Narrative Genres and Cultural Resources of Ordinary Justification of the Soviet War in Afghanistan (1979–1989)
Research Article
How to Cite
Gajiyev A., Dautova T.E. Narrative Genres and Cultural Resources of Ordinary Justification of the Soviet War in Afghanistan (1979–1989). Interaction. Interview. Interpretation. 2025. Vol. 17. No. 1. P. 42-62. DOI: https://doi.org/10.19181/inter.2025.17.1.3 (in Russ.).
Abstract
This paper examines ordinary justification of military conflicts and their cultural resources based on interviews with veterans of the 1979-1989 war in Afghanistan. We begin by reviewing studies of public justifications and ordinary perception of wars. Based on the review of studies of the relationship between public opinion and decisions to initiate and terminate military conflicts, we conclude that ordinary perceptions of military conflicts have a prescriptive force. We criticize the utilitarian focus characteristic of studies of public justifications, as well as the limited consideration of cultural resources and beliefs about what is proper in the study of ordinary perception. To overcome these limitations, we turn to the strong program in cultural sociology that postulates the thesis of the autonomy of culture and offers tools for studying justifications - narrative genres and cultural resources. Ordinary justifications of military conflicts are examined using interviews with veterans of Afghanistan as an example. Based on the analysis of 22 interviews with veterans of the war in Afghanistan, three narrative genres of ordinary legitimation and delegitimation of this conflict are identified: social realism, apocalyptic, and skeptical. Each narrative genre is characterized by its own approach engaging cultural resources, different views on the war in Afghanistan and some of its particular events, such as the withdrawal from Afghanistan of the Soviet troops. Ordinary justifications demonstrate relative autonomy from public justifications, the ability of independent work with an extensive cultural repertoire within the Russian historical context.
Keywords:
ordinary justification, legitimation, narrative, cultural sociology, Afghan war, war veteran
References
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Mirhosseini S.A. (2017) Discursive Double-legitimation of (Avoiding) Another War in Obama’s 2013 Address on Syria. Journal of Language and Politics. Vol. 16. No. 5. P. 706–730. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.16016.mir
Oddo J. (2011) War Legitimation Discourse: Representing “Us” and “Them” in Four US Presidential Addresses. Discourse & Society. Vol. 22. No. 3. P. 287–314. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926510395442
Sagan S.D., Valentino B.A. (2018) Not Just a War Theory: American Public Opinion on Ethics in Combat. International Studies Quarterly. Vol. 62. No. 3. P. 548–561. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/isq/sqy033
Saito H. (2021) The Sacred and Profane of Japan’s Nuclear Safety Myth: On the Cultural Logic of Framing and Overflowing. Cultural Sociology. Vol. 15. No. 4. P. 486–508. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/17499755211001046
Simonsen S. (2019) Discursive Legitimation Strategies: The Evolving Legitimation of War in Israeli Public Diplomacy. Discourse & Society. Vol. 30. No. 5. P. 503–520. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926519855786
Smith P. (2010) Why War? The Cultural Logic of Iraq, the Gulf War, and Suez. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Smith P. (1991) Codes and Conflict: Toward a Theory of War as Ritual. Theory and Society. Vol. 20. P. 103–138. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00160735
Scott W.J., De Angelis K.M., Segal D.R. (2018) Veterans and Veterans’ Issues. In: D. Kieran, E.A. Martini (eds.) At War: The Military and American Culture in the Twentieth Century and Beyond. P. 127–146.
Bakhtin M. (1996) Problema rechevyh zhanrov [The Problem of Speech Genres]. In: Sobranie Sochinenij. Tom 5. [Collected Editon. Volume 5]. Moscow: Russkie slovari. P. 159–206. (In Russ.)
Danilova N. (2005) Memorialnaya versiya Afganskoj vojny (1979–1989 gody) [Memorial Version of the Afghan War (1979–1989)]. In: Pamyat o vojne 60 let spustya: Rossiya, Germaniya, Evropa [Memory of the War 60 Years Later: Russia, Germany, Europe]. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie. P. 262–281. (In Russ.)
Dautova T.E., Rozhdestvenskaya E.Yu. (2024) Repertoire of Biographical Choices of the Afghan War Veterans. Monitoring obshchestvennogo mneniya: ekonomicheskie i socialnye peremeny [Monitoring of Public Opinion: Economic and Social Changes]. No. 3. P. 114–140. (In Russ.) DOI: https://doi.org/10.14515/monitoring.2024.3.2542
Dubin B. (2004) The “Bloody” War and the “Great” Victory. Otechestvennyye zapiski [Patriotic Notes]. Vol. 5. No. 20. P. 82–89. (In Russ.)
Strauss A., Corbin J. (2001) Osnovy kachestvennogo issledovaniya [Basics of Qualitative Research]. Transl. form Eng. by T.S. Vasileva. Moscow: Editorial URSS. (In Russ.)
Tarasenko A., Kulmala M. (2016) Representing Interests and the Crafting of Social Policy: Viewing Russian Veterans’ Organisations as Brokers between State and Society. Zhurnal issledovanij socialnoj politiki [The Journal of Social Policy Studies]. Vol. 14. No. 4. P. 551–568. (In Russ.)
