Sympathy or Criticism? The European Far Left and Far Right React to Russia’s 2022 Invasion of Ukraine

Abstract

This study seeks to contribute to our knowledge on ‘Russia-sympathising’ tendencies in Europe. By means of content analysis, it examines how the far left (N = 26) and the far right (N = 33)—namely, the two party families where benign views on Russia are expected to occur most commonly—have reacted to Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The findings provide insights into the prevalence and nature of ‘Russia-sympathising’ trends in contemporary European party politics.

After months of military build-up along the border, Russia launched an offensive against neighbouring Ukraine on 24 February 2022. The international reactions were not long in coming; all over the world, governments and intergovernmental organisations condemned the invasion, describing it as a blatant breach of international law and as an unprovoked and unjustifiable attack on a sovereign state. The United States, the European Union (EU) and some other (mainly Western) actors swiftly introduced several sets of sanctions on Russia and its ally Belarus, and many (again, mainly Western) states agreed to provide Ukraine not only with humanitarian and financial aid but also with military assistance.

The strong reactions and harsh measures were supported by a broad spectrum of political parties, from left to right. Recent trends in European politics suggest, however, the possibility of some deviations from the general pattern of unconditional condemnation of Russia and extensive support for Ukraine. As several scholars have observed (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016; Golosov 2020; Snegovaya 2022),¹ a distinct group of ‘pro-Russian’ or ‘Putin-sympathising’ parties is emerging on the continent. Although ideologically diverse, these parties are—as Golosov notes—‘most visibly … united by their ideological radicalism’ (Golosov 2020, p. 61); they tend, in other words, to be located either at the left or the right end of the conventional left–right continuum.

The present study sheds further light on the ‘pro-Russian’, ‘Putin-sympathising’ or, perhaps more appropriately, ‘Russia-sympathising’² tendencies within the two European party families where understanding for Russia is expected to occur most commonly: the far-left family and the far-right family.³ By conducting content analyses of authoritative party statements on Russia’s 2022 military offensive on Ukraine, the article seeks to provide a detailed and nuanced view on how 59 radical or extreme parties from 27 European countries perceive the current situation in Ukraine and, more generally, the role of Russia in global politics. Two sets of research questions are addressed. First, I conducted a largely ‘variable-centred’ examination of how far-left and far-right parties view the Russian military offensive: how widespread is sympathy with Russia, and how is it expressed? Second, I implemented a more ‘case-centred’ analysis, focusing on taxonomisation: how can far-left and far-right parties’ views on Russia be classified? Thus, the article contributes to our knowledge of the current conflict in Ukraine, to scholarship on the nature and extent of Russia-sympathising tendencies in European politics, and to research on the foreign policy profiles of far-left and far-right parties.

The article is structured in four sections. In the first section, I provide the background and framework. The second section describes the data and methods used, and the third section reports the results. The last section concludes.

Background and previous research

Since 2014, Ukraine has been a major geopolitical hotspot and the main venue for the deepened conflict between Russia and the West. After years of warfare in the Donbas⁴ region, the situation escalated into a serious international crisis when Russia initiated a military offensive in February 2022.

There are several reasons for focusing on this war when examining sympathy with Russia within far-left and far-right parties. First, it is an urgent event of great concern, almost impossible for any serious political actor to ignore or discard. This allows for a broad European focus, encompassing radical and extreme parties from most parts of the continent. Second, it is also a complex and multi-dimensional event, with several possible interpretations from a number of different perspectives. Hence, it is possible to examine different nuances of the alleged Russia-sympathising tendencies within the relevant party families, rather than just simple binary (‘pro-Russia’ or ‘anti-Russia’) responses. Finally, as a major international conflict, it provides information not only about how radical and extreme parties view the Russian offensive stricto sensu but also clues about how they perceive Russia and contemporary East–West relations more generally.

The following two subsections provide the background and rationale for the study. In the first subsection, I give a brief overview of the conflict in Ukraine (2013–2022) and its different interpretations within the scholarly community. Against this background, the second subsection offers a discussion on far-left and far-right parties and how they could have been expected to perceive Russia’s 2022 military offensive.

The conflict in Ukraine⁵

On 21 November 2013, the Russia-leaning Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych announced that he would postpone the signing of a long negotiated and far-ranging Association Agreement with the EU. Yanukovych’s decision was not well-received among the pro-Western segments of Ukrainian society, and pro-European demonstrations commenced on the same evening on Independence Square (henceforth Maidan) in central Kyiv. After weeks of widespread demonstrations focusing not only on EU relations but also on democracy and anti-corruption, the situation escalated after the parliament’s adoption of a number of repressive anti-protest laws on 16 January 2014. Radicalism and violence now increased significantly, both on Maidan and elsewhere in Ukraine (for example, in Lviv in western Ukraine). The bloodshed culminated on 18–20 February when around 80 protesters and some 20 police officers were killed at Maidan.⁶ With the situation spiralling out of control, an EU-brokered agreement was hurriedly signed by President Yanukovych and the opposition leaders (Vitali Klitschko, Oleh Tyahnybok and Arseniy Yatsenyuk) on the following day. Despite significant concessions from the Yanukovych side, many Maidan protesters were dissatisfied with the agreement. Protests and riots continued, and on the night of 21–22 February a terrified Yanukovych fled Kyiv. Regime change was finalised in the following days when the parliament removed Yanukovych from office, elected an interim president and formed a provisional government.

The ousting of Yanukovych and the installation of a new pro-European and nationalist administration in Kyiv did not, however, mark the end of the dispute. Neighbouring Russia regarded the rise of Ukrainian Western-oriented nationalism as a threat not only to ethnic Russians residing in Ukraine, but also—and perhaps more importantly—to its own strategic interests. The response was prompt. Russian troops soon seized control of the ethnically Russian-dominated and strategically important Crimean Peninsula, and on 16 March a widely criticised and unrecognised referendum allegedly resulted in 97% of Crimeans backing unification with Russia. As a consequence, Crimea declared its independence from Ukraine and expressed willingness to join Russia. Despite harsh Western condemnations, the process was concluded a few days later when Crimea and Sevastopol (as a federal city) were incorporated into the Russian Federation.⁷

In parallel with the Crimean events, civil unrest escalated in the industrial Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. Dissatisfaction with the new, allegedly anti-Russian, administration in Kyiv fuelled autonomism (or separatism) among anti-Maidan elements in the largely Russophone region,⁸ and in March violent clashes between pro- and anti-Maidan groups took place. In April, anti-Maidan activists stormed regional administration buildings and later managed to take control of core structures in Donetsk, Luhansk and several other major Donbas cities. Consequently, the Donetsk People’s Republic (Donetskaya Narodnaya Respublika—DNR) was proclaimed on 7 April, and the Luhansk People’s Republic (Luganskaya Narodnaya Respublika—LNR) on 28 April.⁹ Ukraine responded by launching what was called an anti-terrorist operation, leading to armed clashes between the insurgents and Ukrainian troops in several parts of Donbas throughout spring and early summer.

