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Russia's policy in Central Asia has arrived at a new stage in its development. This is confirmed both by the transformation of the situation in the region and by the changes in Russia's international position. At the previous stage in its Central Asian policy, Moscow was busy trying to implement the so-called Putin Doctrine. This basically consisted of attempts to integrate the post-Soviet expanse (encompassing as much territory as possible) by primarily economic means. However, political means were also implied along with the economic levers. This policy was manifested in the various integration formations that sprang up in the CIS, such as the EurAsEC-Customs Union, the SES, the CSTO, and the Belarus-Russia Union State, as well as the multitude of bilateral and multilateral agreements with Russia's participation in economic trade cooperation, the energy industry, and transportation and communications. This approach was most intensively implemented between 2003 and 2006, when Moscow was able to greatly fortify its position in Central Asia, enter long-term contracts in the production and transportation of energy resources, take partial or complete control over the strategic branches of several regional countries, and achieve advantageous conditions for building pipelines. In addition, the economic penetration of Russian companies into the region was accompanied by intensification of military-technical and military-strategic cooperation between the Russian Federation and the regional states, the setting up of Russian military bases, and the ousting of rivals (with the exception of China). However, after 2006 Russia's international position began to change, which could not help but have an effect on its Central Asian policy. Another spiral of the confrontation with the West began, pulling Moscow along with it and turning the region into an area where their interests clash. There can be no doubt that the Color Revolutions in the post-Soviet expanse were one of the main reasons for the crisis in Russian-Western relations. And Central Asia was no exception-Russia (along with Kazakhstan) did not permit escalation of this kind of revolution in Kyrgyzstan and also supported Uzbekistan in its determination not to allow a full-fledged civil war in the country as a result of the rebellion in Andijan, which was inspired from the outside.

The author presents his conception of the evolution of Russia's geopolitical interests in Transcaucasia (the Central and part of the Southern Caucasus) caused by a gradual transformation of the military-strategic, political, ideological (including religious) ideas of the Russian elites at different periods. The author relies on a wide range of recent historical and political scientific studies, as well as historiographic surveys and scholarly works of the imperial and Soviet periods, to clarify his conclusions. The very fact of the changes that took place in the past and are still going on today and their vector confirms that Russia's top political leaders have been acting and are acting consistently and logically when dealing with the sovereign countries and other Transcaucasian territories. The well-substantiated and conceptually novel conclusions can be described as extremely relevant: they are based on an analysis of the processes of the last two centuries (rather than the last two decades). This means that the author has successfully avoided the political biases suggested by the current situation. Many of his colleagues fell into this trap: they naively believed that state independence of the Central Caucasian countries robbed Russia of its traditional geopolitical presence in the region. The present author is out to demonstrate beyond any doubt that revision by Russia of its geopolitical priorities in Transcaucasia will strengthen the position it lost in the 1990s. In the near future, the regional elites and other power centers will prove unable to stem Russia's mounting influence. In fact, Russia's geopolitical domination in Transcaucasia will merely shift from the military-state to the economic sphere, while Russia's real clout among the local elites and its influence on the electoral preferences of the local population and local economies will remain as prominent as ever.

The EU-Russia relations have never been neither smooth nor too predictable; however, Georgian war was a shock for the West. The August 2008 events made European diplomats question the reliability of the Kremlin in the international arena, while the scholars brought again into discussion the Brezhnev Doctrine. How did the EU and Russia overpass the deadlock and how have their relationship evolved? Using qualitative research methods: elite semi-structured interviews with the EU officials and Russian scholars, document analysis, discourse analysis and press coverage, the present article tries to answer to the above questions, presenting the main challenges of the EU-Russia relations and explaining the difficulties of negotiations between the two actors.

9783940924735; 9783940924735; Half Title; Title; Copyright; Contents; Acknowledgements; Introduction; 1 Russian Presence in the Middle East after the Fall of the Soviet Union; 2 The Disaster Called the Arab Spring; 3 Putinâ#x80;#x99;s Turn to the Middle East after 2012; 4 Why is Syria so Important? Moscowâ#x80;#x99;s Vision of its Tasks in Syria Prior to the Beginning of Russian Military Deployment; 5 Russian Military Involvement in the Syrian Conflict: What Happens Next?; 6 The Marriage of Convenience: Russian-Iranian Cooperation in Syria; 7 Syria, the Middle East and Russian Propaganda; Conclusion; Notes

