Russian National Interests Formation: Discourse analysis of conceptual evolution

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Russian National Interests Formation:

Discourse analysis of conceptual evolution

Sofya Kudlaeva

Department of Political Science Faculty of Social Sciences

University of Oslo June 2019

Number of words: 36508

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Russia’s national interest formation:

Discourse Analysis of Conceptual Evolution

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Russia’s national interest formation:

Discourse Analysis of Conceptual Evolution

Sofya Kudlaeva http://www.duo.uio.no/

Trykk: Reprosentralen, Universitetet i Oslo

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Abstract

This thesis aims to contribute to a better understanding of the national interest formation in Russia’s foreign policy in the timeframe 2008-2017. It puts greater emphasis on the integrational processes in the post-Soviet region as one of the key national interests. It seeks to offer a

comprehensive understanding of how the Russian elites portrayed the country’s national interests, especially in the post-Soviet space, and how their national interests’ construction corresponds with the three main paradigms in the theory of international relations: realism, liberalism and constructivism. It provides the theoretical framework by summarizing key characteristics of each paradigm and describing how the national interest concept is framed within them. I argue that the national interest concept, understood as a social construction, can be applied to analyse how the political elites construct, and therefore understand, political

objectives. Using critical discourse analysis, it analyses the major strategic foreign policy documents along with the supplementary speeches and statements of the Russian President, Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs. The research design takes the form of an

interpretative single case study. The discourse analysis concludes that The Kremlin has redefined the country’s national interests after the Ukrainian crisis, which indicated an imperative change in Russian foreign policy. Official Russian foreign policy discourse is not solely based on the realist premises. It represents an interdiscursive mix, where the neorealist understanding of the competing nature of IR dominates. Discourse on regional integration is constructed mostly in the liberal fashion, but incorporates civilizational components and elements of power politics that prescribe the threats to Russia’s national interests as primarily originating in the “West”.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to express my sincere gratitude for the academic guidance I have received from my supervisor Jon Hovi. Jon Hovi guided me through this writing process, carefully checked my texts and provided valuable feedback. I am extremely grateful that he helped me to refine my research design when I was walking in circles and could not find any way to proceed further in the right direction.

I owe the Department of Political Science at the UiO for their understanding and assistance.

Moreover, a special thanks to Kristian Lundby Gjerde at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs who contributed with input and crucial feedback in the process of writing this thesis.

I would like to thank Kristian Martin for patiently reading my texts and correcting them. I am glad that my parents, my grandmother and friends have been there for me. It has been a long and often challenging process. I started with an idea to get a master’s degree in at the University of Oslo back in 2011. Despite taking a few detours, I am glad I have managed to find the way forward.

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List of abbreviations

AA Association Agreement CDA Critical discourse analysis

CIS Commonwealth of Independent States CSTO Common Security Treaty Organisation

DCFTA Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement EurAsEC Eurasian Economic Community

EAEU Eurasian Economic Union EU European Union

EUMM European Union Monitoring Mission IR International Relations

IPE International Political Economy FPC Foreign Policy Concept WTO World Trade Organisation

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Chapter 1. Introduction

1.1 Thesis aim and research questions

On the 21^st November 2013, at the Eastern Partnership summit in Vilnius, Viktor Yanukovych, the Ukrainian president at that moment, turned down the association agreement with the

European Union. The Ukrainian government also announced that it would re-establish an active dialogue with the Russian Federation and other member-states of the Customs Union and the Commonwealth of Independent States to revive trade and economic ties in order to preserve and strengthen the economic potential of the state through joint efforts.

The actions of the Ukrainian government on the 21^st of November 2013 suspended the process of preparation for the conclusion of an association agreement with the European Union. That also marked a turning point, not only in the relationship between Russia and Ukraine or between Ukraine and the EU, but also in global affairs. This led to the escalation of tensions within Ukraine and caused a series of crises. Politicians, scholars and area experts talk about how the unique status of the Ukrainian crisis in the European security order sheds new light on Russian- Western relations. The Ukrainian crisis and the annexation of Crimea became a turning point in Russian foreign policy as well as for Europe’s security architecture. Starting with the renewal of the Military doctrine, all key Russian strategic documents were reissued after 2014, which indicated a conceptual evolution in the construction of Russia’s national interests.

The crisis began with the opposition of European and Eurasian integration projects. The dramatic events that followed after November 2013 have shown that the essence of the matter was not in the "deep comprehensive free trade zone" as such. Rather the technical topic of economic integration suddenly became a point where everything came together (Lukyanov 2018). The three dimensions of international security, economy and identity issues got intertwined in a tangled knot, where it was difficult to separate internal and external

circumstances, geopolitics and discourses, continuity and change, economic rationality and issues of national pride and great power status seeking behaviour.

This thesis aims to contribute to a better understanding of the national interest formation in Russia’s foreign policy. It puts greater emphasis on the post-Soviet region and integrational processes with Ukraine. The Russian foreign policy in the “near abroad” is representative of the bigger picture of Russia’s self-understanding of its role in world politics. The near abroad is

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often understood as the territory around Russia composed of former Soviet republics. This territory is often claimed as a special area of interest by the Kremlin.

This thesis will consider the following main research question: “How did the Russian elites portray the country’s national interests during the period 2008-2017?”

This main research question will be analysed by assessing the two following sub-questions.

Question 1: Was the Russian national interests formation constructed exclusively on realist premises?

Question 2: How have the three main IR approaches – realism, liberalism and constructivism – influenced official Russian foreign policy discourse on regional integration?

My thesis will not offer an analysis of the crisis itself but will rather look at the national interest formation before November 2013 and after. The research’s timeframe will be from 2008 to 2017, which is divided into two periods. The first period is from the aftermath of the conflict in Georgia and the launch of the Eastern Partnership initiative by the European Union to the beginning of the Ukrainian crisis at the end of 2013. The second period is from 2014 up to 2017 when the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the European Union fully entered into force.

The objective of this study is to identify how the Russian elites portrayed the country’s national interests especially in the post-Soviet space and to understand what priorities they had in doing so and how their national interests construction correspond with the three main paradigms in the theory of international relations: realism, liberalism and constructivism.