While there is scholarly disagreement on Russia’s role in the initial phases of the Donbas insurgency,¹⁰ it is generally agreed that Russia became an important player from July–August onwards. With Russian military assistance, the insurgents managed to stop and push back the advancing Ukrainian forces. A temporary de-escalation occurred after the signing of the first Minsk agreement in early September, but hostilities intensified again in early 2015. A second round of negotiations, resulting in the signing of a new Minsk agreement (‘Minsk II’) in February, remained equally unsuccessful, with continuous ceasefire breaks from both sides during the following years.¹¹

After years of low-intensity warfare,¹² the tensions increased considerably again in 2021. Ukraine adopted a stricter policy towards Russia and took further steps to align itself with the West, for example, by signing a strategic partnership with the United States.¹³ Russia stationed increasing numbers of soldiers at the Ukrainian border and, in December, demanded guarantees that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) refrain from expanding further eastwards. The Russian ultimatum was promptly rejected by the West, and on 24 February 2022 Russia launched its offensive.¹⁴

As already indicated, the interpretations of Russia’s recent policies towards Ukraine and, ultimately, of its military offensive in winter 2022 vary considerably within the scholarly community.¹⁵ At one end, Russia is viewed as a revisionist and blatantly imperialist power aiming at restructuring the post-Cold War international order.¹⁶ According to Braun (2014, pp. 36, 38), Russia’s (and especially Putin’s) ambition is to ‘rebuild what [is considered as] nineteenth-century Russia’s grandeur in the former Soviet space’ by integrating ‘Ukraine into a “Greater Russia”’. A more modest view holds that Russia’s actions are driven by structural rather than legal revisionism; Russia is not interested in modifying international law but, rather, wants ‘a new territorial settlement in Europe, a codified regional hegemony in much if not all the CIS region’ (Allison 2017, p. 542). Consequently, the West should respond by trying to contain Russia through sanctions and military support for Ukraine.

Others argue that Russia creates trouble abroad mainly for domestic reasons. Accordingly, factors such as the need to ensure security for the system (Wilson 2014a), the desire to divert public attention away from domestic failures (McFaul 2014) and the necessity to counteract the spread of democracy (Person & McFaul 2022) are believed to explain the aggression towards Ukraine. Still others have emphasised the role of President Putin’s personal and mental characteristics (Forsberg & Pursiainen 2017), pointed at Russian discursive practices (Hopf 2016) or highlighted the West’s lack of understanding of Ukraine’s critically important position in Russia’s foreign policy calculations (Tsygankov 2015).

At the other end of the spectrum, Russia is considered to be a conservative power, protecting itself against the incremental eastward expansion of a hostile military alliance.¹⁷ In this view, the hubristic West—mainly NATO and the United States, but also the EU—bears huge responsibility for the conflict.¹⁸ As Mearsheimer put it, ‘the taproot of the trouble is NATO enlargement, the central element of a larger strategy to move Ukraine out of Russia’s orbit and integrate it into the West’ (Mearsheimer 2014, p. 77). In this view, Russia is seen as a reactive but increasingly assertive power with neo-revisionist ambitions; it protects its own interests, its status and its prestige, challenging only ‘the claim of the US-led liberal international order to be in some way the guardian of international order in its entirety’ (Sakwa 2019, p. 13). From this perspective, sanctions on Russia and weaponry support to Ukraine will remain ineffective. Instead, what is needed is accommodation and rapprochement: the negotiation of a new European security architecture and a neutral Ukraine.

The far left, the far right and the conflict in Ukraine

How, then, do far-left and far-right parties interpret the conflict in Ukraine and, more explicitly, Russia’s 2022 military offensive? Do they concur with the conventional Western view of an imperialist Russia seeking to control its neighbours and/or prevent the spread of democracy, or are they more inclined to side with alternative assertions of Russia as a victim of Western expansionism?

If recent scholarship is to be believed, both interpretations may be equally plausible. On the one hand, significant parts of the far-left and far-right party families have moved towards the political mainstream, thus becoming increasingly confident with the core principles of Western liberal democratic governance and etiquette (Akkerman et al. 2016; March & Keith 2016). From this perspective, it is reasonable to expect far-left and far-right parties to follow mainstream opinion and unconditionally blame Russia. On the other hand, however, scholarship and commentary also point to a growing understanding of Russia’s actions within both party families. Accordingly, tightening links between Russia and European left and right ‘populists’ (Chryssogelos 2010) and, in particular, between Russia and far-right actors (Laruelle 2015; Shekhovtsov 2018; Diesen 2020) lead us to expect criticism of the Western narrative and some degree of sympathy with Russia.

Several factors are believed to contribute to this sympathy. For the far left—defined as a family consisting of radical (democratic but anti-liberal-democratic) and extreme (anti-democratic) parties located distinctly to the left on a socioeconomic (and often also on a sociocultural) dimension (Mudde 2005; March 2012, ch. 1)—Russian anti-fascist rhetoric and Russia’s cherishing of the memory of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany may contribute to sympathy with Russia’s actions in Ukraine (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016). For the far right, by contrast, Russia’s authoritarianism and conservatism constitute possible points of contact. As a family consisting of radical (democratic but anti-liberal-democratic) and extreme (anti-democratic) parties located distinctly to the right on a sociocultural dimension (Mudde 2005, 2007, ch. 1), the far right may find appeal in the anti-liberal and traditionalist trends in present-day Russia (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016).

Whereas anti-fascist rhetoric is enticing only for the far left and, contrariwise, moral conservatism only for the far right, a number of factors may incite sympathy with Russia within both families (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016; Golosov 2020; Snegovaya 2022). Both far-left and far-right parties tend to share Russia’s aversion to US hegemony and the Atlantic power system. Similarly, parties at both ends of the left–right continuum may find appeal in Russian scepticism of the EU and European integration. Other factors that may link Russia with the ideological fringes are general ‘anti-systemness’—rejection of liberal democracy and the Western form of capitalism—and populist outlooks emphasising the gap between the people and the elite.

Together with more general knowledge of far-left and far-right parties, these observations allow the formulation of a number of ‘variable-oriented’ (and descriptive) hypotheses regarding the ideological fringes and Russia’s 2022 military offensive. First of all, I expected minimal overt support for the offensive. As increasingly vote- and office-seeking actors (Akkerman 2016; Keith & March 2016), European far-left and far-right parties have little to gain in openly supporting military aggression by a state that is increasingly isolated and negatively viewed, at least by the Western world. Hence, my first hypothesis reads as follows: in general, both far-left and far-right parties condemn Russia’s 2022 military offensive against Ukraine (H1).

While unanimity or, at least, near unanimity is assumed in the responses to the military offensive itself, I expect (both inter- and intra-family) disagreement concerning the interpretation of its background. As noted above, different perspectives have gained support in the scholarly community; some consider Russian expansionism as the key explanation, some focus on Russia’s internal problems, and some emphasise the role of the Western advance towards Russia’s borders (Götz 2016). The last-mentioned perspective has potential to gain support on the ideological fringes where anti-Western and, in particular, anti-US attitudes are—as Braghiroli and Makarychev (2016, pp. 224–26) have observed—quite common; many far-left parties are ‘deeply opposed to’ Euro-Atlantic organisations such as NATO (Dunphy & March 2020, p. 213), and many far-right parties ‘are worried about a unipolar world dominated by the US’ (Mudde 2019, p. 41). Hence, references to Western provocation, NATO’s eastward expansion and the West’s general hypocrisy on the international scene are expected to be common features in discussions by far-left and far-right parties on Russia’s military offensive.

