Commonwealth of Independent States at 30: why does Russia still support this organization?

ABSTRACT

This paper seeks to assess Russia’s policy towards the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as the organization turned thirty years old. CIS is frequently depicted as a failure of integration in the former Soviet space, plagued by Russia’s damaging policies of aggression against smaller partners, diverging goals of its members, and inadequate institutional design. This paper argues that Russia continues to support CIS, notwithstanding these issues. By referring to the variables of the theory of cooperative hegemony, I show how Moscow’s commitment to it through the creation of a regional identity validates the continued existence of the Commonwealth.

KEYWORDS:

• Russia
• CIS
• hegemony
• cooperation
• institution

Acknowledgments

The author expresses his gratitude to the editorial office of Southeast European and Black Sea Studies and to the two anonymous referees whose valuable suggestions and comments helped improve this manuscript. Moreover, he would like to thank the scholars he interviewed or consulted while researching this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

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Additional information

Notes on contributors

Janko Šćepanović

Dr. Janko Šćepanović is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Center for Russian Studies in the School of Politics and International Relations of East China Normal University in Shanghai, People’s Republic of China. He holds a Ph.D. degree in International Politics from Fudan University (also in Shanghai) and an M.A. in Middle Eastern Studies from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY) in New York City. His research focuses on the study of Russia’s foreign policy in the former Soviet space, the Middle East, Southeast Europe, and regional institution-building in Greater Eurasia.