Russia and the prestige of multipolarity

Abstract

Despite the endurance of unipolarity in material terms, Russia insists that the world is now multipolar. In this article, I argue that such claims function less as an empirical diagnosis and more as rhetorical strategy of great power status-seeking. Explicit discursive status claims risk to appear vain and may thus backfire. To that end, Russia invokes multipolarity to reclaim its great power status without explicitly asking for prestige. The article identifies three conditions that allow this strategy to gain traction: China’s rise and its reluctance to embrace a bipolar structure; the normative reframing of multipolarity toward something inherently fair and just; and the enduring authority of realist language in world politics. The article traces how this narrative has gained traction not only among Russia’s strategic partners, but also among Western powers. Their adoption of multipolarity rhetoric helps validate Russia’s claim. The article concludes that multipolarity, far from being a neutral analytical term, has become a vehicle for status-seeking among major powers under the guise of structural description.

Introduction

Multipolarity is in vogue. Commentators and policymakers increasingly speak of a world no longer defined by American primacy (Ashford, 2025; Ashford and Cooper, 2025). The unipolar era, it is said, is ending or has already ended (Layne, 2012; Mearsheimer, 2025; Murray and Brown, 2012). Few states have championed this narrative as readily as Russia. Moscow has long promoted a vision of international order in which power is distributed across several poles, and in which Russia is one of them (Ambrosio, 2017; Khoo and Qingmin, 2021; Kurowska, 2014; Turner, 2009).

Yet this claim sits uneasily with material reality. While China’s ascent has narrowed the gap with the United States, it still remains a significant gap (Brooks and Wohlforth, 2023; Røren, 2024b; Wohlforth, 2022). Even if China qualifies as a peer competitor, the result would be bipolarity, not multipolarity. And by standard measures of capability, Russia does not qualify as a pole at all (Bekkvold, 2023; Røren, 2024b; Tunsjø, 2018).

This article argues that Russian claims about multipolarity function less as a material diagnosis and more as a discursive status-seeking strategy. Status remains a central but often concealed driver of state behavior (Beaumont et al., 2025). States rarely acknowledge that they act or speak to gain prestige. Open pursuit of status risks appearing insecure, or worse, vain (Beaumont and Røren, 2025: 11). The theoretical gambit of this article is that the narrative of multipolarity allows well-positioned major powers, like Russia, to project themselves as great powers by embedding their claim in a widely accepted conceptual framework. Put differently, it is a way to discursively seek great power status without explicitly saying so.

To be sure, Russia is not the only advocate of multipolarity. Nor is it the only actor that potentially stands to benefit from it (Zala, 2021). My claim is narrower. Russia has been among the consistent entrepreneurs of the term. And given the state’s current material and social standing, Russia stands to gain disproportionately from the concept’s wider normalization.

Three developments make this strategy viable. First, China’s material rise has lent credence to the idea that the world is changing. But it is difficult to know where the system is heading. Russia exploits this structural uncertainty by framing the world as multipolar. This narrative is further helped by the closer ties between China and Russia as well as Beijing’s reluctance to frame the world as bipolar.

Second, and related to China’s reluctance of framing the world as bipolar, the meaning of multipolarity has shifted. What once referred narrowly to the number of materially capable actors has taken on normative content. Unipolarity is now associated with hierarchy and domination. Bipolarity with the divided and static world of the Cold War. Multipolarity, by contrast, is framed as fairness, pluralism, and multilateralism.

Third, the narrative continues to draw legitimacy from realism. Realism presents itself as an account of the world as it is. And polarity remains one of realism’s core analytical tools. It focuses on the distribution of capabilities and strips away the domestic realm, ideas, and normativity. As such, invoking multipolarity lends realist legitimacy, even when the underlying evidence is contested. Moreover, the narrative gains additional weight when leading realist scholars suggest that multipolarity is emerging.

These developments are not produced by Russia, but they are nonetheless conditions that Russia stand to exploit and amplify. Russia’s insistence of multipolarity has been reinforced by other actors. A growing number of Western policymakers have begun to refer to multipolarity as a fact. In doing so, they normalize a vocabulary that Russia can appropriate for status purposes. The more the concept is used, the more it appears valid. And the more valid it appears, the more plausible Russia’s long-standing claim to great power status becomes.

The article proceeds in five steps. First, I begin by defining polarity and by assessing the current distribution of capabilities. I here show that the system remains unipolar and at most is moving toward bipolarity, not multipolarity. Second, I trace how Russia has advanced multipolarity as a sustained political claim that places it among the system-shaping powers despite weak material foundations. Third, I explain why this strategy makes sense from a status perspective. Here, polarity talk signals rank while avoiding open prestige seeking. Fourth, I identify the conditions that allow the claim to gain traction. These conditions include that China’s rise has created uncertainty, that multipolarity has been recast as a normative good, and that realist language still carries authority in policy debate. Finally, I show how other actors help normalize the spread of multipolarity talk beyond Moscow. This in turn makes Russia’s great power claim harder to dismiss.

Still unipolar, maybe bipolar

On the face of it, polarity is a simple concept. If a state commands more power than other states in the international system, it constitutes a pole. A unipolar system has one dominant state, a bipolar system has two, and a multipolar system has three or more. The 1990s replaced the Cold War bipolar system of the United States and the Soviet Union with a unipolar one with only the United States considered a polar power (Wohlforth, 1999). Since the early 2010s, however, the consensus of which polar system we are living under has been changing. Some argue that multipolarity either has become or will soon be the dominating feature of the international system (Layne, 1993, 2006, 2012; Mearsheimer, 2019; Murray and Brown, 2012; Posen, 2009, 2011). Others argue that the world is becoming bipolar where only China can challenge US primacy (Kupchan, 2021; Lind, 2024; Tunsjø, 2018; Yeisley, 2011).

