The force that the German philosopher called “resentment” forces the Russian autocrat to wage endless war.
Resentment is one of the most powerful human motivators. If you have ever been humiliated, it is possible that you will carry this insult forever. It can affect the way you interact with others in your daily life, as well as your politics and views of the world. During the Russian war against Ukraine, this can explain a lot about the behavior of Russians and even President Vladimir Putin himself.
Journalist Andreas Kluth writes about this in an article for Bloomberg, adding that this is, at least, the opinion of Russian sociologist Grigory Yudin, who was one of the few who predicted Putin's unprovoked attack against Ukraine in February 2022. Yudin is convinced that many Russians are connected to their leader on a psychological level, because they are equally “drowning in resentment, a terrible, endless resentment.”
Such a psychological universe of bitterness and discontent forces Putin and his Russian supporters not show any interest in productive and positive relations with other countries. Yudin explains that in this Putin and the Russians can resemble “a child who is so deeply offended that he harms everyone around him.”
“The damage is getting bigger and bigger, and at a certain point he starts destroying the lives of others and his own,” the Russian sociologist explains.
Where did this insult come from? Kluth writes that much has already been said about the fall of the USSR, which many Russians perceived as a humiliation. Putin called this event “the greatest political tragedy of the 20th century.” Literally in one day, the supervillage in which the Russians lived became barely a developing country. Yudin emphasizes: the worst thing was that the USA and Europe or the West began to make efforts to include Russia in international institutions and help it to achieve prosperity. But the Russians, including Putin, took it as if they were being “reprimanded.” Nobody likes to be lectured, especially if you consider yourself a great power. The result is even more humiliation.
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This humiliation was allowed to fester and worsened as Russia failed to achieve economic prosperity. And the countries that were once in Moscow's orbit began to join NATO and the EU, getting closer to the West. In Putin's mind, if Ukraine also went that far, the shame for Russia would be unbearable. So, like the child in Judah's analogy, he began to destroy.
If resentment of the West, and especially the United States, is the driving force behind Putin, then many things that seem illogical can make some sense. For example, the blurred and sometimes frankly whimsical goals of the Russian war. Putin claimed that he approved the invasion because supposedly ethnic Russians were under threat in Ukraine (this is not the case), because Ukrainians are supposedly Nazis and Satanists, and puppets of the real enemy in Washington. The shared resentment of the leader and his subjects may also explain why so many Russians still support Putin, despite the disasters he has wrought. Qualitative surveys cannot be conducted in dictatorships. But the researcher of the Belgian analytical center Egmont Juris Van Bladel delved into the numbers and reached three conclusions.
First, the invasion of Ukraine appears to have boosted Putin's popularity at home. Three out of every four Russians approve of his leadership. Second, the war helps Putin, not harms him. It is beneficial for the survival of his regime. And thirdly, the largest group of Russians are those who do not support, but do not oppose the war either. In Russia, there are 35-40% of “adjusters” who will accept any of Putin's statements, the most important of which is that the war against Ukraine is part of the apocalyptic struggle against the West.
Yudin is not the first thinker to identify the image as an influential force in history. The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche believed the same. He believed that “resentment” (he used the French word ressentiment in his German writings) provided the creative energy that gave rise to ethical systems such as Christianity. Nietzsche argued that in morally pure cultures such as ancient Rome, people called “good” anything that was strong, healthy, powerful, noble, or beautiful. They considered everything weak, sick, ordinary or ugly to be “bad” (though not yet “evil”). The masses who fell under this description felt humiliated. So they have the same terrible and endless resentment that Yudin talks about.
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At the heart of this feeling is the thirst for revenge and at the same time disappointment in it. The answer may be a maneuver that Nietzsche called a “revaluation of values.” Finding strength in numbers, the offended simply turn reality upside down. Everything that was strong or noble is recognized as sinful. What was weak becomes virtuous. Also, a new concept appears – evil, they say, “it's not our fault, it's all theirs.” A Bloomberg columnist notes that Nietzsche and Yudin use the term “offense” slightly differently. But at the same time, their definitions are surprisingly similar. Putin and his propaganda machine are also doing their best to “reassess values”, turning reality upside down. They call Ukrainian heroes who defend their country “Nazis-Satanists”. Russia's unprovoked and genocidal aggression became apocalyptic self-defense against the hostile West. Offenders become victims and vice versa.
Kluth admits that resentment as a motive is a human phenomenon, not a purely Russian one. In the USA, Germany, Brazil, Israel or any other country, you can take a closer look at local populists, regardless of whether they are right or left.
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In fact, populism is a political style that appeals not to hopes and ideals, but to images, trying to mobilize crowds in pursuit of personal power.
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“The truth is that resentment is one of the most powerful emotions. And it often overcomes hopes and ideals. The consequences are quite terrible. One of them is that the Russian war against Ukraine and the West will not end as long as Putin is in power,” the columnist writes.
