Raising Citizen-Soldiers in Donbas: Russia's Role in Promoting Patriotic Education Programmes in the Donetsk and Luhansk Peoples’ Republics

Abstract

This article examines the role of Russian officials, servicemen, veterans, and paramilitary organisations in coordinating patriotic education programmes in the Donetsk and Luhansk Peoples’ Republics (DNR/LNR) since 2014. Three complementary objectives underpin these programmes: first, indoctrinating youth to a worldview which promotes cultural assimilation into Russian society and denigrates Ukrainian statehood and identity; second, shoring up de facto authorities’ legitimacy by glorifying the DNR/LNR as fully-fledged states requiring protection from Ukraine and destined to be ‘reunited’ with Russia; third, building a training and recruitment mechanism to fill the ranks of ‘republican’ but also Russian military and security structures.

Introduction

The literature on de facto states has mainly concentrated on the different challenges to state-building that are faced by these secessionist territories having some degree of de facto sovereignty but lacking international recognition, such as Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Georgia), Transnistria (Moldova), Donetsk and Luhansk Peoples’ Republics (Ukraine), Nagorno-Karabakh (Azerbaijan) and Northern Cyprus (Cyprus). In particular, strong attention has been given to de facto authorities’ efforts to strengthen governance capacity through institution-building (Bakke et al., 2018; Caspersen, 2015; Florea, 2020; Ó Beacháin et al., 2016; Protsyk, 2012; von Steinsdorff & Fruhstorfer, 2012), their economic constraints (Baar & Baarová, 2017; Isachenko, 2012; Marandici & Lesanu, 2020), and their foreign policy strategies (Berg & Pegg, 2018; Berg & Vits, 2018; Owtram, 2011). Another important focus has been on the role of patron states for the survival of de facto states (Berg & Yüksel, 2022; Caspersen, 2009; Comai, 2018; Cooley, 2015; German, 2016; Gerrits & Bader, 2016; Kolstø, 2020; 2021) and the approaches adopted by the international community when engaging secessionist entities which are not members of the United Nations (Caspersen, 2008; Cooley & Mitchell, 2010; de Waal, 2017; Ker-Lindsay, 2015; 2018; Lynch, 2004; Pegg, 1999). Against this background, a portion of the literature has been devoted to investigating post-Soviet de facto states’ quest for domestic legitimacy through nation-building efforts, with a heavy empirical focus on Transnistria and Abkhazia (Blakkisrud & Kolstø, 2011; Clogg, 2008; Cojocaru, 2006; Dembińska, 2019; Marandici, 2020; Ó Beacháin, 2016; Şveţ, 2013; Troebst, 2003), and a minority of studies looking also at South Ossetia and Nagorno-Karabakh (Dembińska, 2023; Kolstø & Blakkisrud, 2008; O’Loughlin & Kolosov, 2017) and Kosovo (Krasniqi, 2014; Potapkina, 2020). However, there has been little empirical research on the exact nature and degree of patron states’ involvement in facilitating and mobilising nation-building (rather than state-building) processes in de facto states. Thus, this article seeks to contribute to the debate by addressing the question of how and why patron states (and Russia in particular) have tried to consolidate nation-building activities in de facto states, with a focus on patriotic education programmes [programmy patrioticheskogo vospitaniya] in the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk Peoples’ Republics (DNR/LNR). In particular, scholars have drawn attention to the role of patriotic education programmes for reinforcing a sense of national identity and loyalty to the state in Russia (Alava, 2021; Garner, 2023; Kratochvíl & Shakhanova, 2020; Laruelle, 2015a; Rapoport, 2009; Sanina, 2018; Sieca-Kozlowski, 2010). However, their ‘export’ to Russian-supported de facto states has been largely ignored. Two notable exceptions are Corman (2019) for Transnistria and Hoban (2021) for the DNR/LNR. Corman (2019) focuses exclusively on military-patriotic education, thus neglecting the functions of other strands developed both in Transnistria and the DNR/LNR. Rooted in feminist and critical military studies, Hoban (2021) provides a detailed analysis on the role of children in local commemorative practices that normalise violence and promote militaristic values to strengthen the legitimacy of de facto authorities’ secessionist cause. While empirically rich, both studies overlook the systematic participation of Russian state and non-state actors over the years and how local programmatic documents and ‘laws’ on patriotic education copy Russian legislation almost verbatim. As a result, both studies tend to portray nation-building in Transnistria and the DNR/LNR as largely a homegrown process, without sufficiently interrogating the objectives driving the patron state's involvement.

In the context of post-Soviet de facto states, Blakkisrud and Kolstø described nation-building as ‘processes related to the forging of ethnos and demos’, that is, top-down measures which aim to stimulate a sense of political loyalty and belonging to a distinct community from the parent state based on ethnic and/or civic grounds (2011, p. 193, emphasis in original). In line with this definition, this article examines the ways in which the de facto authorities in the DNR/LNR with the assistance of Russian state and non-state actors have designed so-called patriotic education programmes to mould a sense of unity and national identity among children and young people in the self-proclaimed republics. A red thread runs through these programmes, namely, the idea that the DNR/LNR are fully-fledged states belonging to Russia's civilisational space and requiring protection from the parent state (i.e. Ukraine), denounced as a source of political oppression and historical manipulations. Reportedly, these programmes have penetrated the entire educational system in the DNR/LNR, starting as early as in kindergarten (Petik, 2019; Stryzhova, 2020). This case study relies on documentary analysis of planning and strategic documents issued by the de facto authorities and the Russian government and triangulates this data through local newspaper articles and videos from local state-controlled media over the period 2014–2021.

The rest of the chapter is structured into six parts. The first part examines how Russian legislation on patriotic education has been incorporated into the ‘state programmes’ and ‘laws’ issued in the DNR/LNR. To illustrate the distinct, yet complementary functions of the various types of patriotic education programmes, the second, third and fourth parts are each dedicated to one of the main strands listed in the republics’ core strategic and programmatic documents, namely, ‘military’, ‘historical’ and ‘civic’ patriotic programmes. The fifth part builds on the empirical analysis to map out the main objectives of Russia-sponsored patriotic education programmes in the DNR/LNR. Finally, this article summarises the main findings and shows how the measures taken between 2014 and 2021 have been replicated and intensified in the new areas occupied after Russia launched its full-scale invasion against Ukraine in 2022.

