Russia in Global Affairs

In 100 years since the Revolution of 1917, it continues to have impact on the Russian society. Divergent assessments of the Revolution and different approaches to its commemoration have been sparking off heated debates on Russia’s past and future that emphasize the need to reconcile different narratives.

Putin has embraced patriotism and Eurasianism, but Russia must soon confront economic, security, and demographic headwinds, as well as the imperative of reform.

The uniqueness of the Far Eastern mobilization breakthrough is largely based on the traditional Confucian legacy, which, effectively applied, have helped Asian countries boost their status in the changing world order.

In the old days coal miners took a caged canary down into mines. If the canary suddenly dropped dead, that meant that the deadly gas, carbon monoxide, was slowly seeping into the shaft... An order of magnitude increase in killing rampages in America over the last several decades is like canaries suddenly starting to drop dead all around us. It is an early indicator of much worse troubles to come.

Despite its geographical remoteness from conflicts involving radical Islamists, the Russian Far East is not completely isolated from them. Preventing the growth of extremist threats in the Russian Far East and the Asia-Pacific region as a whole requires joint efforts of all states concerned.

The migration corridor that has formed between the countries of Central Asia and Russia is one of the largest and most stable in Eurasia and the world.

The hackneyed saying “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future” is as relevant today as never before, but there is no stopping to the audacious flight of imagination. Popular as it is, extrapolation of current trends to future periods does not work as something always gets in the way, while attempts to draw a completely different picture look like imaginative writing. And still we have taken the risk.

The problem is not rooted in Islam, it is rooted in the intractable economic and social problems faced by the majority of Third World countries. Moreover, the problem is multiplied by unprecedented population growth and an inevitable transformation of demographic processes.

How long can the degradation of the Soviet empire, which started in 1962, continue? Pulling through hardships with minimal losses while avoiding making the same mistakes, is the immediate task that Russia is facing and with which it is able to cope.