politics and Society.