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The article explores the evolving nature of Russian sabotage operations, highlighting the influence of the 'gig economy' in recruitment and attack methods, and the need for intelligence agencies to adapt their responses. Topics include Russian sabotage tactics, intelligence agency collaboration, and the impact of AI on geopolitics and conflict.

The political position of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation is influenced by a wide range of powers of the head of state. The purpose of the article was to analyse the political position of the Federal Assembly in Russia. The main research problem concerns the question: to what extent the strong political position of the head of state in Russian Federation deprives the parliament of political significance? The main hypothesis is that a wide range of powers of the president in Russia contributes to the large reduction of political position of the parliament depriving it of political significance in the system of the highest state authorities. A theoretical approach to the category of depriving parliament of the political significance and analysis of the interactions between the head of state and the parliament allow us to resolve a research problem. It is worth mentioning that the issue of the political system of the Russian Federation and the constitutional principles of state functioning has been repeatedly raised by Polish and foreign researchers. Within the framework of a short article, it is impossible to name all the researchers and refer to the presented findings. However, to mention only a few, among others, these were Aslund (2007), Bartnicki (2007), Bäcker (2007), Czajowski (2001), Holzer & Balik (2009), Szewcowa (1999), Stelmach (2003), Skrzypek (2014), Słowikowski (2018), Zieliński (1995, 2005), and Zaleśny ( 2010, 2012). Taking into account the research problem posed and the fact that the subject of the research was the systemic position of the Russian parliament and to determine whether and to what extent measures have been taken in Russia to deprive it of its political significance by operationalizing a new category, this translated into the process of narrowing the scope and making a selection of sources. Therefore, the authors, using the method of content analysis, focused mainly on primary sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Authoritarian regimes such as Russia and China are skillfully puffing themselves up to appear more economically, politically, and militarily powerful than they actually are—in particular, by presenting an outsized image of their ability to influence the politics of other countries. The success of this "authoritarian inflation" is clearly visible in Europe, the United States, and beyond. Distorted perceptions of authoritarian potency damage democratic confidence and help Russia and China to exert real influence, which turn undermines Western values and institutions. If left unchallenged, these false perceptions will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contributes to the research on diasporic and migrant communities' engagement the democratisation of their home countries. It focuses on the case of the most recent wave of political emigration from Russia that has taken place during President Putin's third term. It confirms the thesis that emigration, particularly forced emigration, whereby political dissidents are squeezed out from their country by the authorities in hopes of calming simmering political protest, has stopped being the safety valve it once was. Drawing on Levitt's seminal work on social remittances, it analyses the content and channels of political remittances by recent Russian emigrants. In terms of the democratic remittances' content, six main broadly defined thematic areas of mobilisation can be distinguished: free and fair elections; human rights and civil freedoms; fighting corruption; environmental protection; anti-war activities; counteracting Russian propaganda and the 'hybrid war'. The channels of these democratic remittances are divided into direct (activities targeted at the Russian society) and indirect ones (targeted at Russian diaspora and political elites and society in the receiving countries). It draws the attention to immeasurable political remittances, those which cannot be easily assessed, yet undeniably impact the country of origin and its society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Russian government has claimed that the Western powers promised at the end of the Cold War not to expand NATO, but later reneged on that promise. Most former officials in the West, and many scholars as well, have denied that this was the case; but other scholars, along with a handful of former officials, believe that promises to that effect were, in fact, made in 1990. So who is right? The question still has political importance: how it is answered has bearing on how we should feel about NATO expansion and, indeed, about the United States' post–Cold War policy more generally. So it makes sense to stand back and try to see where the truth lies. An examination of the debate in light of the evidence—especially evidence that the participants themselves have presented—leads to the conclusion that the Russian allegations are by no means baseless, which affects how the U.S.-Russian relationship today is to be understood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the system of presidential appointments of regional governors, which existed in Russia from 2005 to 2012, gubernatorial loyalty to the central government and particularly governors' ability to deliver satisfactory results to the ruling party in national-level elections were crucial to their likelihood of being reappointed to the next term. In this paper, we argue that governors, anticipating the relationship between loyalty and reappointments, attempted to deliver additional votes to the ruling party, and show that those attempts were subject to regional political cycles. Exploiting variation in the starting and expiry dates of Russian regional governors' terms of office, we find that the winning margins for a pro-government party across Russian regions in national-level elections held between 2007 and 2012 were substantially higher when elections were closer to the beginning or to the expiration of a regional governor's term. The effect is driven almost exclusively by the governors serving their first terms. However, for elections held between 1999 and 2004, when governors were subject to direct votes by regional constituencies, no similar effect is found. The results can be explained by, e.g., first impression and recency biases in appointment decisions. We then implement several exercises to identify the sources of the additional votes for the ruling party and demonstrate that governors, while unlikely committing electoral fraud, likely exerted effort to stimulate turnout among ruling party supporters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Russian authoritarian regime is not necessarily immoral, but its morality shares characteristics with that of street gangsters—and aristocrats. As argued in this article, there are two competing moral orders in Russia—the culture of honor and the culture of dignity. The article presents the readers with a case study of General Viktor Zolotov's challenge of the leader of the liberal opposition Aleksei Naval'nyi to a duel in September 2018. Seen through an analytical lens, this seemingly absurd speech act and its reception reveal the extremes in the spectrum spanning from the ideal-typical culture of honor to the ideal-typical culture of dignity, both of which are present in Russia today. The study points to the hidden reasons behind the failure of the rivals and their respective supporters to engage in a real mutual debate—each side employs moral arguments that make sense only within its respective moral order. The Russian public is divided, not only by political views, interests, class, or even values but also by morality. If we are to understand the Russian regime's behavior internationally and domestically, it is important to recognize this rupture. After all, even the military and security service officials in the ruling elite, the author argues, to a degree share the moral culture of criminal groups but are strangers to the law-based moral culture of the liberal urban middle class—and vice versa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the history of and current relations (as of 2019) between Russia and Lebanon. Topics discussed include business deals between the Russian natural gas producer Novatek and the Lebanese government, the substantial Christian community in Lebanon and the network of religious and secular organizations formed to lobby for Moscow's interests in Lebanon by President Vladimir Putin. The author reports that Russia's growing influence in the country is worrying to some Lebanese politicians. The political and social climate in Syria is also examined.

