Publication details
Ruský imperialismus. Umění, věda a náboženství ve službách režimů (1801–2023)
| Title in English | Russian imperialism. Art, Science and Religion in the Service of Regimes (1801-2023) |
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| Authors | |
| Year of publication | 2023 |
| Type | Monograph |
| Citation | |
| Description | Vladimir Putin regularly uses the past to defend his imperialist policies. He presents Russia as an empire that needs to be restored to its former glory and "original" territory. But what is the history of Russian imperialism? This book shows how Russia's ruling elites have used architecture, images and science to repeatedly 're-create' the story of empire over the past two centuries. The history they have invoked, however, has been largely fabricated. Central to it was the Byzantine Empire, whose succession and territory Russia claimed. The ideologues of Russian imperialism found a bridge between the medieval past and the present in Orthodoxy. And paradoxically, the same story served very different regimes: the last Romanovs, Stalin, and now Putin. The crucial question is whether this story, repeatedly distorted by propaganda, corresponds to reality. And what does it actually tell us about Russia itself? |