Russia's Foreign Policy: the Internal
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RUSSIA’S FOREIGN POLICY FOREIGN RUSSIA’S XXXXXXXX Andemus, cont? Giliis. Fertus por aciendam ponclem is at ISPI. omantem atuidic estius, nos modiertimiu consulabus RUSSIA’S FOREIGN POLICY: vivissulin voctum lissede fenducient. Andius isupio uratient. THE INTERNAL- Founded in 1934, ISPI is Actu sis me inatquam te te te, consulvit rei firiam atque a an independent think tank committed to the study of catis. Benterri er prarivitea nit; ipiesse stiliis aucto esceps, INTERNATIONAL LINK international political and Catuit depse huiumum peris, et esupimur, omnerobus economic dynamics. coneque nocuperem moves es vesimus. edited by Aldo Ferrari and Eleonora Tafuro Ambrosetti It is the only Italian Institute Iter ponsultorem, ursultorei contern ultortum di sid C. Marbi introduction by Paolo Magri – and one of the very few in silictemqui publint, Ti. Teatquit, videst auderfe ndiissendam Europe – to combine research Romnesidem simaximium intimus, ut et; eto te adhui activities with a significant publius conlostam sultusquit vid Cate facteri oriciamdi, commitment to training, events, ompec morterei iam pracion tum mo habem vitus pat veri and global risk analysis for senaributem apecultum forte hicie convo, que tris. Serum companies and institutions. pra intin tant. ISPI favours an interdisciplinary Bonertum inatum et rem sus ilicaedemus vid con tum and policy-oriented approach made possible by a research aur, conenit non se facia movere pareis, vo, vistelis re, crei team of over 50 analysts and terae movenenit L. Um prox noximod neritiam adeffrestod an international network of 70 comnit. Mulvis Ahacciverte confenit vat. Romnihilii issedem universities, think tanks, and acchuiu scenimi liescipio vistum det; hacrurorum, et, research centres. uteropterfin nirtus. Erit poremum hos rem dem se in In the 2020 “Global Go To Think Tank Index Report” edited by the University of Pennsylvania, ISPI ranked first among 153 Italian think tanks. ISPI was also chosen as “Centre of excellence” for topping one of the categories of the ranking for three years straight, in 2018-2020. euro 12,00 RUSSIA’S FOREIGN POLICY THE INTERNAL- INTERNATIONAL LINK edited by Aldo Ferrari and Eleonora Tafuro Ambrosetti © 2021 Ledizioni LediPublishing Via Antonio Boselli, 10 – 20136 Milan – Italy www.ledizioni.it [email protected] Russia’s Foreign Policy: The Internal-International Link Edited by Aldo Ferrari and Eleonora Tafuro Ambrosetti First edition: May 2021 Image cover by Francesco Fadani Print ISBN 9788855264907 ePub ISBN 9788855264914 Pdf ISBN 9788855264921 DOI 10.14672/55264907 ISPI. Via Clerici, 5 20121, Milan www.ispionline.it Catalogue and reprints information: www.ledizioni.it This Report is realized with the support of the Policy Planning Unit of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation pursuant to art. 23-bis of Presidential Decree 18/1967. The opinions contained in this Report are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation and ISPI. Table of Contents Introduction Paolo Magri............................................................................................. 7 1. Influential or Irrelevant? The Role of Foreign Policy Think Tanks in Russia Alexander Graef........................................................................... 12 2. Domestic Lobbyists and Conservatism in Russian Foreign Policy Alicja Curanović.......................................................................... 37 3. The Liberals and Liberalism in Russia: Who is Dead, Who is Alive? Andrei Kolesnikov....................................................................... 65 4. The Czars of Russian Middle East Policies Marianna Belenkaya, Polina I. Vasilenko................... 83 5. Russian “Alternative” in sub-Saharan Africa: A Challenge to Western Liberalism Maxim Matusevich................................................................... 114 Conclusions Aldo Ferrari, Eleonora Tafuro Ambrosetti......................... 142 About the Authors......................................................................... 