Discusses the political condition in Russia in the year 2000. Cooperation between the executive and legislative branch of the government of Russia; Information on the political parties in Russia; Leaders of the major political movements of Russia.

The author asserts that the Russian state is incoherent and that the increasing authoritarian government should not repeat the mistakes of the old Soviet Union. Topics discussed include the rise of bureaucracy in the elite class, forms of resistance from Russians although they do not actively protest, and parallel processes that make an incoherent Russian state including the government's withdrawal from its social protector role, state paternalism and the exploitation of ordinary people.

This article explores protest tactics in Russian cities, stressing the liminality of spatial contestation practices. In this authoritarian context, spatial contestation typically has a liminal character, where citizens employ strategic ambiguity of their actions vis‐á‐vis (a) legal regulations, (b) official discourse, and (c) transcripts of legitimate behaviour. Showing how urbanites develop creative and subversive infrapolitical forms of resistance, the article contributes an analysis of the ways in which public space in the city can be appropriated from below, temporary protest communities formed and active citizenship claimed under non‐democratic regime conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How to cope with the end of utopia? How to move from making history on a day-to-day basis to capitalizing on a legend? That is the dilemma Russian veterans of the Donbas insurgency have faced since the exalting atmosphere of Novorossiya faded away. In this article, I trace the transformations of the Novorossiya utopia from the point at which Russian volunteer fighters began to return to Russia and found themselves compelled to reinvent themselves in a new context. I first look at the difficult reconversion from war to politics of Donbas heroes such as Igor Strelkov and Aleksandr Borodai and how their efforts to launch new structures based on their war legitimacy have succeeded or failed. I then turn to investigate the birth of new heroes, such as the writer Zakhar Prilepin, who wave the metaphorical flag of Donbas at a time when exaltation of the war has declined. After that, I explore how Novorossiya has become a literature genre that occupies the shelves of Russian bookstores, spanning from Novorossievedenie —the "science of Novorossiya"—to the rich subgenre of war memoirs and veteran diaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the symbolic politics of three pro-state movements that emerged from the "preventive counterrevolution" launched by the Kremlin in response to Ukraine's Orange Revolution. In 2005, youth movement Nashi played upon war memory at its rallies and branded the opposition "fascist"; in 2012, the Anti-Orange Committee countered opposition protests with mass gatherings at Moscow's war commemoration sites; in 2015, Antimaidan brought thousands onto Russia's streets to denounce US-backed regime change and alleged neo-Nazism in Kiev. I show how evocation of the enemy image, through reference to the war experience, played a key role in the symbolism of the preventive counterrevolution. Interviews with activists in these movements discussing their symbolic politics reveal an opposing victim/victor narrative based on an interplay of two World War II myths—the "Great Victory" and the "fascist threat." Moving beyond approaches that view the Soviet and Russian World War II cult as a triumphalist narrative of the Great Victory over fascism, I conclude that its threat component is an understudied element. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]