The blaming of the West does not, however, mean that Russia is immune to criticism. In addition to vote- and office-seeking incentives, both families also have ideological (or policy) motivations for harshly criticising Russia’s objectives and motives. The far left, to begin with, is mainly associated with anti-capitalist socialism (March 2012) and, probably increasingly so, with ‘new left’ themes such as environmentalism, feminism and support for minorities (Gomez et al. 2016; Fagerholm 2017; Wang & Keith 2020). Such a profile does not go well with capitalist Russia’s ‘conservative values project’ (Wilson 2014b, pp. 30–2). Consequently, it makes sense to assume that the far left does not criticise only the West but also Russia, albeit to a somewhat lesser extent (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016, pp. 220–21). The ethnic nationalist (Mudde 2007; Bar-On 2018) far right, by contrast, is likely to sympathise with the ‘monolingual, unitary and culturally specific’ (Sakwa 2015, p. 15) form of nationalism that has gained a foothold in Ukraine in recent years and, hence, defend the country against Russian intrusion. Thus, within the far right, criticism of the West is counterbalanced by almost equally critical remarks about Russia’s threat to an increasingly nationalistic Ukraine (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016, pp. 221–22).

Finally, criticism of Russia is expected to take different forms in the fringe families. For the far left, the image of Russia as a global crusader against fascism might still have some support (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016, pp. 226–28). Hence, far-left parties are expected to focus less on Russia’s external goals, such as revisionism and imperialism, than on its internal aspects (such as authoritarianism and democratic deficiency). Far-right parties, by contrast, may view Russian traditionalism and illiberalism with some sympathy (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016, pp. 218–20). Consequently, they are expected to focus their critique less on internal aspects than on external goals.

Taken together, my second set of hypotheses can be formulated as follows. In general, both far-left and far-right parties blame the West for inciting the conflict and/or for general hypocrisy in international politics (H2a). Some far-left and far-right parties also criticise Russia’s external ambitions and/or internal characteristics, but it is more common to discuss the West than to discuss Russia when providing a background to the conflict, in both families (H2b). When criticising Russia, far-left parties are less prone to emphasise Russia’s external ambitions than the country’s internal characteristics (H2c) while far right parties focus less on Russia’s internal characteristics than on its external ambitions (H2d).

In addition to discussing the causes of the conflict, far-left and far-right parties also ponder its possible solutions. The most urgent topics in Europe in spring 2022 were whether weapons support to Ukraine should be allowed, and whether sanctions on Russia were effective or even feasible. With regards to both issues, intra- as well as inter-family differences could be expected. The opposition to military aid, firstly, was expected to be more pronounced within the far left than in the far right, possibly due to the far left’s historically close relations to peace and anti-war movements (Charalambous 2022, ch. 3). Secondly, I expected the opposition to sanctions on Russia to be stronger within the far right than in the far left, not least because of the far right’s tendency to prefer national interests to costly trans- and international commitments (Sondel-Cedarmas & Berti 2022, part II). Hence my expectation was that far-left parties would be more clearly against military aid to Ukraine than far-right parties (H3a), while far-right parties would be more clearly against sanctions on Russia than far-left parties (H3b).

Data and methods

To assess these hypotheses and, more inductively, to taxonomise far-left and far-right parties’ policies towards Russia, I conducted content analyses of party statements concerning Russia’s military offensive against Ukraine. The resulting data set includes reactions by 26 far-left parties and 33 far-right parties from 27 European states. The set of included states largely corresponds to the 31 countries in the PopuList (Rooduijn et al. 2019) data set: the EU-27 plus Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Latvia, Lithuania, Malta and the United Kingdom were, however, excluded due to lack of relevant parties. In general, a party was considered relevant if it was classified as far left or far right in PopuList, and if it had won at least one (lower house) seat in the last national election prior to 24 February 2022 (Sartori 1976, pp. 122–24).¹⁹ Full lists of countries and parties included appear in Tables A1 and A2 in the online Appendix.

The data consist of statements published by the parties themselves, generally on their own websites. Compared to other possible data-collection strategies, studying party documents provides fairly efficient and comparatively reliable information on how the parties collectively—or, at least, their leaderships—perceived the military offensive.²⁰ The statements included in the study were, with a few exceptions, published between late February and late March 2022.²¹ I chose this particular time period because I am interested in immediate reactions to Russia’s offensive rather than reactions possibly affected by specific events in the course of the war. Focusing on a relatively short time period makes sense also from a methodological point of view since extended coding processes tend to increase the risk of problems with intra-coder reliability (Lacy et al. 2015).

To analyse the statements, I utilised (manual) content analysis. After an initial screening of party websites, I singled out the most authoritative texts related to the Russian military offensive. All non-English passages were translated into English, using Google Translate. While recent tests show that ‘humans can code Google-translated text reliably’ and, moreover, that ‘human coding from untranslated text is essentially the same as human coding from automatically translated text’ (Courtney et al. 2020, p. 215), I kept the possible limitations of Google Translate in mind when developing the coding scheme. The focus is, hence, on broad outlines rather than on semantic minutiae.

The coding scheme consists of seven (ordinal) variables, focusing on the military offensive itself, its background (or causes) and its possible solutions (see Table 1).²² The first variable ((1) in Table 1) captures general conceptions of Russia’s 2022 military offensive: did the party support (–1) or condemn (1) it, or did it avoid taking a clear position (0)? The first variable was hence used to assess H1. The following four variables measure far-left and far-right parties’ understandings of the background to the offensive (H2a–d). The second variable (2.1) assesses whether the party was critical of the West’s role in the Ukraine conflict (–1) or not (0), and the third variable (2.2) whether it denounced the West’s role in international politics more generally (–1) or not (0). The fourth (2.3) and fifth (2.4) variables focus on perceptions of Russia: whether the party criticised Russia’s perceived goals in relation to Ukraine (1) or not (0), and whether it criticised Russian politics and society more generally (1) or not (0). The two final variables focus on the most commonly addressed solutions to the conflict (H3a–b). Consequently, the sixth variable (3.1) captures whether the party explicitly opposed (–1) or provided qualified (0) or unconditional (1) support for military aid to Ukraine. The seventh variable (3.2), by contrast, examines whether the party explicitly opposed (–1) or provided qualified (0) or unconditional (1) support for sanctions on Russia.