Kenneth Waltz offered a broad definition of a great power, meaning one that qualifies as a pole. Namely, a state that ranks high in “size of population and territory, resource endowment, economic capability, military strength, political stability and competence” (Waltz, 1979: 131). Of these, economic capability and military strength are the most relevant and representative indicators of the current distribution of capabilities in the international system (Monteiro, 2014; Røren, 2024b). Figure 1 tracks the share of global gross domestic product (GDP) held by major powers from the end of the Cold War through 2023. The data confirm that China’s economic growth has been rapid. The narrowing gap between the United States and China has fueled predictions that the unipolar era is over. But this trend has not extended to other major powers. The economic distance between the top two and the rest remains large. From a purely economic standpoint, the system could potentially be bipolar (for a critical perspective on China’s parity with the United States, see Vagle and Brooks, 2025).

Figure 1.

Share of global GDP.

However, GDP only captures part of the picture. Wealth enables power but does not fully capture it (Monteiro, 2014; Røren, 2024b). Military capabilities provide a more direct measure of coercive capacity. To operationalize military capabilities, I use a formula called Mshare. This formula captures both the size and sophistication of a state’s military. It multiplies a state’s share of global armed forces with its military expenditures per troop (see Røren (2024b) for details and logic of the measure). The measure captures the size, strength, and sophistication of a state’s military. The formula is expressed as a ratio of a country’s military capabilities to the global total, ranging from 0 to 1, with higher values indicating a larger share of global military power (Figure 2).

Figure 2.

Share of sophisticated military capabilities (Mshare), 1988–2021.

Like GDP, the gap between China and the United States has shrunk over the past two decades. But the military gap is noticeably bigger than the economic gap. Thus, while a bipolar world may emerge, the world is still unipolar (Brooks and Wohlforth, 2023; Røren, 2024b; Wohlforth, 2022). Against popular opinion, the two figures show that multipolarity is also not on the horizon. No other state, be it Russia, India, France, the United Kingdom, or Brazil, have come close to challenging China, let alone the United States in the measured period. Indeed, if the contemporary era is multipolar, the post-Cold War era of unprecedented unipolarity also needs to be seen as multipolar. A more plausible explanation is thus that these powers may be regionally influential, but they do not qualify as poles in structural terms. The system, based on the distribution of capabilities, is therefore not multipolar.

Russia views the international system differently. To Moscow, the system is multipolar. Russian President Vladimir Putin has on multiple occasions expressed his analytical take on polarity. Putin (2022) has suggested that a multipolar system is “an irreversible process” and “is objective in nature.” This has also been echoed by Foreign minister Lavrov (2022). More recently, Putin has moved from not just seeing the move toward multipolarity as inevitable, but also as a reality. Speaking in July 2024 Putin said that a “multipolar world has become a reality” with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization along with BRICS as “main pillars” of it (Putin, 2024). In this narrative, Russia stands as a co-equal pole alongside the United States and China.

As Figures 1 and 2 show, the empirical basis for this claim remains weak. Russia’s economic and military capabilities fall far short of polar status. To understand why Russia nonetheless insists on a multipolar structure, we must look beyond material indicators. The answer, or at least parts of it, lies in the pursuit of status is world politics.

Status in world politics

Over the past two decades, research on status and prestige in International Relations (IR) has flourished (see Dafoe et al., 2014; Götz, 2021; MacDonald and Parent, 2021 for reviews of the subfield). Status at its most basic is defined as “collective beliefs about a given state’s ranking on valued attributes” (Larson et al., 2014: 7). This influential definition implies two sub-components of status. First, states seek status by acquiring attributes or engaging in behaviors they believe others value. Second, such claims are evaluated by peers, who either recognize or reject them.

This literature challenges strictly materialist interpretations of state behavior by demonstrating that many states act to enhance their standing within a social hierarchy (see, for example, Krickovic and Weber, 2018; Larson and Shevchenko, 2010; Røren, 2019; Suzuki, 2008; Wohlforth et al., 2018). Whether through displays of strength, generosity, cultural leadership, or principled behavior, states seek to be seen and recognized as important. The aspiration for status helps explain behaviors ranging from acquiring costly status symbols such aircraft carriers, nuclear weapons, naval fleets, and spacecrafts (Gilady, 2018: 55–89; Murray, 2010; Paikowsky, 2017; Prosser, 2017); hosting global mega-events (Beaumont et al., 2025; Rhamey and Early, 2013; van der Westhuizen, 2021); providing development aid, hosting peace talks, or becoming climate front-runners (Crandall and Varov, 2016; de Carvalho and Lie, 2015; Gilady, 2018: 90–120; Lahn and Rowe, 2015); or going to war (Barnhart, 2017; Jakobsen et al., 2018; Onea, 2017; Pedersen, 2018; Renshon, 2016).

A status approach does not refute the idea that material capabilities plays a role in determining social status (Wohlforth, 2009). Instead, material capabilities are but one means out of many to achieve higher social status (Duque, 2018; Renshon, 2016). But the primary mechanism through which powers turn great is not directly achieved by acquiring capabilities, but rather via social recognition (Buarque, 2022; Duque, 2018; Røren, 2023). What matters here is not whether an aspiring great power, for example, has nukes, the size of its military, or that this particular state believes it is a great power. But rather whether it, or its capabilities, is acknowledged, respected, or treated as a great power by its peers (Røren, 2023).