The Transposition of Russian Law on Patriotic Education into the Legal Systems of the DNR/LNR

The de facto authorities placed a high priority on patriotic education targeting local youth since the early stages of the DNR/LNR. In June 2015 the ‘LNR Parliament’ adopted the law ‘On the system of patriotic education of citizens of the [LNR]’, while almost in parallel the ‘DNR Ministry of Education’ in partnership with the ‘DNR Ministry of Youth, Sport and Tourism’ approved a document called the ‘Concept of patriotic upbringing of children and students in the [DNR]’. The LNR ‘law’ defined patriotic education as a set of ‘systematic and targeted activities by state organs’ aimed at ‘creat[ing] among citizens a high level of patriotic awareness’ and ‘the readiness to fulfil their civic duty and constitutional responsibilities regarding the protection of the interests of the Motherland [Rodina]’ (‘LNR Parliament’, 2015, p. 2). The DNR ‘concept’ uses a very similar phrasing, although putting the emphasis on ‘youth’ rather than ‘citizens’ in general (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015, p. 2). Significantly, the definition provided in these documents matches exactly the one contained in the decree on the ‘State programme on patriotic education for the citizens of the Russian Federation for 2001–2005’ (Russian Government, 2001, p. 2)¹ and the ‘Concept’ published two years later by an ad hoc commission² (Russian Government, 2003, pp. 2–3).

It is also worth noting that the documents contain strong parallels also with regards to the general objectives identified for patriotic education. In the DNR version we find ‘creating a moral and psychological readiness to defend the Fatherland [Otechestvo]’ and ‘respect for the cultural achievements and the historical past of the [DNR]’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015, p. 3), whereas the LNR text mentions ‘plant[ing] in citizens’ consciousness and feelings socially significant patriotic values, views […] [and] respect for the cultural and historical past of the [LNR]’ (‘LNR Parliament’, 2015, p. 3). Both documents rely on a vocabulary which is intended to strengthen citizens’ allegiance to the self-proclaimed republics as states requiring protection. For instance, both texts contain the exact same wording regarding the necessity to ‘increase the prestige of state and military service’ and ‘instil in citizens a sense of pride, deep respect, and reverence for the state symbols [gosudarstvennyye simvoly] of the [DNR/LNR]’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015a, p. 3; ‘LNR Parliament’, 2015, p. 3). Once again, the exact same expressions were originally formulated in the Russian ‘Concept’ (Russian Government, 2003, pp. 3–4).

Based on these similarities, it appears that the transposition of Russian law on patriotic education into the ‘republican’ legal systems of the DNR/LNR indicates if not direct coordination with, at least acquiescence by the Russian leadership. Critically, in 2020, the DNR fully switched to Russian educational standards, a decision which the DNR de facto leader Denis Pushylin described as ‘the most important part of the integration process with the Russian Federation’ (dan-news.info, 2020c). An updated programme on patriotic education for the period 2020–2022 in the DNR, directed at ensuring more systematic implementation and monitoring mechanisms, specifies that this policy ‘serves as the most important tool of state management [instrument gosudarstvennogo menedzhmenta]’, and that it builds on the existing experience of the Russian Federation, the LNR and Belarus (‘DNR Government’, 2020, p. 7).

In late December 2016, the ‘LNR Council of Ministers’ issued a decree approving the ‘State programme on the patriotic education of the younger generation in the [LNR] for 2016–2020’. Interestingly, this programme largely emulated the ‘concept’ published the year before in the DNR, including in terms of differentiating various ‘strands’ of patriotic education. Among others, three strands are worth considering in detail: ‘military’, ‘historical’ and ‘civic’ (‘LNR Council of Ministers’, 2017, p. 5; ‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015, p. 4).

Military-Patriotic Education

Perhaps the most compelling evidence to date of the success of patriotic education in the DNR/LNR is the proliferation of military-patriotic (sport) youth clubs.³ In August 2017, then ‘DNR head’ Aleksandr Zakharchenko adopted the ‘Programme on patriotic education of children and youth in the DNR for 2017–2018’. Among its main objectives, the programme mentions the creation of ‘military-patriotic sport clubs’ and their collaboration with veteran organisations with the goal ‘to increase young people's motivation for military service and their readiness to defend the Fatherland’. To this end, priority is given to ‘bolstering the prestige of service’ in the armed forces and law enforcement agencies of the DNR (‘DNR head’, 2017, pp. 4–5). This document also states that ‘patriotic education must become the main goal of the state ideology being created in the Republic as part of the Russian World ideology’ (‘DNR head’, 2017, p. 2). Around a month later, the ‘LNR Council of Ministers’ published a document listing various ‘criteria’ for ensuring an effective implementation of the patriotic education system, repeating almost verbatim those mentioned in Zakharchenko's programme (‘LNR Council of Ministers’, 2017, pp. 5–6). Critically, both documents envisage the ‘patronage of military units over educational organisations’ (‘DNR head’, 2017, p. 5; ‘LNR Council of Ministers’, 2017, p. 3). It is worth mentioning that a separate patriotic education department was created under the direct supervision of Zakharchenko's successor, Denis Pushylin, who in 2019 issued a decree re-emphasising the leadership's role in organising military patriotic clubs and military sport competitions (denis.pushylin.ru, 2019, p. 5). Mentions of the critical role of such clubs and competitions as well as of collaborative engagements with veteran organisations as means to increasing the prestige of military service recurrently appear in Russian state programmes on patriotic education over the years (Russian Government, 2001, p. 2, 3, 14; 2005b, pp. 4, 12; 2015, pp. 3–4).

