This article examines Putin’s expectations prior to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and seeks to answer the following question: Why did Russia invade Ukraine regardless of the West’s threats of severe economic penalties raising the cost of an attack? I argue that the confidence in Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine, despite his awareness that the stakes could go well beyond the borders of Ukraine and increase the cost of war for the Kremlin, was based on Putin’s calculations that the West would be reluctant to change or substantially displace established rich-get-richer economic structures and would not apply high costs on the Kremlin for military aggression against Ukraine in case of a successful blitzkrieg campaign. By utilizing an extended deterrence game analysis, the article demonstrates how Russia, Ukraine, and the West interacted in decision-making, taking into account the reactions and choices of the other players, and adds to the current body of knowledge by introducing an expanded approach to deterrence strategy based on economic interdependence and the scale of the anticipated conflict.

Why did Vladimir Putin order the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, despite numerous warnings from Western countries about the consequences of such an action? This article argues that misperceptions about having the upper hand vis-à-vis Western countries, formed and proliferated among the Russian leadership, emboldened the Kremlin to launch the military invasion of Ukraine, assuming that the West would stand down in the face of the attack. Based on a detailed analysis of Russian elites’ discourse through the theoretical lens of interdependence studies, this study demonstrates that Putin miscalculated Western resolve largely because of two key misperceptions. First, Putin’s elites were convinced that the West was asymmetrically dependent on Russia, viewing it as a strategic resource that would tie the hands of Western and EU countries, eventually making them accept the outcome of the war. Second, the Kremlin believed that Ukraine occupied a secondary role in Western interests that would further limit the West’s involvement in the conflict, as it would not risk exposing its dependence on Moscow for the sake of an issue that, in the Kremlin’s eyes, was marginal to European and American security.

The 2022 war in Ukraine has produced the biggest virtual humor archive in the history of wars. We argue that Ukrainian war humor is a form of civic activism in the name of Ukraine’s sovereignty. This civic activism is defined by resistance, solidarity, vigilance, and dedication to victory. The war humor circulates locally as well as on a global stage. It expresses the government’s positions and the people’s voices and empowers those affected by this war. Ukrainian war humor documents experiences of war realities; provides moral commentaries and emotional and aesthetic interpretations; and articulates visions for the future of Ukraine as a sovereign European state.

This article offers a nuanced examination of the complex identity dynamics among the Christian and Muslim communities in Cyprus during the late 19th and early 20th century, particularly in the aftermath of British administration replacing Ottoman rule in 1878. The article draws attention to the profound impact of this historical transition on the identity formation processes of both communities. Despite the shared wartime experience of the First World War, the Christian and Muslim communities in Cyprus failed to construct a cohesive identity rooted in their common geographical space. Drawing on Zygmunt Bauman’s concept of ambivalence, the article explores the complex process by which Cypriot communities sought to align their identity with larger nations, namely Greece and Turkey, rather than grounding it in their local context. The article contends that the genesis of their ambivalence can be traced back to 1878 when British administration replaced Ottoman rule on the island.

This article analyzes the key factors behind the securitization of Ukraine’s small ethnic Hungarian minority in recent years and how they affect local interethnic as well as interstate relations. It draws on elite interviews conducted in the Ukrainian-Hungarian borderland, and other sources including speech acts. Four underlying factors were identified. The first two are Hungary’s kin-state aid and dual citizenship law, which have empowered Ukraine’s ethnic Hungarians, with the community appearing larger and potentially more threatening in the eyes of the majority population than its mere size justifies. The other two factors are Ukraine’s language policy and Transcarpathia’s future being subject of conspiracy theories in light of Russia’s invasion of eastern Ukraine, which have negatively affected interethnic ties, although somewhat less in the borderland than between Hungary and Ukraine at large. In Transcarpathia, our different informants had diverging perceptions of who is stirring tensions but agreed that actors from outside their region were to blame. Overall, what has emerged is a clash of Hungary’s kin-state politics and Ukraine’s nation-state-building efforts. The article ends with more general implications for kin- and host-state relations in times of conflict.

