Exiled Russian Philosopher Ivan Ilyin Is Really “Putin’s Brain”

But few look into what drives his behavior, what influences him, and what books he has read. Most point to Aleksandr Dugin as “Putin’s brain,” but Dugin is the obvious low-hanging fruit and more of a jingoistic cheerleader than a philosopher who drives Putin’s thinking.

I have researched and written about who Putin should have read. War correspondents and novelists such as Vasily Grossman (one of my favorite all-time Russian writers) and Isaac Babel, another author who stands the test of time, would be ideal for Putin to study. They remain esteemed in the Soviet-era literary canon. If Putin had read these scribes, he may have reconsidered warfare as a tool of geopolitical might.

One Russian philosopher I have considered for further research is Ivan Ilyin. I have been familiar with Ilyin for years, but it wasn’t until I read a splendid book by Marzio G. Mian called Volga Blues: A Journey into the Heart of Russia that I became intrigued even more about who I believe is Putin’s greatest influence—a thinker who undergirds Putinism like no other.

Sneaking Past Russian Censors

A short aside is in order about Mian’s work. Even though no foreign journalists are allowed in Russia, Mian, through one of the most intrepid works of research in recent years, managed to enter the country and interview ordinary Russians about life in the Volga regions. Some of these interviewees even criticized the war against Ukraine, which is unheard of for a native Russian to declare on the printed pages written by a Westerner.

Mian, an Italian journalist and author, told the government apparatchiks a half-truth: he was in Russia to conduct only historical research and not collect ruminations on current events. Since his books are in Italian, the Russian authorities didn’t predict that Mian could interview so many interesting and opinionated people, candid citizens who would make Putin quake with anger if he knew they could speak freely about the problems of Russian society and articulate their dislike of the current war.

He not only got into the country without being detained, but he produced a book that is one of the most interesting exposés on what some Russians are feeling and thinking. What really caught my eye in Mian’s book is his entry about Ilyin, whom I have been trying to understand for so long.

Who Is Ivan Ilyin?

Ivan Aleksandrovich Ilyin was born in Moscow in 1883. The Ilyins were Russian nobility and Ivan’s father was a lawyer. Ilyin attended Moscow University in 1901 to study law like his dad. The younger Ilyin became something of a student radical during a tumultuous time, but he graduated in 1906 without invoking the ire of the Tsar.

Ilyin married well to a woman who was also the child of an attorney. She was intelligent, well-read, and inspired Ilyin to explore intellectual topics. Her husband was on his way to an uncontroversial career—until he started publishing. Ilyin was an acolyte of Hegel and focused his time on that philosopher. Ilyin’s problem was that he was not seen as leftist enough to remain in post-revolutionary Russia. He was expelled by the Bolsheviks in 1922 and made his way to Berlin, where he would remain until 1938.

Ilyin was prolific and believed that he was still beholden to a Russian patriotic ideal. He thought that Russia under Lenin and Stalin was becoming too anti-Christian.

“After losing our ties to God and Christian tradition,” Ilyin wrote in Putin’s favorite passage, “Russia was morally blinded, seized by materialism and nihilism . . . To overcome the global moral crisis, we must return to eternal moral values: faith, love, conscience, family, homeland, and nation, but especially faith and love.”

This quote seems innocuous, but it led Putin to look even deeper into Russian mysticism and the religious fervor of Ilyin.

“The day will come,” Ilyin predicted, “when Russia will rise from its disintegration and humiliation and begin a new era of development and greatness.”

These words are classic Putinism, and one can see how the dictator would be enamored with the exiled jurist.

Mian pointed out how Ilyin believed that the Russian people are the “nucleus of everything that is Eurasian and, therefore, of universal balance.”

This was heady stuff, and Putin was likely in a rapturous state upon his first reading of Ilyin. In the 1950s, Ilyin predicted that the Soviet Union would collapse. He wanted the Russian people to avoid inspiration from the West and thought that ethnic Russians should “purify” their brains.

If this sounds like a Putin speech, you would not be mistaken. As Mian pointed out, “Ilyin’s remains were repatriated from Switzerland in 2005 and interred at the Donskoy Monastery in Moscow.” I would not be surprised if Putin visited the site on numerous occasions.

Thus, Ilyin and Putin are now in lockstep.  and Ilyin has strongly influenced Putin’s  actions as Russia’s supreme leader and modern-day Tsar.