1. 2 Literature review

Russian national interest formation in a so geopolitically, economically and ideationally important area as regional integration in the post-Soviet space is a question of real-world importance that is consequential for political, social, and economic life, and for an understanding of the Russian foreign policy topic. King, Keohane and Verba (1994, pp.15-17) give the following criteria for successful research: real-world importance of the topic that is studied in a systematic way to contribute to a specific scholarly literature. The choice of Russian national interest formation in the period 2008-2017 as the object of my study is aimed at contributing to an identifiable scholarly

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literature by increasing the collective ability to construct verified scientific interpretations. It means that the research design is located within the framework of the existing social scientific literature. My thesis builds on several clusters of literature.

The theory chapter examines different conceptualisations of the national interest concept. It aims to prepare the theoretical background for the research questions that are intended to fulfil a scientific need to further our theoretical understanding of the phenomenon of how the political elites construct the national interests and in which IR paradigm they frame these national interests. The concept of national interest with its wide range of interpretations remains a quite contested idea for many researchers. According to Nye (1999), national interest is a slippery concept, used to describe as well as prescribe foreign policy.

My thesis seeks to enhance our understanding of the national interest concept as it is systematically presented in realism (Morgenthau 1985 and Waltz 1979), liberalism (Keohane & Nye 1977) and constructivism (Weldes 1996, Hopf 2002, Wendt 1999, Neumann 1999, Campbell 1992). I also use Burchill (2005), Jackson & Sørensen (2013), Guzzini (2000), Adler el.a. (2013), Heikka (1999) and Wieclawski (2011) to compare different conceptualisations of the national interests.

The thesis also provides a theoretical background for regional integration as a national priority within each paradigm (Abdelal 2005, Molchanov 2015).

Within each IR approach, I review literature that reflects how researchers explain Russia’s behaviour on the world arena and in the post-Soviet space in particular. To put it shortly, there are different interpretations, not only across, but also within IR traditions. Scholars such as Mearsheimer (2014), Milne (2014), Walt (2015) and others view the Russian behaviour as rather defensive. Others view Russia as a revisionist state that challenges the post-Cold War order in Europe by its imperial ambitions (Matlary 2016, Skak 2011, Staib 2016, Zysk 2018). Makarychev (2014) and Morozov (2015) share a position that combines various features. Götz (2016) offers such categories as “revisionist Russia” and “victim Russia”. Researchers that share the “victim Russia” point of view argue that Russia is a status-quo power that does not pose a major threat to the West and the post-Soviet republics. Rather assertive Moscow’s posture is based on legitimate politico-strategic and economic concerns over NATO’s eastward expansion (Shleifer and Treisman 2011). Russia’s negative attitude towards the increased EU activism in the post-Soviet space is explained by the negative effect that it has on Moscow’s regional economic interests as well as by its political and social-cultural influence in the region, and again is connected to NATO expansion (Charap and Troitskiy 2013). Others view Russia’s behaviour as a post-imperial syndrome (Skak 2011).

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While realists view Moscow’s behaviour in the post-Soviet region as (neo)imperialism, social constructivists call it “a normal great power behaviour”. Tsygankov (2013), Trenin (2014) and Launen (2012) argue that imperial aspirations are not characteristic of Putin’s administration.

“Great power hegemony” in the region is viewed, first of all, as seeking recognition of its “vital and exclusive” interests in the near abroad rather than challenging the formal sovereignty of the ex-republics. Use of “soft power” is presented as a key component of the Kremlin’s strategy for regional cooperation (Tsygankov 2006, Tsygankov 2013, Feklyunina 2015).

To answer my main research question I combine my discourse analysis of the official documents with references to discursive practice and social practice. Hence, literature on area studies is especially useful. There are clusters within the literature on Russian foreign policy that deal with Russia-Europe relations and the “Common neighbourhood” (Neumann 1998, Haukkala 2015, Forsberg & Haukkala 2016, Haukkala 2015, Casier 2018) and with relations in the Russia- Ukraine-EU triangle (Torbakov 2001, Götz 2016, Dragneva&Wolczuk 2015, Samokhvalov 2017, Kovalchuk 2015). There is a cluster that studies Russia’s foreign policies towards the CIS and the Eurasian integration project (Bespalov 2014, Gretskiy 2014, Launen 2012, Kovalchuk 2015, Molchanov 2015). I selectively refer to all of them but the main focus is on the official discourse.

I use energy politics and discourse on energy security as an example. Literature on energy relations between Russia, the European Union and Ukraine/the CIS constitutes another cluster of literature (Pirani 2009, Rutland 2015, Urnov 2014, Kuzemko, Keating and Goldthau 2015, Bouzarovski & Bassin 2011).

Russian vital national interests are spread over diverse spheres such as providing stability of the current political system, maintaining Russia’s nuclear deterrent capability as a guarantor of Russia’s sovereignty, efficient international energy politics, antiterrorism and a number of other issues (Allison 2011, p.16). My thesis doesn’t only present the main trends in the Russian national interests formation before and after 2014, but also connects them to the three paradigms in international relations. It is heavily theoretical since it able to trace Russia’s national interest discursive construction back to different approaches in IR. Thereby it throws new light on the contested concept of national interest.

The thesis refers to scientific work on the conceptual evolution of Russian foreign policy done by Averre (2009), Coker (2016), Matlary (2016), Tsygankov (2013), Hill and Gaddy (2015), Makarychev (2014), Pynnöniemi (2018), Samokvalov (2017) and others. Frear and Mazepus (2017) offer content analysis of the Foreign Policy Concepts and Annual Addresses to the Federal

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Council. However, I have not come across any previous research that systematically connects three different approaches to the national interest concept with within the official Russian foreign policy discourse. I argue that it is incorrect to assume that the official discourse is framed only as a reflection of Realpolitik, as a projection of Russia’s great power aspirations, or as a liberal discourse on economic prosperity. Rather, I argue, it is a curious interdiscursive mix of different tendencies, a mix that evolves over time.

