67 pages • 2 hours read
Alexei NavalnyPatriot
Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 2024A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Battle Against Authoritarianism
Patriot is a manual for political dissent. In telling the story of his life, Navalny is telling the story of the battle against authoritarianism that has come to define his existence. In recounting his experiences, Navalny hopes to encourage others to follow the same path in fighting against oppressive regimes.
Navalny believes that his greatest tool is transparency. In direct contrast to the authoritarian state he opposes, Navalny is anti-censorship. His belief in openness extends to sharing his failures as well as his successes. In effect, his biography is less about his own life than about the viability of certain political techniques and maneuvers. Running for mayor in Moscow, for example, was a campaign based on interpersonal politics and big elaborate stunts. This garnered a great deal of attention, but Navalny still found himself in second place. His experiences in other political parties also led to criticism and failure. Navalny’s outreach to right-wing nationalists, for example, gained him a lot of criticism. Navalny defends his decision to do so, citing the need to create a broad base of support across society, but concedes that this outreach provided his opponents with material to label him as an extremist. Through his own story, Navalny tries to teach the next generation of dissidents about what works and what does not.
The battle against authoritarianism also demands sacrifice. Navalny readily accepts the need for sacrifice: The book begins with the story of how he was nearly assassinated, how he fought hard to recover, and how he subjected himself to further prosecution by returning to Russia. Whether he is fighting in the streets at political demonstrations, being sent through an absurd bureaucracy, or launching a hunger strike in prison, Navalny makes clear that he is willing to make any physical sacrifice necessary for his country. Navalny’s family has been routinely hassled, while his colleagues have regularly had their possessions stolen or destroyed by the authoritarian state. The battle against authoritarianism becomes more than just one person’s sacrifice, requiring a collective effort to succeed.
At the same time, Navalny alludes to his newfound appreciation of religion as a necessary means of maintaining his faith. Though he grew up as an atheist, Navalny converted to Christianity during the course of his battles. His religious faith is a source of tremendous comfort throughout his persecution. He memorizes Bible passages and shares religious icons with fellow prisoners. Through this small act of faith, Navalny is able to remind himself of the scope of his battle. His body is a temporary container for his soul, he suggests, so the pain and suffering he endures is not forever. Faith in religion becomes an important part of Navalny’s battle, but faith in his country and his cause are the most fundamental parts of his existence.
The book’s title—Patriot—reinforces his belief in the potential of his country. He is fighting against the Russian state, he reiterates, not the Russian people. Navalny believes in the potential of the Russian people with near-religious fervor, urging them to join him in the fight against authoritarianism.
The Normalization of Corruption
Navalny depicts Russia as a place where all of society is trapped in a system that everyone knows is failing but for which no one can imagine an alternative. He blames the state of widespread cynicism and apathy on the pervasiveness of corruption in Russian politics and the legal system, arguing that the normalization of corruption has undermined Russia as a whole.
The initial period after the collapse of the Soviet Union was, to Navalny, a moment of wasted opportunity. Rather than transitioning to the kind of Western democratic system that he craves, Navalny witnessed the plundering of the state by corrupt oligarchs. Endemic corruption eventually enabled the election of Vladimir Putin, who promised greater economic stability but has allowed the corruption to continue unabated. From university exams to speeding fines, nothing can be accomplished without bribes, extending corruption from the upper echelons of Russian society down to the average citizen.
When Navalny took up a government position in one of Russia’s most corrupt regions, he witnessed firsthand how corruption had taken hold at every level. He was in danger of becoming corrupt himself just to get things done. He admits to having become so numb to corruption that he could not imagine an alternative. Navalny depicts Putin’s Russia as suffering from the same authoritarian dysfunction as the Soviet Union but now being completely devoid of any ideology beyond corruption. While Navalny has many problems with Soviet politicians such as Mikhail Gorbachev, he credits them with alluding—in the vaguest possible way—to some vestigial communist desire to help people. In Putin’s Russia, even this lip service is gone. The public is trapped in a corrupt, failing system and unable to imagine an alternative.
Navalny presents himself and his work as an alternative to the normalization of corruption. He has used social media, the internet, and direct politics to create a vision for a different kind of country. Through the internet, Navalny has been able to explicitly describe the corruption that Russians observe every day. He cites his viewing numbers and the success of his videos to demonstrate how broadly understood these ideas are in Russia. While he admits the failures of many of his campaigns, he points to growing public awareness and dissent as signs that the regime’s corruption is not invincible after all. Navalny thus presents anti-corruption activism as a catalyst for change: In rejecting corruption, ordinary Russians can work together to change the status quo.
The Enduring Hope for Democratic Reform
As a political dissident, Navalny is keenly aware of his audience. Patriot is a self-conscious piece of political propaganda in which Navalny outlines his ideas for an alternative vision of Russia’s future while also describing the many ways the authoritarian government has actively sought to suppress his vision. Throughout Patriot, he thus emphasizes his enduring hope for democratic reform in Russia.
In Navalny’s ideal version of Russia, the political system would mirror that of European liberal democracies. He hopes that—one day—Russia will be able to return to the European sphere. He signals this desire through his references to Western culture, as well as Western politics. While Navalny details Russia’s long modern history of authoritarianism, first under the Soviet Union and then under Putin’s regime, he is careful not to present authoritarianism as inevitable or innate to Russian culture: Instead, he strongly emphasizes the missed opportunities and bad or corrupt political decisions that derailed Russia’s post-Soviet transition to democracy. In offering this detailed critique of post-Soviet Russia, Navalny stresses that alternatives are still possible—they just need to be clearly articulated and fought for by Russian citizens.
Navalny thus uses his book to imagine a better Russian future. When he was poisoned, he was treated in a German hospital, where he was visited by German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The visit was, in effect, a political statement, with the leader of Germany visiting the targeted Russian dissident as a subtle rebuke to Putin. Navalny thus suggests that even powerful Western leaders believe in Russia’s potential for reform and growth, with Merkel’s support presented as evidence for the seriousness and worth of the work of Navalny and his fellow activists.
Navalny also writes at length, especially in his prison diary, about the importance of maintaining hope and faith even in the direst of circumstances. While he is careful to detail the cruelties and injustices he faces during his trials and imprisonment, he constantly emphasizes that he regrets nothing and that he is willing to continue his fight until death if need be. Navalny urges his readers to follow his example, arguing that ordinary citizens defying fear and continuing to resist is what authoritarian regimes dread most and what ultimately leads to their downfall. Navalny assures his readers that while Putin’s regime may seem resilient, it is not invincible.
The book therefore functions as a manifesto for Navalny’s vision of political change. Though he knows that his book will not be widely available in his native Russia, Navalny uses the book to establish himself as the legitimate vector for a different version of Russia. He uses his book to garner support for his political platform, urging his fellow citizens to actively take up his fight and continue it even if he is no longer able to do so.
