On April 25, the Valdai Club hosted an expert panel discussion devoted to the Russian edition of a book by Samuel Charap and an international team of authors, titled “Rethinking the Regional Order for Post-Soviet Europe and Eurasia”.
For a long time, relations between Russia and the West were determined by a rivalry over former Soviet countries, especially Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Ukrainian crisis of 2014 clearly demonstrated the stark contrasts between the Russian and the Western approaches toward these post-Soviet republics in providing for security within Europe.
The authors of the book argue that these approaches damage the statehood of the post-Soviet countries, reinforce the atmosphere of a new Cold War in relations between Russia and the West for a long period of time, crush hopes for possible cooperation and weaken regional security. In their opinion, such a status quo does not meet the interests of the parties.
Are there alternatives to the current regional order in Europe and the post-Soviet space? Is it possible to reach a compromise in the future between Russia and the West and normalise this relationship? What are possible options for resolving the current conflict? The authors of the book and the guests answered these and many other questions.
Speakers:
Samuel Charap, senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation (co-author of the book);
Alexander Iskandaryan, Director, Caucasus Institute, Yerevan (via video link);
Yulia Nikitina, Associate Professor at the Department of World Political Processes, Research Fellow at the Centre for Post-Soviet Studies at MGIMO University (co-author of the book).
Moderator: