ABSTRACT
The populist wave demonstrated similarities in attitudes towards the West in Russia and in the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries, which are not a pure coincidence. Their strategy of resistance through identarian and conservative narratives might have deeper roots in the common socialist history of the CEE countries and also be grounded in their actual discontent with the peripheral positions they have in European institutions. Russian populism, despite all its specificity, mobilised historical narratives and identitarian discourses on a par with its CEE counterparts. This chapter resorts to the concept of ‘populism-in-law’ which instead of analysing how populists instrumentalise the law for the sake of power, grasps how ideological narratives are used to gain public approval of laws.
