A Fresh Look at Russian Public Opinion on the War in Ukraine

At the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, there were hopes in various quarters for a popular backlash inside Russia against the Kremlin’s unprovoked invasion. Half a year later, grassroots support for the war remains surprisingly resilient. In a new groundbreaking paper “My Country Right or Wrong: Russian Public Opinion on Ukraine,” Andrei Kolesnikov and Denis Volkov explain the underlying currents that drive different segments of Russian public opinion as well as under-appreciated differences with how Russian society reacted to the annexation of Crimea in March 2014.

Moscow-based Carnegie Endowment senior fellow Andrei Kolesnikov and Levada Center director Denis Volkov sit down with Carnegie's Andrew S. Weiss to discuss their latest paper and its implications for Russian society. They will be joined by veteran journalist Nataliya Vasilyeva, the Russia correspondent for the Telegraph.