18 Comments
Sep 28, 2022·edited Sep 28, 2022

It just looks that Russians themselves don't want to die in the war but otherwise supported it.

I am reading vk.com and generally there was 1 post or comment against the war in Ukraine for every 10 or 20 posts pro-war.

Now the ratio is 1 post against the draft versus 1 post pro-draft.

You see the change? Russians mostly supported the war and those few people who were ready to protest against the war were simply overwhelmed and suppressed by those who supported it. Some people live in bubble where they see that everybody around them thinks similarly to them but that doesn't seem to be the whole reality in Russia.

I am not convinced about the resistance against covid restrictions in Russia. Russia had its own share of lockdowns and restrictions. It wasn't as free as Sweden. It avoided some most stupid ones like vaccine mandates. But the UK also didn't have vaccine mandates. Was it due to people actively resisting? Possibly, but I don't think you had something so active as Canadian convoy in Spring 2022. It can rather be explained that the authorities were not really very eager to introduce those measures in the first place. When they encountered even lukewarm resistance, they gave up because vaccine mandates were not effective at all.

Look, Russia had abysmal vaccination rates among elderly (the only measure that really mattered). That shows the failure of public health institutions. The UK (no mandates) and Canada (strong mandates) both had very good vaccine coverage among elderly – which shows that regardless of mandates, it is possible to ensure high vaccination uptake among risk groups. Russia doesn't have that and mandates wouldn't have helped anyway. No wonder authorities gave up so quickly even with a moderate resistence to those measures.

Expand full comment

The resistance of Russians seem to be little more than passive-aggressive behavior, making initiatives more difficult to implement to the point that the people in charge back down. Doubtful that as a rule that kind of resistance particularly scales up.

Too, I wouldn’t underestimate the harm of centuries of powerlessness and lack of agency to create a culture of submission, where there’s no strength to oppose beyond passive-aggressive behavior. Russia has had a culture of individual impotence forever. As always, breaking things -- here, a society and social norms -- is far easier than fixing them, let alone to a point that they’re good as new. Russia has had the former, has yet to experience the latter to any extent that matters.

Too, Prof. Greene’s theory at or around the time of the invasion was that it was motivated less by security concerns and more by economics issues. So query whether that theory is still operative. I believe it still is.

Expand full comment
Oct 4, 2022·edited Oct 4, 2022

"Had I written that article two years later, I could have included the remarkable (if tragic) resistance that Russians put up to the state’s attempts at Covid-19 restrictions, which entirely upended the government’s pandemic response."

"It is early days, but the level of individual resistance is reminiscent of the fight Russians put up against Covid-19 restrictions and may, in and of itself, be enough to sabotage Putin’s draft."

It would seem that the ultimate test of the Russian government’s pandemic response was the level of vaccinations. Russia apparently reached a country wide vaccination rate of 59% (at least one dose). The world average was 68% and the US 80%, this according to Our World in Data. Given that a vaccination mandate was never put into effect by the Russian government (vaccinations were voluntary), a 59% vaccination rate does not necessarily sound like collective resistance and/or government failure, especially since 25% of Russia's total population lives in non-urban areas spread across a vast country.

Expand full comment

Hello everyone from Russia. There are plenty of people who want to go to war. But seems like majority don't want to lose their lives, jobs and close people. A LOT of people go to close countries like Georgia, Kyrgisztan etc. And there are protests here of course. People just don't want to be arrested(it's not like in Europe, where people have rights). Peace

Expand full comment

Your ideas about the Russian people and this war are completely delusional.

Expand full comment