The stigma of status talk

Status-seekers often face a dilemma when they pursue prestige from peers in that they cannot talk much about it. Indeed, as Beaumont and Røren (2025: 11) suggests, “labeling something as driven by status or prestige has a distinctly pejorative meaning in everyday life and politics.” This makes status different than other typical state goals in world politics. States do not have to hide motives of security, wealth, or even power. In fact, pursuing security on behalf of its citizens and being vocal about it is not only widely accepted, but one of the primary tasks of states. In contrast, in her discussion of status symbols and conspicuous consumption, Gilady (2018: 25) argues that because “strong norms restrain an open discussion of conspicuous consumption” states often justify acquiring these symbols “by reference to higher quality, aesthetics, cultural sophistication, interesting design, famous brands, or similar quasi-functional assertions.” States must pretend that they are not in it for status. Conversely, admitting to be a prestige-seeker is likely “to trigger emulative reactions by other actors” leading to self-defeat (Gilady, 2018: 25).

The result is, according to Gilady and others, that status-seekers go out of their way in order to impress other actors that they are worthy of recognition without explicitly saying that they are in it for prestige (see Gilady, 2018; Jakobsen et al., 2018; Pedersen, 2018; Wohlforth et al., 2018). For example, Denmark and Norway have sought status by trying “to be perceived as good, reliable partners in a hegemonic arrangement” (de Carvalho and Neumann, 2015: 15). To do so, Norway and Denmark have gone to war alongside the United States in places where they do not have any concrete interests and against groups and states which do not pose a threat to them (Græger, 2015; Jakobsen et al., 2018; Pedersen, 2018, 2020; Pedersen and Reykers, 2020). These are status-seeking acts. But the Nordic states did not openly disclose their prestige motivations. Instead, they convolute their reasoning saying that they did it in order to strengthen the bilateral relationship to the United States, to maintain the relevancy of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to the United States, or to foster alliance cohesion (Jakobsen et al., 2018; Pedersen, 2018, 2020; Pedersen and Reykers, 2020).

This also has implications for research on status in IR. If we expect status primarily to manifest through disguised behavior of conspicuous consumption, the field risks overlooking other forms of status-seeking. Because explicit appeals to prestige risk to appear vain, they are often muted. Thus, the logical way forward for scholars has been to focus on seemingly irrational behavior. Scholars identify status-seeking when behavior appears hard to justify in terms of security, wealth, or ideology. This in turn makes status the residual explanation (Gilady, 2018: 29–30; Ward, 2017a: 64). That research strategy is analytically useful, but it biases case selection away from the larger set of cases where status concerns likely coexist with other motives. As will be shown below, a more explicitly discursive approach helps loosen this constraint. Status is also produced and circulated through publicly legible cues, such as labels, rankings, metaphors, and other claims that invite recognition.

Multipolarity as a shortcut to greatness

What is argued in the remainder of this article is that polarity, and particularly multipolarity, represents such a mechanism of discursive status-seeking. A rhetorical tool that states in the upper echelons of world politics can use to seek status discursively. It allows aspirational states to seek great power status without saying so. As such, invoking multipolarity offers a useful complement to more practice or behavior-based status-seeking.

A useful way to conceptualize this move is through Beaumont’s (2024) account of how status competition operates through language. Beaumont (2024: 59) shows that “the logic of status competition” can be recognized “as it manifests in language without ‘status’ needing to be uttered as a rationale.” Discursively, states instead might reach for terms like honor, legitimacy, reputation, or moral authority as proxies for status and prestige (de Carvalho and Neumann, 2015; see Wohlforth et al., 2018). These are concepts that are more positively loaded but still imply rank. A reputation for resolve, for instance, signals strength. This implies that a state that can and will defend its interests (Weisiger and Yarhi-Milo, 2015).

Polarity here works in a similar fashion. By invoking multipolarity as a description of structure rather than as a political demand, major powers can advance claims about rank while appearing merely to describe how the world is ordered. While many neorealists eschew the idea of hierarchy, the unequal distribution of capabilities nonetheless forms a de facto hierarchy or multiple hierarchies (Donnelly, 2006). The polar powers matter more in the international system because they have amassed more power than any other state. Polarity thus appeals to an objective understanding of standing in an objective material hierarchy. To be a pole is, in practice, to be a material great power. In realist literature, the terms polarity and great power are often used interchangeably (Layne, 1993; Mearsheimer, 2001; Waltz, 1979). Thus, when Russia describes the world as multipolar, the implication is that it belongs on a shortlist of states that also includes the United States and China. If this view is accepted, so too is Russia’s claim to restored great power status (Chebankova, 2021; Makarychev and Morozov, 2011; Reshetnikov, 2024).

To be sure, I am not ruling out that multipolarity serves different functions other than status. Indeed, as Zala (2021) and his contributors show, multipolarity serve multiple purposes politically both abroad and at home. For Russia, in particular, some scholars argue that Russia’s discourse on multipolarity reflects a principled resistance to US hegemony rather than a strategic aim (Chebankova, 2017, 2021; Kurowska, 2014: 491; Schenoni, 2021). In short, states and their representatives might have numerous reasons why they deploy multipolarity rhetorically. Yet, it would be mistaken not to at least consider the status implications of multipolarity discourse as a strategic tool. Two key overlapping observations point to the idea that multipolarity narratives function as status-seeking rhetorical tools: Russia’s structural status decline and its conspicuous pursuit of great power status.

