Beyond Crimea: The New Russian Empire

Meanwhile, before the compatriots could be turned into Russian citizens by the methods used in Georgia’s South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Moldova’s Transnistria, and Ukraine’s Crimea, the question of how to define and assist them still remained. In June 2000 Putin approved a new document, “The Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation”—the first foreign policy document where compatriots were explicitly mentioned. It stated that “the Russian Federation will seek to obtain adequate guarantees for the rights and freedoms of compatriots in states where they permanently reside and to maintain and develop comprehensive ties with them and their organizations.”⁷⁶ Two months later a clearer definition of compatriots was finally offered. In August 2001, the “Concept of Support to Compatriots Abroad by the Russian Federation in the Current Period” was released. For the first time ever, the definition of compatriots did not evoke the Soviet Union, and thus former Soviet citizens or their descendants were no longer conceptualized as compatriots. Furthermore, compatriots did not need to be former citizens of Russia or their descendants. Instead, the focus was solely on having some connection to Russia, as compatriots were defined as “constantly living abroad, but having historical, ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and spiritual ties with Russia, trying to preserve their Russian authenticity and having a need to maintain contacts and cooperation with Russia.”⁷⁷ Again, the definition was broad and malleable thanks to the deployment of fluid and abstract concepts such as cultural or spiritual connections to Russia. Though the new definition was somewhat narrower due to the exclusion of citizens of the Soviet Union, it included a much broader group of people than solely ethnic Russians or Russian speakers abroad and seemingly evoked the peoples of the historic Russian empire.

Table 2

Compatriot Policy Documents under Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev, 2000–2014