Baiocchi G. (2006) The Civilizing Force of Social Movements: Corporate and Liberal Codes in Brazil’s Public Sphere. Sociological theory. Vol. 24. No. 4. P. 285–311. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9558.2006.00292.x
Baum M.A., Groeling T. (2010) Reality Asserts Itself: Public Opinion on Iraq and the Elasticity of Reality. International Organization. Vol. 64. No. 3. P. 443–479. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020818310000172
Bloch-Elkon Y. (2007) Studying the Media, Public Opinion, and Foreign Policy in International Crises: The United States and the Bosnian crisis, 1992–1995. Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics. Vol. 12. No. 4. P. 20–51. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1081180X07307184
Carpenter C., Montgomery A.H., Nylen A. (2021) Breaking Bad? How Survey Experiments Prime Americans for War Crimes. Perspectives on Politics. Vol. 19. No. 3. P. 912–924. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592720002376
Connor B.T. (2012) 9/11–A New Pearl Harbor? Analogies, Narratives, and Meanings of 9/11 in Civil Society. Cultural Sociology. Vol. 6. No. 1. P. 3–25. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1749975511427809
Cooper D.A., Marvin O.L., Ang A., Li Y. (2010) “Pretty Prudent” or Rhetorically Responsive? The American Public’s Support for Military Action. Political Research Quarterly. Vol. 63. No. 1. P. 83–96. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912908327230
Danilova N. (2007) Veterans’ Policy in Russia: A Puzzle of Creation. The Journal of Power Institutions in Post-Soviet Societies. No. 6/7. P. 1–22. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/pipss.873
Dexter H. (2008) The “New War” on Terror, Cosmopolitanism and the “Just War” Revival. Government and Opposition. Vol. 43. No. 1. P. 55–78. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1477-7053.2007.00243.x
Dill J., Schubiger L.I. (2021) Attitudes toward the Use of Force: Instrumental Imperatives, Moral Principles, and International Law. American Journal of Political Science. Vol. 65. No. 3. P. 612–633. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12635
Hiebert R.E. (2003) Public Relations and Propaganda in Framing the Iraq War: A Preliminary Review. Public Relations Review. Vol. 29. No. 3. P. 243–255. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0363-8111(03)00047-X
Hollander P. (2009) Contemporary Political Violence and Its Legitimation. Society. Vol. 46. No. 3. P. 267–274. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12115-009-9204-y
Jacobs R.N. (2000) Race, Media, and the Crisis of Civil Society. From Watts to Rodney King. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511489211
Jacobs R.N., Smith P. (1997) Romance, Irony, and Solidarity. Sociological Theory. Vol. 15. No. 1. P. 60–80. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/0735-2751.00023
Kalyvas S.N. (2006) The Logic of Violence in Civil War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511818462
Kornprobst M. (2014) From Political Judgements to Public Justifications (and vice versa): How Communities Generate Reasons upon Which to Act. European Journal of International Relations. Vol. 20. No. 1. P. 192–216. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1354066112439218
Laitin D. (2007) Nations, States, and Violence. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press.
Lamont M., Thévenot L. (2013) Rethinking Comparative Cultural Sociology: Repertoires of Evaluation in France and the United States. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511628108
Liu D., Shao L. (2024) Nationalist Propaganda and Support for War in an Authoritarian Context: Evidence from China. Journal of Peace Research. Vol. 61. No. 6. P. 985–1001. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433231178849
Malinova O.Y. (2018) Constructing the “Usable Past”: the Evolution of the Official Historical Narrative in Post-Soviet Russia. In: N. Bernsand, B. Tornquist-Plewa (eds.) Cultural and Political Imaginaries in Putin’s Russia. Boston; Leiden: Brill. P. 85–104. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004366671_006
Maxey S. (2020) The Power of Humanitarian Narratives: A Domestic Coalition Theory of Justifications for Military Action. Political Research Quarterly. Vol. 73. No. 3. P. 680–695. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912919852169
McIntosh J. (2021) Language and the Military: Necropolitical Legitimation, Embodied Semiotics, and Ineffable Suffering. Annual Review of Anthropology. Vol. 50. No. 1. P. 241–258. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-anthro-101819-110258
Mirhosseini S.A. (2017) Discursive Double-legitimation of (Avoiding) Another War in Obama’s 2013 Address on Syria. Journal of Language and Politics. Vol. 16. No. 5. P. 706–730. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.16016.mir
Oddo J. (2011) War Legitimation Discourse: Representing “Us” and “Them” in Four US Presidential Addresses. Discourse & Society. Vol. 22. No. 3. P. 287–314. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926510395442
Sagan S.D., Valentino B.A. (2018) Not Just a War Theory: American Public Opinion on Ethics in Combat. International Studies Quarterly. Vol. 62. No. 3. P. 548–561. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/isq/sqy033
Saito H. (2021) The Sacred and Profane of Japan’s Nuclear Safety Myth: On the Cultural Logic of Framing and Overflowing. Cultural Sociology. Vol. 15. No. 4. P. 486–508. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/17499755211001046
Simonsen S. (2019) Discursive Legitimation Strategies: The Evolving Legitimation of War in Israeli Public Diplomacy. Discourse & Society. Vol. 30. No. 5. P. 503–520. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926519855786
Smith P. (2010) Why War? The Cultural Logic of Iraq, the Gulf War, and Suez. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Smith P. (1991) Codes and Conflict: Toward a Theory of War as Ritual. Theory and Society. Vol. 20. P. 103–138. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00160735
Scott W.J., De Angelis K.M., Segal D.R. (2018) Veterans and Veterans’ Issues. In: D. Kieran, E.A. Martini (eds.) At War: The Military and American Culture in the Twentieth Century and Beyond. P. 127–146.
Article
Received: 23.12.2024
Accepted: 31.03.2025
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Gajiyev, A., & Dautova, T. E. (2025). Narrative Genres and Cultural Resources of Ordinary Justification of the Soviet War in Afghanistan (1979–1989). Interaction. Interview. Interpretation, 17(1), 42-62. https://doi.org/10.19181/inter.2025.17.1.3
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Field work research
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