First, Russia’s structural position makes the pursuit of status desirable. Status-seeking behavior is typically driven by perceived gaps between self-image and external recognition (Murray, 2018; Onea, 2014; Smith, 2014). States already securely at the top have little need to actively seek status because their standing is generally accepted. In contrast, states that have suffered loss of standing have powerful incentives to engage in behaviors aimed at restoring or enhancing their prestige (Barnhart, 2020; Bilgic and Pilcher, 2023; Zarakol, 2010). Russia fits this profile. In Figure 3, I use a common proxy for international status. The data show that Russia has experienced a steady decline in status since the late 1980s (data are gathered from Niklasson and Towns (2023); for explanation of the measure, see Renshon, 2017: 116–149).

Figure 3.

Diplomatic recognition rank (1978–2021).

Second, Russia’s long-standing obsession with great power status makes it difficult to separate its calls for multipolarity from the deeper imperative of status restoration (Clunan, 2014; Forsberg, 2014; Götz, 2019; Larson and Shevchenko, 2010, 2019; Nitoiu, 2016; Reshetnikov, 2024). From the late Soviet period through Gorbachev’s New Thinking, Yeltsin’s tumultuous post-Soviet adjustments, and Putin’s assertive foreign policy, a recurring theme has been the demand for Russia to be treated as one of the world’s indispensable powers (Larson and Shevchenko, 2014, 2019; Neumann, 2014). Russia’s status anxiety has been rooted in the trauma of the Soviet collapse and Russia’s subsequent marginalization (Naterstad, 2026; Smith, 2014). As Freedman (2016) argues, states engage not only in social comparisons with peers but also in temporal comparisons with their own past. Russia’s sense of lost status is magnified by the contrast between its Soviet-era superpower position and its status decline after 1991.

Framing the world as multipolar thus serves a dual function. First, it asserts Russia’s relevance among current powers. Second, it rhetorically bridges the temporal gap to its former greatness. This echoes Zarakol’s (2010) insight that post-imperial states often suffer ontological insecurity, producing foreign policies aimed at restoring their once-dominant status. In this context, the multipolarity narrative acts as a discursive shortcut. It is a way for Russia to assert its claim to great power status without openly pleading for prestige.

Multipolarity as status-seeking

The potential effectiveness of this discursive strategy depends on traction beyond Russia. Once other states begin to speak of Russia as a pole among several, the narrative itself helps bring about the recognition Russia seeks. Yet this strategy faces an inherent tension in that rhetorical normalization alone cannot fully compensate for its material weakness compared to China and the United States. Russia is certainly a major power in world politics. But as Figures 1 and 2 illustrate, Russia is far off to even be considered a polar power in material terms. Why even bother insisting on multipolarity when such a system is not present? And why would actors potentially buy into such a claim? Below, I offer three interrelated explanations as to why status-seeking via multipolarity becomes a useful and permissible rhetorical device: China’s rise and structural uncertainty, the changing meaning of multipolarity, and the continued legitimacy of realism.

Exploiting structural uncertainty

While Russia has not risen materially, China has. By 2025, China is in a league of its own, above both other polar contenders such as Russia, the United Kingdom, and France (see Figures 1 and 2). These core measures, coupled with other factors such as a big population and more aggressive foreign policy posture, have led scholars to claim that the world is or is soon becoming bipolar (Bekkvold, 2023; Tunsjø, 2018). While scholars are still debating whether the world is bipolar or unipolar, even the most ardent proponent of unipolarity recognize that China has risen (Røren, 2024b: 4; Wohlforth, 2022).

China too challenges US primacy. But it does so without claiming the world is turning bipolar. ¹ The result of this change is structural uncertainty. Russia exploits this ambiguity. It embeds itself in a multipolar world it cannot materially dominate.

Putin himself uses China’s rise to advance his claims about the erosion of unipolarity and growing multipolarity. Rather than framing China as a rival to the United States in a bipolar structure, he folds its rise into a broader narrative of multipolarity. Here, Russia also remains central. For example, during his annual news conference in 2019, Putin said that what formed the basis of Russia and China’s accomplishment in bilateral trade “is the unprecedented level of trust” between the two countries. “Russian-Chinese cooperation,” Putin (2019) stated, is “a major factor in international stability” and in “the creation of a multipolar world.” “As a matter of fact,” Putin (2019) said, “it has already been created; a unipolar world no longer exist.”

In Putin’s view, multipolarity is the natural outgrowth of shifting economic realities. “The world’s multipolarity,” Putin said, “is a derivative of economic relations. After World War II, the US share in world GDP was 50 percent. And now China’s share is higher than the US’s share” (Putin, 2019). From this, Putin (2019) draws a broader structural lesson: “This inevitably leads to changes in many other areas. And apart from that, the world simply cannot have a unipolar structure, with a single centre that governs the entire international community.” China’s rise is thus used to declare the end of unipolarity. And the ambiguity that follows allows Putin to project a coming multipolar system.

A similar pattern appeared in his 2025 press briefing following a state visit to China. There, Putin again insisted on material parity, labeling China and India as “economic giants” (NDTV, 2025). He then added that “our country is among the top four biggest economies if we speak of purchasing power parity.” Having positioned Russia alongside larger actors economically, he pivoted to a normative claim: no one “should dominate over politics or over global security.” Instead, he declared, “everyone must be equal.”

Exploiting this structural uncertainty also extends beyond bilateral partnerships. Russia frequently uses multilateral platforms like BRICS (but also the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the G20) as evidence of a shifting global order. These clubs in turn serve as rhetorical vehicles to affirm Russia’s own relevance within a multipolar order. China clearly drives much of BRICS’ global weight. But Russia frames the group as evidence of multipolarity, and itself as an integral part of the order’s emergence. In a 2013 interview with TASS, Putin compared the bloc’s macroeconomic performance relative to the West: “GDP of the BRICS countries derived from the national currency purchasing power parity is currently over 27% of the global GDP and its share continues to increase” (The Russian Embassy, 2013). He thus concluded that “BRICS is a key element of the emerging multipolar world” (The Russian Embassy, 2013).

