The Problem of the “Special Path” in Russian Foreign Policy

Abstract

The authors compare three ideologies of a “special path” in early post-Soviet Russia: neo-Eurasianism, geopolitics, and a new, hybrid version.

This article is the republished version of:

The Problem of the "Special Path" in Russian Foreign Policy

Notes

^1.For a more detailed account of discussions on this theme in the 1990s, see A.A. Sergunin, Rossiiskaia vneshnepoliticheskaia mysl': problemy natsional'noi imezhdunarodnoi bezopasnosti (Nizhnii Novgorod: Izdatel'stvo Nizhegorodskogo gosudarstvennogo lingvisticheskogo universiteta, 2003),

^2. S. Stankevich, “Derzhava v poiskakh sebia,” Nezavisimaia gazeta, 28 March 1992, p. 4; Stankevich, “Russia in Search of Itself,” The National Interest (Summer 1992), pp. 47–51.

^3. N. Travkin, “Russia, Ukraine, and Eastern Europe,” in Rethinking Russia's National Interests, ed. S. Sestanovich (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1994), pp. 34–35.

^4. Ibid.; K. Pleshakov, “Russia's Mission: The Third Epoch,” International Affairs (Moscow) (January 1993), pp. 22–23.

^5. S. Stankevich, “Toward a New ‘National Idea,’” in Rethinking Russia's National Interests, p. 24.

^6. Ibid., p. 28.

^7. Quoted from Neil Malcolm, “New Thinking and After: Debate in Moscow about Europe,” in his edited Russia and Europe: An End to Confrontation? (London: Pinter Publishers for the Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1994), p. 167.

^8. Stankevich, “Toward a New ‘National Idea,’” pp. 25–26.

^9. “Kontseptsiia vneshnei politiki Rossiiskoi Federatsii,” Diplomaticheskii vestnik (January 1993), pp. 3–23.

^10. E. Pozdnyakov [Pozdniakov], “Russia Is a Great Power,” International Affairs (Moscow) (January 1993), p. 6.

^11. E.A. Pozdniakov, Filosofiia politiki (Moscow: Paleia, 1994), vol. 2, p. 102.

^12. For a more detailed discussion of the causes of the crisis of neo-Eurasianism, see Sergunin, Rossiiskaia vneshnepoliticheskaia mysl', pp. 28–31.

^13. The Slavophile tendency has not, however, disappeared. To some extent, it has transformed itself, emphasizing the positioning of Russia not so much as a Eurasian as an “Orthodox civilization”—the sole and real defender of Orthodox values throughout the world. The works of N.A. Narochnitskaia belong to this tendency. See, for example, N.A. Narochnitskaia, Rossiia i russkie v sovremennom mire (Moscow: Algoritm, 2009).

^14. Pozdniakov, Filosofiia; A.G. Dugin, Osnovy geopolitiki (Moscow, 1997); Dugin and A.A. Nartov, Geopolitika (Moscow, 1999).

^15. H.J. Mackinder, Democratic Ideals and Reality: A Study in the Politics of Reconstruction (New York: Henry Holt, 1919), p. 186.

^16. Pozdniakov, Filosofiia, vol. 2, p. 282.

^17. Ibid.

^18. N.J. Spykman, The Geography of the Peace (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1944), p. 43.

^19. R. Strausz-Hupé, Geopolitics: The Struggle for Space and Power (New York: George Putnam's Sons, 1942), p. 195.

^20. S.B. Cohen, “Geopolitics in the New World Era: A New Perspective on an Old Discipline,” in Reordering the World: Geopolitical Perspectives on the Twenty-First Century, ed. George J. Demko and William B. Wood (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1994), p. 28.

^21. Some representatives of this school prefer to call their doctrine “dynamic conservatism” (A.B. Kobiakov and V.V. Aver'ianov, eds., Russkaia doktrina [Moscow: Iauza-press, 2008], p. 842).

^22. Ibid.

^23. Contemporary supporters of the “special path” have their own Web sites, blogs, Internet publications, and so on. In September 2009, there was a sensation over an open letter sent directly by e-mail to President Dmitry Medvedev by one of the leaders of this school, Maksim Kalashnikov (Vladimir Kucherenko), in which he proposed a number of initiatives to develop Russia's potential for innovation (http://m-kalashnikov.livejournal.com/141905.html [Web site address accessed 26 September 2012—Ed.]).

^24. V. Pantin and I. Semenenko, “Transformatsiia natsional'no-tsivilizatsionnoi identichnosti sovremennogo rossiiskogo obshchestva,” in Poisk natsional'notsivilizatsionnoi identichnosti i kontsept “osobogo puti” v rossiiskom massovom soznanii v kontekste modernizatsii (Moscow), p. 39; S.V. Kortunov, Sovremennaia vneshniaia politika Rossii: strategiia izbiratel'noi vovlechennosti (Moscow: Izdatel'skii dom GU—VShE, 2009), p. 92.