Research on the nexus between education and nationalism in the Habsburg Empire has often focused on the role that language may have played in top-down nationalization processes and the popular dissemination of national thought. According to contemporary nationalist logic, undergoing education in a certain language of instruction also entailed the internalization of nationalist values inherent to its corresponding nationalist movement. The present article argues that the Habsburg educational experience was much more contingent, and draws attention to the diversity of pedagogical approaches towards nationalism and nationality that could be encountered in Austrian schools during the last five decades of Habsburg rule. By using examples from German- and Slovene-language textbooks, it shows that sociopolitical, temporal, as well as institutional factors played an important role in determining the practical values and attitudes towards the nationalism that students encountered during their school years. With systematic empirical studies remaining rare, further research will be necessary to gain a fuller insight into the complexities of the Habsburg education system and its potential effects on popular collective identity formation.

Following Max Weber’s emphasis on a fundamental change in ethical values behind the modern capitalistic economy, this paper offers an ideational explanation for China’s economic modernization since 1978. It argues that China’s economic reform, which first and foremost changed the official rhetoric about profit-making, endowed the economic preoccupations of ordinary people with a special dignity. Since then, the Chinese masses have been allowed to proudly connect their personal prosperity with China’s national wealth and international status. This dignifying connection, in turn, led them to invest in sustaining the growth of their personal prosperity and national wealth. In other words, it converted the Chinese masses to economic nationalism that prioritized economic development as the chief means for the achievement of China’s glory. The conversion of the Chinese masses to economic nationalism marked the Chinese society’s reorientation to “the spirit of capitalism,” hence China’s economic modernization.

I would like to thank the editors of Nationalities Papers for providing a forum for the discussion of my book and for facilitating the symposium. I would also like to express my deep gratitude to Lisa Blaydes, Anastasia Shesterinina, and Dan Slater for taking the time to read the book and for offering their insightful comments and questions. Their scholarship was an inspiration and a source of wisdom for my research in almost all its aspects, from the art of theory-building to their methodological input on survey research and qualitative fieldwork (Belge and Blaydes 2014; Blaydes 2018; Shesterinina 2019, 2021; Slater 2010). It was a wonderful feeling to read their engagement with my work. I believe that the ways the authors of the symposium presented some of the central ideas of my book were often better than the ways I did it myself. In this response, I’ll address some of the central questions and comments raised by the reviewers.

This article aims to analyze the impact of memory on security/foreign policy using the example of Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina’s bilateral relations. The basis for these considerations is the concept of ontological security. It indicates the construction of the identity of the state and is implemented through political decisions and social practices (for example remembering important historical events). Here, memory is treated as a social construct. In addition, the article focuses on memory leading to the formation of state identity, also seen in the international sphere. Historical memory has a considerable impact on bilateral relations between countries that used to be in conflict, like Serbia and BiH. In the example analyzed, leaders use historical memory to create separate identities, commemorate chosen and appropriate victims/heroes or important dates, historical sites, monuments events and develop selective narratives. The most significant elements in the analysis of the historical memory of Serbia and BiH relations are (1) the goals of foreign and security policy of Serbia and BiH (2) the contemporary narrative of the Srebrenica genocide and its perception by governments of Serbia, BiH, and by Bosnian Serbs and Bosniaks, and (3) an official Srebrenica commemoration (memorials, Srebrenica Memorial Day).

This article deals with the confiscation of property from the German-speaking inhabitants of Czechoslovakia and its redistribution to the new settlers of the Czech borderlands. It shows how the social revolution—that is, the emergence of an egalitarian postwar society—was made possible by the national revolution—that is, the expulsion of the German-speaking inhabitants of Central Europe. Using the example of the industrial center of Liberec in northern Bohemia, the author shows how the Czech administration that was established after the Second World War applied the dichotomy of the Czech–German conflict to an ethnically complex postwar society and how, despite the ideology of distributing property to the “Slavs,” non-Czech minorities were discriminated against with respect to redistribution. Eventually, she analyzes how postwar Czechoslovak society was shaped, with an emphasis on the material demands of workers and collectives, even as individuals sought to achieve a middle-class lifestyle through participation in property distribution.