This line of argument has even intensified over time. At the 2023 BRICS summit in Johannesburg, Putin (2023) doubled down on the claim that the group’s ascent was emblematic of structural change: “We all unanimously stand in favour of a multipolar world order that is truly fair and based on international law.” Putin (2023) noted that BRICS now accounted for a greater share of global GDP (in PPP terms) than the G7, stressing its scale of “a total population exceeding 3 billion.” Club affiliation allows Russia to narrate its own importance through membership rather than individual capability. In this way, BRICS becomes both evidence of multipolarity and a discursive platform through which Russia sustains its own position as a polar power.

Multipolarity as a normative good

Multipolarity used to describe a structure with more than two centers of power in the world. Over the years, this meaning changed. Perhaps since polarity, according to Buzan (2004: 36), “is one of those rare concepts used frequently in both the public policy and academic debates.” One of the clearest differences is often found in discussions on what kind of structure is the most stable. With only a handful of exceptions, polarity-scholars generally agree that bipolarity, as was seen during the Cold War, was peaceful and stable. Scholars are more divided whether unipolarity is durable and peaceful, but most agree that multipolarity is by far the most conflict-prone structure of them all (Christensen, 1996; Wohlforth, 1999).

Outside the Western sphere, unipolarity is not viewed favorably. And multipolarity is seen as more democratic and fairer. Particularly in Russia. Already in 1997, Russia and China signed their “Joint Declaration on a Multipolar World and the Establishment of a New International Order.” The declaration said that the bipolar era was over, and that a “positive trend towards a multipolar world is gaining momentum, and relations between major States, including former cold-war adversaries, are changing” (United Nations (UN), 1997: 3). Likewise, during a UN Security Council resolution debate on NATO’s intervention in Kosovo in 1999, then ambassador Lavrov said that the draft resolution “highlights the urgent need to form a truly multi-polar world order based on the Charter of the United Nations” (UN, 1999: 8). In this world, Lavrov continued, “there will be no room for unilateral diktat or attempts at domination by force” (UN, 1999: 8). Lavrov suggested that the multipolarity was closer to “true” multilateralism, whereas the current system of unipolarity was closer to collective unilateralism (Chebankova, 2021: 95). Russian leaders revamped the idea of great power concerts as a truer form of multilateralism, whereby Russia, together with the United States and other powers, could be consulted in important matters.

The narrative of multipolarity was cemented by Foreign Minister and Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov (Makarychev and Morozov, 2013). In addition to insisting on its own sphere of influence and opposing further NATO expansion, the Primakov doctrine suggested that Russia should oppose US unipolarity and promote a multipolar world where Russia would restore its status and again become one of the great powers (Makarychev and Morozov, 2011: 355–356; Tsygankov, 2010: 25). Primakov was aware of Russia’s limited national resources, but instead saw multipolarity “as a desired objective, rather than a fact of life” (Tsygankov, 2010: 100). Primakov’s ideas were adopted by Yeltsin, Primakov’s successors Ivanov and Lavrov, and by Vladimir Putin. Thus, the rhetoric of Primakov and the later Russian foreign policy elites was structured around convincing other actors that multipolarity was fairer, freer, and better.

In the Primakov-infused Russian foreign policy discourse, multipolarity also came to be understood as an egalitarian and more democratic order than the unipolar world led by the United States. In 2000, Russia’s foreign policy doctrine suggested that “Russia shall seek to achieve a multi-polar system of international relations that really reflects the diversity of the modern world with its great variety of interest” (quoted in Makarychev and Morozov (2011: 355)). What prevents the transition to a multipolar world order, according to Russia, is “the continuing hegemony of international norms generated during the short-lived ‘unipolar moment’” (Kurowska, 2014: 495). For Russia, multipolarity also signals a rejection of Western-defined modernity in favor of its own civilizational order (Naterstad, 2026). Thus, multipolarity is here conceptualized as a system that allows for a truer form of sovereignty where more voices are heard. In February of 2024, Foreign minister Lavrov said that multipolarity is an order “that will reflect the cultural and civilisational diversity of the modern world and have regard for the right of every nation to determine its own destiny” (Russian MFA, 2024). Likewise, Putin said that building a multipolar world order would entail the world to be “more democratic, more honest” and “fair for the majority of mankind” (Sputnik Africa (200 AD), 2023).

This shift in meaning also could explain why China has refrained from claiming the world is becoming bipolar. As Figures 1 and 2 show, the structural conditions are ripe for at least claiming that the world is turning bipolar (Bekkvold, 2023; Kupchan, 2021; Lind, 2024; Tunsjø, 2018). Yet, China explicitly refrains from doing so. Bipolarity is conspicuously absent from Xi Jinping’s rhetoric. In his 2021 Davos speech, Xi warned that forming “small cliques” or engaging in a “new Cold War” would “push the world toward division and confrontation” (Deutsche Welle, 2021). He has repeatedly called on countries to “reject the Cold War mentality” and to oppose “bloc politics and camp confrontation,” language that resists the narrative of an emerging US–China bipolar system (Aljazeera, 2022).

Instead, Xi presents China as “a pillar in promoting a multipolar world” further implicating greater democracy in world politics (Xi, 2026). Much like Moscow’s narratives, multipolarity is a normative ideal, an ideal that positions China as a force for inclusivity and reform. Multiple reasons might be behind this rhetorical strategy. But by avoiding the label, Beijing sidesteps the confrontational logic it attributes to the West. It furthermore claims the moral high ground in constructing a more pluralistic and supposedly peaceful international order than unipolarity and Cold War bipolarity.

