“In this important volume Professors Williams, Young, and Launer undertake thorough and comprehensive studies of the rhetorical, argumentative, and media strategies that Vladimir Putin has employed in an attempt to shape Russian identity and to relaunch and rehabilitate the Russian empire. The work deepens our understanding of Russian culture, history, politics, and media systems and helps explain Putin’s goals, resentments, and ambitions. Chapters include foundational theoretical examinations of Russian symbols and key terms and case studies of discourse created to manage public crises and controversies. The volume is of course urgently important today given the war in Ukraine and the open confrontation between Putin’s Russia and the Western democratic alliance.” 

—Thomas Hollihan, University of Southern California 

"Williams, Young, and Launer's third volume is a tour de force in its skillful unpacking of Putin's definitional shifts and reconfiguring of the lexicon of Russian ‘democracy.’ Using the tools of rhetorical criticism and argumentation, the authors offer a compelling case for the ways in which Putin's public discourse both reflects and helps construct the movement from a national identity embracing democratic norms to an increasingly authoritative state."

— J. Robert Cox, Professor Emeritus, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

“This much anticipated third volume of a long-standing collaborative project gathers an expansive and revealing rhetorical archive to provide insight into the discursive forces fueling Russia’s gradual abandonment of the project of liberal democratization. In four sections covering the years between 2000 and 2008, the authors explore the philosophical and political exigencies that shaped President Vladimir Putin’s attitudes toward the West, the rhetorical production of Russian national identity in the transition from Yeltsin to Putin’s leadership, Russia’s evolving communication culture as a structural backdrop for its political development, as well as the reorganization of the county’s foreign policy. In each chapter, the reader encounters consistent effort at historical contextualization, painstaking application of rhetorical and argumentation theory, and an impressive body of primary materials that add up to a forceful explication and critique of Russia's slide toward authoritarianism.” 

David Cratis Williams is recently retired Professor of Communication and Rhetorical Studies at Florida Atlantic University. His scholarship focuses on argumentation, rhetorical theory, and criticism; he is a recognized authority on Kenneth Burke. His work on Russian political discourse began during a meeting in Russia in January 1992.

Marilyn J. Young is the Wayne C. Minnick Professor of Communication Emerita at Florida State University. Her research has focused on political argument with an emphasis on the development of political rhetoric and argument in the former Soviet Union, particularly Russia. She remains an active scholar in retirement.

Michael K. Launer is Professor Emeritus of Russian at Florida State University. In 1987 he interpreted for the first group of Soviet scientists visiting the United States following the Chernobyl nuclear accident. A State Department certified technical interpreter, he supported Nuclear Regulatory Commission and Department of Energy assistance programs through 2012.

Contents

List of Photos

Acknowledgements

Contributors

Note to Readers

Preface

Introduction to Volume Three

Part One: Initial Considerations

1. The Rhetorical Sources of Putin’s Evolving Governance Philosophy

Alexander Panarin

Alexander Dugin, 2017

Alexander Dugin, undated

Lev Gumilev—Passionarity Party

Lev Gumilev and Anna Akhmatova

Statue of Lev Gumilev

2. Strategic Goals Underpinning the Struggle to Maintain a Slavic Majority in Russia:

Putin, Compatriots, and Fellow Countrymen

3. The Sinking of the Kursk: A Soviet Response to a Russian Tragedy

The Kursk Nuclear Submarine

4. The Political Lexicon of Putin the “Democrat”

Part Two: Redefinition of the Russian Nation

The Russian Tricolor

The Russian Coat of Arms

The Russian Armed Forces Flag

5. New/Old Russian Symbols as Arguments for Identity Transformation:

Reviving Ghosts Is a Tricky Business

Vladimir Putin and Boris Yeltsin, 1999

6. Reconstituting the Body Politic: Yeltsin, Putin, and the Struggle

for Russian (Self-)Identity

7. Identification, Division, and Consubstantiality Between:

A Burkean Assessment of Political Transformations in Post-Soviet Russia

8. Russian National Identity as Argument Construction: An Assessment

of Political Transformations in Russia

9. Argumentation, Globalization, and the New Nationalism:

Implications and New Directions

Part Three: “Democracy in Action” or “Democracy Inaction”

10. Argumentation and Education: Preparing Citizens

in Cultures of Democratic Communication

11. Liberty vs. Security in Putin’s “Managed Democracy”: Back to the Future?

12. The Role of Communication in Political Transition: A Review Essay

13. Definition and Political (Un)change: The State of Political Rhetoric

in Putin’s Russia

14. The Authoritarian Turn: Vladimir Putin’s 2005 Presidential Address

to the Federal Assembly

15. Citizen Putin: Presidential Argument and the Invitation

to (Democratic) Citizenship

Part Four: International Relations

Alexei Salmin

16. Foreign Policy Challenges and the Historical “Anchors” of Russian Federation

Foreign Policy after September 11, 2001

Vladimir Putin and George Bush, 2001

Vladimir Putin at the UN

17. Managing “Democracy” in the Age of Terrorism: Putin, Bush,

and Arguments from Definition

Viktor Yushchenko, 2004

Viktor Yanukovich, 2004

18. Presidential Rhetoric on a National and International Scale:

The Ukrainian Presidency through the Lens of Russian and Ukrainian Politics

Vladimir Putin and Robert Gates, 2007

Angela Merkel in Munich, 2007

Robert Gates, John McCain, and Joseph Lieberman with Angela Merkel, 2007

Robert Gates, John McCain, and Joseph Lieberman with Vladimir Putin, 2007

Robert Gates, John McCain, and Joseph Lieberman in Conversation, 2007

19. Rhetorical and Argumentative Strategies in Putin’s 2007 Munich Speech

Afterword

Vladimir Putin and Dmitri Medvedev

Bibliography

Index