Laying flowers in memory of slain Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov, Moscow, February 2024
Evgenia Novozhenina / Reuters

On May 7, as Russian President Vladimir Putin was inaugurated for his fifth term in office, no one in Russia was prepared to protest. Given the country’s protracted and costly war in Ukraine, its creeping autocracy, and now this spring a major terrorist attack and widespread floods, outsiders may have wondered why people are not taking to the streets in large numbers and calling for an end to Putin’s rule. Are Russians simply unable to think and act for themselves?

The situation is more complicated than it appears. Yes, Russian society is in a state of conformist apathy, justifying

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