To be sure, scholarship on the political use of multipolarity in China, Russia, and in other rising powers is not new (Ambrosio, 2017; Chebankova, 2021; Makarychev and Morozov, 2011; Murray and Brown, 2012; Schenoni, 2021). But what has been underplayed is the way that this changed meaning of multipolarity offers a way for states positioned in the vicinity of the great power club, like Russia, to seek great power status. The shift rhetorically coerces actors to accept that multipolarity as an intrinsic good. Thus, if the very concept of multipolarity is accepted as something that promotes multilateralism, fairness, justice, and democracy, other actors than Russia would gradually accept multipolarity as a legitimate order. If multipolarity is accepted and promoted by a wide range of states in world politics, Russia hopes and believes that it would be considered one of those great powers (Chebankova, 2021: 98–99).

The objectivity of realism and the new multipolar world

The fact that both the normative and material definitions of multipolarity exist simultaneously also means that realism plays a role in facilitating the Russian status-seeking narrative. A running thread in realism, as opposed to idealism, is that the theory speaks the truth. This was the case for classical realists, as it has been for neorealists (Fluck, 2017: 27; Molloy, 2004). Realists claim to observe the behavior of states and to go beyond the façade of norms, institutions, cooperation, and ideas (Maxwell, 1994: 385). For example, Waltz’ stated goal of his theory of international politics was to “discover some law-like regularities within[the international system]” and to “develop a way of explaining the observed regularities” (Waltz, 1979: 116). Likewise, in multiple critiques of other IR theories, Mearsheimer claims that realism is better equipped in explaining and predicting international politics because its fundamentally skeptical view of human nature and focus on the distribution of capabilities (Mearsheimer, 2001, 2018, 2019).

Polarity functions as realists’ pinnacle tool to examine the going-ons within the international system. It is not the individual leaders, the state system, nor the international organizations and institutions that condition or induce behavior. Instead, polarity captures the very structure of the system itself. And gauging whether the system is unipolar, bipolar, or multipolar is done by assessing the distribution of capabilities (mostly material ones) within that system.

It is worth noting that the continued dominance of polarity language is increasingly contested within IR scholarship. A growing body of work questions whether polarity remains an adequate framework for capturing contemporary global order, proposing alternatives such as multiplexity, multi-order dynamics, or deep pluralism (Acharya and Buzan, 2019; Acharya et al., 2023; Flockhart, 2016). These debates, however, remain largely absent from policy discourse. As a result, polarity continues to structure how change is narrated and recognized in practice, with important status consequences of the kind analyzed here.

Something odd happens when the political-normative and material-realist version of polarity and multipolarity coexist. In short, the realist claims to truth offer legitimacy to the political-normative narrative. This happens in two ways. First, most people—including state leaders and their representatives—do not possess in-depth knowledge about IR theory. But given that realism is perhaps the most prominent of theories emerging out of the discipline of IR, they are vaguely aware of it and its claim to truths. Thus, when actors suggest that the world is multipolar, recipients of that message relate it to realism and its claim to speak the truth. As Stephen Walt (2025) notes, policymakers often invoke realism to justify their decisions. Trine Flockhart (2016: 6) similarly observes that current debates about world order are “rooted in the realist tradition,” where the balance of power and the distribution of capabilities are assumed to be the key structuring forces in international affairs. Thus, even when multipolarity is described in idealistic terms, as fairness, pluralism, or justice, the mere invocation of the term carries at the very minimum a residue of realist credibility. For state representatives, referencing multipolarity thus becomes a way of sounding empirically grounded while pushing a political agenda. The result is that realist framings, even when only superficially understood, continue to shape how international change is narrated.

Second, Russian narratives of multipolarity are specifically offered further legitimacy by some realists. For example, John Mearsheimer, one of the most prominent and oft-cited realists to date, has been more than willing to entertain both Russian and international audiences that the world is indeed turning (or has turned) multipolar. On numerous occasions, Mearsheimer (2019, 2025) has claimed that the world is either becoming or already is multipolar. In his critique of the liberal international order and its proponents in 2019, Mearsheimer (2019) wrote that “With the rise of China and Russia’s comeback, the international system has become multipolar, which is a death knell for the liberal international order” (p. 43). Mearsheimer also appeared at Valdai Discussion Club in Sochi, Russia reaffirming the political-normative view of polarity:

I have said on numerous occasions, we are now entering a world where the United States is no longer the only great power on the planet. We are moving out of the unipolar world to a multipolar world where there are three great powers that really matter in shaping the international system. (Valdai Discussion Club, 2017)

Mearsheimer is undoubtedly well-versed in realist understanding of polarity. Russia’s presence as a polar power in his analysis is therefore odd. I will not speculate much about the reasons. But it is evident from his scholarship that Mearsheimer believed since the end of the Cold War that the system, at least the European one, would only momentarily be unipolar and then turn multipolar (Mearsheimer, 1990a, 1990b). Thus, narratives of multipolarity—be they of a political-normative origin or the material version—support Mearsheimer’s own predictions.

Regardless of what the aim of Mearsheimer’s analysis really is, his arguments are key in validating and recognizing the kind of status-seeking implied by these narratives (see Kurowska, 2024). The political-normative narrative of multipolarity is set up to latch on to the realist research program but not to be specific of the details of that international set up. Realists affirm that narrative formally recognizes the idea that there are more than one and two power centers of the world. And by logic of deduction, Russia also finds itself on that list.

