Andrei Tsygankov: “The US establishment, not the Kremlin, is undermining normalisation with Russia”

The release of an intelligence report on Russian interference in the US presidential election, alongside allegations of links between Donald Trump and the Kremlin, have strained US-Russia relations. Andrei P. Tsygankov argues that there remains a deep-rooted fear of Russia within the American establishment, but that Donald Trump’s election provides an opportunity for the two countries to normalise their relations

Nobody loves Russia: how western media have perpetuated the myth of Putin’s ‘neo-Soviet autocracy’

Russia’s political system has frequently been criticised by Western politicians and commentators, with some observers drawing parallels between the rule of Vladimir Putin and the old Soviet regime during the communist-era. But how accurate are these criticisms? Andrei P. Tsygankov writes that a particular narrative which views Russia as a ‘neo-Soviet autocracy’ has built up in western media sources. He argues that this narrative ignores the reality of Putin’s regime and serves simply to legitimise the identity of the United States and the American-led ‘free world’ relative to that of an ‘oppressive’ Russia

Why Russia’s ‘strong state’ political system still remains a better option for the country than western-style democracy

Russia’s political system has often been criticised by commentators and academics who advocate a transition to a more western-style of democracy. Andrei P. Tsygankov argues that while the Russian system under Vladimir Putin undoubtedly requires substantial reforms, the ‘strong state’ model adopted in the country also generates a number of benefits for Russian citizens that have largely been overlooked in the West. He writes that abandoning this model in favour of a western political system would be at odds with the prevailing conditions within the country and that the aim should instead be to reform the existing system so that it works more effectively for ordinary Russians

Western civilizational biases, see Hoffmann

This article addresses the question of interaction between Western and ''non-Western'' international relations (IR) by analyzing liberal theory of IR that is emerging in contemporary Russia. We argue that, despite a growing diversity within Russian scholarship of liberal orientation, it remains largely a product of Western, particularly American, intellectual hegemony, and more so than any other theoretical perspective. As compared to two other existing traditions in Russian IR-realism and critical studies-liberalism remains the most dependent and therefore must be explored before any other traditions as a crucial case for understanding the dialectic of cultural dependence and hegemony in production of global knowledge. We argue that the greater dependence of Russian liberal IR results from its relatively weak indigenous tradition, perception of Russia's material weakness as opportunity, and greater availability of Western research funds. We also discuss an alternative, less dependent version of Russian liberal IR, and opportunities that its existence implies for development of a global, de-centered international relations theory. Scholars do not like to think about their intellectual dependence on the status of their country, and on ambitions of its political elites; it disturbs their sense of belonging to a cosmopolitan, free-floating community of science … And yet, the link exists. And it is sometimes reinforced by institutional arrangements. Stanley Hoffmann (1995: 225) Western scholars can improve their understanding of the world by studying international relations (IR) as a discipline outside the West. For a long time, international relations have been developing as an excessively West-centric and pro-Western branch of research. As many scholars pointed out, IR all too often reflects political, ideological, and epistemological biases of Western, particularly American, civilization. 1 As a result, a perception has arisen throughout the world 1 For various analyses of international relations as a discipline that is ethnocentric and reflects American

Implantación iónica

En este trabajo se presenta una revisión de las diferentes técnicas de implantación de iones desde los implantadores por haces iónicos, utilizados en la fabricación de semiconductores, pasando por una serie de desarrollos con base en la tecnología de la física del plasma, hasta llegar a la técnica denominada Implantación Iónica Tridimensional (3DII). Para cada una de las técnicas de implantación iónica se presentan los dispositivos más comunes y se analizan sus características principales. Para el caso de la Implantación Iónica Tridimensional se describe el equipo JUPITER (Joint Universal Plasma and Ion Technologies Experimental Reactor), único en el mundo, para la investigación de descargas pulsadas de alto voltaje a bajas presiones y para el tratamiento superficial de materiales. Este dispositivo se implementó en el Laboratorio de Física del Plasma y Corrosión de la Universidad Industrial de Santander, con la colaboración financiera de COLCIENCIAS y con la cooperación de la Universidad Técnica Estatal Bauman de Moscú.Palabras Clave: Implantación iónica tridimensional; descarga de alto voltaje; nitruración.

Russia and the diffusion of political norms: the perfect rival?

Russian norm diffusion has been studied mainly as the mirror image of the EU’s, but deserves to be studied in its own right and complexity. Three core categories of political norms are explored: sovereign choice, regime and conservative ideas. It is argued that Russia does not promote a coherent political model, by lack of one, but rather diffuses a disparate set of conservative ideas and non-democratic practices. Russia’s normative positioning is equivocal. It champions established international norms like sovereignty, placing itself within the dominant normative community, but contesting the application by the West. When it comes to certain liberal political norms (often reduced to a strawman version), it questions their validity and rejects them, placing itself outside the dominant normative community, but claiming to defend ‘genuine’ European values. This makes Russia an ambiguous norm contester, rather than the perfect normative rival of the EU. The complexity of its norm contestation follows from exogenous motives: it is predominantly an anti-hegemonic reaction against what it perceives as the Western imposition of norms, harming vital Russian interests

Orbital variability of the optical linear polarization of the γ\gamma-ray binary LS I +61 303 and new constraints on the orbital parameters

