People in the Kursk region have experienced a lot - a temporary occupation of part of the territory by Ukraine, a humanitarian crisis, tens of thousands of refugees. However, as sociological surveys have established, neither the invasion of Ukraine nor the shelling have turned local residents into greater or lesser supporters of the war or the authorities, quite the opposite - they have avoided giving it assessments to an even greater extent.
Svetlana Erpileva from the Center for East European Studies at the University of Bremen noted to DW that, contrary to all expectations, even greater distancing from reality was found in the Kursk region than in other Russian regions. “People are making even more efforts to live as if there is no war.”
DV: In the course of your research, you found that residents of the Kursk region call drones “birds” and explosions - “salutes”, that they joke about the war, use shelters as toilets, dance to the sound of sirens. Maybe this is how they try to “ignore” the war?
S. Erpileva: Yes, the ways in which they do it are different, but they are all aimed at the same result: efforts are made to restore normality, for example, through a humorous attitude towards the war and turning military elements into something frivolous. Active avoidance is also a fact - people turn off danger messages on their phones or turn their smartphones with the screen down. We have heard them say - this happened on the outskirts of the city, therefore in the center where I live, it is not dangerous. Or the elements of military reality are presented as eternal and omnipresent, therefore they do not deserve attention.
The locals equate the danger with domestic unrest, and this lowers the level of threat, which we from the outside can perceive as existential. They are not stupid - they know, of course, that drones are flying, but they refuse to call things by their real names, because they want to somehow continue to live normally.
DV: Do the locals understand that they are avoiding a clash with reality?
S. Erpileva: They do not think about it - they do not ask themselves these questions. Therefore, one can simultaneously say that they understand and do not. People often practice denying something during times of danger, for example, during a war. This is both knowledge and ignorance, which somehow combine.
The clash with the war, which radically changes people's lives, makes them feel even more powerless before the powerful in the world - politicians, states, political decisions that lead to war. And they strengthen the feeling that the state and politics are a kind of “world of the gods”, over which they have no influence. In this situation, people experience this event as a natural disaster - as something whose causes are pointless to think about. This is a strong traumatic experience that strengthens the feeling of powerlessness and the rupture between the everyday life of “ordinary” people and political decisions. Ultimately, the refusal to interpret, evaluate and discuss the causes is strengthened.
DV: Why is the reaction to the danger like this? Can it not be assumed that it is somehow “descended from above” from the authorities?
S. Erpileva: One of the factors that has an impact is the inconsistency in the actions of the state. On the one hand, alarm sirens are turned on, notifications are sent to phones. On the other hand, local officials until the last moment kept emphasizing to the residents of the border regions that everything will be normal and there is no need to go anywhere. The state does not signal that the military situation is worsening and that salvation must be sought.
There is also no trust in the actions of the state, which are aimed at protecting “ordinary” people, on the contrary - the feeling is growing that no one will help “ordinary” people. That is why they say to themselves - let's hope the trouble passes us by. If they can't do anything about the reality of the war, the only thing they can do is make it seem normal to them.
DV: The results of the survey could be summarized as follows: the war is very close, and the Russians don't think about the reasons. Does that mean they will swallow everything?
S. Erpileva: There are political-historical prerequisites and reasons for this type of reaction - the explanation lies in the specifics of the relations between the state and society in Russia, in the formation of these relations. We are talking about an explanation that can be related to the policy of the state, to the specifics of the regime, and not to some "mentality", "character", etc.
It should also be noted that there are manifestations of discontent. It contains a certain potential, but this is not a criticism of the war or of President Putin. These are not people who will go to an anti-war protest, but those who are unable to normalize the situation and are dissatisfied with the fact that they cannot live as before. But this group of people is visible, and this shows that not everything is normal.
Author: Irina Chevtaeva