1. 3 Choice of theory

Social constructivist theory in IR reconceptualises the classical realist concept of national interest (a justification tool) as a social construction and offers us a useful analytical tool to endogenize the formation of interests by connecting them theoretically and empirically to identity (Hopf 2002). The national interest category is also used as an analytical framework providing the roadmap that shapes what are the main priorities for the state in the decision- making process.

The geopolitical significance of the near abroad is not in doubt. However, together with the fact that Russia is usually presented as an example of a state with foreign policy constructed on the classical realistic premises, I argue that Russia’s foreign policy discourse cannot be totally reduced to the Realpolitik understanding. Furthermore, I argue that the liberal paradigm, which is very useful to analyse the interdependence in the context of regional integration, is also not fully covering all of the aspects. Only social constructivism, recognising the importance and partial validity of both paradigms, is able to widen our analytical framework and include identity and culture as significant causal factors that help define the interests and hence states’ behaviour (Katzenstein 1996, p.537).

While social constructivism seems suitable in the analysing process, I expect Russian official foreign policy discourse to be often dominated by the realist paradigm in IR. It is a challenge within my study to apply constructivist theory in an interpretative single case study of Russian national interests’ formation while the empirical data is often dominated by realism in IR. The theoretical framework will also be covered in the second chapter.

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1. 3 Research design

My research design in the form of an interpretative single case study of Russian national interest formation allows me to demonstrate the variation in meanings and representations. Since my research question reflects the “how-possible” framing it seems suitable to use the tools of discourse analysis to examine how meanings are produced and thus “constituting particular interpretive dispositions that create certain possibilities and preclude others” (Doty 1996, p.4).

Discourse analysis is paying extra attention to the construction of meanings together with how they are reflected and maintained in language. Discourses are formed through language and discursive practice. Relations between different parts of a given discourse are not constant and not necessarily internally consistent. Sometimes there can be friction and different perspectives and argumentation within one discourse (Bratberg 2014, p.31). We can also observe gradual drift from one approach to another; for example, from liberal argumentation emphasising

interdependence and economic gains towards a more structural realism like approach focusing on the international system and power games. Hence, the aim is to uncover the cognitive and normative frameworks within the analysed discourses that decide directions in the Russian integration policy and cement themselves in the official documents.

I empirically apply the three-dimensional model of critical discourse analysis (CDA) of Fairclough (Phillips & Jørgensen 2002). This model prescribes a special place to the text (“the communicative event”), the discursive practices that involve the production and consumption of texts (“order of discourse”) and the social practices (the wider social practice to which the communicative event belongs). Text analysis alone is not sufficient for discourse analysis since it does not uncover links between texts and societal and cultural processes and structures. CDA not only allows for change, but also explores the links between language use and social practice, sees how the argumentation of the Russian officials was changing alongside growing tensions in relations between Russia and the West, and connects certain texts with realist, liberal and

constructivist discursive practices in IR.

Politicians, scholars and area experts talk about how the unique status of the Crimea crisis in the European security order sheds light on Russian-Western relations. According to the Carnegie Moscow Center, “the Euro-Atlantic region has entered a different epoch” (Trenin 2014). The same happened with the official Russian foreign policy discourse. The most important official sources of Russian foreign policy include: the Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation, the Military Doctrine and the National Security Strategy. The official speeches and interviews of

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the Russian President, Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs will also be used as my primary data. Even though they do not necessarily correlate with real political actions, they are important as indicators of political fashion and as a rationalisation mechanism (Lo 2002).

1. 4 Thesis outline

This introductory chapter provides a brief introduction to the topic of the thesis and the main research question. It locates the thesis within the framework of the existing social scientific literature, specifies different clusters of literature used in the thesis, and explains how it aims to fill the knowledge gap.

Chapter 2 is dedicated to the theoretical framework of this thesis. The national interest concept along with the literature review on Russian foreign policy are presented for the realist, liberalist and constructivist approaches in IR.

Chapter 3 elaborates on the methodological framework. It explains how the study is conducted and how the data is approached. It also gives a brief description of discourse analysis and provides a set of epistemological and ontological assumptions for critical discourse analysis.

In Chapter 4, the study is contextualized by providing a brief review of some key historical trends after the collapse of the Soviet Union up to 2008. It presents general trends in the national interests formation and puts extra emphasis on the post-Soviet region and Ukraine in particular.

Chapter 5 presents a critical discourse analysis of the official foreign policy discourse. It is based on the assumption that the national interests of economic growth, security and international prestige are mutually reinforcing and closely intertwined. The first part of the analysis answers the first sub-research question and is constructed around the following nodal points:

“greatpowerness”, “energy superpower”, sovereignty, sphere of influence, and threats, which traditionally represent the realist paradigm. The second part of the analysis answers the second sub-question. It interprets how the three IR approaches influenced official Russian foreign policy discourse on regional integration and examines the intersubjective construction of Russia as a potential economic pole of attraction. This part of the discourse analysis of Russian foreign policy has received less attention than the issues of prestige, identity, and geopolitics. However, discourse on economisation is fundamental in the order of discourses on integration in the post- Soviet space.

The final chapter is dedicated to concluding remarks.

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Chapter 2. Theoretical framework for the national interest concept

Comprehensive understanding of the three major paradigms in international relations theory is needed in order to be able to unpack the official Russian foreign policy discourse. The

theoretical framework chapter is structured around realist, liberalist and social constructivist interpretations of the national interest concept. After offering a more general operationalisation of the national interest concept and making references to the broader discursive practice in Russia, I provide useful for my critical discourse analysis insights into the main features of each theoretical tradition and consequently support them with a literature review on Russian foreign policy analysis conducted within each of the paradigms. A short unit on examining regional cooperation in the post-Soviet space will be offered for the three approaches.

2.1 Concept of the national interest

The concept of national interest is one of the key elements in international relations theory that aims to provide an explanation of state action. National interests usually deal with long-term objectives defining a common ground of what is best for the nation. National interest is supposed to prescribe how national capabilities should be used to achieve the best outcome for the nation.

At the same time, it is essential to remember the academic and political fluidity of the concept.