By examining social media interactions, the analysis that is presented in this article reveals how hashtags are adeptly used to reframe the lithium mining issue, embedding it within wider narratives. The article investigates narratives surrounding lithium mining protests in Serbia, using digital ethnography and narrative analysis to study the discourse of ecology activists on the social platform X (formerly known as Twitter). It illuminates the fluid, rhizomatic, and puzzle-like nature of hashtags that helps to achieve online visibility, mobilize audiences for street protests, and appear as narrative building blocks. Hashtags operate as algorithmic signifiers that create additional layers of meaning and fine-tune narratives toward either the left or right side of the political spectrum. This article focuses on how activists use hashtags not just as tools for categorizing content but also as essential components in shaping their narratives. This approach reveals the dynamic engagement of a broad political spectrum in the lithium mining debate, forging connections between different actors. The analysis demonstrates how interconnected hashtags modulate the narratives so that they can transgress from the right to the left side of the political spectrum, indicating that lithium mining is a global rather than a local problem.

Before World War I, the Ottoman Empire ruled the southwestern region of the Arabian Peninsula. However, unlike other Ottoman territories in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, the fate of this region was not decided during the Paris Peace Conference. This created a vacuum of power that allowed the local elites of Arabia to engage in a lengthy process of conflict, negotiations, peace talks, and the exchange of ideas to resolve issues of legitimacy, sovereignty, borders, and cultural differences. This article argues that these local elites of Arabia developed an alternative model of statehood and sovereignty that persisted until the outbreak of the Gulf War in 1990. The immediate result of this new model was the separation of al-Mikhlāf al-Sulaimānī region and the transformation of the people of the Najrān region into a sectarian group.

Debates on the connection between human trafficking and war have been discussed in wars and conflicts across the globe. Russia’s war on Ukraine has brought this relationship to the forefront again, questioning whether trafficking flows have increased, examining the types of trafficking in war, and determining the conditions (if any) that make it flourish. This article examines human trafficking in Ukraine before the war and during limited and total war to determine how governments with robust anti-trafficking institutions negotiate anti-trafficking responses over different stages of war. The main research question of this study aims to determine how different stages of the war in Ukraine have changed human trafficking dynamics and responses over time. Using data from interviews and participant observations from Ukraine, I analyze the different types of human trafficking characteristics and flows, conditions that create vulnerabilities, and prevention tools that have been used in different periods. I theorize that war fundamentally alters human trafficking prevention but a foundation of prevention tools before war means that governments are better able to respond to human trafficking dynamics and flows when war occurs. Ukraine offers a unique and important perspective from which to examine human trafficking dynamics and the consequences of war due to a stable government, external aggressor, and clear path for those fleeing the violence to the European Union. The results show that Ukraine’s strong prevention efforts before the war helped shape responses after the war and full-scale invasion began. The data revealed that human trafficking is a longer-term form of gender-based violence in war because the exploitation is prolonged and there is a delay in identifying victims.

This article analyzes the patriotic turn in Holocaust memory politics, exploring the processes through which the narrative of a morally upright national majority has been pitted against transnational entities such as the European Union. The EU is considered to foster multiculturalism, leading to interpretations of what some perceive as national guilt. The article investigates invocations of shame and pride in Czechia and Slovakia, two countries that are often overlooked in works on Holocaust memory politics yet are symptomatic of larger changes in the region and history appropriation in general. Building on research into emotional communities, it traces how and why political actors across the ideological spectrum have adopted notions of pride to mobilize domestic audiences against “accusations” of local guilt and complicity in the Nazi genocides of Jews and Roma. By doing so, our article demonstrates how Holocaust memory has become entangled with Europeanization and highlights the role of emotions in shaping national identity and belonging.

This article explores Bernard Stiegler’s concept of Epiphylogenesis as an alternative framework for understanding modern nations while aspiring to resolve major gaps in the classic theories of Benedict Anderson and Anthony Smith. Epiphylogenesis offers a fresh perspective and broader scope for the study of nations, with a view to critically enlarging the dynamic interaction between modern mass media and cultural traditions, particularly as conceptualized by Anderson and Smith. Stiegler classifies modern nations as chapters in the broader narrative of technical evolution. In epiphylogenesis, cultural traditions and technical artefacts function as a working partnership; modern nations are seen as the outcome of this co-constitutive process, wherein mass media technical systems (that is, print capitalism) exteriorize cultural traditions (ethnié), dressing them up in distinctive, open, pervasive, and standardized forms. This discussion concludes by exploring the relevance of epiphylogenesis for assessing the impact of networked communications on contemporary national identities.

