Sovereigntism, sovereignism or souverainism (from French: souverainisme, pronounced [su.vʁɛ.nism] ⓘ, meaning "the ideology of sovereignty") is the notion of having control over one's conditions of existence, whether at the level of the self, social group, region, nation or globe.
[1] Typically used for describing the acquiring or preserving political independence of a nation or a region, a sovereigntist aims to "take back control" from perceived powerful forces,[2] either against internal subversive minority groups (ethnic, sexual or gender),[3] or from external global governance institutions,[4] federalism and supranational unions.
Thus, sovereigntism in Europe is opposed to federalism and typically involves nationalism, particularly in the United Kingdom (which withdrew from the EU in 2020) and in France where parties on the left and right margins lean strongly towards it.
Putin advisor Vladislav Surkov articulated the threat to "sovereign democracy" posed by international organizations serving the interest of NATO, the OSCE, and the unipolar world order controlled by the United States.
According to the ideology of Putinism, Georgian and Ukrainian sovereignty could not be respected since it had already been lost due to their color revolutions, seen as a collapse of borders protecting them from being engulfed culturally, economically and politically by Europe and the West.
[31] Sovereigntism in foreign policy is charactized by opposition to multilateral regimes relating to climate change, war crimes, arms control and international declaration of human rights.
Similar to the perspective of Putinism, those individuals who maintain a separate minority identity are not only excluded, but are regarded as a threat to the majority's sovereignty, especially when they seek legal redress for violation of their human rights as defined by constitutional and international norms.