Perceptions of changing power, dyadic rivalries and security dilemma mechanisms in the wider Black Sea area

The NATO/EU countries and the Russian Federation have a common neighborhood in Eastern Europe, which includes the Black Sea region. This area could be defined as a "security complex", whose security architecture is made by the interaction of the various state and non-state actors, or as a geopolitical region. The riparian states are very heterogenous, they greatly differ in territory, population, economy and strategic affilitions. One important problem is that these countries - Bulgaria, Romania, Russia, Georgia, Ukraine and Turkey, plus the nonriparian ones -the Republic of Moldova, Armenia and Azerbaijan- do not have the same strategic culture, or similar national interests, they do not perceive themselves, at the level of political and economic elites, as being part of the same area and having a common regional identity. No regional organisation plays the role of EU or NATO and this increases the insecurity perceptions among rival actors. Moscow wants to create a "buffer" area by putting pressure on the NATO/EU states to stop the enlargement process and proposes political and economical alternatives like the CSI Collective Security Treaty and the Eurasian Economic Union, while the West wants the Black Sea countries to remain NATO partners (via the PfP) and possible members (Ukraine and Georgia were promised NATO membership in April 2008 at the Bucharest Summit), and also economic/political partners for the EU via the Eastern Partnership and the free trade agreements. The lack of trust and even fear between Russia and the Western states generated, since 2014 (when Crimea was illegally annexed by Russia), accusations, provocative actions and arms building, economic sanctions, thus fostering a "security dilemma" mechanism which is to be explained not only by structural factors like systemic power polarity, predominance of offensive/defensive weapons, but also by psycho-cognitive perceptions of decision-makers. The fact that some states’ leaders perceive the balance of power in the Black Sea as being in a process of rapid change in economy, military, demographics may generate attempts to take profit of or close the windows of vulnerability, increasing the likelihood of regional military or "hybrid" conflicts

In quest of a smart neighborhood strategy: how should be the future Eastern foreign policy of Romania?

As Romania became a NATO and EU member and geographically a border country for these organizations, its new interest in the foreign policy area should turn to the East, in order to reduce the level of risks, vulnerabilities and use the existing opportunities to develop more positive relations with the Republic of Moldova, Ukraine and Russia. As there are numerous obstacles like the psychocognitive misperception affecting leadership of states, the negative aspects of the organizational processes and the systemic pressures on all states, the only solution would be the progressive development of pragmatic areas of cooperation, especially the economic, cultural and environment issues. Mutual knowledge and the diminution of traditional, historic, fears generated by political myths inherited from the communist era would produce positive outcome, especially if new generations of policy-makers come in power with a new mentality

The Rebirth of Geopolitics in Post-Communist Romania: Ideas, Role and Collective Imaginary

The paper examines the historical developments of the controversial scientific discipline of geopolitics in Romania and the aim of our contribution is exactly to clarify the status and role of the geopolitics as a possible branch of social sciences, the main schools of thought, authors, and topics. If the interwar tradition of Romanian geopolitics is generally well popularized in universities and research institutions, the contemporary autochthonous geopolitical discourse is largely ignored by our scientific reviews of sociology and social sciences. We put the basic question: why this geopolitics’ reemergence happened in the 90s? One can mention the historical intellectual tradition, the ontological anxiety produced by the new status of Romania as an independent state not covered by any great power’s security guaranty or by an alliance, the foreign policy identity crisis produced by the difficulty to decide if Romania was a Western, an Eastern or a Central European state, plus the sensitive domestic situation at the beginning of the 90s, the mass psychology focusing on external threats and conspiracy against Romania’s interests. A special emphasis is put on the foreign policy imaginary which is still heavily dominated by the materialist and deterministic vision on Romania’s role as an EU and NATO member. After collecting many of the available proofs, be they texts, debates, institutional activities, opinions, we can generally conclude that there has been a revival of geopolitics in Romania, which became obvious in the first half of the previous decade, immediately after the end of the Cold War

