Following the Path of Ozymandias
Journal: Russia in Global Affairs
Year: 2022

By the end of the second decade of the 21st century, the Russian foreign policy discourse had transformed from hard-headed "sober realism" into bizarre "values-obsessed realism." The texts of Russia's official strategies now appeal to such aspects of political identity as "spiritual values," "cultural (civilizational) code," "historical truth," etc. Such appeals, coupled with almost eschatological rhetoric, are not uncommon in official speeches of the country's political leadership. But this shi