Who is defining what is best for the nation, especially in a situation of poor functioning

democratic institutions or even the illusion of functioning of such institutions? What is best? And not least, what is nation? Which roles do domestic and international dimensions play in defining the national interest and so on? This is just a small list of related questions. In Russian political realities, political elites use this vague concept for different purposes and colour it with quite different sentiments.

For example, Russian President Vladimir Putin always underlines that national interest is what is good for Russians and that countries have to pursue their interests based on the norms of

international law while he steadily emphasises that Russia is more “rigidly defending its national interests ... We want respect for our national interests" (cited in Pavlovskii 2015). If Dmitrii Medvedev feels a need to “excuse ourselves for such a pathos expression [based on our national interests]” in front of international partners, then president’s press-secretary D. Peskov is not

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afraid to spice things up with some grandiloquent national interest polemics. According to D.

Peskov, when Russia’s right on sovereignty and respect to its national interest will be realised there will be a renaissance in international relations (Pavlovskii 2015).

Another important although not so influential figure in Russian politics, oppositionist Mikhail Khodorkovsky, argues that the interests of the inhabitants of Russia and the interests of its leadership are fundamentally divergent. Tension in international relations and creation of the enemy’s image that are often presented as defence of the national interest, serve their purpose to distract the population from the failures in domestic policies and economic stagnation.

(Khodorkovsky 2015)

Political expert Gleb Pavlovskiy (2015), who can probably be generalised as Russian

intelligentsia, sarcastically pointed out an absence of any strategic dialogue on Russia's national interests. There is no correspondence between the expert community and the narrow circle sitting in the Kremlin on that topic. «Today, there are no centres that would work to delineate Russian national interests, nor politically rigorous terminology that could be used for that purpose.

Everything being written on this topic is fiction, often politically irresponsible. We hear

fairytales about supremacy, telling the other countries that they are no more than targets for our Iskander missiles.” – writes Pavlovskiy (translation by V. Morozov, 2016).

We can see that the concept is highly speculative but it does not mean that it is not useful. The concept of national interest has a very important constructive function. It can be carefully applied in order to analyse how political elites construct, and therefore understand, political objectives. It can also be used to place parts of the official Russian discourse on national interests in different international relations theory paradigms.

If we come back to the theory of international relations, we see that national interest in the foreign policy domain plays an important role as a justification tool when it is seen as a rhetorical device through which the legitimacy of and political support for state action is generated. It helps to legitimise the actions taken by states and constitute particular issues as issues of national importance. Rosenau, following classical realist logic, effectively specified this instrumental understanding of the national interest notion by saying: “as an instrument of

political action, it [national interest] serves as a means of justifying, denouncing and proposing policies” (Rosenau 1971, p.239). According to the definition given in the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics and International Relations (2018), the national interest concept is applied as a powerful device for invoking support for a certain course of action, given the well-known attachment to the nation as a social and political organization. On the international arena,

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national interest raises an image of the nation protecting its interests within the anarchic international system.

The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics and International Relations (2018) also proposes the second definition of the interest of a state, usually as defined by its government. The second usage of national interest is usage as an analytical tool for understanding foreign policy,

particularly by political realists, such as Hans Morgenthau. Here, national interest is supposed to indicate what is best for the nation in its relations with other states. However, it will not just put emphasis on the anarchic nature of the international system and the threats it poses, but also draw attention to the external constraints on the freedom of manoeuvre of the state from treaties, the interests and power of other states, and other factors beyond the control of the nation such as geographical location and dependence on foreign trade. The realists’ way of using the term national interest has focused on national security as the core of national interest.

Constructivist Jutta Weldes points out that the national interest concept has another function in IR. It forms the basis for state action on the world arena. Policy-makers understand the foreign policy goals through the concept of national interests (Weldes 1996, p.276). National interests appear as an analytical tool that can help to explain why particular policy choices have been made. This function of national interest was called ‘criterion’ by Alexander George and Robert Keohane (1980). The criterion function of national interests refers to the fact that national interests provide the roadmap that shapes what are the main priorities for the state in the decision-making process. In this sense, national interests come before policy and stipulate general directions for the state’s foreign policy (Laenen 2012, p.22). I will apply this interpretation of the national interest concept in IR in my analysis.

Summarised, the national interest can be understood as a way of thinking about the state’s goals and as a mean of mobilizing support for them. However, there is little that is objective and clear about the national interest notion. The notion of “national interest” remains central to

explanations of the state’s behaviour in international politics although it is frequently criticised for being too speculative. Category of the national interest may be useful as an analytical tool for determining the state’s actions based on elite’s understanding of the purposes of the foreign policy, if we will be able to set harder restrictions on this very elastic in use concept. Diverse studies of Russian foreign policy offer us completely different conceptualizations of Russian national interests and hence different interpretations of the country’s behaviour and possible variations of the future political posture. Thoughtful conceptualisation is crucial in order to avoid comments such as “it can be used to mean whatever the user wishes”. The grand theories in IR

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(realism, liberalism and social constructivism) offer us quite diverse operationalisations of the national interest concept.

2.2 Realist understanding of the national interest concept 2.2.1 Classical realism

The most classical understanding of the national interest is offered by the most pessimistic theoretical tradition, realism, which is usually favoured by international politics experts on Russia. Classical realism assumes that the core concept of interest defined in terms of power is an objective and fixed in time and space category, i.e. national interest is given, unchangeable and represents a driving force of foreign policy. Survival of the state is the main concern. It is all about protection of physical, political and cultural identity against encroachments by other nations. The state’s behaviour is based on egoism and power politics that are inbuilt human nature (Morgenthau 1985, p.10). However, if, for classical realism, it is a moral idea or duty that is supposed to be defended and promoted by state leaders, for neorealism the national interest is more an automatic signal inbuilt in the international system. It is a systemic given (Jackson &

Sørensen 2003, pp.87-88).

Some realists (and some social constructivists) argue that, for a long time, Russia has been an example of a state with foreign policy constructed on the classical realistic theses. The state’s central role in international relations, the primacy of the sovereignty, and the instrumental attitude towards international organizations are often presented as the main features of Russian foreign policy. The priority of the Kremlin’s national interests is absolute in realists’ opinion since it has been clearly reflected by all key official state documents, including the Concept of the state’s foreign policy and the Military doctrine. Instrumental use of national interests in Russia is a sign of realism (Wieclawski, 2011).

