Russia's Geoeconomic Strategy for a Greater Eurasia

Russia's Geoeconomic Strategy for a Greater Eurasia
Author: Glenn Diesen
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 355
Release: 2017-07-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1351815032

Moscow has progressively replaced geopolitics with geoeconomics as power is recognised to derive from the state’s ability to establish a privileged position in strategic markets and transportation corridors. The objective is to bridge the vast Eurasian continent to reposition Russia from the periphery of Europe and Asia to the centre of a new constellation. Moscow’s ‘Greater Europe’ ambition of the previous decades produced a failed Western-centric foreign policy culminating in excessive dependence on the West. Instead of constructing Gorbachev’s ‘Common European Home’, the ‘leaning-to-one-side’ approach deprived Russia of the market value and leverage needed to negotiate a more favourable and inclusive Europe. Eurasian integration offers Russia the opportunity to address this ‘overreliance’ on the West by using the Russia’s position as a Eurasian state to advance its influence in Europe. Offering an account steeped in Russian economic statecraft and power politics, this book offers a rare glimpse into the dominant narratives of Russian strategic culture. It explains how the country’s outlook adjusts to the ongoing realignment towards Asia while engaging in a parallel assessment of Russia’s interactions with other significant actors. The author offers discussion both on Russian responses and adaptations to the current power transition and the ways in which the economic initiatives promoted by Moscow in its project for a ‘Greater Eurasia’ reflect the entrepreneurial foreign policy strategy of the country.

Rethinking Europe's Future

Rethinking Europe's Future
Author: David P. Calleo
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 411
Release: 2003-03-02
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 069111367X

Rethinking Europe's Future is a major reevaluation of Europe's prospects as it enters the twenty-first century. David Calleo has written a book worthy of the complexity and grandeur of the challenges Europe now faces. Summoning the insights of history, political economy, and philosophy, he explains why Europe was for a long time the world's greatest problem and how the Cold War's bipolar partition brought stability of a sort. Without the Cold War, Europe risks revisiting its more traditional history. With so many contingent factors--in particular Russia and Europe's Muslim neighbors--no one, Calleo believes, can pretend to predict the future with assurance. Calleo's book ponders how to think about this future. The book begins by considering the rival ''lessons'' and trends that emerge from Europe's deeper past. It goes on to discuss the theories for managing the traditional state system, the transition from autocratic states to communitarian nation states, the enduring strength of nation states, and their uneasy relationship with capitalism. Calleo next focuses on the Cold War's dynamic legacies for Europe--an Atlantic Alliance, a European Union, and a global economy. These three systems now compete to define the future. The book's third and major section examines how Europe has tried to meet the present challenges of Russian weakness and German reunification. Succeeding chapters focus on Maastricht and the Euro, on the impact of globalization on Europeanization, and on the EU's unfinished business--expanding into ''Pan Europe,'' adapting a hybrid constitution, and creating a new security system. Calleo presents three models of a new Europe--each proposing a different relationship with the U.S. and Russia. A final chapter probes how a strong European Union might affect the world and the prospects for American hegemony. This is a beautifully written book that offers rich insight into a critical moment in our history, whose outcome will shape the world long after our time.

Russian Energy Chains

Russian Energy Chains
Author: Margarita M. Balmaceda
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 421
Release: 2021-05-11
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 023155219X

Russia’s use of its vast energy resources for leverage against post-Soviet states such as Ukraine is widely recognized as a threat. Yet we cannot understand this danger without also understanding the opportunity that Russian energy represents. From corruption-related profits to transportation-fee income to subsidized prices, many within these states have benefited by participating in Russian energy exports. To understand Russian energy power in the region, it is necessary to look at the entire value chain—including production, processing, transportation, and marketing—and at the full spectrum of domestic and external actors involved, from Gazprom to regional oligarchs to European Union regulators. This book follows Russia’s three largest fossil-fuel exports—natural gas, oil, and coal—from production in Siberia through transportation via Ukraine to final use in Germany in order to understand the tension between energy as threat and as opportunity. Margarita M. Balmaceda reveals how this dynamic has been a key driver of political development in post-Soviet states in the period between independence in 1991 and Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. She analyzes how the physical characteristics of different types of energy, by shaping how they can be transported, distributed, and even stolen, affect how each is used—not only technically but also politically. Both a geopolitical travelogue of the journey of three fossil fuels across continents and an incisive analysis of technology’s role in fossil-fuel politics and economics, this book offers new ways of thinking about energy in Eurasia and beyond.

The Routledge Handbook of EU-Russia Relations

The Routledge Handbook of EU-Russia Relations
Author: Tatiana Romanova
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 558
Release: 2021-07-25
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 135100624X

The Routledge Handbook of EU-Russia Relations offers a comprehensive overview of the changing dynamics in relations between the EU and Russia provided by leading experts in the field. Coherently organised into seven parts, the book provides a structure through which EU-Russia relations can be studied in a comprehensive yet manageable fashion. It provides readers with the tools to deliver critical analysis of this sometimes volatile and polarising relationship, so new events and facts can be conceptualised in an objective and critical manner. Informed by high-quality academic research and key bilateral data/statistics, it further brings scope, balance and depth, with chapters contributed by a range of experts from the EU, Russia and beyond. Chapters deal with a wide range of policy areas and issues that are highly topical and fundamental to understanding the continuing development of EU-Russia relations, such as political and security relations, economic relations, social relations and regional and global governance. The Routledge Handbook of EU-Russia Relations aims to promote dialogue between the different research agendas in EU-Russia relations, as well as between Russian and Western scholars and, hopefully, also between civil societies. As such, it will be an essential reference for scholars, students, researchers, policymakers and journalists interested and working in the fields of Russian politics/studies, EU studies/politics, European politics/studies, post-Communist/post-Soviet politics and international relations. The Routledge Handbook of EU-Russia Relations is part of a mini-series Europe in the World Handbooks examining EU-regional relations established by Professor Wei Shen.