Based on the discursive analysis of 28 semidirected interviews conducted in the small industrial town of Martfű, this article reflects on the role played by nationalism in the construction of political and cultural hegemony by Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz, Hungary’s ruling party since 2010. The ten themes mobilised by the respondents to express their vision of the Hungarian nation (identification, belonging, commitment, transmission, territory, uniqueness/fragility, heterogeneity/homogeneity, unity/division, east/west, and insubordination) and the issues attached to them (relationship to Hungarian minorities of neighbouring countries, relationship to the European Union, immigration, etc.) are paralleled with Fidesz’s discourse. On those subjects, Orbán’s party’s nationalism positions itself in a “central” way, managing to incarnate heterogeneous conceptions of the nation that are shared among this research’s respondents by Fidesz as well as non-Fidesz voters.

This article focuses on the use of banal nationalism outside of the realm of formal politics. I examine several cases of major airports renaming in the Balkans, aiming to uncover distinctive logic behind the state introduction of nationalism in the ostensibly non-political domain. Based on the intended audience (domestic/international) and the chosen commemorative name (accepted/contested), I uncover two paths to banal nationalism: (1) internationally-oriented nation branding and (2) domestically-oriented memorialization. The analysis shows that the same action of renaming the airport can be normalized and taken for granted as assumed by the banal nationalism literature, or it can remain highly visible and disputed, leading to high-profile “hot” nationalism, indicating the failure of banalization. This article calls for more investigation of nationalism in everyday spaces that are not part of formal state domain and politics.

While the motivations of individuals to become foreign fighters have been at the forefront of academic interest, an important motive—revenge—has so far remained under-researched. Drawing on the case study of pro-Ukrainian Chechen foreign fighters self-deployed in the ongoing Russo-Ukraine War, this article seeks to fill the gap in the extant literature by identifying and conceptualizing revenge. This article posits that two intertwined motives—revenge for perceived historical injustices and revenge for personal wrongs—have played an important role in motivating Chechens to become foreign fighters in the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war. This article suggests that while revenge might be a potent driving force of foreign fighting, its appeal may be stronger in the cultures of honor with the persisting notion of retaliation.

The Bosniak and Albanian minorities in postcommunist Montenegro have supported and been represented by mainstream Montenegrin parties more than by their ethnic parties. This stands in striking contrast to the situation in neighboring Serbia and North Macedonia where the Bosniak and Albanian minorities vote almost exclusively for their ethnic parties. The Montenegrin case stands out as deviant also when one considers a number of extant explanations, all of which would predict a different outcome. Montenegrin Bosniaks and Albanians constitute two native, sizeable and geographically concentrated minority groups inhabiting a country with an institutional framework and several special electoral arrangements favoring minority parties. Drawing on original data on Bosniak and Albanian legislators elected across 12 parliamentary elections in Montenegro (1990–2023), municipality and country-level parliamentary election results and 12 semi-structured elite interviews, I argue that what explains the deviance in the Montenegrin case is the peculiar nature of Montenegrin identity, specifically the fact that it does not pit the majority against minority, but rather it pits the Montenegrin and Serbian components of the Orthodox majority against each other and in such a context the non-Orthodox minorities become critical political allies of the Montenegrin bloc against the Serbian one.

In Estate Origins, Tomila Lankina sheds new light on the logic of persistence and resilience in the Russian social structure that shapes political possibilities in Russia to the present day. It is a wonderful and rewarding read on the historical origins of social requisites of democracy, such as greater civic activism and more pluralistic political competition. To understand variation in attitudinal and behavioral support for democracy in contemporary Russia, according to Lankina, we must go back to tsarist Russia’s estate institutions. A set of institutions that codified the rights and privileges of different social groups, the estates system created incentives for an eclectic and growing stratum of urban dwellers known as meshchane to invest in education while simultaneously fostering the creation of institutional “infrastructures”—professions, educational institutions, charitable, civic, and local governance bodies—that retained during the communist period a degree of autonomy vis-à-vis the state. This, Lankina argues, allowed the meshchane’s distinct value orientations to persist over time.