Leading Western far-right personalities have descended on Moscow for the “Forum of the Future,” a two-day event aimed at broadcasting Russia’s state ideology and an ultra-conservative, neo-imperialist vision for its future to audiences abroad.
Sessions focused on topics ranging from “The Multipolar World of the 21st Century” and “Broadcasting Values to Generation Beta Through Content,” to “Harmonious Balance 2050. A Date with the Future. A Woman’s View,” “Greater Eurasia 2050” and “Ideology and Traditional Values.”
Hosted by the Tsargrad Institute, the event’s speakers include Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, right-wing influencer Jackson Hinkle, American economist Jeffrey Sachs, British politician George Galloway and Elon Musk’s father Errol Musk.
The Tsargrad Institute, which was founded by the magnate Konstantin Malofeyev and directed by ideologue Alexander Dugin, bills itself as a think tank for conservative policy prescriptions, blending right-wing political and Orthodox thought.
‘Only under the conditions of autocracy’
The forum coincides with the Tsargrad Institute’s report on its vision for Russia in 2050, which lays out several extreme conservative policy suggestions to set Russia on a course more in line with its worldview.
The report opens by claiming that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, marked “a new era of regional world order.”
“By launching the Special Military Operation and openly challenging the hegemony of the West, Russia has entered the struggle not only for its sovereignty, but also for the right of every country to its own development, culture and religion,” it continues.
The report explicitly states that Russia must be an autocracy if it is to succeed, using its interpretation of the reigns of Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great, Josef Stalin and other Russian and Soviet leaders to justify this assertion.
The Russian idea
The Tsargrad Insitute’s report states that Russia is a distinct civilization that has been entrusted by God with a spiritual and historical mission.
“The idea of a nation is not what it thinks of itself in time, but what God thinks of it in eternity,” the report says, invoking 19th-century Russian philosopher Vladimir Solovyov.
It invokes the tsarist-era concept of Russia as the “Third Rome” — which is used today to justify Moscow’s geopolitical aspirations for control of the “Russian World” — and calls for the “collection of historically Russian lands,” of which Ukraine is included.
The report says that Russia must deconstruct the “artificially created ‘Ukrainian nation’,” and restore its historical memory as an integral part of Russian civilization.
A higher purpose
“Russian women should see the main purpose of their lives and the highest manifestation of their service in bearing and raising children,” the report says on family policy.
In Tsargrad’s ideal future, 85% of children will be born to mothers under the age of 23, the divorce rate is under 10%, less than 3% of children are born outside of wedlock and abortion has been almost completely eliminated.
As a part of the policy framework to encourage early childbirth, the report states that women should be exempt from childbirth if they have three or more children.
The report cites the example of the Russian Empire, where, according to it, a woman’s main occupation was “marriage, motherhood and housework.”
Musk, Galloway, Lavrov and the rest
One of the main events on Monday was a panel discussion called “The Multipolar World in the 21st Century.” The panel included speakers like Lavrov, Galloway, Russian state TV presenter Dmitry Symes, former CIA and U.S. State Department analyst Larry Johnson and others.
In his address to the assembly ahead of Errol Musk’s speech, Malofeyev thanked Elon Musk for demonstrating to the world that “we can have a common future” based on “what is happening in space.”
Malofeyev then ticked through several of Moscow’s typical anti-Western talking points: that the war in Ukraine would end with “a new Yalta” between Moscow and Washington; that the Russian and American peoples had a common future thanks to Donald Trump’s election, that Trump’s re-election prevented a world war; and that only the “corrupt” U.S. Democratic Party benefited from a confrontation between the two countries.
Errol Musk, who has previously voiced admiration for Putin, heaped praise on Moscow.
“Moscow is like Rome to me, the most beautiful city,” the elder Musk said. “I am extremely surprised that Russia is portrayed as an enemy, even though it is trying to be part of the European community. It is being denied this. Russia saved Europe twice — from Napoleon and from Hitler. How can you continue to paint Russia in a negative light?"
Musk also played down his son’s fallout with the U.S. president, saying that it stemmed from “fundamental disagreements between him and certain White House officials over federal spending.”
The forum is set to continue on Tuesday with talks from Jackson Hinkle, George Galloway and Alex Jones.
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