TABLE 1 Coding Scheme

	Variable	Code	Definition	α*
(1) Offensive	(1) The invasion	–1	Support for Russia’s 2022 military invasion of Ukraine (for example, the need to fight fascism).	0.800
		0	No support for Russia’s 2022 military invasion of Ukraine, but no condemnation either.
		1	Condemnation of Russia’s 2022 military invasion of Ukraine (for example, the violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and international law).
(2) Background	(2.1) The West: Ukraine	–1	Criticism of the West’s (EU, NATO and/or US) role in the Ukraine conflict (for example, explicit references to Western provocation and/or NATO’s eastward expansion).	1
		0	No criticism of the West in Ukraine.
	(2.2) The West: general	–1	Criticism of the West’s (EU, NATO and/or US) role in international politics more generally (for example, references to Western hypocrisy; criticism of the role of the West in the wars in former Yugoslavia or Iraq).	0.875
		0	No general criticism of the West.
	(2.3) Russia: Ukraine	0	No specific criticism of Russia’s goals in Ukraine.	0.816
		1	Specific criticism of Russia’s goals in the Ukraine conflict (for example, references to Russian revisionism and/or imperialism; Russia as an explicit threat to own country).
	(2.4) Russia: general	0	No general criticism of Russia.	0.886
		1	Criticism of Russian domestic politics (for example, references to Russia’s authoritarianism, nationalism and lack of democracy); support for Russian democracy and the Russian peace movement.
(3) Solution	(3.1) Military aid	–1	Explicit opposition to military aid to Ukraine.	0.847
		0	Explicit support for ‘defensive’ and support equipment only, or no mention of military aid.
		1	Unconditional support for military aid to Ukraine.
	(3.2) Sanctions	–1	Explicit opposition to all sanctions against Russia.	0.803
		0	Explicit support for defined targeted sanctions only (for example, oligarchs), or no mention of sanctions.
		1	Unconditional support for sanctions against Russia.

Notes: *Krippendorff’s alpha coefficient. Values of α = 0.800 or above are good (1 is max) while values between α = 0.667 and α = 0.799 allow tentative conclusions (Krippendorff 2004, p. 241). (Correlations between variables are given in Table A5 in the online Appendix.)

To test the reliability of the scheme, I used a well-established (Lacy et al. 2015) agreement measure: Krippendorff’s alpha. Inter-coder reliability was thus calculated from a sample consisting of nine (randomly selected) far-left and ten (randomly selected) far-right parties, with two coders coding each variable. If an alpha-value of 0.800 was not reached in the first round—this was the case for variables 1 and 2.3—a new round was performed, with revised instructions and a new sample. As shown in the last column of Table 1, inter-coder reliability was satisfactory for all variables (after the second round), with α ranging between 0.800 and 1.

Results

The following two subsections report the results. In the first subsection, I evaluate, descriptively, how far-left and far-right parties viewed the military offensive, its background and its possible solutions, in light of the expectations listed earlier. The second subsection takes a more holistic view on the data and seeks to form an empirical classification of far-left and far-right parties’ conceptions of Russia’s military offensive and—tentatively, at least—of Russia more generally.

Descriptive analysis I: hypotheses

As Table 2 shows, H1 is supported. An overwhelming majority of far-left and far-right parties explicitly condemned Russia’s military offensive, with no party providing explicit support for it. Among far-left parties, only one—the Portuguese conservative communist (Marxist–Leninist) party PCP—did not condemn Russia’s actions, instead only expressing its deep concern and calling for an ‘urgent de-escalation of the conflict’.²³ Not taking a clear stand was more common within the far-right family, where roughly one-fourth of the parties did not explicitly condemn Russia. Bulgarian Vazrazhdane and Greek Ellinikí lýsi (Greek Solution—EL), for example, wanted their states to function as pillars of ‘stability, security and peace’²⁴ and ‘not take sides in a conflict that is not [their] own’.²⁵ Similar views occurred in neutral Switzerland, where Schweizerische Volkspartei (Swiss People’s Party—SVP) claimed that ‘Switzerland is committed to impartiality’²⁶ and in the Netherlands, where Forum voor Democratie (Forum for Democracy—FvD) held that the war in Ukraine is ‘not “our war”’.²⁷ The ultra-nationalist Slovak Ľudová strana naše Slovensko (People’s Party Our Slovakia—ĽSNS) probably came the closest to outright support for Russia, describing the offensive as ‘a logical, albeit sad outcome’.²⁸

TABLE 2 Conceptions of Russia’s Invasion

	Support		No position		Condemnation
	%	N	%	N	%	N
Far left	0.0	0	3.8	1	96.2	25
Far right	0.0	0	24.2	8	75.8	25
Total	0.0	0	15.3	9	84.7	50

Looking at the parties’ views on the background to the invasion, the picture is somewhat different. As expected, a majority—more than two-thirds—of European far-left parties criticised the West (see Table 3, second column). Levica (The Left) in Slovenia considered the West (and NATO in particular) to be ‘part of the problem, not the solution’²⁹ while Partij van de Arbeid van België (Workers’ Party of Belgium—PvdA) recalled how also the US and other Western states violated the principle of sovereignty during the conflicts in Kosovo (1999), Iraq (2003) and Libya (2011).³⁰ Of the 18 far-left parties that explicitly criticised the West, nine focused on its role in relation to Ukraine while seven focused on both Ukraine and Western standards more generally (see Table A6 in the online Appendix). Among far-right parties, by contrast, only about one quarter (nine parties) voiced criticism of the West. Of these, most (six parties; see Table A6 in the online Appendix) focused on the Ukraine conflict, reprimanding—as Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (Freedom Party of Austria—FPÖ) did—‘USA, NATO and, in their slipstream, also the EU’ for ‘provocative behaviour’.³¹ The remarkably low incidence of anti-Western sentiments within the far right in relation to the Ukraine conflict contradicts H2a, leaving the hypothesis only partially supported.

TABLE 3 Conceptions of the Background to the Invasion

	Parties criticising the West*				Parties criticising Russia^†
	Yes		No		Yes		No
	%	N	%	N	%	N	%	N
Far left	69.2	18	30.8	8	61.5	16	38.5	10
Far right	27.3	9	72.7	24	24.2	8	75.8	25
Total	45.8	27	54.2	32	40.7	24	59.3	35

Notes: * Yes = parties scoring –1 on variable(s) 2.1 and/or 2.2; No = parties scoring 0 on both 2.1 and 2.2. ^† Yes = parties scoring 1 on variable(s) 2.3 and/or 2.4; No = parties scoring 0 on both 2.3 and 2.4.

H2b, on the contrary, is fully supported: substantial criticism of Russia occurred in both party families, albeit to a lesser extent than critical assessments of the West. Interestingly, there is again a clear inter-family difference, with parties of the far-left family being considerably more prone than far-right parties to express strong criticism not only of the West but also of Russia (see Table 3). Table 4 sheds more light on criticism of Russia. As expected, far-left parties focused their critique of Russia mainly on internal characteristics, with Partei der Arbeit der Schweiz (Swiss Party of Labour—PdA) describing the country as ‘deeply anti-communist and reactionary’,³² Croatian RF as autocratic and politically ‘backward’,³³ and Norwegian Sosialistisk Venstreparti (Socialist Left Party—SV) as ‘socially deeply unjust and undemocratic’.³⁴ Also in line with my expectations, far-right parties were more inclined to focus on Russia’s external aspirations than on internal characteristics. Among the (rather few) far-right parties that explicitly criticised Russia, Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy—FdI) suspected that Russia has ‘imperialist ambitions’³⁵ while Eesti Konservatiivne Rahvaerakond (Conservative People’s Party of Estonia—EKRE) claimed that the country was an ‘existential threat’ to states located within its area of interest.³⁶ Taken together, these observations lend support for H2c and H2d.

TABLE 4 Conceptions of Russia

	Parties criticising Russia’s external ambitions*		Parties criticising Russia’s internal characteristics^†		Parties criticising both external ambitions and internal characteristics^‡		Parties criticising neither external ambitions nor internal characteristics
	%	N	%	N	%	N	%	N
Far left	11.5	3	38.5	10	11.5	3	38.5	10
Far right	18.2	6	0.0	0	6.1	2	75.7	25
Total	15.3	9	16.9	10	8.5	5	59.3	35

Notes: * Parties scoring 1 on variable 2.3 (and 0 on 2.4). ^†Parties scoring 1 on variable 2.4 (and 0 on 2.3). ^‡ Parties scoring 1 on both.

Table 5, finally, provides information on far-left and far-right parties’ views on military aid to Ukraine and their conceptions of sanctions against Russia. As the last column reveals, explicit opposition to military aid is more common among far-left than among far-right parties. The majority of far-left parties are clearly against arming Ukraine, reflecting both their opposition to ‘further escalation’ of the conflict (for example, the Norwegian Rødt (Red Party))³⁷ and their more fundamental hostility to the ‘cruel business’ of arms exports (for example, the German Die Linke (Linke, The Left)).³⁸ This observation is in line with H3a. Regarding sanctions, both families remained somewhat indecisive. Explicit opposition to sanctions was, however, more common within the far right than within the far left, with more than a few far-right parties turning against sanctions that negatively affected the people of their own countries. Examples are the Bulgarian Vazrazhdane (‘The 3Bulgarian people will pay for them’)³⁹ and the French Rassemblement National (National Rally—RN) (‘[they] lead to disastrous economic consequences for French citizens’).⁴⁰ H3b is, hence, also supported.

TABLE 5 Conceptions of Sanctions and Military Aid

	Unconditional support		Qualified support (or no position)		Explicit opposition
	%	N	%	N	%	N
(a) Military aid to Ukraine
Far left	7.7	2	34.6	9	57.7	15
Far right	18.2	6	48.5	16	33.3	11
Total	13.5	8	42.4	25	44.1	26
(b) Sanctions against Russia
Far left	26.9	7	53.9	14	19.2	5
Far right	27.3	9	39.4	13	33.3	11
Total	27.1	16	45.8	27	27.1	16

Descriptive analysis II: towards a taxonomy

The analysis reported above shows that most far-left and far-right parties condemned Russia’s offensive on Ukraine, although a significant minority of far-right parties did not take a clear position. Furthermore, the analysis also shows that, in explaining their understanding of the background to the conflict, both far-left and far-right parties tended to criticise the West somewhat more than they criticised Russia. It is also interesting to note that the far left was far more apt to criticise both actors than was the far right. Finally, the analysis confirms a number of expected differences between the families. Far-left parties tended to focus their critique of Russia on Russia’s internal characteristics (staying relatively quiet on the country’s external aspirations) while the far-right parties that explicitly criticised Russia centred on the country’s external ambitions rather than on its internal characteristics. Regarding military aid and sanctions, the far-left family seemed more critical of military aid to Ukraine than the far right, while the far right was more vocally opposed to sanctions against Russia than was the far left.

In order to provide more information on the parties, I complemented the ‘variable-centred’ analysis above with a more inductive and ‘case-centred’ examination of the data. One way to do this is by scaling. By summing up the seven variables, a scale ranging from –5 (most sympathy with Russia) to 5 (least sympathy with Russia) was constructed. As Figure 1 shows, both the far-left (μ = 0.31, σ = 2.18) and the far-right (μ = 0.64, σ = 2.36) families include parties with varying views on Russia’s offensive. While many positioned themselves in or close to the centre of the scale, it seems clear that both families also include parties where sympathy with Russia was relatively strong and, conversely, very weak in the time-period under study.

FIGURE 1. Far Left (grey circle) and Far Right (white circle) Parties’ Position on Russia’s 2022 Invasion of Ukraine

A second way to get a better understanding of patterns among parties is to group them. While purely ‘qualitative’ empirical groupings are feasible in cases where the data structure is simple and/or when the number of observations to group is fairly small, ‘quantitative’ strategies such as cluster analysis become inevitable with more complex data sets (Bailey 1994, ch. 1). With seven variables and 59 observations, the data set is best described as mid-sized—too big to facilitate exclusively ‘qualitative’ groupings⁴¹ and too small to make a purely ‘quantitative’ clustering feasible.⁴² Therefore I combined both strategies by complementing statistical grouping with an in-depth examination of clusters and cases.

Table 6 reports the results from a robust cluster analysis (k-medoids clustering) with five clusters.⁴³ The leftmost cluster in the table includes a number of (mainly far-right) parties that can be described as more or less outspokenly pro-Russian. These parties did not condemn Russia’s offensive; neither did they criticise Russia in any way. Generally, they blamed the West for the conflict, criticising all forms of military aid to Ukraine and, in general, opposing all sanctions on Russia. Typical pro-Russian parties are the Bulgarian Vazrazhdane and the Slovakian ĽSNS. A more common, and more qualified, form of sympathy with Russia was communicated by parties with an anti-Atlanticist foreign policy profile. These parties explicitly condemned Russia’s offensive, but—like the pro-Russians—avoided a detailed critique of the country. The main scapegoats in relation to the Ukraine conflict were, instead, Western actors such as NATO, the US and/or the EU. Consequently, anti-Atlanticists were highly sceptical of weapons support to Ukraine and also remained hesitant regarding sanctions on Russia. Anti-Atlanticist parties are found both on the far left and the far right. Geographically, they seem to be most common in Western (and, more precisely, Southwestern) Europe. Typical parties in this cluster are the Cypriot Anorthotikó Kómma Ergazómenou Laoú (Progressive Party of Working People—AKEL) and the Austrian FPÖ.

TABLE 6 Far-Left and Far-Right Party Positions on Russia’s 2022 Invasion of Ukraine: Five Clusters

	Pro-Russians	Anti-Atlanticists	Pragmatists	Anti-militarists	Euro-Atlanticists
Average dissimilarity*	1.41	1.32	1.21	1.29	0.92
Diameter^†	3.77	3.77	7.64	5.15	3.83
Medoids^‡	0, –1, 0, –1, –1	1, –1, 0, –1, –1	1, 0, 0, 0, 0	1, –1, 1, –1, 0	1, 0, 1, 1, 1
Description	Benign towards Russia, fiercely critical of the West	Critical of the West’s allegedly belligerent foreign policy, limited criticism also of Russia	Condemn Russia, but generally silent on background (and solution)	Equally critical of both Russia and the West, support for de-escalation	Fiercely critical of Russia, supportive of the Western narrative
N of parties (WE + CEE)^§	4 + 4	7 + 1	13 + 5	11 + 1	10 + 3
% of parties (WE)	8.9	15.6	28.9	24.4	22.2
% of parties (CEE)	28.6	7.1	35.7	7.1	21.4
N of parties (L + R)^¶	1 + 7	4 + 4	5 + 13	12 + 0	4 + 9
% of parties (L)	3.8	15.4	19.2	46.2	15.4
% of parties (R)	21.2	12.1	39.4	0	27.3
% of parties (Total)	13.6	13.6	30.6	20.3	22.0
Parties^‖	L’SNS (SK)	AKEL (CY)	AUR (RO)	BE (PT)	EKRE (EE)
	Vazrazhdane (BG)	FPÖ (AT)	Lega (IT)	PBP (IE)	PS (FI)
			Lénk (LU)	PCF (FR)	V (SE)
			SPD (CZ)

Notes: *Average dissimilarity between observations and cluster medoid. ^†Maximal dissimilarity between two observations in the cluster. ^‡The most typical configuration of variable scores in the cluster (on variables 1, 2.5, 2.6, 3.1 and 3.2, see footnote 43). ^§ WE = Western Europe; CEE = Central and Eastern Europe. ^¶L = Far left; R = Far right. ^‖ Some of the most typical parties for each cluster, based on the author’s case knowledge. For a full but tentative list of parties, see Table A7 in the online Appendix.

The third cluster consists of ‘pragmatists’. Pragmatists generally condemned Russia’s offensive but abstained from a more detailed critique of the country, as well as from blaming the West. Regarding military aid and sanctions, pragmatists often avoided taking clear and definite positions. Pragmatists can be found in both families but are clearly more common within the far right than within the far left. Typical cases are the Romanian AUR and the Czech Svoboda a přímá demokracie (Freedom and Direct Democracy—SPD). The fourth cluster consists of anti-militarists. Anti-militarists seem to locate themselves exclusively at the left end of the left–right continuum, with almost half of all far-left parties located in this cluster. Anti-militarists hold critical views on both Russia and the West. They condemned Russia’s offensive but were generally not ready to provide Ukraine with military aid, instead supporting de-escalation, diplomacy and, to some extent, sanctions on Russia. Typical parties in this cluster are Western (and, in particular, Southwestern) European far-left parties such as the Irish People Before Profit (PBP) and the Portuguese Bloco de Esquerda (Left Bloc—BE). The fifth and final cluster consists of ‘Euro-Atlanticists’. The Euro-Atlanticists were clear supporters of the Atlanticist view on the Ukraine conflict; they blamed Russia and never the West, and they were generally in favour of both military aid to Ukraine and harsh sanctions on Russia. The most salient Euro-Atlanticist parties on the far left are to be found in Western and, in particular, Northern Europe (for example, the Swedish Vänsterpartiet (Left Party—V)) while far-right Euro-Atlanticists exist in Northern (for example, the Finnish Perussuomalaiset (Finns Party—PS)) as well as in (Eastern and) Central Europe (for example, the Estonian EKRE).

Conclusions

The Ukraine conflict in 2014 marked the end of the ‘fragile, exclusive and unsustainable’ post-Cold War European peace order (Sakwa 2017, p. 164) and the beginning of an intensified conflict between the West and Russia. In this conflict, European mainstream parties have generally (although not univocally) sided with the West (Golosov 2020; Snegovaya 2022), embracing the dominant scholarly narrative of Putin’s Russia as an increasingly authoritarian state and as a revanchist power seeking to fundamentally revise the international order.⁴⁴

On the ideological fringes, by contrast, some have shown explicit sympathy with Russia (Braghiroli & Makarychev 2016). As the present study shows, within both the far-left and the far-right families are parties that show at least some degree of understanding of the Russian perspective, even after the country’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Within the contemporary far left, roughly one-sixth displayed qualified sympathy with Russia in the early days of the invasion. These anti-Atlanticist parties condemned the 2022 military offensive but accused the West of instigating it. At the other end of the spectrum, a group of Euro-Atlanticist far-left parties gave their full support to the mainstream Western approach to the offensive and, hence, unconditionally blamed Russia. Most commonly, however, far-left parties are anti-militarist: while they condemned and criticised Russia, they also criticised the West’s role in the conflict. Within the far right, sympathy with Russia has been signalled both by overt pro-Russians—parties that do not condemn Russia in any way, instead typically blaming the West—and by more lenient anti-Atlanticists. Also here, Russia-sympathisers remain a minority: most far right parties—roughly two-thirds—are, hence, either cautious pragmatists or keen Euro-Atlanticists.

Taken together, the present study contributes to several literatures. To begin with, it is probably one of the first articles to examine party reactions to Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, hence adding topical knowledge to our understanding of this major episode in European politics. Moreover, the study also contributes to the growing literature on Russia-sympathising sentiments in contemporary Europe by illustrating patterns of sympathy and antipathy within the non-mainstream far-left and far-right party families. By this, it also provides relevant information on another understudied topic: that of the foreign-policy positions of radical and extreme parties. With this said, the study also has several limitations. First of all, it is based on limited data. Future studies should, hence, corroborate the findings of this study by using other sources of data, qualitative as well as quantitative. This may identify more details about individual parties’ stances and, for example, relocate some of the many (far-right) pragmatists in other groups. Second, to provide a more comprehensive view on party positions on Russia, future studies should focus on longer time periods—trends—and include also other party families. Finally, the present study remains largely descriptive. Hence, it is important that future examinations focus more on the rather sharp intra-family differences observed within both families by searching for and testing possible explanations to the existence, or otherwise, of Russia-sympathising sentiments within the far-left and far-right party families.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Andreas Fagerholm

Andreas Fagerholm, Faculty of Social Sciences, Business and Economics, and Law, Åbo Akademi University, Rantakatu 2, Vaasa 65100, Finland. Email: [email protected]

Notes

1 See also Braghiroli (2015), Ishiyama et al. (2018), Onderco (2019).

2 This study uses the label ‘Russia sympathy’ as an umbrella term for a range of (more or less) favourable views on Russia. It is a rough translation of the German Russlandversteher (or Russland-Versteher), meaning someone who ‘understands’ Russia and its behaviour. While not perfect, it is preferred to (the too narrow, categorical and definitive) ‘pro-Russian’ and (the too personified) ‘Putin-sympathising’ (German: Putinversteher or Putin-Versteher). The antithesis of ‘Russia sympathy’ is perhaps ‘Russia anxiety’, that is, fear, disregard or contempt of Russia (see Smith 2020 for a historical survey).

3 To be clear, I do not argue that Russia sympathy occurs only in these two families (or, for that matter, that virtually all far-left and far-right parties sympathise with Russia). However, of the 40 European parties that Snegovaya (2022, p. 411; see also the online Appendix) identifies as ‘openly [embracing] pro-Russian positions’, at least 26 can be classified as either far left (six ‘radical left’ parties) or far right (15 ‘radical right’ parties and at least five of the parties classified by Snegovaya as ‘conservative’).

4 Transliteration from Russian and/or Ukrainian adheres to journal guidelines and is not indicative of any political or cultural preferences by the author.

