Sharon Werning Rivera, the Sidney Wertimer Professor of Government, recently authored an article titled “The Views of Russian Elites on Military Intervention Abroad.” The piece was published as part of a special issue of the Russian Analytical Digest (RAD) devoted to explaining the “Ideological and Conspiratorial Underpinnings of Russia’s War Against Ukraine.”
The article analyzes trends from a unique dataset extending from 1993 to 2020, the Survey of Russian Elites (SRE), and shows that highly placed Russians exhibit a nuanced combination of views on issues pertinent to the ongoing war in Ukraine. Rivera says that although overall approval of the use of Russia’s military outside its borders is shown to be much higher in 2020 than it was in the early 2000s, support for the unification of Ukraine with Russia is weak, as is approval of military adventurism that comes at the expense of domestic improvements.
Rivera is the principal investigator of the SRE. The project spanning more than two decades is on deposit with the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research at the University of Michigan.
