Difference between adjectives русский and российский

Did you know that even though both adjectives are translated into English as ‘‘Russian‘‘, they have quite different meanings?

There are more than 180 nationalities (ethnic groups) living in the Russian Federation (Российская Федерация). Describing concepts common to the whole country, we use the adjective российский: российская конституция, российская экономика, российский паспорт, российская армия, российские законы. Normally it is something controlled by the federal government. In fact, this adjective is relatively new – it substituted an adjective советский after the collapse of the Soviet Union. A Russian Federation citizen who holds a passport is called россиянин.

Россиянин can represent various ethnic groups: Belarusians, Chechens, Armenians, Tatars, Jews, Buryats etc. Русский is used for people who identify themselves as belonging to a Russian ethnic group, they may have Russian citizenship or not. The adjective русский describes everything connected to this particular ethnic group historically and culturally. For example, русский язык, русская литература, русская кухня, русские танцы.

As you can see, the adjectives российский and русский are not the same. The first one is related to Russia as a country and its government, while the adjective русский refers to the certain ethnic group and its culture. Don’t confuse them!