Overall, the ‘military component’ of these clubs consists of training future recruits to local security agencies and ‘republican’ armies or even the Russian armed forces. All involve military training (including classes on how to use and assemble weapons, combat tactics, and sabotage activities), survival training as well as first aid training, and are supervised by local but also (former) Russian military officers (East Human Rights Group, 2021; Vynogradov, 2019). This is where the ‘patriotic’ component comes into play. As a matter of fact, all these clubs engage in systematic ideological indoctrination. Here two themes stand out. The first theme is that of Donbas as a fully-fledged state that needs to be protected. Thus, instructors promote among the recruits the desire to serve the ‘Fatherland’ [Otechestvo], associated primarily with the self-proclaimed republics but also with Russia: the term ‘Russian land’ [russkaya zemlya] is often used to refer to the DNR/LNR. Inevitably, this rhetoric blurs the boundaries between Russia and Donbas, thereby reinforcing the notion that the latter is an integral part of the ‘Russian World’. In turn, Ukraine is consistently depicted as the ‘invader’ of Donbas, which facilitates the progressive alienation of young members of these clubs from the rest of Ukrainian society. The second prominent theme emerging from these clubs’ activities is the alignment of the historical memory of the DNR/LNR with that of Russia. This can be observed through organisers’ methodical efforts to draw parallels between the war in Eastern Ukraine started in 2014 and the Great Patriotic War (GPW)—the name attributed to World War 2 in Russia and elevated to a national myth to reinvent the country's post-Soviet identity and reinforce the regime's legitimacy (Gjerde, 2015; McGlynn, 2018; Torbakov, 2011; Wood, 2011). As shown in the section dedicated to the ‘historical’ strand of patriotic education, such parallels tend to glorify ‘heroes’ from Russia and Donbas as ‘defenders of their native land’ against the Ukrainian state, consistently associated with ‘fascism’—an empty signifier to stigmatise anyone who openly challenges the de facto administration and Russia's state narrative about the war (Gaufman, 2015; Osipian, 2015; Polegkyi, 2016; Prus, 2015; Siddi, 2017). This pattern confirms Kolstø's observation that in the process of ‘exploiting war memories for nation-building purposes’, de facto authorities reinforce the image of the parent state as the ‘common external enemy’ (2006, p. 730).

All publicly available information on military patriotic sport youth clubs can be extracted from their pages on social media, local news websites and YouTube channels run by local state-controlled media. During a military drill for members of the ‘Volunteer’ club in the LNR, its commander openly stated that the club prepares future recruits to join the republic's security apparatus (Luganskyy Informatsionnyy Tsentr, 2015). In an interview, the commander talks about a meeting organised with veterans of the GPW close to ‘Victory Day’ on 9 May, as it is traditionally celebrated in Russia (‘LNR Today’, 2016, 1:11–11:25).

Arguably, military patriotic sport youth clubs have proliferated more systematically in the DNR. What's interesting about clubs such as the ‘Amazons’ and ‘Knight’ is that they are mainly female squads. According to one Ukrainian investigation, the club ‘Amazons’ invites instructors from the Russian Federation (Gorlovka.ua, 2016). Members of the club have also taken part in military youth competitions in the Moscow region (Gorlovka.Today, 2015, 2:56–54:08). One documentary covered the military training of the ‘Knight’ squad in preparation to an annual contest held at a military academy in Donetsk, which is judged by the academy's members and former Russian military and awards the winners with a visit to a Russian patriotic camp (VICE News, 2015). In the video, the club organiser confirms that the primary goal of the club is to ‘instil patriotism among the young generation’ and that several of its members had already joined the ‘DNR armed forces’ (VICE News, 2015, 1:11–1:34). The main coach is a former Russian officer who served in Afghanistan (VICE News, 2015, 1:56). The squad can also be seen singing military patriotic songs, expressing ‘unconditional love’ to ‘our holy Russian land’ and ‘readiness to join the holy fight’ in defence of the DNR (VICE News, 2015, 4:49–5:06). The documentary also shows how members of the Oplot battalion⁴ have been training young members from various clubs how to handle different pieces of military hardware (VICE News, 2015, 6:57–7:07). In the documentary, young club members express their aspiration to join the ‘DNR armed forces’ and their desire for the republic to join the Russian Federation (VICE News, 2015, 7:07–7:23). It is worth stressing that the programmatic document on patriotic education in the DNR for the period 2020–2022 explicitly mentions ‘representatives from the Russian Federation’ participating in ‘republican military-sport student games’ (‘DNR Government’, 2020, p. 8).

The ‘Amazons’ and ‘Knight’ clubs are both members of the Russian military-patriotic movement ‘Young Army’ [Yunarmiya], which has acquired a coordinating role. Created at the initiative of Russian Minister of Defence Sergei Shoigu in late 2015—early 2016, Yunarmiya has branches throughout Russia but also in other neighbouring countries. The movement provides military, emergency response and first aid training to young individuals aged 8 to 18. In the ‘about’ section, the ‘Young Army’ website states that the movement ‘prepares youth to serve in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation’ (Young Army, n.d.). In January 2018, Crimean-born member of the Russian State Duma Andrey Kozenko, in his capacity as director of the Russia–Donbas Integration Committee (RDIC)—an institution tasked with overseeing all integration processes between the DNR/LNR and Russia—announced the signing of an agreement with ‘LNR leader’ Leonid Pasechnik, allowing ‘Russian subjects’ to assist with the organisation of Yunarmiya in the republic (Luganskyy Informatsionnyy Tsentr, 2018). The movement was eventually introduced in the DNR/LNR in the spring of 2019. During the first recruitment round, the deputy chief of the LNR ‘national militia’ explicitly described Yunarmiya members as ‘mobilisation reserve’ and ‘potential officers’, confirming that this movement is in essence a replica of the Russian original (news-front.info, 2019). Significantly, the ‘state programme’ for the period 2020–2022 in the DNR lists Yunarmiya as one of the executors of public commemoration events on key anniversaries directed at ‘the formation of a state identity’ and summer ‘defence-sport rallies’ aimed at ‘increasing the amount of youth motivated to defend their state and serve in the armed forces of the DNR’ (‘DNR Government’, 2020, p. 28, 58–59).