Recognition of multipolarity

Status is intersubjective. Not objective, nor is it subjective. States like Russia cannot determine their own international status unilaterally. Instead, it must be conferred by others (Murray, 2010: 660–662; Pu, 2017: 135–136). A state may insist on its social status, but if no one listens or rejects the claim it remains a rhetorical exercise. Multipolarity as a concept operates in much the same way. Russia’s insistence that the world is, or is becoming, multipolar is not by itself enough to make it true. The narrative only becomes politically effective if others begin to speak of and treat the world through that lens and position Russia as a pole within it. This is not to suggest that a simple causal chain from Russian rhetoric to global recognition exists. Instead, polarity talk is constituted through repeated use across multiple actors. No single state fully controls the narrative. But certain states, like Russia, stand to gain more recognition from it becoming institutionalized.

That recognition has to some extent occurred. Russia’s strategic partners and regional powers like the BRICS countries endorse the vision of a multipolar order (Hall, 2021; Schenoni, 2021). These countries have long viewed US hegemony as structurally unjust and have sought to elevate their own status through multilateral groupings like BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. For most of the members, multipolarity is a political project with obvious appeal in that it aligns with their ambitions and provides a discursive framework for asserting their standing in it (Røren and Beaumont, 2019; Stuenkel, 2014).

However, using the same logic, it is somewhat puzzling that China has refrained from the structural opportunity to portray the world as bipolar (see Figures 1 and 2). Since status is always positional and sometimes scarce, a bipolar system would imply more status to China (Larson et al., 2014: 9; Røren, 2023: 23). Two possible explanations consistent with the status theory and narrative approach above seem plausible. First, China may view multipolarity not as an end in itself, but as a discursive staging ground. By embracing a narrative of multipolarity, China builds legitimacy. Yet over the longer term, it may be positioning itself to transition toward a de facto bipolar role. One in which its material capabilities and global influence clearly surpass all but the United States. Once multipolarity has gained broad normative acceptance or the structural gap between China and other powers has widened further, Beijing may have greater incentive to assert a more dominant role.

Second, bipolarity has also become rhetorically stigmatized, even though it is less so than for unipolarity. This is even more apparent in contrast to the increasingly legitimized discourse of multipolarity. Outside of academic theorizing and the neorealist tradition (Tunsjø, 2018; Waltz, 1979), few political actors seem to embrace bipolarity as a more stable structure than multipolarity. Bipolarity evokes images of bloc politics and Cold War-style confrontation. This runs counter to China’s preferred rhetoric of peaceful ascent.

An even clearer evidence for conceptual shift of multipolarity as a normative good is that it is adopted beyond Russia’s strategic partners. Western leaders and institutions have also begun to adopt the language of multipolarity. In 2018, the United Kingdom referred to an “emerging multipolarity,” a formulation that suggested a shift underway rather than a fixed structure (quoted in Blagden (2019: 215)). By 2023, that hedging was gone. The United Kingdom’s Integrated Review stated flatly that “the transition into a multipolar, fragmented and contested world has happened more quickly and definitively than anticipated” (Brooke-Holland et al., 2023). Likewise, High Representative Josep Borrell of the European Union (EU) called the current condition a form of “messy multipolarity” (EEAS, 2022). And in its 2023 National Security Strategy, Germany declared that “the world in the 21st century is multipolar” (The Federal Government, 2023; also see Scholz, 2023). It is an acknowledgment that the system cannot be understood through unipolarity. According to then German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, “The 21st century will be multipolar; it already is” (Noyan, 2023).

Other actors go further. French President Emmanuel Macron has championed multipolarity, sometimes using it as a foil for US dominance. In a joint statement with Xi Jinping, Macron committed France to “promote the process of world multipolarity” (Xinhua, 2018). “Promoting the process” here suggests an active construction of multipolarity, not just passive recognition. This also reflects a French ambition to be a pole in its own right with Europe as a “third power” (with France at the helm) alongside the United States and China (Rankin, 2023). Likewise, as Charles Michel, President of the European Council, stated at the UN: “The EU is striving for a multipolar world, a world that cooperates and moves towards more democracy and more respect for human rights” (Michel, 2023).

António Guterres, Secretary-General of the UN, has perhaps most clearly framed multipolarity not just as a description of global diffusion but as a necessary solution to a looming crisis. Much like China’s insistence on avoiding bipolarity, Guterres warned against “a world splitting in two,” and calling for “a multipolar world with strong multilateral institutions” as the best way to avoid a great fracture (Guterres, 2019: 2).

This dynamic has now even extended to the United States under the second Trump administration. In an interview shortly after taking office as Secretary of State, Marco Rubio (2025) openly stated that “it’s not normal for the world to simply have a unipolar power,” describing unipolarity as an “anomaly” produced by the Cold War’s end. “Eventually,” he continued, “you were going to reach back to a point where you had a multipolar world, multi-great powers in different parts of the planet. We face that now with China and to some extent Russia” (Rubio, 2025). Rubio’s remarks are significant for multiple reasons. First of all, because they reflect an acceptance and a normalization of multipolarity from within the heart of US foreign policy. In doing so, Rubio provides support to Russia’s status claim. His framing of multipolarity as an inevitable structural reality contributes to the broader recognition process (Rubio, 2025). Second, and perhaps even more importantly, Rubio connects multipolarity directly to Russia emergence and of Russia as, at least partially, one of those “multi-great powers.”

