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Russia Outside the Security System
Abstract
This article considers the reasons for and likely trajectory of the confrontation with the West that the Russian government began abruptly in 2014. While Russia's leadership quickly recognized that its confrontational strategy in Ukraine was a strategic mistake, it could not reverse course. As it has continued to escalate the confrontation, it has become hostage to an aggressive policy that cannot end successfully for Russia.
With the war against Ukraine, Russian foreign policy is going through a critical juncture that causes significant regional and global uncertainties. The current crisis is not a result of short-term brinkmanship but a consequence of Moscow’s three-decade-long search for self-identification since the collapse of the Soviet Union. To follow the overall foreign policy trajectory and self-identification of the Kremlin, Foreign Policy Concepts are quite helpful since they reflect the main framework of Russian diplomacy since 1993. The study begins by explaining the significance of the Concepts for Moscow’s foreign policy. Then it highlights the main themes of the latest Foreign Policy Concept: anti-hegemonism, multipolarity, Russia as a center, and Russia as a civilization-state. In each section, Moscow’s understanding of these themes is discussed and put into a historical context to explain the significance of their appearance in the official documents. The article then compares the previous concept to expose the change of narrative in 2023 to show the main changes in Russia’s foreign policy priorities, articulation of other actors, and perception of threats.
This study examines how the Russo-Georgian War in 2008 and the Ukraine Crisis in 2014 were discussed in Western and Russian academic circles. The findings show that historical accounts as well as various theoretical frameworks were used to explain the Russian foreign policy (RFP) regarding these conflicts. In comparison, although mono-theoretical models were utilized in both cases, they are more dominant in the works of Western scholars. On the other hand, inductive historical explanations were used more in the works of Russian scholars. Another important point is that in the latter studies, alternative accounts to the Western unilateralism are more popular. These accounts reveal themselves with concepts such as “multipolar world” or “Eurasianism”. As for the mono theoretical accounts, realist approaches seem to be the dominant framework in both cases. Realist frameworks emphasize the improved material capabilities of Russia and external pressures in its sphere of influence. The later component of the realist approach is stressed more by scholars from both academic circles. Moreover, even the studies that utilize different approaches, such as ideational explanations, domestic political factors, decision-maker related approaches, or the ones that highlight the regional competition, emphasize the role of the strategic or geopolitical imperatives as a factor that cannot be ignored regarding how RFP is formed and implemented.
In this article, I shall demonstrate that several of the arguments made in favour of an offensive realist explanation of Russian actions in Ukraine as part of a power balancing process are inconsistent both with available empirical knowledge of the conflict in Ukraine and with the structural logic postulated by offensive realist theory itself. Rather than a conflict about power in a material sense, I will argue that the war in Ukraine is better understood as a conflict about the incompatibility of the Russian state structure to cope with the imperatives of functional differentiation as understood by theories of world society.
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