Some of these clubs have joined the so-called Association of military-patriotic clubs named after ‘DNR hero’ Oleg Grishin.⁵ Allegedly, the association was established in February 2016 at the initiative of Aleksander Khodakovskyy, then commander of the Vostok battalion, former commander of the Alpha unit of the Security Service of Ukraine and ‘DNR Minister for State Security’ for a brief period. Alongside patriotic and physical training, the association prepares youth for admission to various military academies in the DNR/LNR. Reportedly, the association has been supported by the organisation ‘Patriotic Forces of Donbas’ (led by Khodakovskyy), which turned into a unit of the regular ‘armed forces of the DNR’ and has managed various military patriotic youth clubs (‘Patrioticheskie sily’, 2016, 0:33–1:37).

Already in July 2015, the Vostok battalion opened the military-patriotic camp ‘Vympel’. The latter brings together members aged 10–17 from various clubs based in the DNR. Сlub members receive military, first aid and survival training, and learn how to assemble weapons (‘Patrioticheskie sily’, 2015, 0:00–2:21). A similar camp called ‘Lesnyye prostory’ has been operating in the LNR since 2016, becoming the model for other camps (Luganskyy Informatsionnyy Tsentr, 2016a). A key figure in the organisation of military-patriotic education activities in the LNR is Aleksey Selivanov,⁶ previously an assistant to Ukraine's former Minister of Defence Pavel Lebedev⁷ and currently ataman of the organisation ‘Faithful Cossackdom’ (founded in 2004) and chairman of the ‘Patriotic Association of Donbas’, a project coordinated jointly by the ‘LNR Ministries of Interior, Emergency Situations, and Education’. In an interview, Selivanov explained that every year these camps host the St. George military-patriotic rally, during which local officers from the ‘LNR Ministry of Interior’ brief local youth on what a career in law enforcement entails (‘GTRK LNR’, 2021, 3:07–4:19). Often participants also get invited to various military-patriotic events in Russia (‘GTRK LNR’, 2021, 9:46–10:03).

Reportedly, teenagers from Luhansk have been invited to two ‘military camps’ based in the Russian city of Penza and in the Nizhny Novgorod region respectively, both operating with the support of the Russian Ministry of Defence (Lgikvideo, 2016; Stryzhova, 2016). The ‘programmatic document’ covering the period 2020–2022 lists ‘the possibility of acquiring experience in the implementation of state policy in the field of patriotic education in the territory of the Russian Federation’ as one of the strengths of the programme (‘DNR Government’, 2020, p. 110).

Historical-Patriotic Education

The distinction between the ‘military’ and ‘historical’ strands of patriotic education is analytically useful, although in practice the organisation of activities such as ‘lessons in courage’ and ‘lessons in patriotism’ show the profound interaction between the two. This is because the de facto authorities’ attempts to draw young people into joining local armed forces and law enforcement agencies are systematically accompanied by the glorification of Soviet soldiers’ feats [podvigi], which in turn helps strengthen the idea that there is a historical continuum between the GPW and the war in Donbas.

For example, in January 2017 the ‘LNR Ministry of Culture, Sport and Youth’ issued a decree approving the organisation of patriotic games called ‘Proud to be a defender’ in honour of the ‘Defender of the Fatherland Day’ celebrations, a Soviet-era public holiday still celebrated in Russia on 23 February. The decree mentions that the games are intended to ‘stimulat[e] among youth an informed interest into the historical events of the GPW’ and ‘popularis[e] service in the armed forces of the LNR’ (‘LNR Ministry of Culture, Sport and Youth’, 2017, p. 4). In other words, the militarisation of the younger strata of society centres on the adoption of Soviet/Russian interpretations of history.

This link is especially evident in the content offered in so-called ‘lessons in courage’ and ‘lessons in patriotism’. It is telling that these activities often coincide with 8 September, considered to be the anniversary of ‘the liberation of the Donbas region from Nazi occupation’, and the ‘Day of Heroes of the Motherland’, a festivity celebrated in Russia on 9 December, while being always accompanied by Soviet symbolism such as the St. George ribbon (dan-news.info, 2020d; Russkaya Vesna, 2018). News reports from the DNR indicate that these lessons have been organised for schools under the supervision of the ‘Ministry of Defence’ (Russkaya Vesna, 2015) and the ‘Ministry of Interior’ (‘Ministerstvo Vnutrishnikh Del DNR’, 2016). The ‘DNR Ministry of Information’ has also run these lessons for various patriotic clubs (‘DNR Ministry of Information’, 2018a, 2018b, 2019). As for the LNR, ‘lessons in courage’ have been coordinated by the ‘Ministry of State Security’ (Gazeta, 2015) and the ‘Ministry of Interior’ (Luganskyy Informatsionnyy Tsentr, 2016b) for military patriotic clubs, whereas the ‘Ministry of Education’ (Russkaya Vesna, 2018) and Yunarmiya (Stryzhova, 2020) have been involved with schools more generally.

‘Lessons in courage’ often involve the participation of veterans of the GPW (but also the Soviet–Afghan War) as well as former fighters who survived the most intense battles in Eastern Ukraine in 2014–2015. To reinforce this parallel between the GPW and the war in Donbas, these lessons are often held at the local museum in Donetsk dedicated to the GPW (Telekanal ‘Oplot TV’, 2015; ‘NovorossiyaTV’, 2017). On these occasions, organisers have also presented the web project ‘White Cranes’, which glorifies the soldiers who lost their lives ‘in the holy war to defend the Motherland against Ukrainian fascism’ (‘White Cranes’, n.d. [a]). The vocabulary nurtures the image of the DNR as a state that needs protection from hostile forces, which in turn is reinforced by public commemoration events in honour of those who have fallen in the war in 2014–2015 as well as the GPW.

