№ 2 April/June 2010
Global Security
"Resetting": Interim Results
  • "Hard Power" Imperative

    After the New START Treaty is ratified, it would be highly desirable to invite the U.S. leadership to enter into a broader politico-strategic dialogue than reductions of tactical nuclear weapons. To this end, Moscow could propose a joint search for ways to minimize risks stemming from the objectively existing situation of mutual nuclear deterrence.

  • Resetting and Disjunction

    A peacetime alliance is not contra-indicated either for the U.S. or Russia. In principle, they are capable of finding solutions to the existing and even future problems (such as the development of resources in the Arctic region) and creating an effective mechanism of interaction. These solutions would help strengthen the rationality of world politics and the world order.

  • CFE: Overcoming the Impasse

    Russia and the West have lost a great deal of trust in each other, and trust is proving hard to restore, the maintenance of existing arms control regimes such as CFE remains an important political objective, even if the military rationale behind their establishment at the end of the Cold War has largely vanished.

Uneasy Neighborhood
  • The Dilapidation of Authoritarianism

    (1)

    The recent revolution in Kyrgyzstan – the second in five years – and the bloodshed in the south of the country that followed it have cast doubts over the country’s viability as an independent state. There is yet another important factor: an outwardly solid authoritarian regime, one among many in the territory of the former Soviet Union, collapsed within a few days. This raises a more general question: Is this an exceptional case or does it open a new chapter in post-Soviet history?

  • How to Make Peace with Neighbors

    The normalization of Russian relations with neighbors is rather a steady trend, than a string of casual diplomatic successes. The question is what this normalization is all about “technologically,” so to say, and not from the standpoint of content. Is there a reason to say that this successful experience may furnish a solid basis for an overall strategy of building relations with neighbors west of the Russian border?

  • Avenue of Independence

    For all the complexity and diversity of Russian interests in the neighboring country, an adequate model of relations between them requires that Moscow view Belarus as an independent state and an ally whose interests are not necessarily identical with Russia’s.

Shadows of the Past
  • Russia: Politics and History

    (1)

    The ruinous consequences of history politics in Russia may be much tougher than in other countries: the weaker pluralism and democracy, the fewer opportunities society and the guild of historians have to resist history politics. If interference of politics in history continues to develop at such a fast rate and in the same vein as in the past two or three years, Russia will suffer a major setback.

  • Should We Fear the Past?

    A meaningful conversation about Joseph Stalin makes sense only in the context of Russian history. However dramatic and intricate the latter might be in the 20th century, there is no way to cross out the industrial and cultural breakthroughs of the 1930s, the victory in World War II and the country’s reconstruction from postwar ruins between 1945 and 1953 amid conditions of a new threat. Whether anyone likes it or not, Stalin cannot be torn away from these obvious achievements.

Facets of Modernization
  • Innovations and Investment:Two Sides of the Same Coin

    (2)

    The obsession with grand scale projects is as damaging to the idea of innovative economic zones as the trend towards small-budget minimalism. For example, the projects to set up Science Towns provide for all kinds of measures – from improving the public transport infrastructure to developing pedestrian walkways in neighborhoods. Just one thing is missing: a program to build effective cooperation between research centers and private business companies.

  • Climate Change and Economy

    In spite of the highly controversial picture of climate change, it is fairly clear that already in the near future all world countries will increasingly employ climate change as a pretext for shackling their counterparties and stimulating their own producers in the competition for a speedy transition to new technological systems in the economy.

  • Energy Security Without Panic

    (1)

    Re-economization of the EU’s energy security benefits both Russia and the EU, as politicization of the sphere leads but to an impasse. Still, we must be prepared for an activation of somewhat forgotten or yet incompletely shaped contradictions – the problems of legal approximation and liberalization, differing perceptions of reciprocity, and the dissimilarities in building dialogue between the private and public sectors.

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Publisher's column

A revolutionary chaos of the new world

The world is getting more troublesome and increasingly challenging right before our eyes.

Editor's column

Will Russia Lose Georgia for Good?

Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili finally got what he couldn’t get for several years: an official visit to the White House.

Reviews and essays

Russia Is Not Prepared to Restore the Empire

When the Baltic countries entered NATO and the European Union a couple of years ago, many thought it was the end of the centuries-old "red line." Euro-Atlantic organizations had crossed into the former Russian and Soviet empires.

Russia at the Turn of the Century: Hopes and Reality

In September 2004, the Russian city of Novgorod hosted an international conference entitled Russia at the Turn of the Century: Hopes and Reality. Its organizers were the RIA Novosti news agency, the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, Russia in Global Affairs, and The Moscow Times.