PUTINISM AS A CONFLICTING FACTOR OF WORLD IMPORTANCE AND THE UKRAINIAN SPECIFICITY OF ITS MANIFESTATIONS

In: Ukrai͏̈noznavčyj alʹmanach, Heft 24, S. 114-118

Abstract

The specificity of Putinism as a phenomenon of the modern age is analyzed in this article. It is emphasized that the analysis of Putinism as a phenomenon and as a process is of theoretical and practical importance for contemporary Ukrainian and the world at whole. This is due to a variety of reasons. The most serious of these is the real threat of the Third World War as a result of the redistribution of borders and zones of influence that can be unleashed by the Putin regime, provoking global conflict. Attention is drawn to the term "Putinism" of scientific significance. It is stated that several years ago, the scientific environment of Ukraine and abroad debated whether it was possible to use the term "Putinism" in scientific texts, or whether it was just a popular journalistic cliché. This term was first used in 2000 by Andrei Piontkovsky, defining "Putinism as the highest stage of bandit capital in Russia" in the eponymous article. At the same time, journalist Richard Gwynn started using it in English. Today there is already a corpus of scientific texts that proves the validity of the use of this concept in scientific analytics, as one that describes a really existing phenomenon. Attention is drawn to the differences in the interpretation of this concept in English, Ukrainian and Russian segments of Wikipedia. Sources that look at the phenomenon of Putinism from the exact opposite are used. It is argued that today, Putinism must be regarded as a phenomenon of global importance, the specificity of which is the desire for world domination. Special attention is paid to the role of Ukraine and the plans of the Kremlin neo-empire to destruction of Ukrainian independence and authenticity. It is concluded that Putinism today has become a conflicting factor of world importance, the most pressing challenge for the West and the most serious threat to sovereign Ukraine.