Double-talk: Russia’s Variable Ideology

Russia occupies a unique position in the contemporary global order, simultaneously presenting itself as the defender of Western civilisation to the far right and as an opponent of Western civilisation to the Global South. This ideological dualism is strategically anchored in a shared adversary: liberalism. Russia frames liberalism as a source of moral decay for Western conservative audiences, and as a tool of neocolonial domination for the Global South. Moscow deploys modular ideological messaging across geopolitical and affective registers, operating as a flexible interlocutor in a post-liberal world to generate discontent and facilitate ideological realignment that discards the centrality of liberalism.