The European Union, Russia and the Post-Soviet Space PDF Download

Author: Viktoria Akchurina
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000630234
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 148

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Book Description
This book is an exploration of how the European Union (EU) and other regional actors construct, understand and use different forms of power in a political space that is increasingly referred to as "Greater Eurasia". The contributors examine the extent that the understanding of power shapes how states and the EU act on a range of questions from energy to the balance of power in Eurasia. They explore how the EU’s and other regional actors’, primarily Russia’s, understanding of power determines whether the post-Soviet space is a neighbourhood, a battleground or an arena for geopolitical and geostrategic confrontation. The chapters deal with a range of issues from negotiations between the EU and Azerbaijan, to how the EU and Russia are trying to shape relations in Central Asia. The volume represents an innovative way of understanding the changing dynamics of the relationship between Russia and the EU, with some original empirical data, and presents these dynamics within a broader conceptual and geographic framework. It also contributes to emerging debates about how the ideational construction of political space may provide insight into how actors behave. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the journal Europe-Asia Studies.

Author: Laure Delcour
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
ISBN: 1409489302
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
While the European Union (EU) is widely perceived as a model for regional integration, the encouragement of regional co-operation also ranks high among its foreign policy priorities. Drawing on a wealth of sources and extensive fieldwork conducted in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Laure Delcour questions the pursuit of this external objective in EU policies implemented in the CIS and the existence of an EU regional vision in the post-Soviet area. She asks does the recent compartmentalization of EU policies correspond to a growing fragmentation of the former Soviet Union that cannot be considered as a region anymore? Does it rather reflect the EU's own interests in the area? Interested in exposing why the EU has not pursued a strategy of 'region-building' in the post-Soviet area, Delcour examines the disintegration dynamics affecting the area following the collapse of the USSR, the interplay between different actors and levels of action in EU foreign policy-making and the role of other region-builders. She takes a closer look at the strategic partnership with Russia, European Neighbourhood Policy, Eastern Partnership and Black Sea Synergy as a capability test for the European foreign policy to promote its foreign policy priorities and to raise a distinctive profile in the international arena.

Author: Laure Delcour
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317055810
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Book Description
While the European Union (EU) is widely perceived as a model for regional integration, the encouragement of regional co-operation also ranks high among its foreign policy priorities. Drawing on a wealth of sources and extensive fieldwork conducted in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Laure Delcour questions the pursuit of this external objective in EU policies implemented in the CIS and the existence of an EU regional vision in the post-Soviet area. She asks does the recent compartmentalization of EU policies correspond to a growing fragmentation of the former Soviet Union that cannot be considered as a region anymore? Does it rather reflect the EU's own interests in the area? Interested in exposing why the EU has not pursued a strategy of 'region-building' in the post-Soviet area, Delcour examines the disintegration dynamics affecting the area following the collapse of the USSR, the interplay between different actors and levels of action in EU foreign policy-making and the role of other region-builders. She takes a closer look at the strategic partnership with Russia, European Neighbourhood Policy, Eastern Partnership and Black Sea Synergy as a capability test for the European foreign policy to promote its foreign policy priorities and to raise a distinctive profile in the international arena.

Author: Esther Ademmer
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317371852
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 313

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Book Description
Russia's impact on EU policy transfer to the post-Soviet space has not been as negative as often perceived. EU policies have traveled to countries and issue areas, in which the dependence on Russia is high and Russian foreign policy is increasingly assertive. This book explores Russia's impact on the transfer of EU policies in the area of Justice, Liberty, and Security and energy policy - two policy areas in which countries in the EU's Eastern neighborhood are traditionally strongly bound to Russia. Focusing especially on Armenia and Georgia, it examines whether it is the structural condition of interdependence, the various institutional ties and similarities of neighboring countries with the EU and Russia, or their concrete foreign policy actions that have the greatest impact on domestic policy change in the region. The book also investigates how important these factors are in relation to domestic ones. It identifies conditions under which different degrees of EU policy transfer occur and the circumstances under which Russia exerts either supportive or constraining effects on this process. This book will be of key interest to students and scholars of EU and European politics, international relations and comparative politics.

Author: Ryhor Nizhnikau
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351337173
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
This book analyses the role of the European Union in the process of institutional change in its Eastern neighbourhood and explains why EU policies arrive at contradictory outcomes at the sectoral level. Combining EU studies approaches with insights from the fields of new institutionalism, international development studies and transnationalisation, it explains how the EU policies contribute to rule persistence or lead to institutional change. Highlighting the importance of investigating how the policies of external intervention interact with domestic institutions, the book also provides a coherent presentation of the political and economic problems of Ukraine and Moldova and a comparative analysis in key areas at critical junctures of their development. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of European Union politics and more broadly to International Relations, post-Soviet and Russian studies.

Author: K. Malfliet
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230210996
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 263

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Book Description
This book focuses on the difficulties facing Russia, Ukraine and Belarus with regard to their integration into both the CIS and the encroaching EU. It analyzes the links between the integration mechanisms of the CIS and EU and the various state policies towards, and the elite interests in, the territory of the former Soviet Union.

Author: Bidzina Lebanidze
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3658264462
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
By studying the influence of the two main external actors in post-Soviet space, the EU and Russia, this study contributes to the increasing body of literature that studies the causes of democratic recession and authoritarian backlash in post-Soviet states and the role of regional actors in these processes. Empirically, the study finds the EU to be both a democracy-promoting and democracy-hindering actor in post-Soviet states. Russia’s impact, on the other hand, is far more negative than the literature on democratization and autocracy promotion typically suggests. It negatively affects both the quality of democracy of post-Soviet states and limits the EU's options for promoting democracy in its neighborhood.

