Conflict and cooperation between Europe and Russia: the autonomy of the local

ABSTRACT

This paper takes a bottom-up perspective on the “boundary issues” that emerged between the EU and Russia with and since the end of the Cold War: the mobility of people and goods, energy and natural resources, security, and protection of minorities. This paper compares three zones of contact: Estonia, Moldova and Kaliningrad. Our starting point is that there is not a European-Russian relationship, but Russian European relations that vary according to interests and representations on the ground. We argue that cooperation and conflict are not tightly coupled with the geopolitical level but also shaped by the local dynamics of symbolic boundary making.

KEYWORDS:

• Cooperation/conflict
• symbolic boundaries
• EU-Russia relations
• Estonia
• Moldova
• Kaliningrad

Disclosure statement

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

Notes on contributors

Magdalena Dembińska is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and Academic Director of CÉRIUM, Université de Montréal. Postdoctoral fellow at McGill University (2007–2009), she received her PhD in Political Science from UdeM and her MA in International Relations from Warsaw University. Her research in comparative politics focuses on identity politics, ethnic conflict, Sate- and nation-building in Central Europe and the post-Soviet space.

Frédéric Mérand is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Université de Montréal Centre for International Studies (CÉRIUM). He is a specialist in European politics and the sociology of international relations. A former foreign policy advisor, he has been a visiting professor at Sciences Po Paris and the universities of Toronto, Strasbourg, Toulouse, Lille and Guido Carli of Rome. His current research focuses on relations between Europe and Russia, the politicisation of the European Union and the decline of great powers.

Anastasiya Shtaltovna is a researcher at, University of Montreal, Canada. She holds a PhD in development studies from the University of Bonn, Germany. Her work and research interests lie in, but are not limited to, post-socialist transformations, knowledge and innovation, rural development, governance, formal and informal institutions, ethnographic research and comparative studies. For her studies and work, Ms. Shtaltovna has conducted an extensive fieldwork in Central Asia, Eastern and Western Europe, and sub-Saharan Africa. Contact: [email protected]

Notes

1 Throughout the studied period, Russia never imposed embargo on wines from Transnistria and Gagauzia in contrast to numerous restrictions towards the imports of Moldovan agricultural products and wines to Russia (Interview with a think tank analyst, Chisinau, 2019).

Additional information

Funding

This research is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.