Putinisms

The public image of Vladimir Putin concerns the image of Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, among residents of Russia and worldwide.

Ratings and polls

Domestic

According to public opinion surveys conducted by NGO Levada Center, Putin's approval rating was just 60% in July 2020. Putin's popularity rose from 31% in August 1999 to 80% in November 1999, never dropping below 65% during his first presidency.Observers see Putin's high approval ratings as a consequence of the significant improvements in living standards and Russia's reassertion of itself on the world scene that has occurred during his period of office. One analysis attributed Putin's popularity, in part, to state-owned or state-controlled television.

A joint poll by ''World Public Opinion'' in the US and Levada Center  in Russia around June–July 2006 stated that "neither the Russian nor the American publics are convinced Russia is headed in an anti-democratic direction" and "Russians generally support Putin's concentration of political power and strongly support the re-nationalization of Russia's oil and gas industry." Russians generally support the political course of Putin and his team.Russians Support Putin's Re-Nationalization of Oil, Control of Media, But See Democratic Future
– World Public Opinion.org A 2005 survey showed that three times as many Russians felt the country was "more democratic" under Putin than it was during the Yeltsin or Gorbachev years, and the same proportion thought human rights were better under Putin than Yeltsin.Russia through the looking-glass
openDemocracy. "...while only about half of Russian households have a telephone line at home, well over 90% have access to the First Channel and Rossiya. And for a vast majority of Russians, they are virtually the only source of information about political events. Given that typically well over half of their news broadcasts consist of sympathetic coverage of Putin and members of the United Russia party, and oppositional figures are always presented in a negative or ironic light (if at all), it is unsurprising that the president is enjoying considerable popularity.". Retrieved 16 April 2008.

In January 2013, at the time of 2011–2013 Russian protests, Putin's approval rating fell to 62%, the lowest figure since 2000 and a ten-point drop over two years. By May 2014, following the annexation of Crimea, Putin's approval rating had rebounded to 85.9%, a six-year high.

After EU and U.S. sanctions against Russian officials as a result of the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Putin's approval rating reached 87 percent, according to a Levada Center survey published on 6 August 2014. In February 2015, based on new domestic polling, Putin was ranked the world's most popular politician. In June 2015, Putin's approval rating climbed to 89%, an all-time high. In 2016, the approval rating was 81%.

Despite high approval for Putin, confidence in the Russian economy is low, dropping to levels in 2016 that rivaled the recent lows in 2009 at the height of the global economic crisis. Just 14% of Russians in 2016 said their national economy was getting better, and 18% said this about their local economies. Putin's performance at reining in corruption is also unpopular among Russians. ''Newsweek'' reported in June 2017 that "An opinion poll by the Moscow-based Levada Center indicated that 67 percent held Putin personally responsible for high-level corruption".

In July 2018, Putin's approval rating fell to 63% and just 49% would vote for Putin if presidential elections were held. Levada poll results published in September 2018 showed Putin's personal trustworthiness levels at 39% (decline from 59% in November 2017) with the main contributing factor being the presidential support of the unpopular pension reform and economic stagnation. In October 2018, two thirds of Russians surveyed in Levada poll agreed that "Putin bears full responsibility for the problems of the country", which has been attributed to decline of a popular belief in "good tsar and bad boyars", a traditional attitude towards justifying failures of the ruling hierarchy in Russia.

In May 2020, Putin's approval rating dropped to a historic low of 59% in an April poll by the Levada Center.

In December 2021, a Levada Center poll found that 65% approved of Putin personally, That jumped to 69% who had a positive view of Putin in January 2022, and 71% who approved of the Russian president in February 2022 (before the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine).

International

According to a 2017 survey by the Worldwide Independent Network/Gallup International Association (WIN/GIA), Putin's international reputation increased significantly between 2015 and 2017 (43% favorable in 2017 compared with 33% in 2015).

Some of these views have changed considerably over time ever since 2017. For instance, in Romania, in a 2022 poll, only 3% of Romanians had a positive opinion of Putin while 70% of Romanians had a negative one.

Assessments

Putin was ''Time'' magazine's Person of the Year for 2007. In April 2008, Putin was put on the ''Time'' 100 most influential people in the world list.

On 4 December 2007, at Harvard University, former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev credited Putin with having "pulled Russia out of chaos" and said he was "assured a place in history", despite Gorbachev's claim that the news media have been suppressed and that election rules run counter to the democratic ideals he has promoted. In December 2011, amid the protests following the 2011 Russian elections Gorbachev criticized Putin for a decision to seek the third term in the presidential elections and advised Putin to leave politics.

Criticism of Putin has been widespread especially over the Runet. It is said that the Russian youth organisations finance a full "network" of pro-government bloggers.

In the U.S. embassy cables, published by WikiLeaks in late 2010, Putin was called "alpha dog" and compared with Batman (while Dmitry Medvedev was compared with Batman's crime-fighting partner Robin). American diplomats said Putin's Russia had become "a corrupt, autocratic kleptocracy centred on the leadership of Putin, in which officials, oligarchs and organised crime are bound together to create a "virtual mafia state." Putin called it "slanderous".

By western commentators and the Russian opposition, Putin has been described as a dictator. Putin biographer Masha Gessen has stated that "Putin is a dictator," comparing him to Alexander Lukashenko. Former UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband has described Putin as a "ruthless dictator" whose "days are numbered." U.S. Presidential candidate Mitt Romney called Putin "a real threat to the stability and peace of the world."