5 The conflict has generated a large amount of literature. If not otherwise indicated, the following summary of the main events is based on readings of the early authoritative book-length treatments by Wilson (2014b), Menon and Rumer (2015), Sakwa (2015), and Charap and Colton (2017). Wilson provides a largely Ukrainian/Western perspective while Sakwa shows understanding also of the Russian mindset. The studies by Menon and Rumer, and Charap and Colton, respectively, strike a balance between different perspectives. In addition, I have also used the detailed chronology of key events (November 2013–February 2015) provided by Black and Plekhanov (2016). For discussions on the historical background to the current conflict—the fragile post-Cold War peace system, the complex nature of Russo–Ukrainian relations throughout the post-Soviet era and the differing domestic developments of the two countries, see Wilson (2014b, ch. 1–3), Menon and Rumer (2015, pp. 22–52), Sakwa (2015, ch. 1–3), Charap and Colton (2017, ch. 1–2).

6 The role of the far right in the Maidan protests and, more specifically, in the massacres of 18–20 February is a hotly debated issue. While the Russian narrative of a Western-orchestrated coup d’état led by fascists and neo-Nazis is an exaggeration (for surveys of protest participants, see Onuch 2015; Shestakovskii 2015; Onuch & Sasse 2016), recent systematic evaluations indicate that far-right actors played a non-negligible (or even key) role in the protests (Ishchenko 2016; Kudelia 2018; Katchanovski 2020). In the subsequent 2014 parliamentary elections, however, far-right parties received only limited popular support.

7 The majority of Western legal experts consider the Russian takeover as a violation of international law (see, for example, Grant 2015). For a dissenting view, see Geistlinger (2014).

8 On public opinion in Donbas at the start of the conflict, see Giuliano (2018).

9 DNR and LNR remained unrecognised until 21 February 2022 when the Russian President Vladimir Putin acknowledged their independence.

10 At one end, the conflict is viewed as a largely home-grown civil war (see for example, Sakwa 2015; Matveeva 2016), and at the other as a Russian invasion (see for example, Wilson 2014b; Bowen 2019). For balanced discussions, see Hauter (2021) and, above all, Arel and Driscoll (2023, ch. 6–7).

11 For a detailed analysis of the Minsk agreements see Åtland (2020).

12 According to OHCHR (2022), the total number of conflict-related casualties in Ukraine 2014–2021 was between 51,000 and 54,000, with 14,200–14,400 killed (including 3,404 civilians) and 37–39,000 injured.

13 See, ‘US–Ukraine Charter on Strategic Partnership’, US Department of State, 10 November 2021, available at: https://www.state.gov/u-s-ukraine-charter-on-strategic-partnership/, accessed 12 March 2024.

14 For different perspectives on key events in 2021–2022, see Roberts (2022), Savelyev (2023).

15 For good overviews, see Götz (2016) and, more generally, Götz (2017).

16 For variants of this argument, see, for example, Braun (2014), Mead (2014), Allison (2017), Kuzio (2017, 2023), Marples (2022).

17 For a brief and nuanced history of NATO’s enlargement in the post-Cold War era, see Walker (2016). The alleged US ‘no-NATO-enlargement’ pledge to the USSR in the early 1990s is contested. Kramer (2009, p. 54) argues that ‘declassified evidence [shows that] no such assurances were ever given or sought’ while Shifrinson—based on newly released government documents—claims that ‘US officials repeatedly offered the Soviets informal assurances—a standard diplomatic practice—against NATO expansion … throughout the spring, summer and fall of 1990’ (Shifrinson 2016, p. 11).

18 For a range of perspectives in this tradition, see, for example, Mearsheimer (2014, 2022), Sauer (2017), Cohen (2019), Sakwa (2019), Karaganov (2022).

19 Due to recent changes in party identity, the set of parties included differs slightly from PopuList. Regarding the far left, I follow recent judgments (Bischoff & Kosiara-Pedersen 2023; Dunphy 2023) in not considering the Danish Socialistisk Folkeparti (Green Left, formerly Socialist People’s Party) and the Irish Sinn Fein as far-left parties. In the case of Spain, I include Partido Comunista de España (Communist Party of Spain—PCE) rather than its electoral alliance Izquierda Unida (United Left), and for Portugal I include Partido Comunista Português (Portuguese Communist Party—PCP) rather than the coalition Coligação Democrática Unitária (Unitary Democratic Coalition). Two minor Irish parties are excluded due to lack of data. Far-left parties included in this study but currently not in PopuList are the democratic socialist (Ómarsdóttir & Erlingsdóttir 2023) Vinstrihreyfingin–grænt framboð (Left–Green Movement—VG) in Iceland and the Croatian newcomer Radnička fronta (Workers’ Front—RF). Concerning the far right, I do not include the formerly far-right Hungarian party Jobbik (Hyttinen 2022; Borbáth & Gessler 2023), nor do I include the Polish borderline case Kukiz’15 (Kosowska-Gąstoł & Sobolewska-Myślik 2017; Fijał 2022). I also exclude the Hungarian ‘satellite’ party Kereszténydemokrata Néppárt (Christian Democratic People’s Party). I include the Polish Konfederacja rather than its member parties. Far-right parties included here but not in PopuList are four newcomers with a relatively clear-cut far-right profile: the Bulgarian Vazrazhdane (Revival), the Croatian Domovinski pokret (Homeland Movement—DP) the Romanian Alianța pentru Unirea Românilor (Alliance for the Union of Romanians—AUR) and—with some hesitation—the Dutch Juiste Antwoord 2021 (Correct Answer 2021—JA21). From both families, I exclude parties that are considered as members of an ethnoregionalist family (such as Spanish and Croatian regionalists), parties that were dissolved before February 2022 (such as Symmachía Politón (Citizens’ Alliance) in Cyprus) and parties lacking seats in the national parliament as of February 2022 (such as Komunistická strana Čech a Moravy (Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia) in Czechia).

20 One could think of collecting data also by conducting an expert survey or by analysing the parliamentary speeches, voting behaviour or social media postings of individual politicians. Expert surveys are, however, more time-consuming than content analyses while studies of politicians provide less authoritative (less valid) data on parties’ collective views.

21 I preferred statements published as early as possible (after 23 February 2022), but in some cases more detailed (but substantively similar) statements with a later publication date were used instead of earlier ones. For some parties, I used more than one statement (that is, two to three). I preferred statements by the party as a collective actor, such as declarations by the party board or the central committee. When no such text was to be found on the party website, I used statements by the party leader or, in some cases, by other prominent party actors (for example, foreign policy spokespersons). In a few cases, I made use of information from other sources than party websites (for example, media sources or social media postings). (The lack of collective statements is more common among far-right parties, reflecting their often decidedly leader-centred nature.) Tables A3 and A4 in the online Appendix provide detailed information on the statements used.

22 The scheme broadly follows Goertz’s (2020) three-level concept structure. At the basic level, we thus find the concept at the core of this article (that is, the level of sympathy with Russia’s offensive on Ukraine). The concept’s core features (perception of the military offensive itself, of its background and of its possible solutions) are at the secondary level, and the seven (1+4+2) variables listed in Table 1 at the data–indicator level. For a conceptual scheme, see Figure A1 in the online Appendix.