What is particularly puzzling is that states and institutions that have benefited from the stability of a unipolar world seem eager to replace it with a multipolar order. For example, from a status perspective, US acceptance of multipolarity entails acknowledging that power and status are more widely distributed. Status is after all scarce. And gatekeepers such as the United States have strong incentives not to admit Russia into the great power club (Greve and Levy, 2018: 8; Larson et al., 2014: 9). Assigning great power status to a geopolitical adversary risks conferring social recognition, influence, and legitimacy on an actor the United States has spent decades to constrain (Røren, 2023: 23). To be sure, many states can benefit from multipolarity narratives. But the distribution of gains is uneven. For Russia, it is a status claim with especially high payoffs.

I offer no formal theory to explain why this has happened. However, that such recognition nonetheless occurs may suggest that the discourse of polarity cannot be reduced to US preferences. Status is intersubjective, and narratives about the structure of the international system emerge through interaction rather than unilateral declaration (Bilgic and Pilcher, 2023: 11; Buarque, 2022: 2451; Røren, 2023). Status orders are shaped not only by the dominant power, but also by the cumulative effects of repeated claims, alignments, and practices across a wider audience of states and institutions (Røren, 2024a: 4–6). Once alternative narrative of polarity gain sufficient traction among major actors, they begin to delimit what can plausibly be said.

In this sense, the growing normalization of multipolarity narrows the discursive bandwidth available to US officials and other actors that from the outset would not benefit from a multipolar world (Krebs, 2015: 816; Neumann, 2008: 62–63). Continuing to insist on unipolarity risks appearing analytically outdated or politically disconnected from observable shifts. This is particularly so in light of China’s rise and the conceptual change of multipolarity.

Conclusion

Russia’s invocation of multipolarity is less a reflection of a material fact than a method of status-seeking ingenuity. Materially, the world remains unipolar. Perhaps moving toward bipolarity. The United States still vastly outstrips any rival in composite power. By conventional measures of polarity (which require several comparably strong poles), Russia does not qualify as a peer competitor. Yet Moscow’s great power ambitions persist despite this material gap. The solution, as this study has shown, lies in status and discourse. By invoking multipolarity, Russia attempts to will into being the status it cannot achieve by capabilities alone, seeking status as a great power through rhetorical means.

Russia’s status strategy relies on conditions that make its claims to great power plausible. First, China’s rise has unsettled unipolarity without solidifying bipolarity, creating ambiguity about how the future system will look. Second, multipolarity’s meaning has shifted. It now carries normative weight, including ideas of fairness, inclusion, and sovereignty. This stands in contrast to hegemonic unipolarity and the rigidity of bipolarity. This reframing lets Russia present its bid for status as a good cause. Third, realism’s structural vocabulary still dominates ideas how the world looks like. By speaking that language, Moscow cloaks ambition for great power status in the objective state of things.

This method enables Russia to assert its desired status without overtly trumpeting it. Moscow grounds its narrative in familiar IR terminology even as it bends those terms to new purposes. Talking of a “multipolar world” signals Russia’s intent to be counted among the leading powers and thus implicitly inviting others to acknowledge its self-conceived rightful place in historical time (Naterstad, 2026).

The resonance of Russia’s narrative beyond its borders has further bolstered its plausibility. China amplifies a multipolar narrative that validates its and Russia’s stature. So does Brazil. India likewise champions a more plural global order. These major powers, much like Russia, are states that also plausibly can claim polar power status under multipolarity. But the main evidence for widespread normalization of multipolarity comes from the fact that Western leaders have begun to mirror elements of this discourse. Each repetition makes Russia’s claim appear more credible. This multipolar narrative in turn fixates the great power status that Moscow seeks to project.

Russia’s case shows that narratives can shape how international status is negotiated, even when the material foundations are weak (Beaumont, 2024). Multipolarity, in this context, functions less as an objective fact than as a tool for repositioning. By embedding itself in a concept that others begin to echo, Russia turns discourse into a form of influence. This does not make it a polar power in structural terms. But it does show how states can work around constraints by reshaping the very meaning of structure.

These findings introduce an important question: Does Russia receive something more than just the mere possession of status? Can Russia, or any other state benefiting from acceptance of the multipolarity narrative, use this newfound status for influence and power? Status scholars in IR argue that states pursue social status for two reasons. First, it is seen as an autotelic good. It simply feels good to have high status (Larson et al., 2014: 17; Onea, 2017: 129; Wohlforth, 2009: 29). Second, states pursue it precisely because it comes with increased influence and power. In this perspective, status is instrumental (Dafoe et al., 2014: 373; Renshon, 2017: 33). However, to date, we do not know whether states can use their status for something more. And the little work that has been conducted on the topic comes to diverging conclusions. For example, Mercer (2017) shows that states who fight wars might gain prestige but that others are unlikely to voluntary defer to this newly acquired prestige. In contrast, Røren (2025) shows that high-status states are able to convert their status into power via acts of recognition. Low-status states here view recognition from high-status actors as valuable, in turn making them more willing to act in accordance with the wishes of the high-status state.

Even if multipolarity talk does not change Russia’s influence, recognition can still be politically usable at home. Novel work suggest that status also is a potential source of domestic legitimacy (Beaumont, 2024; Lin and Katada, 2022; Schweller and Pu, 2014; Ward, 2017a, 2017b). If domestic audiences value standing, governments have incentives to seek (or at least perform) recognition and to publicize it. Recognition (or even the appearance of it) can be cashed out in domestic political currency, and status contests can feed back into internal legitimacy struggles. Seen this way, multipolarity discourse can matter even if Russia fails to convert its status into power.

Ultimately, Russia cannot talk itself into being a pole. But it and other states can use the language of polarity to make its place in various international status hierarchies look more natural than the numbers allow. While other states might have their own reasons to recognize the multipolarity narratives, this article has shown that the status payoff from normalizing multipolarity is uneven, and Russia arguably stands to benefit more than most. Perhaps both abroad and at home.