A similar war museum was also opened in Luhansk in 2016 at the initiative of the (Donbas) Night Wolves, a Russian nationalist motorcycle club with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin (Izvestiya, 2021). The club also happens to be a ‘national militia’ under the ‘LNR Ministry of Interior’, a voluntary organisation tasked with maintaining public order and assisting with patriotic education. During the opening ceremony, the ‘LNR Deputy Minister of Interior’ explicitly stated that one of the main tasks of the museum would be to ‘educate the military-patriotic spirit of the youth of the republic’ (RIA Novosti, 2016).

In 2017 the ‘DNR Ministry of Education’ published a programme with recommendations on the content to be included in ‘lessons on the history of the Fatherland’. Critically, these lessons treat the history of Donbas as a constitutive part of the history of Russia. The programme also instructed a highly selective interpretation of the events of 2014, referring to the ‘Ukrainisation of Donbas’ over the period 1991–2013, ‘regime change’ in Kyiv and ‘Russophobia and neo-Nazism as fundamental elements of political life in modern Ukraine’, but also the ‘war for independence’ of the ‘national republics of Novorossiya’⁸ as part of their ‘state-building’ process, and ‘Donbas as part of the Russian World’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2017a, pp. 28–29).

In an interview, Pavel Morozov, head of the department of social disciplines at the Donetsk Republican Institute of Additional Pedagogical Education (DRIAPE⁹), announced the publication of a new series on the local history of Donbas for all grades. Significantly, he stressed that the history of Donbas should be treated as ‘an integral part of the history of Russia’ (Holokha, 2019). Morozov explained that the new subject under the name ‘history of the Fatherland’ is now mandatory and has replaced Ukrainian history as a subject. Critically, he admitted that the new textbooks were modelled on those imported from Russia in 2015,¹⁰ preserving even the same section titles (Holokha, 2019).

A few examples are illustrative. The grade 10 textbook refers to the creation of the Donetsk–Krivoi Rog Soviet Republic (DKRSR) in February 1918¹¹ as ‘the first experience in the establishment of an autonomous statehood on the territory of Donetsk’ (Morozov et al., 2020, p. 39). The textbook also relies on tsarist terminology to disparage efforts by the Soviet political leadership of ‘so-called Ukraine’ to impose control over Donbas on the grounds that its population had preserved its ‘little Russian’ [malorossiyskaya] and ‘Great Russian’ [velikorossiyskaya] identities (Morozov et al., 2020, p. 40). Significantly, the use of the DKRSR as a historical point of reference appears also in the official rhetoric of the DNR leadership. A few days before the signing of the Minsk 2 Agreements in February 2015—which remained the main framework for conflict resolution until Putin's decision to recognise the DNR/LNR as independent states in February 2022—the DNR de facto leadership issued a memorandum proclaiming the DNR as the successor of the DKRSR, appealing to other regions formerly controlled by the DKRSR (but then under Ukrainian control) to join the DNR in establishing a ‘federative state’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015a). In this regard, Voronovici aptly pointed out that creating historical continuity between the DKRSR and the DNR served de facto authorities’ efforts to fend off accusations that the republics were artificial entities and that aspirations for autonomy in Donbas had no historical precedents (2020, p. 295).

With regards to the post-Soviet period, the grade 11 textbook denounces the forceful ‘Ukrainisation’ of the Donbas region during the years of Ukrainian independence (Morozov et al., 2019, pp. 58–60). The narration about the Euromaidan protests reiterates Russian state rhetoric about a Western-orchestrated ‘coup’ (Morozov et al., 2019, pp. 34–38). The war is framed as an act of ‘external armed aggression by the Kyiv regime’, while the Russian Federation is praised for its ‘humanitarian assistance’ (Morozov et al., 2019, p. 114). The ‘Russian spring’ is presented as a ‘national liberation movement demanding a return to Russian cultural and historical roots and reunification with Russia’ (Morozov et al., 2019, p. 64). The same exact narratives can be found also in the textbook History of Donbas: from antiquity to modernity (Shepko & Nikolskyy, 2018, p. 604). In an interview, the Dean of the Faculty of History of the Donetsk National University explained that back in 2015 then ‘DNR head’ Aleksandr Zakharchenko had proposed to members of the faculty to write a new textbook on the history of Donbas which would cover the events of the ‘Russian spring’, interpreted as a stepping stone for the ‘establishment of the DNR statehood’, and overall treat the history of Donbas ‘as part of the Russian world, […] of Greater Russia’ (Donetskoe Vremya, 2020). In another interview, the Dean confirmed that the book has already been adopted by all schools in the DNR with the goal to ‘form […] a clear civic position [among pupils]’. She also explained that Dmitry Sablin,¹² a member of the Russian State Duma and coordinator for the patriotic education of youth for the ‘United Russia’ party since 2007, had assisted with the publication of this textbook in memory of his friend Zakharchenko (Russkaya Vesna, 2020).

Civic-Patriotic Education

The third and final category of patriotic education worth exploring in detail deals with compulsory civics classes. In 2015 the ‘DNR Ministry of Education’ published a school programme with a detailed breakdown of the various topics that ‘civics lessons on Donbas’ were expected to cover. Overall, the goals in this programme echoed those listed in official documents addressing patriotic education programmes more generally, namely, ‘assert[ing] in [people's] consciousness […] [their] importance as citizens for the state’, ‘produc[ing] moral and psychological readiness to defend the Fatherland’ and ‘instilling in citizens a sense of pride, deep respect and worship of the symbols of the [DNR]’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015b, p. 8). A revised programme was published in 2017 (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2017b). Significantly, both documents organise civic education classes around three ‘macro-spheres’: ‘Donbas is my motherland’, ‘Educate in you a citizen of the DNR’ and ‘Donbas and the Russian World’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015b, p. 8, 10–11, 2017b, p. 5, 9–10). The first sphere includes themes related to the cultural history and ecosystem of Donbas as well as discussions on what constitutes the ‘Donbas character’, but also abstract concepts such as ‘heroism’. The second sphere aims to strengthen the idea of the ‘statehood’ of the DNR by focusing on ‘state symbols’ and the ‘Constitution’. To this end, it envisages discussions on how young people's military service reflects a ‘sense of responsibility’ and ‘active citizenship’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015b, p. 73; 2017b, p. 67).

