Russians and Ukrainians Increasingly Divided in Their Assessment of Stalin, Levada Center Reports

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 25 – Ever more Russians over the last 15 years have had a positive assessment of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, while among Ukrainians, attitudes toward the Soviet dictator have deteriorated sharply from an already low point to an even more negative one since Putin launched his expanded war there in 2022, according to Levada Center surveys.

            Last month, the independent Russian polling agency said, slightly more than half of Russians surveyed said they had a positive attitude toward Stalin, about a quarter were indifferent to him and about a tenth were negative (levada.ru/2026/08/25/otnoshenie-k-figure-stalina-v-iyule-2026-goda/).

            The share of Russians expressing a positive attitude toward Stalin has been increasing since the 1990s and reached its highest level in recent times in 2023. Ukrainian attitudes toward Stalin were never as positive as those of Russians, but since 2022, they have plummeted. Now only three percent of Ukrainians say they view him positively.

            Because of the terror famine Stalin conducted in Ukraine and his repressions of Ukrainians more generally, he has never been popular there; but the new polls show that Putin’s action in Ukraine has deepened the divide between Russians and Ukrainians on this question as well as on so many others.

            And that in turn suggests that if and when Putin’s war there ends, it will be far more difficult for Russians and Ukrainians to view each other in positive ways, especially given how central Putin has made Stalin and his role in World War II in the construction of present-day Russian identity.