blogpost 2: When Dissent Blooms: How Flowers Symbolize Over-Identification
Bringing flowers to a protest or memorial would seem like an act affirming norms of peaceful demonstration and respectful mourning. But in certain contexts of political tension, the customary appearance of flowers takes on an ambiguous, even subversive meaning. We can analyze such symbolic dissonance through the lens of “over-identification” – a concept developed from artistic and activist strategies of nuanced dissent in authoritarian contexts.
Over-identification involves superficially adopting the symbols or rhetoric of dominant ideologies to the point of absurd literalism in ways that ultimately highlight unseen blindspots and fractures. Rather than critique power structures from a “critical distance,” practitioners of over-identification inhabit official narratives from within, stretching them to uncomfortable extremes to expose hypocrisies and inconsistencies.
Philosopher Slavoj Žižek coined the term to describe avantgarde artists in Soviet-era Slovenia, like the band Laibach, who amplified state socialist imagery into exaggerated, hyperbolic spectacles. This manic mimetic excess crossed a line from affirmative propaganda into latent parody, functioning as dissent masked by overzealous conformity. The goal was to frustrate and critique regimes of control on their own terms.
We can detect traces of this tactic in the Catalan independence protests when dissidents brought flowers for armed police. This gesture seemingly embraced authorities as guarantors of lawful assembly but with a surplus of meaning that strained the facade of “peacekeeping.” The excess hinted at ironies around identifying police as protectors rather than oppressors of protest and civil critique rather than violent suppression of speech.
The appearance of makeshift memorials with flowers, candles, and portraits to mourn Alexei Navalny serve as a prime example of over-identification. At first glance, these gatherings in Russian public spaces adopted recognizable visual tropes that signaled sanctioned acts of mourning and memorialization. The use of solemn flowers, votive candles, and images showing Navalny's face mirrored the familiar coded language used to honor respected public figures after their death.
However, Navalny's identity as a prominent opposition leader and anti-corruption activist, fiercely critical of Putin's administration, added layers of tense ambiguity. Navalny himself blamed Russian authorities for an assassination attempt against him using chemical weapon. So, while memorial attendees adopted ritualized signs and codes that, on a surface level, "affirmed" the state's techniques for honorable remembrance, this particular application broke the standard mold.
By using the very same visual lexicon to mourn now a newly anointed state martyr — seen by dissidents as murdered by that same state — the act of laying flowers and gathering for Navalny amplified tensions already latent in the symbolism itself. It strained the usual links between floral tribute and apolitical displays of patriotic loyalty or gratitude towards uncontroversial figures.
This effect culminated when police arrested over 400 people who gathered peacefully at these makeshift memorials to lay flowers. The spectacle of force and repression targeting respectful mourners reinforced underlying ironies in the coopted ritual itself. It begged questions around whether alleged "extremists" deserve minutes of silence or flower bouquets (or even having a funeral ceremony). If non-disruptive remembrance supposedly demonstrates a commitment to law and order, why incentivize it with detention vehicles and batons?
The customary symbolism is fragmented by exaggerating familiar acts of sanctioned mourning for a forbidden target in Navalny. The state's violent response to benign floral rituals spotlit the hypocritical gap between mythmaking around national solidarity and the contradictory reality underneath. It laid bare the regime’s illegitimacy through symbolic meanings. Over-identification exploits these uncertain lines by pantomiming consent to give a covert voice to dissent. Mimicry, exaggeration and repetition expose absurd asymmetries in supposedly universal rights and rituals. Incriminating flowers for “enemies of the state” fractures pretenses to represent all citizens.
The ritual of laying flowers allows Russian protesters to cleverly adopt state-sanctioned acts of mourning and memorialization while subtly undermining their meaning. Honoring the murdered Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny with typically apolitical floral tributes strains the facade of social harmony and unity narratives promoted by authorities. The subsequent mass arrests of harmless mourners only further delegitimize and expose the regime’s authoritarian reflexes on the global stage. As dissenters frustrated by the crimes against liberty expose the hypocrisies lurking underneath the state’s slick ceremonies, they contribute to long-term transformations in political consciousness. Though regimes can violently punish dissent, citizens creatively subvert public ceremonies to undermine state narratives over time and eventually enter the beautiful Russia of the Future Navalny dreamt of so much.