146 Introduction What drives Russia’s foreign policy in Vladimir Putin’s times? Why did the Kremlin decide to annex Crimea, occupy South Ossetia, intervene in Syria, or give its blessing to Nord Stream II? Which are the most important groups affecting Moscow’s foreign policy decisions? And are Putin and his entourage more swayed by domestic or international developments? More than two decades into Putin’s rise as Russia’s uncontested leader, many facets of the country’s foreign policy decisions remain obscure, shrouded under a thin veil of vagueness and secrecy. And sure, the criteria followed by leaders and their aides in foreign policy choices may change over time and place, so that many of us looking for simple explanations will often be left wanting. However, the fascination with how Russia has been able to punch above its weight for over a decade now, being able to play its part as one of the main powers in the current international system, is well founded. The fact that we are still left in the dark over the interplay of domestic and international factors in Russia’s major foreign policy decisions is therefore problematic, as the “mystery” surrounding such actions lends itself to being either romanticized or outright condemned, but often lacks objective analysis. A case in point is the recent poisoning and, later, incarceration of Alexei Navalny, Russia’s most famous opposition leader. Were it not for Moscow’s sporadic but ruthless crackdowns against dissent (and, over the past year, the relentlessness with which the regime went after a specific person), it could be 8 Russia’s Foreign Policy: The Internal-International Link argued that Navalny would not have become an international martyr, instead remaining a prominent but not too powerful opponent. Moscow’s choice of a hard stance has not only dented Putin’s stability at home, but appears to have undermined its own prospects at reconciliation with the West – at least in the short term. Indeed, just a few weeks before the release of this Report, G7 leaders went out of their way to condemn “Russia’s irresponsible and destabilising behaviour”, explicitly mentioning Navalny’s poisoning and noting “with regret the deterioration in Russia’s relations with Western countries”. As the Navalny affair unfolded, in February this year, another coup de theatre left foreign observers puzzled. As the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, visited Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov seized on the opportunity to label the EU an “unreliable partner”, sending European diplomacy into a spin. It was the same phrase that the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, had used to label Trump’s United States in 2017, plunging transatlantic relations to their lowest point in decades, and Lavrov probably knew this. Most importantly, it was unexpected. Lavrov’s decision to condemn the EU arrived at one of the most delicate times in relations between Brussels and Moscow over the past few years. Russia could have leveraged Borrell’s visit, coming on the heels of Navalny’s incarceration, as an attempt to open a new window for dialogue with the EU. Instead, it chose to “bite” Borrell’s extended hand. These two recent cases highlight how unpredictable these decisions may appear to “untrained eyes”. This Report is an attempt to do just that: to shed some light on Russia’s foreign policy decision making, highlighting the links between internal and international factors, and showing how their interplay can explain (at least in part) decisions that might have been considered surprising beforehand. Alexander Graef kicks off the discussion posing a very relevant question: to what extent do Russian foreign policy think tanks manage to have an impact on their country’s Introduction 9 foreign policy-making process? The question of impact does not only affect Russian foreign policy think tanks, of course; as a matter of fact, it haunts most of the world’s think tanks, which sometimes fail to influence policy-makers – or even to deliver their policy recommendations to them. Yet, the informal nature of Russian politics exacerbates this failure, as well as posing methodological issues for the researchers trying to analyse this issue. Graef argues that, despite the comparatively high number of Russian think tanks, few of them have real impact. Their political prominence is linked to their personal access to the president and the staff of his administration. Even in that case, being close to Putin does not automatically imply influence. Instead, the political volatility deriving from the characteristics of the Russian regime often leads to the existence of multiple interest groups within the administration. The Russian Orthodox Church is arguably much more successful than think tanks in influencing Russian diplomacy and in its role in promoting conservatism in Russian foreign policy. The Church’s bilateral cooperation with the Kremlin has been on the rise for some years now, to the point that critics argue that it became a “propaganda machine”. But Alicja Curanović shows in her chapter how the Church-State relationship is more complex than it seems. She emphasises the often-unnoticed dynamic nature of conservatism in Russian politics, which has been evolving for over a decade. After a description of conservatism in contemporary Russian politics, her chapter touches upon the domestic factors affecting