THIS ARTICLE EXAMINES BUSINESS LOBBYING AN CONTEMPORARY RUSSIA WITHIN THE WIDER CONTEXT OF LOBBYING IN THE DECISION-MAKING SYSTEM OVERALL. IT IS ARGUED THAT, ALTHOUGH LOBBIES WERE AN IMPORTANT PART OF THE OLD SOVIET SYSTEM, THE DEFENCE OF CORPORATE INTERESTS WAS HELD WITHIN "NATURAL" LIMITS B AN OVERRIDING CONCERN TO MAINTAIN THE ESTABLISHED CONSENSUS - IN THE FORM OF A BUREAUCRATIC CORPORATIST ECONOMY. IN THE "PERESTROIKA" AND "POST-PERESTROIKA" YEARS, HOWEVER, LOBBIES THEMSELVES TOOK FRONT STATE BECOMING THE DECISIVE ELEMENT IN THE ECONOMY. EASILY THE MOST IMPORTANT, IN TERMS OF ECONOMIC STRENGTH AND POLITICAL INFLUENCE, WERE THE VARIOUS BUSINESS INTERESTS GROUPS, WHICH THE AUTHORS HAVE ATTEMPTED TO CLASSIFY ACCORDING TO THEIR LOBBYING POTENTIAL AND THE CHANNELS OF INFLUENCE AVAILABLE TO THEM. THE PECULIARITIES OF BUSINESS INTEREST LOBBYING ARE ALSO CONSIDERED, INCLUDING THE AS YET UNSATISFIED QUEST FOR POLITICAL REPRESENTATION, THE TENDENCY FOR MANAGEMENT AND EMPLOYEES TO "ROW TOGETHER", THE HUGH POTENTIAL OF UNCONTROLLABLE LOBBYING "ROM BELOW" IN THE FACE OF GROWING SOCIAL TENSION AND, FINALLY, THE DISPARITY BETWEEN LOBBYING AND OTHER FORMS OF STATE-SOCIETY RELATIONS.

Reviews Andrey Kokoshin's O strategicheskom planirovanii v politike (2007), which details how to construct a badly needed strategic planning system in Russia.

"Since its inception, The National Interest, the leading realist journal of international affairs, has devoted a good deal of attention to the relationship between Moscow and Washington, from the dying days of the Cold War to the prospect of true Russian-American partnership following 9/11. This work brings together the reflections and ruminations of statesmen, policymakers, and academics on developments and forecasts about one of the world's leading geo political actors. This edited volume is the third in a series of readers co-produced by The National Interest and Transaction Publishers. Each brings together in one place prescient analysis and provocative assessments, this case, about Russia, published in the last decade. For some of the contributors, Russia is to be viewed with suspicion, a state whose current weakness has only retarded, not extinguished, its hegemonic ambitions to dominate Eurasia. For others, Russia is a strategic partner and prospective ally. This volume tackles the hard questions. Readers have the opportunity to listen in on a number of the great debates surrounding Russia policy. Is Russia finished as a great power, or will its influence grow in the coming years? Can a true partnership be forged between Washington and Moscow based on common interests and values? To what extent can Russia be integrated into the institutions of the Euro-Atlantic community? Has American policy aided or harmed the course of market reforms and democratization over the past decade? Is the -war on terrorism- a sufficient foundation for a new U.S.-Russia relationship? How can conflicting interests, whether in Iran, Iraq, or North Korea, be dealt with? This book presents a fascinating and multifaceted look at a country that is likely to remain a major factor in U.S. foreign policy in the twenty-first century. The list of distinguished contributors to this volume includes Zbigniew Brzezinski, William Odom, Stephen Sestanovich, Robert Legvold, Martin Malia, Alexey Pushkov, and Dimitri K. Simes."--Provided by publisher.

Status of Africa in Russian foreign policy is characterized by combination of high interests in multidirectional development of cooperation with some restrictions defined by geodistance, political instability, economic specifications of potential partners as well as unpreparedness of Russian business to manage projects within African realities. However development of cooperation between Russia and African states is in trend of Russian international strategy and shall be supported not only by practice of international relations but also by business and humanitarian cooperation and expansion of objective knowledge about African realities. After the period of reduction of Russian presence in Africa in the early 90-th, in recent 10-15 years we witness the inverse trend, that is controversially assessed by Russian and foreign experts. However the author of the article believes that the situation in 2018-2020 is positive, stable and predictable in general. That may be proved by system analysis of the system moments: role of Africa in current world order, cooperation of Russia with African states, promotion of Russian interests in the African region. That is worth mentioning that Russian policy at African direction increases its economic efficiency and material data of Russian-African economic cooperation is gradually growing.