The Decay of Western Civilisation and Resurgence of Russia

The Decay of Western Civilisation and Resurgence of Russia
Author: Glenn Diesen
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 363
Release: 2018-09-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1351012614

What explains the rise of populist movements across the West and their affinity towards Russia? UKIP’s Brexit victory, Trump’s triumph, and the successive elections and referendums in Europe were united by a repudiation of the liberal international order. These new political forces envision the struggle to reproduce and advance Western civilisation to be fought along a patriotism–cosmopolitanism or nationalism–globalism battlefield, in which Russia becomes a partner rather than an adversary. Armed with neomodernism and geoeconomics, Russia has inadvertently taken on a central role in the decay of Western civilisation. This book explores the cooperation and competition between Western and Russian civilisation and the rise of anti-establishment political forces both contesting the international liberal order and expressing the desire for closer relations with Russia. Diesen proposes that Western civilisation has reached a critical juncture as modern society (gesellschaft) has overwhelmed and exhausted the traditional community (gemeinschaft) and shows the causes for the decay of Western civilisation and the subsequent impact on cooperation and conflict with Russia. The author also considers whether Russia’s international conservativism is authentic and can negate the West’s decadence, or if it is merely a shrewd strategy by a rival civilisation also in decay. This volume will be of interest to scholars of international relations, political science, security studies, international political economy, and Russian studies.

Reviewing European Union Accession

Reviewing European Union Accession
Author: Tom Hashimoto
Publisher: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers
Total Pages: 348
Release: 2017-09-25
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9004352074

The year 2017 has been an uneasy one for the EU, with so-called Brexit on the horizon and the rise of populist euroskepticism in a number of Member States. This year, with the tenth anniversary of the Romanian and Bulgarian accession to the Union, is a good year to pause and reflect over the life and future of the Union. In this work, we envision the next decade with Europe 2020 strategy and review the fruits of the 2004 accession in Central and Eastern Europe. What has the Union achieved? Which policy areas are likely to change and how? How successful, and by what measure, has the accession of the 10 Member States in 2004 been? Reviewing European Union Accession addresses a wide range of issues, deliberately without any thematic constraints, in order to explore EU enlargement from a variety of perspectives, both scientific and geographical, internal and external. In contrast to the major works in this field, we highlight the interrelated, and often unexpected, nature of the integration process – hence the subtitle, unexpected results, spillover effects and externalities.

Delivering Energy Law and Policy in the EU and the US

Delivering Energy Law and Policy in the EU and the US
Author: Raphael J. Heffron
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2016
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780748696789

From evaluating policy delivery on wind farms in Texas in the US, to developing nuclear power in the Middle East, this book presents fresh thinking on key concepts and ideas on energy law and policy delivery. The contributors write from a range of perspectives, including the sciences, law, politics, economics and engineering.

The European Gas Markets

The European Gas Markets
Author: Manfred Hafner
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 437
Release: 2017-08-16
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3319558013

This book explores in detail the challenges which the European gas markets currently face, and the opportunities they present. Bringing together some of the most prominent gas experts on Europe from both academia and industry, this edited volume provides a comprehensive analysis of the various economic, political and technological factors that interact in this sector. Featuring a Foreword by Maroš Šefčovič, Vice-President of the European Commission in charge of the Energy Union, contributions explore a wide range of issues, such as the role of gas in decarbonizing Europe, the outlook of Europe’s gas demand, supply and pricing, and global LNG dynamics. Country specific studies include Russia, Norway, the Netherlands, and Germany, with regional studies including North Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean. Alongside detailed analysis of this complex sector it also puts forward a set of policy recommendations for the sector’s key stakeholders. This volume will be of interest to researchers and academics, as well as practitioners and professionals within European gas markets.

Politics of Energy Dependency

Politics of Energy Dependency
Author: Margarita M. Balmaceda
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 465
Release: 2014-01-31
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1442667141

Energy has been an important element in Moscow’s quest to exert power and influence in its surrounding areas both before and after the collapse of the USSR. With their political independence in 1991, Ukraine, Belarus, and Lithuania also became, virtually overnight, separate energy-poor entities heavily dependent on Russia. This increasingly costly dependency – and elites’ scrambling over associated profits – came to crucially affect not only relations with Russia, but the very nature of post-independence state building. The Politics of Energy Dependency explores why these states were unable to move towards energy diversification. Through extensive field research using previously untapped local-language sources, Margarita M. Balmaceda reveals a complex picture of local elites dealing with the complications of energy dependency and, in the process, affecting the energy security of Europe as a whole. A must-read for anyone interested in Eastern Europe, Russia, and the politics of natural resources, this book reveals the insights gained by looking at post-Soviet development and international relations issues not only from a Moscow-centered perspective, but from that of individual actors in other states.

EU-Russia Energy Relations

EU-Russia Energy Relations
Author: Lukáš Tichý
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 227
Release: 2018-12-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3030041077

This book explores the timely topic of energy security and international relations between the European Union and the Russian Federation. Pursuing a constructivist-discursive approach, it empirically analyses a corpus of energy discourses involving policymakers and representatives of the EU and the Russian Federation. Exploring various discursive meanings assigned to the material and technical character of EU-Russian energy relations, the monograph underscores how the identities and interests of both parties are strongly affected by the norms and values which frame the individual energy discourses.