Author: Mikhail Molchanov
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 13

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Book Description
Russia's attempts to create a single economic space with other post-Soviet states proceed against the background of these states' engagement with other regional entities, European Union in particular. Liberal scholars argue for mutual complementarity of diverse regional integration arrangements. Other disagree, seeing the world as divided in various civilization "camps" defined by their pro-western or non-western orientations. Using a formal gravity model, the article evaluates comparative attractiveness of the European Union versus Russia as potential centers and gravity poles for regional cooperation and integration of the post-Soviet states. It concludes that for the next five to ten years, Russia will remain an absolute attractor for most members of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Ukraine, in spite of its high level of attraction to the EU, is better off as a member of the Single Economic Space (SES) with Russia. In the longer run, the prospects of integration with the EU depend on the success of the SES, since none of its members stand better chances of integrating with Europe than the SES as a whole.

Author: Servaas Taghon
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
EU-Russia relations within the context of the post-Soviet space have been one of the most investigated research topics in the field of international relations. With the return of great power politics, this region has been one of the centres of attention for researchers of geopolitics. However, while geography and borders have played prominent roles in this debate, the aspect of spatiality has barely been researched. This paper seeks to explore these concepts in the post-soviet space. Rather than viewing this region as a static and defined space, we look at how it is approached to be integrated within the structures of the European Union (EU) and Russia. Moreover, this paper challenges the fixation on hard power and soft power within the EU-Russia debate. Through the application of spatial concepts and their link with power, we aim at bringing new insights to the debate about the post-soviet space. Specifically, we apply spatial concepts to the EU's European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP). After that, we compare these instruments and their objectives with the Russian approach and look at how they differ or resemble EU-policies and intentions. We find that rather than the product of hard power and soft power, post-soviet countries are actively integrated within the wider spatial strategies of Russia and the EU. Through our analysis we discovered spatial concepts to be more appropriate and comprehensive to understand the conflict between Russia and the EU in the post-soviet space. In fact, instead of clashing perceptions in foreign policy attitudes, the conflict exposes deeper rooted and conflicting notions of space. While Russia views the post-soviet space as an indispensable part of itself, the EU aims at extending the EU community beyond its natural borders to create a common space of values.

Author: Roger E. Kanet
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789089790965
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 276

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Book Description
Central and East European Studies Series, 2 (International Studies Library, 33) Over the past decade the policies of the European Union and the Russian Federation have increasingly come into conflict, as both have attempted to pursue their interests in their respective 'neighbourhoods', neighbourhoods that overlap thoughout post-Soviet territory. Russia views efforts by the EU to establish closer political and economic ties and to support democratic political developments in the region as direct challenges to Russia's 'legitimate' interests. With the reemergence of Russia as an important international actor under Vladimir Putin, Russian policy became increasing assertive in protecting those interests, culminating in the war with Georgia. The book provides a broad examination of various aspects of this competitive relationship. Table of Contents Preface Contributors Introduction - Roger E. Kanet University of Miami, USA and Maria Raquel Freire University of Coimbra, Portugal PART I: RUSSIA, THE EUROPEAN UNION, AND THEIR COMMON NEIGHBOURHOOD Ch. 1. Russian Foreign Policy Toward Its Neighbourhood: A Complex Mosaic of Relations - Maria Raquel Freire, University of Coimbra, Portugal Ch. 2. Are the Policies of Russia and the EU in their Shared Neighbourhood Doomed to Clash? - Tom Casier, Brussels School of International Studies / University of Kent, Belgium Ch. 3. Cross-conditionality in a Common Neighbourhood: Russia and the EU Competing for Influence in Moldova, Ukraine, and Belarus - Jakob Tolstrup, University of Aarhus, Denmark Ch. 4. The Russian Factor in the EU's Ambitions towards the East - Sandra Fernandes, University of Minho, Portugal Ch. 5. The Northern Dimension: A Possible Model for the EU-Russian105 Relationship? - Dina Moulioukova-Fernandez & Roger E. Kanet, University of Miami, USA PART II: RUSSIA, THE EUROPEAN UNION, AND THE GREATER CASPIAN REGION Ch. 6. Security, Sovereignty, and Democracy: The EU, the OSCE, and Central Asia - Charles E. Ziegler, University of Louisville, USA Ch. 7. EU-Russian Security Relations: Lessons from the South Caucasus - Licínia Simão, University of Coimbra, Portugal PART III: RUSSIA AND THE WEST: THE FOUNDATIONS OF RUSSIAN FOREIGN POLICY Ch. 8. The 2012 Presidential Problem: Reset once again in Russian-US Relations? - Bertil Nygren, National Defence College and Stockholm University, Sweden Ch. 9. Reflections on Russia-EU Relations after the Arab Spring - Graeme Herd, Geneva Centre for Security Policy, Switzerland Ch. 10. North Stream-South Stream - Nabucco: How Gas Supplies Redefine the Balance of Power in East and South Europe - Remi Piet, University of Miami, USA Conclusion - Roger E. Kanet, University of Miami, USA & Maria Raquel Freire, University of Coimbra, Portugal About the Editors Roger E. Kanet, Ph.D. (1966) in Politics, Princeton University, is Professor of International Studies at the University of Miami. He has published extensively on international politics and Russian foreign policy, including The United States and Europe in a Changing World (RoL, 2009) and A Resurgent Russia and the West: The European Union, NATO and Beyond (RoL, 2009). Maria Raquel Freire, Ph.D., University of Kent at Canterbury, is assistant professor in the Department of International Relations at the University of Coimbra and researcher at the Centre for Social Studies (CES) of the University of Coimbra. Her research focuses on foreign policy, Russia and the post-Soviet space and peace studies. She has published widely, including Key Players and Regional Dynamics in Eurasia (Palgrave, 2010)