Where [Stephen] Cohen was once considered a luminary within the Russian scholarly community, his star has fallen precipitously over the past few years, such that he’s been described by The New Republic as “Putin’s American Toady.” Not only has Cohen described the illegal referendum in Crimea in 2014 as “legitimate” — language echoing leaders like Putin — but he has further questioned the notion that Russia invaded southern Ukraine, noting that Russia’s incursion was “an invasion only in the sense that [Russian troops] left the base on Crimea.”
The push-back against Cohen’s analysis has also extended beyond his writings. According to Coda Story, Cohen has “charged… that all of his enemies were ‘McCarthyists’ who were keeping him from speaking out.” Cohen’s writings at The Nation, where he works as a contributing editor, have also helped lead to “[s]taffers at The Nation… openly revolting against the magazine’s pro-Russian tilt,” per The Chronicle of Higher Education. (Cohen’s work has been endorsed by, among others, prominent white supremacist David Duke, whose website noted that Cohen “has no peer in his ability to destroy the anti-Russia and anti-Putin lies.”)
As it is, when asked via email whether he had any reaction to Doctorow writing for Russia Insider, Cohen offered a lengthy response:
If you look at list of [ACEWA] Board members, you see they are very diverse people. The ACEWA is not responsible for or necessarily endorses what individual Board members may do or say, or not do or not say. Apart from our sponsored events, there is no collective responsibility. Many, perhaps most, do not share many of my own publicly stated views, for example. I have my own opinions about Doctorow and Russia Insider, but they are my personal ones and have no bearing whatsoever on the ACEWA. I do not practice collective denunciations based on guilt by association, having long been a student of the Soviet Stalin-era and seen where they led.