As for the third sphere, there are some noteworthy differences between the 2015 documents and its 2017 revision. Only the 2015 version contains a section dedicated to the origins of the ancient Rus’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015b, p. 33) and one dedicated to relations between Donbas and Russia with the goal to ‘reveal the close relationship among Slavic peoples—Russia, Ukraine and Belarus’, described as ‘brotherly nations’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015b, p. 70). This topic is completely absent in the 2017 revision. But unlike the 2015 document, the 2017 programme referred to the history of Donbas as ‘an integral part of the history of the Russian World’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2017b, p. 27, 32). At the same time, history lessons on the various stages of the formation of the Russian state (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015b, p. 11, 40, 2017b, pp. 43, 49), ‘heroic pages’ in Russian history and Russian state symbols (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2015b, p. 11, 2017b, p. 10), which were already present in the 2015 document, were preserved in its revision two years later. These differences are important as they reveal the gradual removal of any references to the role of Donbas in Ukrainian history and the progressive consolidation of the idea that the DNR is a fully-fledged state, which has historically evolved in parallel with, even as part of the Russian state over the centuries. Overall, these policy documents indicate that civics lessons are believed to play a critical role in buttressing the allegiance of younger generations not only to the ‘state’ institutions of the DNR/LNR but also to the Russian state.

Following these programmatic documents, ‘civics lessons on Donbas’ have been regularly held in local schools (Donetskaya Respublika, 2019; Durnev, 2021; ‘DNR Ministry of Information’, 2018с; ‘NovorossiyaTV’, 2016). Publicly available videos show local teachers admitting that the ‘DNR Ministry of Information’ regularly provides them with ‘objective information’ to be shared with pupils in the context of ‘civics classes’ held in primary schools (‘Nastoyashcheye Vremya’, 2016, 2:22–2:33), such as the questionable notion that the DNR was ‘liberated from Ukrainian invaders’ (‘Nastoyashcheye Vremya’, 2016, 1:20–1:35). Local teachers show the ‘state symbols’ of the DNR to pupils (‘Nastoyashcheye Vremya’, 2016, 0:04–0:19) and children can be seen singing the ‘DNR national anthem’ (‘Nastoyashcheye Vremya’, 2016, 2:38–2:47).

In August 2019 the ‘DNR Ministry of Education’ issued a decree recommending the use of school textbooks published in the Russian Federation for primary and secondary education for the academic year 2019–2020 (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2019a). Based on an annex to this document, teachers are instructed to instil in students the appreciation of the Russian language ‘as the basic element of the culture for the residents of the DNR’ and ‘promote the understanding of Russian as the state language of the DNR’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2019a, p. 17). In this respect, local journalists have reported that since 2015 Ukrainian language, history and literature course have been made optional and progressively removed altogether (Kovalenko and Rezchikov, 2017; Movchan et al., 2020).

In another annex to the decree, Pushylin published a list of recommendations on how to carry out ‘lessons on civics and the spirit of Donbas’ on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the ‘the liberation of Donbas from fascists’. Here teachers are instructed to inspire in students a sense of pride for the ‘feats’ of those who fought in the GPW as well as the war in Eastern Ukraine. ‘State representatives’ and soldiers from the ‘DNR armed forces’ would be invited to support teachers (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2019b, pp. 6–7). Various public commemoration events associated with the GPW would also be organised with the intent to form a ‘unique system for the creation of the national-civic identity and patriotic position of […] young citizens of the DNR’ (‘DNR Ministry of Education’, 2019b, p. 9). This document exemplifies well the complementarity of the military, historic and civic strands of patriotic education: the noblest form of civic engagement championed by the de facto authorities is showing respect for the traditions of the DNR/LNR as nations through knowledge and emulation of great examples in Russian/Soviet military history, and especially protecting the republics seen as states under existential threat through military service.

The Objectives of Patriotic Education Programmes

This study has shown the critical role of Russian state officials, (former) Russian military and representatives of Russian paramilitary nationalist organisations in assisting de facto leaders’ implementation of patriotic education programmes in the DNR/LNR. The systematic nature of Russian actors’ involvement suggests the need to expand our understanding of nation-building processes in de facto states, especially in terms of how they are intended to undermine the parent state's sovereignty and societal cohesion. Based on these empirical findings, patriotic education programmes in the DNR/LNR serve three main and mutually reinforcing objectives.

Firstly, they operate as instruments of mass indoctrination. In fact, they systematically promulgate the idea that the historical evolution of the ‘statehood’ [gosudarstvennost’] and of the ‘people’ [narod] of Donbas is inextricably linked to that of the Russian state and nation. By contrast, ties to Ukraine tend to be portrayed as an historical aberration. The idea that Donbas belongs to the ‘Russian World’—a deliberately vague ideological concept with a transnational outlook used by Russian officials and de facto authorities to refer to the ‘civilisational’ space of people culturally oriented towards Russia—is a constant. The criteria for belonging to the ‘Russian World’ are not limited to Russian language and ethnicity as markers of identity, which is why political elites can strategically adjust its values and geographical boundaries based on political calculations (Laruelle, 2015b; see also Feklyunina, 2016). In short, cultural affiliation with Russia in the DNR/LNR is presented in confrontational terms to encourage cultural alienation from Ukraine and, ultimately, assimilation into Russian society. Critically, Ukraine is consistently vilified as the aggressor state. However, this accusation is not accompanied by any evidence-based discussion on international legal principles such as territorial integrity and sovereignty when explaining the takeover of the administrative buildings in Donetsk and Luhansk in the spring of 2014 which saw the involvement of Russian special forces, security officers, veterans¹³ and representatives from Russian nationalist paramilitary groups (including Cossack units) alongside local pro-Russian activists and criminal groups (Bowen, 2019; Kazanskyy & Vorotyntseva, 2020, pp. 277–285; Laruelle, 2016; Mitrokhin, 2015; Yudina & Verkhovsky, 2019). By contrast, Russia is hailed as the main source of security and prosperity for the local population, although Moscow's role in escalating the war in Donbas in contravention of those same principles is not problematised in any way.