Specific Russian Public Policy Inspired by Ilyin

Ilyin has clearly influenced Russian foreign and domestic policy. Look no further than the concept of Russkiy Mir or “Russian World.” Russkiy Mir is the belief that the Putin-led nation-state should have more impact in the former Soviet republics and satellites of the old Warsaw Pact. It encompasses the belief in the primacy and exceptionalism of Russian language, culture, and borders. This ideology is set against Western liberal values, which t are believed to be corrupt and decadent. Putin wants to recruit anyone who is attracted to the Russian ideal and who speaks and thinks in Russian. This also explains why Putin is enamored with the Russian Orthodox Church. Some of the following policies associated with the Ilyin underpinnings of Russkiy Mir are prevalent.

●      Passportization. This is a fast-track program for those with Russian cultural inclinations and traits to obtain a passport for Russian citizenship. The naturalization process is made easier and streamlined. The idea is to “Russify” Ukrainians and other people in the post-Soviet space to add more citizens who identify with a high level of “Russian-ness.”

●      Linguistic Promotion. This is a key aspect of Russian soft power to make sure more people are speaking the Russian language and to encourage those who would then want to receive a passport or become a naturalized citizen. The linguistic promotion allows more people to become familiar with Russian nationalist propaganda and the benevolence of Putin.

●      Global use of propaganda media channels. RT (formerly Russia Today, the staterun television broadcaster) is the prime example. It continues to expand around the world, and the media behemoth even broadcasts into Africa and Latin America. RT is disseminated to the developing world by Telegram and Rumble. There is RT Spanish and broadcasts out of Algeria. RT may reach as many as 900 million TV viewers in more than 100 countries.

●      Deployment of Russian military personnel. The obvious troop presence is in Ukraine, but there are many other combatants from Russia stationed around the world. “Russia now has some form of permanent or recurring military presence in Syria, South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, Transnistria, Venezuela, the Central African Republic, Libya, Egypt, and Sudan,” according to the New Lines Institute.

●      Birth promotion and pronatalist policies. Russia is paying young women to have babies. In some parts of the country, a new birth allows a family to receive up to 100,000 roubles (around $1,300). Russia’s birthrate is declining, and Putin wants his countrymen to have large families to boost demographic strength.

●      Agriculture leadership. Putin wants Russia to replace Ukraine as the breadbasket of Eurasia. Russia is the world’s top wheat exporter. The country is also a leader in the region for its milk and meat production.

I mentioned Aleksandr Dugin previously, and he deserves a broader explanation that could justify how he rivals Ilyin for purported influence in the Kremlin. Russia analysts are divided on the role of Dugin and his effect on Russian policies. Dugin’s neo-Eurasianism is popular with many Russians, and he is quotable and loquacious. Political philosophy expert Michael Millerman wrote Inside “Putin’s Brain” and believes that Dugin is highly influential with the Russian dictator.

Think tank researcher Andreas Umland, writing in the Moscow Times, disagrees. “Dugin is neither a philosopher of intellectual novelty nor an ideologue with direct access to the Kremlin,” Umland wrote.

While Dugin can articulate the belief that the West is corrupt and that Russia should be robust and grow stronger as a global hegemon, Umland is skeptical. “This verbal alignment is real, yet not sufficient enough to claim there is a straightforward causality between Duginist ideas and Putinist policies,” Umland explained.

How much further will Putin go in his pursuit of Ilyin’s view of Russia and its role in the world? Putin certainly makes no move that does not honor Russian cultural chauvinism, and his view of a conservative, anti-pluralistic, and anti-individualist state remains paramount. There are no other dissidents in Russia for Putin to crack down on, so we need more books like Mian’s to explore the real Russian conscience rather than Ilyin’s mystical and ultraorthodox views about Russian culture.

We can only hope that someday Putin picks up a copy of Grossman’s Life and Fate or Babel’s Red Cavalry to catch some semblance of anti-war sentiment until the conflict in Ukraine finally ends with a just and lasting peace.

Featured Image: The mural depicts the images of Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin and Vladimir Putin, with their eyes covered by the inscription "no more time", meaning "never again" / "time is up". December 2022
Featured Image Credit: Dawpry, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

In-text Image: Kremlin.ru, CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons