My guest today is Marlene Laruelle. Marlene is a Research Professor of International Affairs at George Washington University in Washington, DC, where she also holds various administrative functions, including Director of the Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies. She is also a Senior Research Fellow at the Institut Francais des Relations Internationales in her native France and a prolific writer on Russian and Central Asian history and politics. This year alone she has two new books out: “Is Russia Fascist? Unraveling Propaganda East and West”, with Cornell University Press, and “Central Peripheries: Nationhood in Central Asia”, with UCL Press.

We talk about all things Russia: nationalism, Eurasianism, illiberalism, disinformation, and, of course, Vladimir Putin.