Secondly, patriotic education programmes serve as an important source of self-legitimisation for the de facto authorities. In fact, the statehood of the DNR/LNR is recurrently portrayed as a historical fait accompli and something to be defended at all costs. In order to strengthen the idea of the existence of a Donbas ‘people’ having a rightful claim to independence, these programmes rely on the concept of ‘historical statehood’ (Voronovici, 2020). This narrative is reinforced in the newly introduced school history curriculum since 2014, which interprets the history of Donbas exclusively in the context of Russian history. State-sponsored policies of Russification during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries targeting Ukrainian language and culture are ignored, whereas periods under Ukrainian rule in the past are unequivocally described as periods of oppression characterised by forceful ‘Ukrainisation’. In turn, this set of premises serves de facto authorities’ rhetorical efforts to glorify the conflict of 2014 as an act of national liberation and thus legitimise their aspiration to independence as a stepping stone to future integration with the Russian Federation.

Thirdly, patriotic education programmes provide an efficient recruitment tool for the self-proclaimed republics’ military and security apparatus (but also the Russian armed forces) as they are heavily centred on the militarisation of youth through military patriotic youth clubs and paramilitary movements. As shown above, training sessions are often delivered by Russian servicemen and members of Russian veteran or paramilitary organisations.

Conclusion

This article showed how the implementation of patriotic education programmes in the DNR/LNR since 2014 with the assistance of Russian state officials, servicemen, veteran and Cossack organisations, has sought to achieve three complementary objectives. The first objective has been indoctrinating youth to the political cause of the DNR/LNR as part of Russia's civilisational space while promulgating militaristic values and misrepresenting Ukrainian national identity as inherently hostile to the local population. By denigrating Ukrainian historiography as a nationalist and alien tradition, de facto authorities have been able to offer alternative educational content designed to instil loyalty to the DNR/LNR and facilitate assimilation into Russian society among young people, especially those who are too young to have experienced life as part of the Ukrainian state before 2014. The second objective has been boosting de facto authorities’ domestic legitimacy and public support for their secessionist cause and policies promoting integration processes with Russia, hailed as the ‘true’ Motherland. In this respect, the adoption of Russian educational standards and the exclusive use of Russian and ‘republican’ history textbooks has served de facto authorities’ efforts to craft a new national myth that portrays them as paladins of peace against an aggressive Ukraine. In turn, these initiatives have also served Russia's goal to undermine the Ukrainian government's authority in the region and fuel internal discord by politicising selective historical narratives that dismiss Ukraine's state borders as the product of a historical accident or even an act of historical injustice which divided the Russian people [russkiy narod]. The third objective has been institutionalising reliable mechanisms for finding and preparing young recruits to serve in the armed forces and/or law enforcement agencies of the DNR/LNR but also the Russian Federation, tasked with ‘defending’ the Donbas against Ukraine. Significantly, the systematic involvement of Russian state and non-state representatives revealed by the empirical findings invites a radical reappraisal of the evolution of nation-building processes in (post-Soviet) de facto states. From this perspective, identity construction in de facto states can serve not only as an instrument of legitimisation for de facto leaders but also as an instrument of destabilisation and control of the patron state over the parent state as a whole.

Between 2014 and 2021 the Russian leadership sought to obtain a ‘special status’ for the DNR/LNR and ensure their reintegration into Ukraine in the context of the Minsk peace negotiations under the assumption that the Ukrainian leadership would cave in to Moscow's demands to prioritise local elections over demilitarisation efforts. Critically, this arrangement would have sealed Russia's stronghold in the region. Over this period, Russia-sponsored patriotic education programmes in the DNR/LNR acted as catalysts for the consolidation of a distinct ‘republican’ identity culturally oriented towards Russia to fuel polarisation in Ukrainian society (Abibok, 2018; Vchasno, 2020). Scholars cautioned that the political aspirations and cultural narratives feeding into de facto authorities’ nation-building activities targeting domestic audiences were severely at odds with Moscow's political goals in the Minsk peace process and that this ideological tension has led to further social frustration among local residents already disillusioned with local elites amid racketeering allegations and authoritarian crackdowns (Malyarenko & Wolff, 2018, pp. 30–42). Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 effectively marked the abandonment of this subversive strategy. Patriotic education programmes turned into means of political control to root out and convert ‘disloyal’ citizens, laying the ideological groundwork for the incorporation of these (and other) territories into the Russian Federation.

Preparatory steps had been taken in the months preceding Putin's decision to announce the formal annexation of the territories controlled by Russian forces in Ukraine's Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia regions on 30 September 2022. In April the de facto authorities in the DNR declared their plan to open a Cossack cadet corps (Radio Svoboda, 2022). Many graduates from military academies and cadet corps in the DNR/LNR were recruited in the ‘republican’ armed forces and lost their lives in combat. Around the same time, the Russia-installed de facto leader of Crimea announced that ad hoc programmes were being established to assist teachers from the Kherson, Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia regions to adopt Russian educational standards (KrymInform, 2022). Reportedly, similar programmes were installed for teachers from the newly occupied areas in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions (Larina, 2022). Moreover, in May 2022 the Russian and local branches of Yunarmiya signed a cooperation agreement, signalling the intention to continue emulating Russian military structures as a blueprint for the development of the local military and security apparatus (lnr-news.ru, 2022). Russian independent media investigations reported that children from the DNR/LNR have been sent to Chechnya to obtain military patriotic education (Meduza, 2022). The growing body of evidence shows that Russia has organised on a systematic scale the illegal transfer of thousands of Ukrainian children to dozens of ‘re-education’ camps set up in occupied Crimea and mainland Russia and designed to weaken their allegiance to the Ukrainian state and instil pro-Russian patriotic sentiment (Humanitarian Research Lab, 2023).