We studied the variability of the linear polarization and brightness of the $\gamma$-ray binary LS I +61 303. High-precision BVR photopolarimetric observations were carried out with the Dipol-2 polarimeter on the 2.2 m remotely controlled UH88 telescope at Mauna Kea Observatory and the 60 cm Tohoku telescope at Haleakala Observatory (Hawaii) over 140 nights in 2016--2019. We determined the position angle of the intrinsic polarization $\theta \simeq 11^\circ$, which can either be associated with the projection of the Be star's decretion disk axis on the plane of sky, or can differ from it by $90^\circ$. Using the Lomb-Scargle method, we performed timing analyses and period searches of our polarimetric and photometric data. We found statistically significant periodic variability of the normalized Stokes parameters $q$ and $u$ in all passbands. The most significant period of variability, $P_\text{Pol} = 13.244 \pm 0.012$ d, is equal to one half of the orbital period $P_\text{orb} = 26.496$ d. Using a model of Thomson scattering by a cloud that orbits the Be star, we obtained constraints on the orbital parameters, including a small eccentricity $e<0.2$ and periastron phase of $\phi_\text{p}\approx 0.6$, which coincides with the peaks in the radio, X-ray, and TeV emission. These constraints are independent of the assumption about the orientation of the decretion disk plane on the sky. We also extensively discuss the apparent inconsistency with the previous measurements of the orbital parameters from radial velocities. By folding the photometry data acquired during a three-year time span with the orbital period, we found a linear phase shift of the moments of the brightness maximum, confirming the possible existence of superorbital variability.Comment: 15 pages, 16 figures, accepted for publication in A&

The Cold Peace: Russo-Western Relations as a Mimetic Cold War

In 1989–1991 the geo-ideological contestation between two blocs was swept away, together with the ideology of civil war and its concomitant Cold War played out on the larger stage. Paradoxically, while the domestic sources of Cold War confrontation have been transcended, its external manifestations remain in the form of a ‘legacy’ geopolitical contest between the dominant hegemonic power (the United States) and a number of potential rising great powers, of which Russia is one. The post-revolutionary era is thus one of a ‘cold peace’. A cold peace is a mimetic cold war. In other words, while a cold war accepts the logic of conflict in the international system and between certain protagonists in particular, a cold peace reproduces the behavioural patterns of a cold war but suppresses acceptance of the logic of behaviour. A cold peace is accompanied by a singular stress on notions of victimhood for some and undigested and bitter victory for others. The perceived victim status of one set of actors provides the seedbed for renewed conflict, while the ‘victory’ of the others cannot be consolidated in some sort of relatively unchallenged post-conflict order. The ‘universalism’ of the victors is now challenged by Russia's neo-revisionist policy, including not so much the defence of Westphalian notions of sovereignty but the espousal of an international system with room for multiple systems (the Schmittean pluriverse)

High-precision optical polarimetry of the accreting black hole V404 Cyg during the 2015 June outburst

Our simultaneous three-colour (BVR) polarimetric observations of the low-mass black hole X-ray binary V404 Cyg show a small but statistically significant change of polarization degree (Delta(p) similar to 1 per cent) between the outburst in 2015 June and the quiescence. The polarization of V404 Cyg in the quiescent state agrees within the errors with that of the visually close (1.4 arc-sec) companion (pR = 7.3 +/- 0.1 per cent), indicating that it is predominantly of interstellar origin. The polarization pattern of the surrounding field stars supports this conclusion. From the observed variable polarization during the outburst, we show that the polarization degree of the intrinsic component peaks in the V band, p(V) = 1.1 +/- 0.1 per cent, at the polarization position angle of theta(V) =-7 degrees+/- 2 degrees, which is consistent in all three passbands. We detect significant variations in the position angle of the intrinsic polarization in the R band from -30. to similar to 0 degrees during the outburst peak. The observed wavelength dependence of the intrinsic polarization does not support non-thermal synchrotron emission from a jet as a plausible mechanism, but it is in better agreement with the combined effect of electron (Thomson) scattering and absorption in a flattened plasma envelope or outflow surrounding the illuminating source. Alternatively, the polarization signal can be produced by scattering of the disc radiation in a mildly relativistic polar outflow. The position angle of the intrinsic polarization, nearly parallel to the jet direction (i. e. perpendicular to the accretion disc plane), is in agreement with these interpretations

SRG/ART-XC, Swift, NICER, and NuSTAR study of different states of the transient X-ray pulsar MAXI J0903-531

The results of the broadband spectral and timing study of the recently discovered transient X-ray pulsar MAXI J0903-531 in a wide range of luminosities that differ by a factor of ~30 are reported. The observed X-ray spectrum in both states can be described as a classical pulsar-like spectrum consisting of a power law with a high-energy cutoff. We argue that the absence of the spectrum transformation to the two-hump structure that is expected at low fluxes indicates that the magnetic field of the neutron star is relatively weak below (2-3) x 1012 G. This estimate is consistent with other indirect constraints and non-detection of any absorption features that might be interpreted as a cyclotron absorption line. The timing analysis of the NuSTAR data revealed only slight variations of a single-peaked pulse profile of the source as a function of the energy band and mass accretion rate. In both intensity states, the pulsed fraction increases from 40% to roughly 80% with the energy. Finally, we were also able to obtain the orbital solution for the binary system using data from the Fermi/GBM, NICER, and NuSTAR instruments.</p