The Role of Soft Power and Culture in Security Strategies: The Case of Russia (part two)
Simonas Kairys, Member of the Seimas, former Minister of Culture
This is the second article in a three-part series. Read the first part, focusing on the United States, here.
In the first article, when discussing approaches to national security strategy, I argued that Russia employs security narratives not to respond to external threats, but rather to justify its own military aggression and wars. Vladimir Putin’s regime continues to pursue imperial ambitions, despite lacking any realistic prospect of global dominance.
Concepts such as the Russian World (Russkiy Mir), the alleged need to protect Russian speakers abroad, and the ostensible need to preserve the Soviet heritage in foreign countries are consistently misrepresented as threats requiring action with the view to subsequently invoking them as justifications for military intervention and aggression.
Against this backdrop, it is significant that on 5 September 2022, during the seventh month of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Putin signed Decree No 611 approving the Concept for Russia’s Humanitarian Policy Abroad.
The document was adopted at a time when Ukrainian forces were conducting a successful counter-offensive in the Kharkiv region and global attention was focused on developments on the battlefield. This timing was not coincidental. In the Kremlin’s strategic thinking, military power and soft power are not separate domains; rather, they operate in tandem.
The Decree forms part of a broader framework of Russian strategic documents. It complements the 2021 National Security Strategy, the 2016 Foreign Policy Concept and, perhaps most importantly, Putin’s speech of 21 February 2022, in which he sought to deny Ukraine’s legitimacy as a sovereign state through a series of fabricated historical and cultural claims.
The Humanitarian Policy Concept institutionalises these arguments, provides them with an official framework, and extends their application across the broader post-Soviet space. In other words, this is not merely a cultural policy document. It is an element of Russia’s security doctrine. In this context, however, ‘defence’ serves as a euphemism for attack.
A closer reading of the document reveals how the Kremlin constructs the concept of the Russian World. It is presented as a space united by the Russian language, Russian culture, ‘traditional spiritual and moral values’, and a shared historical narrative. The boundaries of this space do not coincide with the internationally recognised borders of the Russian Federation.
Instead, these borders are cultural and ideological and encompass territories that were once part of the Russian Empire or the Soviet Union but are now independent democratic states. The Decree explicitly calls on combating those who allegedly discredit the Russian World and who replace its traditions and ideals with ‘pseudo-values’.
The most concerning aspect of the concept of the Russian World is that it provides Russia with a seemingly legitimate rationale for intervening in the internal affairs of other states whenever they are populated by Russian-speaking communities or ethnic Russian minorities. Ukraine was the victim of this logic. Of geographical limits, the doctrine logic bears no trace.
The Concept outlines several channels of cultural expansion. The first one is the organisation of so-called Cross Years—bilateral cultural programmes to showcase Russia’s cultural achievements in partner countries on a large scale. The second one is Russian Seasons, an international initiative promoting Russian theatre, ballet, cinema, and music abroad. The third one consists of Russian cultural and information centres operating overseas, often functioning as cultural extensions of Russia’s embassies abroad.
Furthermore, the Concept instrumentalises historical memory for wielding influence. Particular emphasis is placed on combating what Russia describes as the ‘falsification of history’, especially with regard to the Second World War. Russia portrays itself as the sole legitimate guardian of the historical narrative of the Great Patriotic War and regards alternative interpretations as distortions that must be neutralised.
Religion constitutes another important dimension of the instrumentalisation of culture. The document highlights the importance of the Russian Orthodox Church’s international activities and cooperation.
In this framework, the Church is not treated as a separate institution but rather as an integral component of humanitarian policy of the state. It serves as a vehicle for promoting ‘traditional values’ and ‘spiritual heritage’ in places where conventional political instruments may prove less effective.
The Concept also establishes a clear geographical hierarchy of priorities, offering valuable insight into the Kremlin’s strategic intentions. The post-Soviet space is its top priority. The document identifies key partners for bilateral cooperation, including CIS member states, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic and the so-called Lugansk People’s Republic. This is particularly significant, as the document treats these annexed territories as if they were sovereign states.
The European dimension is equally revealing. The Decree calls for ensuring ‘respect for the rights of the Russian-speaking population’ in the Baltic States, Moldova and Georgia. This wording reflects a familiar pattern in Kremlin rhetoric, where accusations of discrimination are used to establish a purported moral permission for political interference.
For the Baltic States, the threat is multifaceted. Historical memory will always remain a particularly sensitive issue for Russia. Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia openly recognise the Soviet occupation as a crime and communicate this position internationally.
Within the Kremlin’s framework, such countries are frequently portrayed as ‘falsifiers of history’. Consequently, Russian narratives seek to undermine and discredit the Baltic interpretation of historical events on the international stage.
Russian-speaking communities in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia represent a potential avenue of Kremlin’s influence. The Concept envisages active engagement with ‘compatriots abroad’, including the ‘protection’ of their rights and the provision of cultural and informational support. In practice, this is a mechanism for cultivating alternative loyalties and fostering societal fragmentation.
The media occupies a particularly prominent place within the Concept, and for good reason. The Kremlin understands that modern conflicts are not won on battlefields, but rather on television and smartphone screens. The Concept explicitly describes the media as a powerful instrument for shaping public attitudes and disseminating information with educational content.
Russian television channels and new digital media —ranging from social media and messaging applications to blogs—are portrayed as the most effective instruments of soft power, capable of boosting Russian culture’s appeal and expanding the use of the Russian language abroad.
This doctrine provides the ideological justification for the activities of RT, Sputnik, Pervyi Kanal and numerous smaller Kremlin-funded media outlets that have operated internationally for decades. Significantly, the Concept places particular emphasis on social media and messaging applications.
This reflects lessons that the Kremlin appears to have drawn from the 2016 US presidential election, the Brexit referendum, and electoral campaigns in countries such as France, Germany and Moldova, where Russian disinformation networks were especially active.
The document also advocates strengthening Russia’s ‘digital diplomacy capabilities’ and expanding the international reach of Russian ‘educational’ platforms and social media services. This effort comes in response to Russia’s ban on major Western platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and X.
In effect, the Kremlin is developing an alternative digital ecosystem through which it can project cultural influence beyond its borders while competing with Western platforms.
Russia’s humanitarian doctrine is not merely theoretical. For decades, it has been implemented through concrete actions, some of which have direct implications for Lithuania.
One of the most striking examples is the renaming of the writer Kristijonas Donelaitis Museum in Tolminkiemis, a move that illustrates how the cultural heritage of Lithuania Minor is gradually being marginalised and subsumed into a broader narrative of the Kaliningrad Region.
Another example is the publication in Russia of a new historical monograph on Lithuania. This one and similar publications frequently present Lithuanian history through a pro-Kremlin lens: Lithuania is depicted as a part of the Russian empire, its independence is portrayed as a temporary anomaly, and the independent historical development of the Lithuanian nation is dismissed as a nationalist myth.
Far from being scholarly contributions, these works function as instruments aligned with the objectives of the Humanitarian Policy Concept, promoting false narratives about Lithuania in regions where Russian remains the dominant language.
In the third and final article of this series, I will examine how Lithuania integrates soft power and culture into its own national security strategy. Particular attention will be devoted to the measures Lithuania employs and the gaps that remain in responding to threats in the field of culture.