The military outcome of the war will remain unclear for some time. One could argue that the level of success of patriotic education programmes has been mixed to begin with, as the poor economic prospects and international isolation of the DNR/LNR have pushed many young people to flee either to Ukraine or Russia. Arguably, the regime of terror imposed in the newly occupied territories has weakened rather than strengthened the propaganda efforts of the occupying administration. Restricted physical access to the DNR/LNR and risks to participants’ safety make it virtually impossible to conduct sociological research that could help us better understand the extent to which the militaristic values and historical narratives promoted through patriotic education programmes have penetrated local society since 2014. Despite these caveats, future studies should address the political and security challenges that Russia-sponsored patriotic education programmes and related activities might pose for the efforts of governments such as Ukraine to reintegrate breakaway regions and facilitate reconciliation processes in the long run.

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Dr. Derek Averre, Dr. Paul Richardson, Prof. Kataryna Wolczuk, Prof. Stefan Wolff as well as one anonymous reviewer, for their helpful comments on drafts of this article.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) (grant agreement number 2064576).

Notes on contributors

Jaroslava Barbieri

Jaroslava Barbieri is a teaching fellow and doctoral researcher at the University of Birmingham. She is also a researcher with Arena at Johns Hopkins University, a multi-disciplinary program dedicated to creating best practices for overcoming disinformation and polarisation. Her research interests include Russian foreign policy, post-Soviet conflicts, post-Soviet democratisation in hybrid regimes, disinformation and the politics of memory in the post-Soviet region. Her media commentary has appeared on Sky News, NBC News, ABC News, France 24, Euronews, Channel 4 News, Newsweek, BBC Radio and LBC Radio.

Notes

1 The same applies to the programme covering 2016–2020 (Russian Government, 2015a, p. 2).

2 Created in 1994, the decree establishing this commission lists the development of initiatives aimed at ‘increasing the prestige of military service and military-patriotic education’ among its main tasks (Russian Government, 1994).

3 The above-mentioned programmatic document covering the period 2020–2022 claims that between 2014 and 2019, the number of clubs had tripled in the DNR alone, reaching a total of 62 (‘DNR government’, 2020, p. 107).

4 The battalion's commander used to be former ‘DNR head’ Aleksandr Zakharchenko until his death in August 2018.

5 Grishin died in July 2014 during separatists’ defence of their position on the Saur-Mohyla height, strategically located on the border between Ukraine's Luhansk and Donetsk regions and Russia's Rostov region. This battle is recurrently celebrated by de facto authorities to mark the anniversary of ‘Victory Day’ on 9 May and ‘the liberation of Donbas from Nazi invaders’ on 8 September, thus reinforcing the parallel between the GPW and the war in Eastern Ukraine (‘DNR Ministry of Foreign Affairs’, 2018; dan-news.info, 2020b).

6 In an interview, Selivanov explained that the organisation was created by individuals who believed that the territories of Ukraine and Russia are ‘part of the same country, the same Motherland’ (‘Andrei Savelev’, 2017, 0:23–0:50). In his words, members of this organisation viewed the Euromaidan as a ‘coup’, an ‘anti-Russian’ event (‘Andrei Savelev’, 2017, 1:26–1:43). He admitted fighting on the side of LNR separatists (‘Andrei Savelev’, 2017, 2:34–3:37) and having expansionist territorial ambitions beyond the DNR/LNR with the objective to ‘liberate’ additional territories and ‘impose a Russian, Slavic, Orthodox order’ (‘Andrei Savelev’, 2017, 5:05–5:15). In another interview, Selivanov described the accession of the DNR/LNR as ‘only one aspect of the Russian Reconquista’, which would also involve the incorporation of other Ukrainian territories (‘LNR Today’, 2021, 1:10–1:58).

7 Lebedev held this position from December 2012 to February 2014, when he defected to Russia and fled to Crimea.

8 In the initial stages of the war, the de facto authorities alongside Russian officials started popularising the idea of ‘Novorossiya’ [New Russia] as a legitimising narrative to consolidate their power. The term itself derives from the administrative name given to the territories annexed by tsarist Russia following the Russo-Turkish wars in the second half of the eighteenth century. Project ‘Novorossiya’ was officially abandoned in the spring of 2015 when the leaders of the so-called ‘Russian Spring’ in the DNR/LNR failed to find popular support in other Ukrainian southern and eastern regions for the establishment of similar secessionist ‘republics’.

9 The official website describes the DRIAPE as an institution tasked with implementing the ‘government's educational strategy’ and focused on activities dedicated to the ‘the full integration of the educational system in the DNR into the Russian educational space’ (DRIAPE, n.d.).

10 There is extensive evidence of Russian textbooks being transported in ‘humanitarian convoys’ across the Russian-Ukrainian border in February 2015 (TASS, 2015), throughout the summer of that year (Interfax, 2015; Fond ‘Russkyi Mir’, 2015; Odnarodyna, 2015a; ‘NovorossiyaTV’, 2015) and then again in December (Odnarodyna, 2015b). In May 2018 the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations oversaw a new shipment (RIA Novosti, 2018). In March 2020, the ‘Russkiy Mir’ Foundation donated 250 Russian history school textbooks to the central library of Donetsk (dan-news.info, 2020a).

11 The DKRSR emerged against the background of the Russian Civil War (1917–1922). Its leaders sought an autonomous status within the Russian SFSR. However, the project was short-lived: only one month after its establishment the Bolsheviks incorporated the territories controlled by the DKRSR into Soviet Ukraine (see Shabelnikov, 2013).

12 Sablin is a former Russian military officer and former advisor to Boris Gromov, governor of the Moscow Region from 2000 to 2012. He was a member of the Committee on Defence and Security in the Russian Federation Council between 2013 to 2016. He is also the First Deputy Chairman of the All-Russian public organisation of veterans ‘Militant Brotherhood’, directed by Gromov.

13 One of the most famous figures is Igor Girkin (nom de guerre: ‘Strelkov’), a retired FSB agent of monarchist convictions who served in Chechnya and Transnistria. In a 2020 interview, he admitted leading one of the units which had seized Slovyansk in April 2014 after being involved in the annexation of Crimea (see ‘Dmitry Gordon’, 2020, 13:06–14:09; 27:09–30:55).