Spheres of influence together with great power status seeking behaviour that in turn is dependent on the Russian status in the former Soviet republics are among the most crucial notions in the realist interpretation of foreign policy. As Makarychev states, these are reflected in the Kremlin’s willingness to be recognised in the West as a legitimate hegemon in the region (Makarychev 2014). An important part of the realist approach is an understanding of spheres of influence. The idea of ‘near abroad’ is tightly connected with the idea of spheres of influence or interests.

Realist models of Russian foreign policy underline Russian eagerness to be accepted in the West as a legitimate regional hegemon in the near abroad, the post-Soviet region that nowadays in

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most conceptions excludes the Baltic states. A. Makarychev (2014) states that the realist approach of power balancing between the EU and the Eurasian union is not ideally suited to analyse the competition between the two integration projects due to the fact that Russia and Europe have different types of power that do not balance each other because of the different nature of the powers. Derek Averre, (2009) among other researchers, refers to it as the incompatible logics of EU postmodern or normative power and Russian modern or structural power.

The realist school has often emphasised the role of Russia’s national interest as the driving force behind its international behaviour. The national interest usually understood as a geopolitically enduring reality with Russia’s commitment to the status quo and at the same time expansionism, rather than something open to interpretations (Tsygankov 2013, p.10).

2.2.2 Neorealism

Kenneth Waltz’s neorealism is constructed on the statement of the anarchic nature of the international system in the sense that it lacks a central authority. Neorealism is also called structural realism due to an understanding of international politics as a system with a precisely defined structure. The logic of anarchy by itself constitutes “self-help” systems and power politics as necessary features of world politics. The imperative of survival in this self-help environment ensures that states behave in accordance with the anarchic nature of the international system. If they do not perceive the relations as competitive and do not act

egoistically to reach their national goals, they will be punished for their idealism. “To say that a country acts in its national interest means that having examined security requirements, it tries to meet them,” stated K. Waltz (1979, p. 134). Maximizing power and wealth, the necessary conditions of survival, has to be an objective in state policy. It has to take into account the situation in which the state finds itself in order to guarantee its own survival. Changes in the material circumstances should lead to corresponding changes in definitions of the national interest.

For neorealists, the national interest as an analytical concept is a useful tool to analyse the distribution of power in the system, suitable to examine the Kremlin’s objections towards the place and role it is allowed to play on the world arena. However, foreign policy of the Russian Federation, being full of political and ideological dilemmas on both domestic and international levels, can be challenging to analyse on the systemic level of analysis (J. Wieclawski 2011,

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p.174). Internal complexity of states is mostly irrelevant to their main task – survival. The

anarchic condition defines and determines the national interest in a very similar way for all states no matter their domestic realities. Neorealism tends to emphasize strategic interests when

analysing the Russia-Ukraine affairs and might have a tendency to ignore the importance of different interest groups, the regime determinants, the role of the military lobby, different industries, oligarchs, gas and other material sector interests, not to mention the ideational dimension of this relationship.

2.2.3 Realist perspectives on Eurasian political economy and integration

According to the realist paradigm, cooperation in the world economy is quite elusive. Self- interested and rational states struggle over the distribution of profit from economic cooperation.

Regional integration is seen more like alliance-building exercise with a focus on the power geometry of the international system. A true regional cooperation is barely possible because states are supposed to seek to balance against neighbours that are more powerful rather than try to construct a regional community with them. Even if states happen to cooperate, they should act in an atmosphere of suspicion, fearing that the other partner will gain more benefits since the relative gains are more important than absolute gains (Molchanov 2015, p.12).

States would rather seek economic autonomy than face military and economic coercion according to the realist tradition in IR and IPE (Kirshner 1999). Ukraine’s behaviour towards Russia after the Ukrainian crisis is a living example: Ukraine’s efforts to get off the Russian carbon train and cut diverse integrational initiatives that notably benefited Ukraine’s trade in order to avoid Russia’s coercion and gain a more independent position from Russia in the world order. At the same time, according to the realist paradigm, Ukraine along with other post-Soviet states would have to seek economic autonomy from Russia from the very end of the Soviet Union and then strategically continue to follow that path. Economic reintegration with new-born Russia would be impossible since Ukraine would balance against Russian hegemony in the region and view the cooperation and hence economic dependence as a security threat. However, it did not actually happen until 24 years later, despite Ukraine’s long-lasting aspirations to be closely connected to Europe and reinforce its “Europeaness” in the national discourse.

Two realist expectations in the post-Soviet space would be 1) economic autonomy seeking behaviour to counterbalance Russia and 2) bandwagoning with Russia because of an absence of opportunities to build new alliances. According to theories of bandwagoning, some republics

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lacked alternative allies and trade partners and had to reintegrate with a threatening Russia out of necessity, keeping in mind how vulnerable they were. Abdelal points out that this was never the case in the post-Soviet region. Not all republics viewed economic dependence on Russia as a threat, and if they did, it was hardly based on their material conditions. Countries like Belarus were in a better position to seek autonomy than the Baltic states. He also points out that the support from the West was not the cause of the pro-western orientation of Lithuania but rather a consequence. The EU was not reassuring about future membership, but nothing could change Lithuania’s mind on the necessity of disintegration with Russia and the other republics (2001, pp.16-17).

In 2001, Abdelal claimed that explaining Ukraine’s behaviour in the realist fashion is an even more challenging task. Even taking into account Ukraine’s significant capabilities and being second only to Russia in the region, Ukraine did not truly balance Russian power. If in the first couple of years of independence, Ukraine tried to follow a radical autonomy course, then soon after, the country turned towards partial reintegration with the CIS under pressure from within the society. Ukraine’s indecisive behaviour is hard to explain in the realist tradition, as is Russia’s behaviour in “allowing” Ukraine to behave in this matter (Abdelal 2001, p.18).

