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Germany’s and Italy’s claims for colonial expansion were based on the slogan Might Makes Right. In Germany social Darwinism expressed itself also in pan German theories, which were “a racist variant of those legitimation and expansion attempts.”^[23] “Economic advancement and the subjugation of overseas territories seemed due to the ‘natural qualities’ of the nation, ‘that means its racial qualities.’ In any case, massive demands could be deducted from these. Out of the racist pan Germanism, that would heal the world, emerged a pseudo-scientifically ‘disguised legitimation’ for permanent expansion.”^[24] Theories of the white man’s burden, even if they might have appeared hypocritical, still preserved a moral legitimation for imperial rule and justified this rule by the benefits that this rule was supposed to bring to the colonized populations. Pan Germanism and social Darwinism, on the contrary, did away with any bad conscience and proclaimed loudly and without any moral restraint the right of the strongest. “The general basic values in Imperial Germany,” wrote Helge Pross, “. . . were order, obedience, subordination, duty, work, performance, discipline, functioning. In the thinking of very many bourgeois men and women the state, monarchy, national greatness and [Germany’s] international standing equally had the status of values, they were desirable and should be realized.”^[25] “Many citizens dreamt of German greatness, German international standing, a policy that would give Germany its rightful place as one of the leading world powers. . . . The state became a value in itself.”^[26] Worshipping an almighty state that was able to extend its imperial rule overseas went hand in hand with feelings of racial superiority. According to the historian Hans-Ulrich Wehler the logical conclusion of these theories was fascism: “Undeniably since the 1870s–1880s this social Darwinism has spread throughout the western industrial nations and it has exercised a demonstrably great influence, but it reached its apogee only in the racist radicalization by National Socialism.”^[27]

Three Russian Legitimation Theories for Imperial Expansion: Orthodoxy, Pan Slavism, and Communism

It is now time to turn to Russia and to ask what kind of legitimation theories were used during the expansion of the Russian empire. As was already mentioned, in the first centuries of Russian expansion no special legitimation theory seemed necessary. Territorial expansion was “the normal way of life” of the Russian state. It was something akin to breathing: you are doing it, but you are not conscious of doing it. This was especially the case when the empire expanded into quasi-empty, sparsely populated territories. However, when the expansion began to take place in territories occupied by foreign populations there emerged a need for legitimation theories. We can distinguish at least three:

The Orthodox religion

Pan Slavism

Communism

Sometimes these legitimation theories overlap. But they will be represented here as different, sequential phases.