Russians about the fascist threat

On February 20, 2006, VTsIOM published data from a sociological survey on who Russians consider fascists and how they feel about fascist manifestations. The survey was conducted on February 12-13, 2006 in 153 settlements in 46 regions, territories and republics of Russia. 1600 people were surveyed. The statistical error does not exceed 3.4%. The survey was timed to coincide with the campaign for signing the Anti-Fascist Pact, which determined some of its questions.

To the question “Who would you classify as a fascist today?” . To which up to two answers could be given, respondents responded as follows:

46% consider followers of Hitler and Hitler’s ideology to be such;

41% - everyone who uses fascist symbols (swastika, Nazi salute, etc.). The same number of people said that they consider everyone who preaches racial and national intolerance (hatred of blacks, Caucasians, Jews, etc.) to be fascists.

The following answers were much less common among sociologists: “Everyone who promotes the slogan “Russia for Russians” (8% of respondents think so) and “Everyone who advocates the violent overthrow of the current government” (4% of respondents).

To the question “Which parties, movements, associations can be classified as fascist?” , to which any number of answers could be given, opinions were distributed as follows:

61% of respondents found it difficult to answer this question

The NBP is considered fascists by 15% of respondents,

skinheads - 14%

7% believe that there are no fascist organizations in modern Russia.

5% identified the RNE as a fascist organization,

4% - LDPR

and 1% - the Communist Party of the Russian Federation.

The overwhelming majority of respondents - 85% - said that they had never encountered people professing fascist ideology. 11% believe that such manifestations sometimes occur among their acquaintances, and 1% believe that such sentiments are common among their acquaintances.

At the same time, only 19% of respondents believe that there is no threat of the spread of fascist ideas in Russia. Another 30% believe that it is “very small.” However, the same number - 30% of respondents - believe that this threat is “quite great” , and another 12% - that it is “very great” .

At the same time, the overwhelming majority of respondents believe that the best way to combat the “fascist threat” is criminal prosecution. 35% - that it is necessary to ban the activities of radical parties and movements, another 26% - that it is necessary to prevent the participation of fascists in election campaigns, and another 23% - for banning the sale and posting of fascist literature on the Internet. But 2% of respondents believe that there is no need to fight this threat at all. (The question allowed up to two answer options.)

The next question was formulated as follows: “Some politicians have recently expressed the opinion that any cooperation with the fascists should be punished by the exclusion of the party that agreed to such cooperation from the Russian legal space. In other words, such parties should be banned. How would you rate such an initiative? . The answers looked like this:

67% would rather support this thesis, 11% would rather not support it, and 21% found it difficult to answer.

79% of respondents supported the United Russia initiative to sign an “anti-fascist pact.”

Comm. In our opinion, the data published by VTsIOM requires careful analysis and mandatory commentary from specialists. For example, about the negative/positive perception by respondents of the slogan “Russia for Russians” (compare with the Levada Centerstudy ), that only 14% perceive skinheads as fascists, and that the National Bolsheviks consider even more people to be fascists than skinheads ( which indicates the success of the propaganda campaign launched against the NBP). In our opinion, a methodological explanation for the questionnaire is also required. Otherwise, this data becomes unsuitable for further use by their specialists.

Sources

• Equate propaganda of fascist ideas to a criminal offense // VTsIOM. 2006. February 20.