Putin’s war and a world in crisis: Beyond democracies and autocracies
Putin’s war and a world in crisis: Beyond democracies and autocracies
WRITTEN BY EVA SEIWERT
12 January 2023
On 24 February 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin started a large-scale war of aggression on Ukraine, making this the most egregious example of territorial conquest in Europe since World War II. As much as the European Union’s (EU) unusually quick and unified reaction took observers by surprise, many Europeans seemed taken aback by the lack of unity on the international level to act against Moscow’s aggression. Western governments quickly framed the conflict as one between democracies and autocracies, while Russia propagated the narrative of ‘the West against the Rest’. Neither of these framings is correct or helpful. However, considering their persistence throughout 2022, a closer look at the origins of these narratives reveals some important lessons as the war moves into its second year.
The problem with the framing 'democracies vs autocracies’
Following the invasion, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) convened an “emergency special session” — of which only ten have taken place since 1950 — and passed its first non-binding resolution on Russia’s aggression in Ukraine. Four more resolutions followed by mid-November. The EU also imposed unprecedented sanctions against Moscow, including bans on Russian oil and SWIFT financial transactions. While several non-EU countries joined the sanctions, many others did not.
At first sight, the framing of the conflict as one between democracies and autocracies seems reasonable, considering who has been standing on Putin’s side. Besides Russia, Belarus, North Korea, and Syria are the three countries that voted against all five UNGA resolutions (Nicaragua and Eritrea rejected at least two of them). Iran has been providing Moscow with drones and China has increased bilateral trade, thereby making sure its sanctions-hit partner does not become too economically isolated.
However, it would be wrong to assume that only the ‘usual suspects’ challenging the ‘rules-based international order’ have been unwilling to condemn Russia’s aggressions. Many democracies in the Global South have chosen not to take a stance during UNGA votes and equally refrained from joining sanctions. Among the most prominent has been the “world’s largest democracy”, India. While the US views India as a partner with “shared values”, New Delhi does not openly oppose Putin’s war. Other countries not commonly treated as members of the ‘autocracy camp’ — such as Brazil, Indonesia, South Africa, and Sri Lanka — have similarly refrained from taking a clear stance.
The EU and allies should scrap the framing of ‘democracies vs autocracies’ not just with regard to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, but also when speaking about China’s increase in power.
Thus, several observers have noted that it is not a state’s governmental system that determines its response to Russia’s war. Rather, countries’ historic experiences as part of the so-called West or the so-called Global South seem to play an important role, along with economic and strategic considerations. Therefore, the West’s framing of Putin’s war as a struggle between democracies and autocracies is incorrect and unhelpful.
The West’s image in crisis
However, this does not mean that Putin’s narrative of ‘the West against the Rest’ is any more correct. While several countries are choosing to remain neutral in the war, many of them emphasise that this should not be understood as an automatic condoning of Russia’s actions. Rather, they simply do not want to become involved in a conflict they do not see themselves as having a stake in.
Many of those ‘neutral’ governments have been members of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which, during the Cold War, brought together over 100 countries that tried to remain neutral in the conflict between East and West. NAM members share a strong emphasis on the principles of non-interference and peaceful coexistence of nations. Given Western states’ — above all the United States’ — history of intervening in other countries, however, it seems that the NAM countries’ neutral stance on Russia also partly “stems from the persistence of the ideological legacy of anti-Americanism from the Cold War and a wariness about U.S. influence rooted in U.S. actions since 1991”.
The West indeed has a serious image problem, for which it is mainly responsible itself. For example, some commentators have drawn parallels between Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the United States entering Iraq in 2003 — an invasion that severely harmed the credibility of the world’s most powerful state. Western countries’ alleged “vaccine nationalism” and lack of willingness to take on their historical responsibilities in the fight against climate change are two further indications of what many perceive as Western hypocrisy and selfishness. Comparisons of Europe’s treatment of Ukrainian refugees on the one hand, and refugees from Syria, Afghanistan, and African countries on the other, only aggravate Europe’s image in the world.
Both Moscow and Beijing use this to their advantage by regularly referring to Western double standards when justifying their own violations of international law. With the shared criticism of Western hypocrisy as a basis, Russia and China can quite easily push their anti-West narratives. As Putin’s war in Ukraine has gone on, Moscow has been successful in pushing its narrative of the war outside — and even inside — Europe. The large exposure of Russian and Chinese media outlets in the Arab World, Africa, and Latin America has made it possible for them to share their propaganda widely, including their narrative on who is to blame for the international food and energy crisis.
At this point, it is important to emphasise that the UNGA has “resoundingly rebuked Russia for its invasion of Ukraine and unwarranted and egregious violations of UN norms” in each of its five resolutions on the war. In other words, the overwhelming majority of the 193 UN member states — both Western and non-Western — are more united on this issue than on most others. The blatant violations of the UN Charter and international law, as well as the suffering of civilians — not their respective positions on the West — are the main reasons most countries decide to condemn Russia’s war. Still, the fact that 35 or more countries abstained from the resolutions — some of them close partners of Russia but others merely not willing to “take a side” — offers important lessons for the West.
Lessons for the West
With the war soon moving into its second year – and with no end in sight – Western states should make sure to pay enough attention to other countries’ views and apprehensions about the conflict. Insofar as some governments’ neutrality is partly due to their discontent with the international behaviour of Western states, this should get the West thinking. Western states should listen carefully — and respond appropriately — to criticism of their supposed hypocrisy in the Ukraine war and beyond. Even if some arguments may have been instrumentalised by China and Russia for their own purposes, this does not necessarily make them untrue. The EU and allies should scrap the framing of ‘democracies vs autocracies’ not just with regard to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, but also when speaking about China’s increase in power. Such a framing drives away potential partners (such as Vietnam or Kazakhstan) that share the West’s opposition to Russian and/or Chinese supremacy, but do not feel welcome within such a dichotomy.
The practice of inviting countries from the Global South to join meetings that traditionally bring together only countries from the Global North should be upheld and further extended in 2023. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s invitation of Argentina, India, Indonesia, Senegal, and South Africa to join the G7 summit in Schloss Elmau allowed all participants to exchange views and find common ground on the war in Ukraine. This, arguably, made it easier for the G20 — which, amongst others, also includes the G7, Argentina, India, Indonesia, and South Africa — to reach an agreement, and led to the group’s surprisingly strong condemnation of Russia’s war.
The G20 summit declaration is an important sign that Russia’s narrative of the Ukraine war as a conflict between the ‘West and the Rest’ is incorrect. In fact, the declaration’s wording “[t]oday’s era must not be of war” is thought to have been championed by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who first said these words to Putin at a bilateral meeting in September 2022. This “listening to India [as well as other countries] as a major stakeholder in the region” should be upheld and may very well lead to some countries distancing themselves from Moscow, as some argue India is cautiously doing right now. If these lessons are learned well, chances are that more states will gradually give up their neutrality and judge the war first and foremost as a violation of international legal and humanitarian norms, rather than as a facile binary between Western democracies and non-Western autocracies.
DISCLAIMER: All views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent that of the 9DASHLINE.com platform.
Author biography
Dr Eva Seiwert is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow and Lecturer at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg and Managing Editor at 9DASHLINE. She is also an Associate Research Fellow at the OSCE Academy in Bishkek. Eva’s research focuses on China’s international relations, with a particular interest in China-Russia relations and China’s ambitions for the international order. Image credit: kremlin.ru.