Putin Elite has Three Immediate Reasons for Devoting Ever More Attention to Emigres, Sonin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 25 – Putin and his inner circle in recent weeks have been devoting ever more attention to Russians who have left Russia,  attention that at times has risen to a kind of “collective hysteria,” Konstantin Sonin says; and he argues that there are three reasons that the issue of emigres and “relocants” is now so fraught in Moscow.

            First of all, the economist and commentator says, Kremlin propagandists need a new “abstract enemy” now that Ukraine has become a real one with its attacks on Russian cities and infrastructure because it is easier to create propaganda about an abstract enemy than about a real one (echofm.online/opinions/prichiny-isterii).

            Russians abroad at present are no threat to the regime, but memories of the role that emigres played in the past provide just enough fuel for Putin and those around him to believe that such people could threaten those in power once again and to use propaganda tropes like those the tsars and commissars did.

            Second, Sonin argues, there is “’the technical’ perspective,” driven by the fact that “the potential for whipping up hatred against Ukrainians has been exhausted.” Having lost the target it has been concerned about, Putin’s propaganda machines “must always be kept busy with something;” and emigres and those who have moved abroad are a good target in that regard.

            And third, some members of the Putin elite suffer from an intensifying “fear of the future,” even though Sonin argues, this fear which has to do with the isolation of Russia is “largely unfounded” but “fear – even when irrational – is a powerful force” – and so fears that the departure of Russian is a sign that Russia has been cut off from the West are real.

            Consequently, the Kremlin’s current obsession with emigres and those who have relocated abroad is likely to continue and perhaps even intensify given its problems in Ukraine and at home, highlighting along with everything else the paranoia and lack of good judgment currently at the top of the Russian political system.