2.2.4. Russian foreign policy in the realist perspectives

Within the realist paradigm, there are opposite explanations of how Russia should achieve its national interest to pursue power and wealth through cooperation or conflict: offensive and defensive realism. Distinction between offensive and defensive realists lies in a different view on how much power is needed for a state in the anarchic system. Defensive realists such as Waltz put emphasis on status quo powers seeking only to preserve their respective positions in the international system by maintaining the prevailing balance of power (Waltz 1979, p.126).

Offensive realists such as Mearsheimer assume that states are power-maximisers (Mearsheimer 2001).

Both realist groups agree that states try to maximise their security. Both entail that national interests and identities are governed by the material constrains and elite perceptions of them. In defensive realism, changes in Russia’s posture should occur according to a rationalist learning through weakness. Since the ultimate goal of each state is to survive and maintain the status-quo, based on the idea of national interests being a function of material capabilities, Russia should have become more accommodationist as it weakened both in economic and military terms.

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However, the real Russian foreign policy started to harden already after 1993-94 (seven years before the global rise in oil prices) even though the economic situation continued to deteriorate.

In offensive realist accounts, Russian foreign policy would be expected to be aggressive, especially against post-Soviet states. When the international distribution of power is changing like after the end of the Soviet Union, preventive aggression can be viewed as necessary to safeguard the national security (Clunan 2009, p.5). Following the same logic, Russia will act rationally to achieve military hegemony if conditions are right. Maximization of world power will guaranty the state’s survival. The aim of revanchist Russia would be to become a hegemon, not necessarily in the entire world, but in the particular region, secure its existence, and then pursue a status-quo power position (Mearsheimer 2001). At the same time, the Kremlin’s assertiveness should be seen as a response to the hostility of the international system. For example, offensive realist Mearsheimer argues that Russian behaviour towards Ukraine is rather defensive and that Russia was responding to the actions of the West when it comes to Russian foreign policy in the near abroad (Mearsheimer 2014).

In other words, following the logic of “socialization to the system”, neorealists were expecting gradual emergence of a more assertive Russia as a natural consequence of the pushing and shoving shaped by the structural forces of the international system. Heikka argues that a realist outlook on foreign policy can be seen as an acceptance of Russia’s role as a great defensive power (but not a global superpower or an ally of the West) arising from the structure of the international system and a relation of the Russian capabilities to those of other states (Heikka 1999, pp. 61-62). At the same time, we meet a quite different explanation of Russian foreign policy and predictions of its future behaviour.

Even within the realist paradigm, there are two completely different explanations of Russian behaviour on the world arena. Elias Götz (2016) offers such categories as “revisionist Russia”

and “victim Russia”. Researchers that share the “victim Russia” point of view argue that Russia is a status-quo power that does not pose a major threat to the West and the post-Soviet republics.

Rather assertive Moscow’s posture is based on legitimate politico-strategic and economic concerns over NATO’s eastward expansion (Shleifer and Treisman 2011). Russia’s negative attitude of towards the increased EU activism in the post-Soviet space is explained by the

negative effect that it has on Moscow’s regional economic interests as well as by its political and social-cultural influence in the region, and again is connected to NATO expansion (Charap and Troitskiy 2013).

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Scholars such as Milne (2014), Walt (2015), and Mearsheimer (2014) view the Russian

behaviour as rather defensive. The international system’s incentives have the biggest influence on national interest formation. Mutual fear and distrust as key elements of anarchy shape relations between Russia and the West. Assertive behaviour of Russia is therefore a logical response to the threats that came from an international structure where NATO and the EU enlargements appear to be closely associated and posed a threat to the Russian national security.

Others view Russia as a revisionist state that challenges the post-Cold War order in Europe by its imperial ambitions. They often cite Vladimir Putin’s words about the collapse of the Soviet Union as the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the XX century (Putin 2005) and analyse

Russia’s desire to recreate an empire. Crimea was the first step (or second step if we consider the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in 2008) on the road to re-establish Moscow’s supremacy in the region. They try to predict what countries will be the next targets of the Russian aggression.

Neorealism with its systemic level of analysis seems very suitable to evaluate Russian strategic interests in the Near Abroad, including Ukraine, perhaps the most important country in the Russian sphere of influence, again using the neo-realist language. It would be difficult not to use neorealism in the assessment of threats that Russia faces, not least because of the Russian realist tradition in the field of international politics. A broad consensus among realists that great powers have a tendency to build regional spheres of influence near their borders can provide an

important argument for the basis of Russia’s policy towards Ukraine and the European

Neighbourhood Policy (ENP). At the time, as it was mentioned above, structural realism is too concentrated on absolute gains that can become an issue when we are evaluating integrational processes between Russia, Ukraine and the European Union. It also tends to underestimate internal factors.

As if answering the critics of the neo-realist perspective on Russian foreign policy in the near abroad that emphasises the role of internal factors in the proposed explanations, Götz offers a theoretical framework neorealist in its nature to study Russia’s Ukraine policy that seems relevant to the topic of my research. Using John Mearsheimer’s (2014) work as a starting point, he develops an adjusted neorealist theory aimed at explaining why and how major powers build regional spheres of influence. Mearsheimer argues that geopolitical factors are primer elements of the Russian national interest and the Kremlin’s behaviour towards Ukraine is the result of external pressures of the international system, namely the EU’s and NATO’s eastward

expansion. Expanding the classical realist claim about the state’s desire to maximise the amount

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of power and material capabilities, Götz argues that regional great powers also seek to constrain the foreign-policy autonomy of smaller neighbouring states. They also try to secure lines of communication and trade routes in their vicinity and keep access to strategically key locations near the border (Götz 2016, pp. 301-302).

There is a direct correlation between external pressure and hard/soft-power tools that major powers can choose as a response to the smaller neighbours’ behaviour. Götz (2016) distinguishes between three levels of external pressure: high, medium and low. They lead to different

diplomatic, economic and military reactions.

On the one hand, it is hard to disagree with the realists. On the other hand, the content of the argument defined as the security and survival of the state is so general as to be indeterminate.

Weldes gives us another important problem with realism. It is that this notion of the national interest rests on a questionable empiricist epistemology that ignores the centrality of processes of interpretation (Weldes 1996, p.4).