Identitatea religioasă versus deriva sectară ca factori de potenţare a războaielor civile din Orientul Mijlociu: implozia Ummah şi redefinirea 'alterităţii ostile'

This article analyzes the ways in which the Ummah or Islamic community is affected by division and internal conflicts, taking as main example the case of Syria’s conflicts. The research is based on the combination of two theoretical approaches: the Islamic religion’s interpretations from ancient times to the contemporary world, and the analysis of civil wars taking place in the Middle East. The main research question concerns the role of domestic and external factors in shaping the violent civil conflicts in Syria and Yemen. Currently, the Islamic world is affected by civil wars, episodes of state collapse, insurgency and terrorist activity. With the constant involvement of foreign non-islamic powers (USA, Russia, etc.) and regional Islamic powers (Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Iran) and the divisive line between Sunni and Shia Islam, the Ummah does not have any chance, on the short and medium term, to become a unified and coherent community. Civil wars create durable psychological and material barriers among the civilians, based on fear and hatred, while the presence of strong external powers make the likelihood of ending such wars other than by massacres and ethnic or religious cleansing remote and difficult. The conclusions of this investigation are that the Islamic world is more and more splitted according to geopolitical and tribal lines, and that foreign interference by external actors (non-muslim states and muslim ones) contributes to the further radicalization and jihadist trends affecting Middle Eastern societies

Mai multă putere sau mai multă securitate? Scenarii pentru transformarea NATO în contextul conflictului din Ucraina şi a ascensiunii ISIS

Since its origins, in the context of the Cold War's beginning, NATO has been a robust defensive alliance, acting in accordance with UN Charter, as a collective defence structure based on solidarity and mutual trust. Nowadays it has 28 member states and one can say that it fulfilled its main role: to protect the West against communist/Soviet threats using the deterrence and containmemt tools. Neither USSR nor its main instrument, the Warsaw Pact dare to attack the Euro-Altantic area. Our main assumption is that because the specific national interests of each member state, because of the domestic-constitutional issues and bureaucratic obstacles, the Alliance cannot yet forge a common strategic culture for all its members and also lacks a common lens for detecting real risks and therats, be they nation states or non-states actors. Nowadays, Russia and Islamic State are the main adversaries for the Western states, thus NATO should be more effective in dealing with them. And there is a need for reform and transformation. Divergences between adepts of territorial defence and those of pro-active "out of area" missions go in addition to divergences concerning the neeed for increased defence budgets for all members and especially concering the attitude towards Russia. Moscow used economic and energy tools trying to divise some allies like Hungary, Greece and Bulgaria and it partially succeeded. Using some theories of alliances and of democratic peace, resorting to recent facts and figures related to NATO's activities and plans, will help the reader understand the problem of increasing the power vs. increasing the security dilemma and the prospect of future conflicts

China and India: learning from history, building the present and avoiding narratives on their "unescapable clash"

This paper examines the difficult relations between the biggest Asian states and the most populous countries in the world: China and India. Starting from the historical experiences of crisis and war, the study is focusing on the strategic culture and on the decision-makers' visions on their own state and the other one. In spite of the fact that both countries have peaceful official doctrines and try to normalize their relations, People Republic of China’s spectacular rise in power, its assertiveness concerning the borders, the support for Pakistan and some more or less accidental events like border violations, could precipitate an armed clash between the two Asian neighbors. The balance of power at the world level, with the USA and China oscilating between rivalry and cooperation, balance of power versus engagement, could determine India and China to reshape their strategies and policies on the long term

Realism between science and ideology

Sovereignty is defined as the external behaviour of a state personalized by its elite after gaining the consensus of the public. Seldom between decision making and public approval there are many intermediate actors such as lobbies and group interest. In a country such as USA many complain what they called the hijacking of public interest by particular lobby organizations. Stephen Walt’s and John Mearsheimer’s book, Israeli lobby and US foreign policy are some of these voices. Aggressively attack because of its supposedly anti-Semitic character, few have noticed its broader and more cerebral stake: that of raising a call for a realist and prudent American diplomacy, free from the temptation of tangling alliances and military unwanted adventures