Saturday, December 23, 2023

Two Russian Scholars Offer Another Reason Not to Believe Moscow Polls Showing Russians Overwhelmingly Back Putin’s War in Ukraine

Saturday, December 23, 2023


            Staunton, Dec. 21 – Two Samara sociologists, Vladimir Zvonovsky and Aleksandr Khodykin, draw on “the spiral of silence” model offered by German scholar Elisabeth Noelle-Neuman’s work to provide yet another reason for being skeptical about Moscow’s claims that polls show overwhelming majorities of Russians support Putin’s war in Ukraine.

            Their article, “Conceptions by Russians of the Conflict with Ukraine: Testing the ‘Spiral of Silence’ Hypothesis,” Sotsiologicheskiye issledovaniya, 11 (2023): 38-50 (in Russian) is available at socis.isras.ru/article/9837 and in English at eastviewpress.com/adaptation-strategies-of-opponents-and-supporters-of-the-special-military-operation-based-on-residents-of-samara-province. It is discussed at telegra.ph/Spiral-molchaniya-i-vojna-v-Ukraine-obzor-novogo-sociologicheskogo-issledovaniya-12-14 and therussianreader.com/2023/12/20/2521/.

            The two Samara researches argue that many Russians who oppose the war are not willing to voice their opinion either to others or pollsters because they are convinced that their position is unpopular and because they fear both disapproval and other negative consequences. And many then just go along with the preferred position even though they do not share it.

Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada Set to Condemn Moscow’s Actions against Ingushetia and Back Republic's Right to Seek Independence


            Staunton, Dec. 21 – Having declared Chechnya a temporarily occupied country a year ago (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/11/zelensky-orders-study-on-extending.html), Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada is set to consider a resolution condemning Moscow’s actions against Ingushetia and supporting Ingushetia’s right to seek independence from Russia.

            The draft measure has already been registered on the site of the Ukrainian parliament (itd.rada.gov.ua/billInfo/Bills/Card/43321 and fortanga.org/2023/12/v-verhovnuyu-radu-ukrainy-vnesli-proekt-postanovleniya-o-priznanii-prava-ingushej-na-sozdanie-svoego-gosudarstva/) and reflects the views of the Ingush Independence Committee established last year (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/09/committee-for-ingushetia-independence.html).

            Moscow is certain to be outraged by this move, seeing it an indication that Kyiv may soon acknowledging Russian crimes against larger non-Russian groups such as the Tatars within the current borders of the Russian Federation and supporting their right to seek independence (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/11/moscow-not-happy-kyiv-might-recognize.html).

            Many in Russia and the West dismiss such Ukrainian actions as irrelevant, but they are important in that they signal that these peoples are not alone and have support around the world, something that may not lead to independence immediately but can play an important role of the kind US-led non-recognition policy did for the Baltic nations in Soviet times.


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