23 ‘O PCP apela à promoção de iniciativas de diálogo e à paz na Europa’, Portuguese Communist Party, 24 February 2022, available at: https://www.pcp.pt/pcp-apela-promocao-de-iniciativas-de-dialogo-paz-na-europa, accessed 12 March 2024.

24 ‘Anakoínosi týpou—Apántisi tou proédrou tis Ellinikís lýsis Kyriákou Velópoulou stin dílosi tou prothypourgoú anaforiká me ta gegonóta stin Oukraína’, Greek Solution, 24 February 2022, available at: https://elliniki-lisi.gr/anakoinosi-typou-apantisi-tou-proedrou-tis-ellinikis-lysis-kyriakou-velopoulou-stin-dilosi-tou-prothypourgou-anaforika-me-ta-gegonota-stin-oukrania, accessed 12 March 2024.

25 ‘Deklaratsiya na PG na Vazrazhdane po povod na voenniya konflikt’, Vazrazhdane, 1 March 2022, available at: https://vazrazhdane.bg/novini/818-deklaraciia-na-pg-na-vazrajdane-po-povod-na-voenniia-konflikt, accessed 1 February 2023.

26 ‘Die Schweiz muss neutrale Vermittlerin bleiben: Jetzt erst recht; keine Mitgliedschaft im UNO-Sicherheitsrat!’, Swiss People’s Party, 24 February 2022, available at: https://www.svp.ch/news/artikel/medienmitteilungen/die-schweiz-muss-neutrale-vermittlerin-bleiben-jetzt-erst-recht-keine-mitgliedschaft-im-uno-sicherheitsrat/, accessed 12 March 2024.

27 ‘Niet onze oorlog: Maak een einde aan het conflict in Oekraïne’, Forum for Democracy, 20 June 2022, available at: https://fvd.nl/nieuws/niet-onze-oorlog-maak-een-einde-aan-het-conflict-in-oekraine, accessed 12 March 2024.

28 ‘Vyhlásenie k udalostiam na Ukrajine’, People’s Party Our Slovakia, 1 March 2022, available at: http://kotlebovci.sk/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/noviny-marec-2022.pdf, accessed 12 March 2024.

29 ‘Izjava Levice ob vojni v Ukrajini’, Levica, 24 February 2022, available at: https://www.levica.si/vojna-ukrajina-rusija/, accessed 13 March 2024.

30 ‘Ukraine: non à la guerre’, Workers’ Party of Belgium, 24 February 2022, available at: https://www.ptb.be/actualites/ukraine-non-la-guerre, accessed 13 March 2024.

31 ‘Ukraine–Krise: Waffen niederlegen und zurück an den Verhandlungstisch!’, Freedom Party of Austria, 24 February 2022, available at: https://www.fpoe.at/artikel/ukraine-krise-waffen-niederlegen-und-zurueck-an-den-verhandlungstisch/, accessed 13 March 2024.

32 ‘Nein zum Krieg, gegen alle imperialistischen Staaten, für Frieden und Freundschaft unter den Völkern!’, Swiss Party of Labour, 22 March 2022, available at: https://pda.ch/2022/03/nein-zum-krieg-gegen-alle-imperialistischen-staaten-fuer-frieden-und-freundschaft-unter-den-voelkern/, accessed 13 March 2024.

33 ‘Izjava o Ukrajini’, Workers’ Front, 25 February 2022, available at: https://www.radnickafronta.hr/hr/t/tekstovi/clanci/533/izjava-o-ukrajini/, accessed 13 March 2024.

34 ‘SV fordømmer det russiske angrepet på Ukraina’, Socialist Left Party, 24 February 2022, available at: https://www.sv.no/blog/2022/02/24/sv-fordommer-det-russiske-angrepet-pa-ukraina/, accessed 13 March 2024.

35 ‘Ucraina, Lollobrigida: Nostra ferma condanna a Putin, draghi subito in aula’, Brothers of Italy, 24 February 2022, available at: https://www.fratelli-italia.it/2022/02/24/ucraina-lollobrigida-nostra-ferma-condanna-a-putin-draghi-subito-in-aula/, accessed 13 March 2024.

36 ‘EKRE kongressi avaldus: Kaitskem Eesti rahvusriiki!’, Conservative People’s Party of Estonia, 9 April 2022, available at: https://ekre.ee/ekre-kongressi-avaldus-kaitskem-eesti-rahvusriiki/, accessed 13 March 2024.

37 See, ‘Stop krigen’, Rødt, 11 March 2022, available at: https://roedt.no/stopp-krigen, accessed 13 March 2024.

38 See, ‘Die Waffen nieder! Nein zum Krieg, nein zum Völkerrechtsbruch durch Russland, für Deeskalation und Abrüstung’, Linke, 25 February 2022, available at: https://www.die-linke.de/themen/frieden/ukraine-krieg, accessed 13 March 2024.

39 See, ‘Deklaratsiya na PG na Vazrazhdane po povod na voenniya konflikt’, Vazrazhdane, 1 March 2022, available at: https://vazrazhdane.bg/novini/818-deklaraciia-na-pg-na-vazrajdane-po-povod-na-voenniia-konflikt, accessed 1 February 2023.

40 See, ‘La délégation du Rassemblement National soutient la résolution du Parlement européen sur l’agression russe en Ukraine’, Rassemblement National, 1 March 2022, available at: https://rassemblementnational.fr/communiques/la-delegation-du-rassemblement-national-soutient-la-resolution-du-parlement-europeen-sur-lagression-russe-en-ukraine, accessed 13 March 2024.

41 The number of theoretically possible groups is 3³ · 2⁴ = 432 with seven variables (or 3² · 2⁵ = 288 if variable 1 is treated as a dichotomy). Thirty-three of these groups have empirical instances. If variables 2.1 and 2.2 (–1 if one or both variables score –1) and 2.3 and 2.4 (1 if one or both variables score 1) are merged, the number of theoretically possible groups is still 3³ · 2² = 108 (or 3² · 2³ = 72 if variable 1 is treated as a dichotomy), with 24 being empirically observed.

42 There is no consensus on the minimum number of observations, variables and clusters in cluster analysis. One recommendation (Dolnicar et al. 2014, p. 298) is to include at least 2^d observations (that is, cases) while another suggestion (Dolnicar et al. 2014, p. 298) says at least 10 · d · k observations (with d being the number of variables and k the number of clusters). A third suggestion is to include a minimum of 70 · d observations (Dolnicar et al. 2014, p. 302).

43 While relevant indicators show that the (statistically) optimal number of clusters may be somewhat above five, detailed case- and cluster-based examinations of solutions with between four and ten clusters provide best support for a solution consisting of five, six or seven clusters (for solutions with four and six–ten clusters, see Tables A8–A13 in the online Appendix). All the seven solutions are computed on five variables by merging 2.1 and 2.2 (–1 if either or both variables score –1) into 2.5, and 2.3 and 2.4 (1 if either or both variables score 1) into 2.6. The clusterings are performed in R (package ‘cluster’), using the Partitioning Around Medoids (PAM) algorithm, with Manhattan distance and standardised variables.

44 See Gill (2021) for an overview.