(2017) The October Revolution swept aside the Provisional Government in the name of dictatorship of the proletariat and a future socialist utopia that never materialized. Putin has never been overly ideological, and he apparently has no great nostalgia for Marxism-Leninism. Yet Lenin and the Bolsheviks committed two cardinal sins that, from Putin’s standpoint, can never be forgiven. First, in March 1918, Lenin agreed to the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk that ended Russia’s involvement in World War I and led to the surrender of Russian territory to Germany. Nothing is more sacred than the unity of (the) Russian state; it dominates the preamble to the 1993 Russian constitution, and Putin has invested his career in promoting political strategies (sovereign democracy, the power vertical) that ensure the integrity of the Russian state. Thus, the 1917 revolution represents the ultimate catastrophe for Putin, since it directly led to the relinquishing of lands that had formed an integral part of the Russian empire. Lenin’s mistake could be overlooked, since he gathered up most of the lost territory during the Russian civil war. Yet Lenin (with a direct assist from Stalin) only compounded his error by building the Soviet Union on the nationality principle. The 1922 Union Treaty, which created the Soviet Union, was signed by four national republics: Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, and the then-called Transcaucasian Federative Republic. While retaining strict central control, the Soviet Union proceeded to establish internal regional boundaries, promote ethnic leaders, and endow its national republics with their own cultural institutions. It even recognized the right of secession from the Soviet Union, a purely theoretical right until it wasn’t.
www.wilsoncenter.org/...
(2014) Fatally, the Ukrainian government has turned to fascist nationalism and heroes in order to forge a post-Soviet, essentially Ukrainian, identity for the post-1991 state.
[...]
When eastern Ukraine rose up, the current Kyiv government, admittedly laboring under significant disabilities of illegitimacy, incompetence, and penury, has experienced immense difficulties in rallying a multi-ethnic Ukrainian nation. It was almost a foregone conclusion that fascist paramilitaries would be called upon to supplement or even replace the wavering regime forces in the field.
[...]
Fascism—and anti-EU sentiment—pervade parts of Europe that never felt Stalin’s wrath. In the last elections for the European Parliament, “eurosceptics” and xenophobic ultra-nationalists scored significant gains, led by Marine Le Pen, whose National Front took 25% of the French seats.
A lot of it has to do with the equivocal track record of globalized neo-liberal capitalism in the last decade. We’re all Pikettyists now, and it seems that among the most important outcomes of neo-liberalism are income inequality and oligarchs.
It is anathema to liberal democrats, but it should be acknowledged that fascism is catching on, largely as a result of a growing perception that neo-liberalism and globalization are failing to deliver the economic and social goods to a lot of people.
Democracy is seen as the plaything of oligarchs who manipulate the current system to secure and expand their wealth and power; liberal constitutions with their guarantees of minority rights appear to be recipes for national impotence. Transnational free markets in capital and goods breed local austerity, unemployment, and poverty. Democratic governments seem to follow the free market playbook, get into problems they can’t handle, and surrender their sovereignty to committees of Euro-financiers.
Fascism, with its exaltation of the particular, the emotional, and the undemocratic provides an impregnable ideological and political bulwark against these outside forces.
www.counterpunch.org/…