All other factors, such as domestic politics and perceptions, aside from power, security and the structure of the international system, have a secondary role in explaining a country's behaviour.

This puts certain limitations on the analysis. The importance of the domestic and ideational sources of Russian foreign policy can be easily underestimated within the realist framework.

Realism works effectively when it is a zero-sum situation, but Russia’s relationships with the West, and Europe specifically, as well as with the post-Soviet republics are dominated by mutual profit coming from cooperation on different levels in an atmosphere of mutual suspicion.

Realism does not pay enough attention to cooperation between states when they have competing interests. It does not reflect how discourses evolve. The liberal paradigm in international

relations addresses some of these criticisms.

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2.3 National interest and regional cooperation in the liberal paradigm

The liberal approach to the national interest concept, in short, has championed limited

government and scientific rationality, believing individuals should be free from arbitrary state power, persecution and supervision. Liberals have always been in favour of political and economic freedom, democracy, human rights, individual competition and market capitalism.

According to one of the fathers of liberalism or idealism, Adam Smith, a policy of international free trade will even end conflicts between states since the spirits of war and mutually profitable commerce are incompatible. Free trade and the removal of barriers to commerce is central both to the old and well-known theory of comparative advantage of Ricardo and the more modern interdependence theory. While neorealists are concerned with ‘relative gains’, liberals emphasise the importance of maximising their ‘absolute gains’, that is to say an assessment of their own gains rather than their rivals: “what will gain me the most?” instead of “who will achieve more?”

(Burchill 2005, pp.104-125). Hence, interactions between states do not have to be a zero-sum game and cooperation can be profitable for everyone. In an environment of growing regional and global integration, states can often realise a convergence of interests both economic and

strategic.

Liberals claim that international institutions can transform state identities and interests (Wendt 1994). Liberalism puts emphasis on the role of internal factors in interest formation, the realization of which is then constrained at the systemic level by institutions. Neoliberals pay extra attention to the role of expectations rather than power and interests, that what make them more engaged in idea-based ontology than just pure materialism like realists and neo-realists.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian elites were strong proponents of the liberal paradigm in international relations. According to MacFarlane (1999), the ideas of balance of power and obsession with absolute gain and great power status was not dominant for the Russian government at the first stage. Realist points of view were too static and not well aimed to explain changes in the international system according to liberals. Liberal researchers do not condemn the realist notion that states would pursue their national interests; neoliberalism emphasises that cooperation is in the interest of states.

Liberals and realists within the country argue about the issues of CIS integration and European security. Liberals argued that the main challenge for Russia was not integration or disintegration of the CIS, but rather a successful completion of democratic and economic reforms in the region.

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Liberal approaches put emphasis on economic incentives when it comes to cooperation, rather than on anarchy and power. It is a mutually beneficial exchange (Keohane & Nye 1977).

Regional integration is often understood as a consequence of complex interdependence.

Organised interests of non-state actors play an influential role in preference formation both domestically and internationally. In the liberal tradition, post-Soviet states would work on economic integration motivated by material incentives, as well as that Russia and the EU would pursue deeper cooperation. Classical liberalism would argue that domestic economic actors and their interests would shape the rationality of foreign policy. Neoliberalism would put stronger emphasis on the importance of the international institutions that would help to build win-win situations for all parties and make cooperation easier by reducing transaction costs. The interdependence of Ukraine and Russia as well all other post-Soviet republics would create incentives for mutually beneficial cooperation and CIS institutions would ease these processes.

However, no matter how deep interdependence between the republics was after the collapse of the USSR, and how institutionalised the relationship was within the CIS framework and other integrational initiatives, some countries failed or choose not to reintegrate, even though such disintegration meant big material disadvantages in the short and medium term. The Baltic states are a classic example of the failed liberal explanation. While Belarus and a number of Central Asian states support the liberal approach. Ukraine was ready to accept huge energy subsidies from Russia, but was not ready to be truly engaged in the regional integrational processes in the same way as Belarus or Kazakhstan, and did not perfectly fit in the liberal paradigm’s

explanation (Abdelal 2001).

In regard to European security, liberals argue that Russia should act towards strengthening multilateral institutions, which would act as a guarantor towards the return of the balance of power politics. The main principle of liberalism in IR is the notion of building peace through economic interdependence. The EU’s policy towards the “common neighbourhood” with Russia since the end of the Cold War was always presented with this notion in its basis (DeBardeleben 2018, pp.119-21). However, Russia was not particularly satisfied with the ‘one track’ nature of the EU-Russia relations where the European Union was imposing its normative power on the post-Soviet space. Realists disagreed with liberals about the nature of the post-Cold War world order and viewed NATO as having offensive, rather than defensive intentions. As a result of the liberalist influence, the new leaders of Russia after the dissolution of the USSR had very high expectations about joining Western international organizations and expected high Western investments to help restructure the debt and stabilise the currency (Donchenko 2017, p. 12). The liberal approach pays a lot of attention to regional integration and co-operation and could bring

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interesting insights to the understanding of the Russian discourse on the country’s interest in the near abroad. However, the very initial principles of the liberal paradigm seem to impose

restrictions on the future analysis because of certain features of Russian foreign policy very briefly described above. J. Wieclawski argues that despite the increasing desire for cooperation with the neighbours, the Russian position in world politics has often been looking back to classical realistic fundaments of the state’s interest, principles of ‘self-help’ and a general atmosphere of distrust (Wieclawski 2011, p. 177).

One weakness of liberalism can be seen as providing unrealistic assumptions and selective focus (Tsygankov 2013, p.13). Liberalism does not account for conservative changes in Russian foreign policy, describing them as “setbacks” that imply the country’s future return to the progressive and liberal way of development. Tsygankov notes that it seems quite symptomatic that liberals who spent a lot of resources on analysing Gorbachev’s New Thinking and Russia’s liberal shift in the 1990s have not come out with systematic accounts of Russia’s return to great power thinking and were hardly able to explain Primakov’s and Putin’s influence in the foreign policy of Russia (ibid p.14).

