The Rhetoric of Traditional Values in Contemporary Russia

Although the notion of “traditional values” has recently become popular in Russia, it is actually a new phenomenon in both religious and political discourse. In the 1990s, the most common and established use of the word “values” was with adjectives such as “spiritual” and “moral,” while the word “traditional” was mostly attributed to religions. In a certain sense, the very concept of “spiritual and moral values” was used as a transitory one. Having emerged between the 1980s and the 1990s as an antithesis to Communist values, this concept was nevertheless based on an understanding of spirituality that was exceptionally wide and could not be limited exclusively to the Orthodox framework. As a result, the new social and political situation required a clarification of notions and definitions. One can trace the use of the concept of “traditional values” in the Orthodox context with a high level of certainty. For several years (2000– 2012), it was used only by Metropolitan Kirill and a circle of publicists around the WRPC 1. Yet, even in this milieu, it took a while for the notion to take root. In an extended collection of articles and speeches published