Prominent German political scientist Herfried Münkler uses his theories of “heroic” and “postheroic” societies to describe the phenomenon. At the recent Petersburg Dialogue in Leipzig — an important forum between Germany and Russia that has brought together representatives of the worlds of politics, culture and business since 2001 — Münkler said this “postheroism” is essentially an expression of prosperity, the German daily Die Tageszeitung reported. Those who have it good don’t want to jeopardize their good fortune.
Münkler argues that, as a rule of thumb, there’s an ideal of “heroism of masculinity” in poorer and less developed counties in which notions of war and defense of the homeland are idealized. In “postheroic” societies, however, which tend to be well-developed and prosperous, war is deemed to be aberrant. According to the newspaper, he argued that Eastern Europe isn’t prosperous enough to discourage young men from this idea of heroism. Indeed, politicians can often profit if they are able to tap these emotions. When it comes to Putin’s policies, he argues, this heroism aspect makes the situation unpredictable. “Dynamics are being toyed with that, at some point, will no longer be controllable,” he said.
That sense of heroism was recently on display on Maidan Square in Kiev, where, five months ago. the current crisis began. There, three men stood in front of a barrel on a sunny spring day and used their powerful voices to sing an impassioned song about the “Cossacks’ blood-bought glory” and the “Moskaly,” a pejorative for Russians. “When the Moskaly cross the border, we’ll finish them off,” says Dmytro, a 30-year-old whose head has been shaved clean, save for a small tail. He says an invasion by the Russians is only a matter of time, but that his people will be undefeatable if it comes to war. “A Ukrainian with a tail on his head like mine and a weapon in his hand will sit behind every bush,” he says.
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