Both liberalism and realism, and their neo-versions, tend to emphasise one aspect of the

international system at the expense of others. Liberals give too much importance to the notions of modernisation and democratisation defined in exclusively western terms without adapting those concepts into cultural and historical realities while trying to overlook the factor of power in its realist way of thinking that can be important in explaining Russia's foreign policy in Putin’s era. Meanwhile, realists are too preoccupied by power and security.

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2.4 National interest and identity in social constructivism 2.4.1 Notes on rationalism versus constructivism

The important difference between liberals and realists is understanding to what extent state actions are influenced by “structure” (realist anarchy principle) versus “process” (interaction and learning) and institutions (preferable explanations in the liberal approach). At the same time, both paradigms focus on how the behaviour of actors in world politics generate outcomes instead of examining identities and interests of agents as endogenously given. This is what Alexander Wendt calls commitment to “rationalism” (Wendt 1992).

It is too easy to see national interests exclusively as some kind of realist variable, but it also matters how interests are thought to be constructed. The question of how the national interest is shaped and changes was broadly outlined in the debate between rationalists and social

constructivists in the discipline of international relations in the 1990s. Rationalists view the logic of political choices and behaviour as the consequence of action in certain circumstances. They often assume that states have a stable set of core tasks and an ordered rank of preferences dictating the most rational choice in every situation. Rationalists are used to treating interests as exogenous. Providing for the national security by accumulating international power and wealth is the objective. The national interest is derived from the material situation in which states find themselves. The place of norms, ideas and preferences entailed in national identities is defined by the elite’s perceptions of material constraints. Changes in material objectives should lead to corresponding reshaping of national interests. Both realist and liberal paradigms in the

international relations theory represent the rationalists’ camp, which is opposed to the social constructivists’ camp. Constructivists argue that in order to understand a state’s behaviour, scholars must examine not just material constraints, but also what the sources of a country’s national identity are and how they influence its national interest. Constructivism puts emphasis on how collectively held ideas create social structures and form people’s interests, national interests in our case.

Social constructivists believe that these shared ideas and normative practices are key elements in determining state behaviour and have been a missing component from previous rationalist accounts of international politics. The national interest notion is an important social construction which is a key indicator of state actions. The social constructivism school does not try to reject all rationalist work. On the contrary, they show agreement with Hans Morgenthau’s thought that the national interest depends on the ‘political and cultural context within which foreign policy is

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formulated’. According to constructivists, this claim was underdeveloped in international relations theory and now the national interest concept is again a significant analytical tool (Burchill 2005, p. 187).

2.4.2 Social constructivism

In order to be able to understand Russia’s conceptualization of its national interests, we need to treat countries’ interests as endogenous. The reaction in the autumn of 2013, which may seem excessively strict and exaggerated, was based on the Russian understanding of its own national interests and Russia’s threat assessment. The constructivist approach offers a useful tool to endogenize the formation of interests by connecting them theoretically and empirically to identity (Hopf 2002, p.16).

Constructivism is often presented as a result of IR theory’s ‘third debate’. Nowadays, debates between rationalism and constructivism have decreased noticeably (Adler el.a. 2013). Social constructivism focuses on social aspects of international relations and does not try to reduce them to materialism. The two greatest topics within the constructivist approach are role of norm in constructing social reality and identity, its strategic consequences and interest formation.

One of the main figures in social constructivism, Alexander Wendt, defines constructivism as a structural theory of the international system that makes the following key statements:

(1) states are the principal units of analysis for international political theory;

(2) the key structures in the states system are intersubjective, rather than material;

(3) state identities and interests are in important part constructed by these social structures, rather than given exogenously to the system by human nature or domestic politics (Wendt 1994, p.385).

The second and the third points oppose the rationalist approach. Social constructivists argue that social reality is not objective or externally given. The behaviour of states cannot be seen as a given set of strategies defining the best possible outcome based on material facts. The social world, which includes the world of international relations, is not a physical entity or material object that exists outside of human consciousness (Jackson & Sørensen 2013, p.209).

Constructivism is a structural theory of the international system. In other words, it is not a theory of international politics; it is a social theory that works well in the international dimension. In

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social theory, it emphasizes the social construction of reality. Social theory is located on a higher level of abstraction than substantive international relation theory. Examining the social world, constructivism looks at it as a world of human consciousness: of ideas, concepts, beliefs, of languages and discourses, images, signs, and understandings among humans and groups of people, such as states and nations (ibid, p.212).

In constructivism, the international environment constructs states’ interests and behaviour.

States’ actions are not rationally uniform but rather dependent on their experience in the world arena with different actors. Particular social contexts define national interests and formation of national interests needs to be studied in itself instead of being assumed to be given and rational (Tsygankov 2013, p.15).

There is compliance among rationalists and constructivists who state that material forces constrain and enable social forms of interstate interactions, but constructivism also claims that the distribution of interests helps to constitute the meaning of power. The distribution of power in international politics is created by distribution of interests, and the content of interests are in turn constituted in important part by ideas. It does not mean that ideas are more important than power and national interests are autonomous from them. Wendt’s claim is rather “that powers and interest have effects they do in virtue of the ideas that make them up” (Wendt 1999, p.135).

He emphases the constitutive nature of ideas instead of treating them in causal terms since ideas constitute “material base” initially.

There are several branches and different classifications in constructivism, such as modernists, modernist linguistic, critical constructivists, poststructuralists. The majority of them share the understandings about constructivism: 1) social construction of knowledge and 2) the construction of social reality (Guzzini 2000, p.149). Different collective meanings attached to material

realities twice – as social reality, and as scientific knowledge.

There are a variety of constructivist approaches to interest formation and collective identity.

Examples include the structural constructivism of Alexander Wendt, the situational

constructivism of Ted Hopf, the aspirational constructivism of Anne Clunan, and others. Wendt gives the following distinction of the three main streams of constructivism in IR: a modernist stream with John Ruggie and F. Kratochwill, a post-modernist stream associated with R. Ashley and R. Walker, and a feminist stream associated with Spike Peterson and Ann Tickner. Although very different from each other, they all show solidarity with critics in that neorealism and

neoliberalism pay insufficient attention to the ways in which the actors on the world arena are

Russian National Interests Formation: Discourse analysis of conceptual evolution