The 2004 Valdai conference was attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin.[4][5] Among many other Russian Government officials attending Valdai meetings are Dmitry Medvedev, former Prime Minister and former President; Sergey Ivanov, former Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office; Sergey Lavrov, Minister of Foreign Affairs; Sergey Shoygu, former Minister of Defence.[6]
Daniel W. Drezner, professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, described Valdai as "a swanky high-level conference put on by the Russian elite" and "the highest-profile Russian equivalent to Davos (minus the corporate presence)".[12] Drezner also wrote that the chief value to attendees is the ability to determine the official line of the Russian government, although attendance also risks "greater legitimacy on a government that has been accused of some less-than-legitimate activities as of late."[12] Nikolay Petrov of the Carnegie Moscow Center identified Valdai as "a project used as blatant propaganda by the Kremlin" while Russian sociologist Lilia Shevtsova criticized the Valdai conferences in an article entitled "Putin's Useful Idiots."[13] Marcel H. Van Herpen wrote that Valdai was a soft power effort by the Kremlin in service of Russian foreign policy goals, with Russian leadership using the conference in a bid to gain goodwill among Western intellectuals, create networking opportunities between Russian and Western elites, and "create a testing ground for the Kremlin's foreign policy initiatives."[14]Angus Roxburgh wrote that RIA Novosti was important to the establishment of Valdai during Putin's second term, and that the conference plays a key role in the Russian government's effort to burnish Putin's image and influence outsiders.[4] Nikolay Petrov also wrote that the club has increasingly become a "propaganda tool."[15] British journalist Angus Roxburgh described it as part of the Russian propaganda effort.[4]
According to the Institute for the Study of War, in 2023, one of Valdai's contributors, Konstantin Zatulin, stated that Russia had failed to achieve any of its major goals during the Russo-Ukrainian War. These he listed as "denazification, demilitarization, the neutrality of Ukraine, and the protection of the inhabitants of the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics". He said that these goals "have ceased to hold actual meaning" and suggested that Russian forces should have been more aggressive in efforts to push Ukrainian forces back from the borders of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.[16]
The Valdai Discussion Club Foundation has been sanctioned in connection with Russia's aggression against Ukraine, by Ukraine and by Canada.[17][18][19]
In John Mearsheimer's 2023 book "How States Think", the foreword acknowledges him receiving a small financial support from Valdai in conjunction with Best Book award for his 2019 book "The Great Delusion".[20]
Annual meetings
Title
Place
Date
Notes
Russia at the Turn of the Century: Hopes and Reality
^ abcRoxburgh, Angus (2013). The Strongman: Vladimir Putin and the Struggle for Russia (2nd ed.). I.B.Tauris. p. 193.
^Shimotomai, Nobuo (2015). "Politics of Dictatorship and Pluralism". In Inoguchi, Takashi (ed.). Japanese and Russian Politics: Polar Opposites or Something in Common?. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 79.
