137 research outputs found
Elite opinion and foreign policy in post-communist Russia
Russian elite opinion on matters of foreign policy may be classified as âLiberal Westerniserâ, âPragmatic Nationalistâ and âFundamentalist Nationalistâ, terms that reflect longstanding debates about the countryâs relationship with the outside world. An analysis of press
statements and election manifestoes together with a programme of elite interviews between 2004 and 2006 suggests a clustering of opinion on a series of strategic issues. Liberal Westernisers seek the closest possible relationship with Europe, and favour eventual membership of the EU and NATO. Pragmatic Nationalists are more inclined to favour practical co-operation, and do not assume an identity of values or interests with the Western countries. Fundamentalist Nationalists place more emphasis on the other former Soviet republics, and on Asia as much as Europe, and see the West as a threat to Russian values as well as to its state interests. Each of these positions,
in turn, draws on an identifiable set of domestic constituencies: Liberal Westernisers on the promarket political parties, Pragmatic Nationalists on the presidential administration and defence and security ministries, and Fundamentalist Nationalists on the Orthodox Church and Communists
Russia and the Arab Spring: supporting the counter-revolution
Russiaâs response to the Arab Spring ranged from apprehension to deep anxiety and diverged significantly from the US and the EU responses. While initially
welcoming the popular demands for political reform in North Africa, the Russian reaction rapidly became more critical as a result of Western military intervention into Libya and the threat of the spread of Islamist extremism. It was these twin fears which prompted the Russian leadership to adopt an uncompromizing stance towards Syria. While geopolitical factors certainly played a role in driving Russian strategy, domestic political factors were also more significant. As the Russian leadership felt internally threatened by the growing opposition within the country, conflict in the
Middle East highlighted the perceived flaws of the imposition of Western liberal democracy and the virtues of Russiaâs own model of state-managed political order.
There was, as such, a significant ideational and ideological dimension to the Russian response to the Arab Spring
Russiaâs Eurasian past, present and future: rival international societies and Moscowâs place in the post-cold war world
The failure of post-Soviet Russia to integrate into the West became
evident with the 2014 Ukraine crisis, leading Moscow to accelerate
its declared âpivot to the Eastâ. However, the increased dependence
on China carries its own risks, such as the danger of becoming
Beijingâs junior partner. For an erstwhile superpower that
continues to declare and prize its autonomy in international
affairs, this is a particularly unappealing prospect. Thus, it remains
to be seen whether a genuinely balanced partnership can exist
between both countries. This article uses insights from Adam
Watsonâs pendulum theory to explore Russiaâs post-2014 Eurasian
predicament. We argue that the rapid rightward swing of the
pendulum in the Euro-Atlantic order following the end of the Cold
War has proven indigestible for Moscow. The article then moves
to discuss the Sino-Russian relationship in the context of the
emerging Eurasian space. It concludes that the growing
disillusionment of Russian leaders with the West since the 2000s,
along with the normative convergence between Moscow and
Beijing, has led to a closer partnership between the two. Yet the
partnership is also riddled with a number of insecurities on
Moscowâs side that could undermine the long-term prospects for
cooperation between Russia and China
Normative resistance to responsibility to protect in times of emerging multipolarity: the cases of Brazil and Russia
This article assesses the normative resistance to Responsibility to Protect adopted by Brazil and Russia against the backdrop of their international identities and self-assigned roles in a changing global order. Drawing upon the framework of Bloomsfield's norm dynamics role spectrum, it argues that while the ambiguous Russian role regarding this principle represents an example of 'norm antipreneurship', particularities of Brazil's resistance are better grasped by a new category left unaccounted for by this model, which this study portrays as 'contesting entrepreneur'.- (undefined
Development of the parallel algorithm for dynamic control system of a manipulation robot
In this article the calculable-intensive algorithms of direct and reverse decision of the task dynamics of manipulation robot were considered. To accelerate the task computation the heuristic multiprocessor system model was proposed. Parallel algorithms and processor structures were integrated in the decision model of direct and reverse dynamics tasks which has the common memory blocks. These processor structures were illustrated. The system was simulated for the direct and reverse dynamics tasks. The estimates of the computation acceleration and the changes in the system cost were obtained
Experimental Results of Hydrogen Distillation at the Low Power Cryogenic Column for the Production of Deuterium Depleted Hydrogen
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