In the fall of 2011, the anti-Putin opposition movement in Russia became more visible, with street protests against allegedly falsified parliamentary elections (in favor of Putin's party, United Russia) cropping up across major Russian cities. Following Putin's re-election in March 2012, the movement struggled to redefine its new course of action. In early September 2014 Patriarch Filaret, head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyivan Patriarchate, linked Putin with the biblical figure Cain because Filaret believed that although Putin claimed to be their “brother”, he was responsible for "shedding the brotherly blood" of Ukrainians during the War in Donbass. Filaret believed "Satan went into him, as into Judas Iscariot".Ukrainian Church leader likens Putin to Cain and says he is under the influence of Satan
The Independent (6 September 2014). The Dalai Lama criticized Putin's foreign policy practices, claiming it to be responsible for isolating Russia from the rest of the world. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project named Putin as the 2014 Person of the Year, recognizing "the person who does the most to enable and promote organized criminal activity."

According to Denis Volkov from Moscow Levada Center, drawing any conclusions from Russian poll results or comparing them with Western polls is pointless as there's no real political competition in Russia. Unlike in democratic states, the Russian voters aren't offered any "credible alternatives" and the public opinion is formed primarily with state-controlled media which promotes the ruling party and discredits any alternative candidates. This kind of illusion of democracy, choice only between "A and A", is part of "Russian consciousness", according to a nationalist publicist Alexander Prokhanov, who considers the "elections between A and B" to be part of a "liberal" mindset.

Brands

Putin's name and image are widely used in advertisements and product branding. Among Putin-branded products are Putinka vodka, the PuTin brand of canned food, ''Gorbusha Putina'' caviar, and a collection of T-shirts with his image. In October 2016, the luxury company, Caviar, produced a limited series of iPhone 7s made from Damascus steel called Supremo Putin Damascus. It features a golden bas-relief portrait of Putin.

Public image

Putin has created a cult of personality for himself as an outdoorsy, sporty, tough guy public image, demonstrating his physical capabilities and taking part in unusual or dangerous acts, such as extreme sports and interaction with wild animals. For example, in 2007, the tabloid ''Komsomolskaya Pravda'' published a huge photograph of a bare-chested Putin vacationing in the Siberian mountains under the headline: "Be Like Putin." Such photo op'', "deliberately cultivates the macho, take-charge superhero image". The British tabloid '' Daily Express'' has commented that this cultivated image runs counter to the reality of Putin's modest physical stature, his height being officially reported as 170 cm (5'7"), and some of the activities used to promote his virile prowess have been criticized for involving deception or being completely staged. Notable examples of Putin's macho adventures include:7 Reasons Vladimir Putin Is the World's Craziest Badass
cracked.com

*Putin flew in a Sukhoi Su-27 fighter over Chechnya in 2000 and a Tu-160 supersonic heavy bomber on 16 August 2005 at MAKS Airshow.
*Martial arts – Putin demonstrated his martial art skills on a tatami at the Kodokan Institute in Tokyo on 5 September 2000 and has subsequently made further demonstrations. Putin currently holds a black belt in Judo. Putin had also been awarded a 9th Dan belt in Taekwondo before it was rescinded in February 2022.
*Adventures in the wild – On his trip to Tuva in August 2007, Putin was seen riding horses, rafting, fishing and swimming in a cold Siberian river (mostly bare-chested). In August 2009, Putin repeated the experience. In 2008, Putin visited the Ussuri national park, where he sedated an Amur tiger with a tranquiliser gun and then helped measure its teeth and fit it with a tracker. Claims were made later that the tiger was actually from the Khabarovsk Zoo and that it died soon after the stunt, but the suspected tiger named by the Khabarovsk Zoo workers was found in late 2009 in Zelenogorsk, while the claims of a stunt were denied by the scientists who organized the "safari". In April 2010, Putin traveled to Franz Josef Land in the Russian Arctic, where he tranquilized a polar bear and attached a satellite tag to it. In late August 2010, Putin shot darts from a crossbow at a gray whale off Kamchatka Peninsula coast as part of an eco-tracking effort, while balancing on a rubber boat in the sea.
*Descending in a deepwater submersible – On 1 August 2009, Putin descended 1395 m to the bottom of Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, on a MIR submersible accompanied by deepwater explorer Anatoly Sagalevich (who had been among the team which had reached the bottom at the North Pole in the Arktika 2007 expedition). From the bottom of Baikal Putin spoke to journalists via hydrophone.
*Riding a motorbike – In July 2010, Putin appeared at a bikers festival in Sevastopol riding a Harley-Davidson tricycle; the high council of Russian bikers movements unanimously voted him into a Hells Angel rank with the nickname of Abaddon. Putin's associations with motorcycle gangs led to him being accidentally placed on a blacklist of banned people in Finland. In August 2011 a video showed Putin riding with the Night Wolves.
*Firefighting from the air – In August 2010, Russian TV broadcast a video of Putin co-piloting a firefighting plane Beriev Be-200 to dump water on a raging fire during the 2010 Russian wildfires.

*Driving a race car – Putin tested a Formula 1 car on 7 November 2010 in Saint Petersburg, reaching a maximum speed of 240 km per hour (149 mph).
*Scuba diving – Putin took part in scuba diving at the archaeological site of the ancient Greek colony of Phanagoria in the Taman Bay on 11 August 2011.Путин погрузился с аквалангом на дно Таманского залива
tetis.ru During the dive, he "discovered" two amphorae and emerged from the sea exclaiming to television cameras "Treasure!". In October 2011, spokesman Dmitry Peskov

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