Political Science
Unpacking ‘Traditional Values’ in Russia’s Conservative Turn: Gender, Sexuality and the Soviet Legacy
Document Type
Article
Abstract
We argue for analytically separating women’s and LGBTQ+ rights and differentiating the degrees of sexism and LGBTQ-phobia in Russia to better understand its conservative turn in the 2010s. Comparing Putin’s speeches to domestic audiences (1999–2020) with public opinion, we identify a somewhat conservative trend regarding women’s rights and a far more conservative one on LGBTQ+ rights. While Russia made a sharper conservative turn in summer 2021, we find that until 2020, state discourse and public opinion on these topics mostly echoed Soviet approaches, suggesting that the conservative ‘turn’ amounted more to a ‘return’ than to a novel development. © 2023 University of Glasgow.
Publication Title
Europe - Asia Studies
Publication Date
2024
Volume
76
Issue
2
First Page
173
Last Page
197
ISSN
0966-8136
DOI
10.1080/09668136.2023.2215484
Keywords
Russia, politics, LGBTQ+ rights, sexism
Repository Citation
Novitskaya, Alexandra; Sperling, Valerie; McIntosh Sundstrom, Lisa; and Johnson, Janet Elise, "Unpacking ‘Traditional Values’ in Russia’s Conservative Turn: Gender, Sexuality and the Soviet Legacy" (2024). Political Science. 4.
https://commons.clarku.edu/faculty_political_science/4