The Eurasian Project And Europe

This book explains the historical and philosophical understanding of Eurasia and its current relevance to the formation of the Eurasian Union. It considers Eurasia's historical underpinnings, and its current economic, political and geo-strategic relevance in world politics.

Regional associations have become major players in international politics and economics. The Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), composed of Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan, is considered as a player which will strengthen the international influence and international trade of the post-socialist countries. It is intended to become a parallel association to the European Union. This comprehensive volume considers the potential global role of the EEU. A major problem outlined is the balancing of relations between the EU and the West on the one hand, and China and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation on the other. The book explores the impact of the global crisis as well as a consideration of the EEU in the world system of states. It also examines the EEU’s relationship with other regional developments, in relation to the EU and to the outer circle of post-socialist states that joined neither the EU nor the EEU. It concludes by considering Eurasia in the Asian context, looking at the two central Asian countries (Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan), relations with China and the relationship between the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and the EEU. This book was originally published as a special issue of European Politics and Society.

This book explains the historical and philosophical understanding of Eurasia and its current relevance to the formation of the Eurasian Union. It considers Eurasia's historical underpinnings, and its current economic, political and geo-strategic relevance in world politics.

As Eurasia and the adjacent territories become more important to the world, there is increasing interest from international powers, accompanied by attempts to give institutional form to traditional economic and security links within the region. This book includes a range of substantive work from scholars based in the region, offering contrasting perspectives on the process of Eurasian integration and its place in the world. Chapters consider economic, political, social and security developments, with notable studies of the major countries involved in the development of the Eurasian Economic Union. The work also examines the connections between the region and China, greater Asia and the European Union. It outlines the varying dynamics, with populations growing in Central Asia while at best stagnant elsewhere. The book discusses the increasing strategic significance of the region and explores how the new post-Soviet states are growing in national cohesion and political self-confidence. Above all, the book examines the concept of ’Eurasia’, outlining the debates about the concept and how various aspects of the legacy of ‘Eurasianism’ contribute to contemporary plans for integration. The book argues that although regional integration is very much a popular idea in our age, with the potential for economic benefits and increased international influence, in practice contemporary projects for Eurasian integration have been highly ambiguous and contested. Nevertheless, significant steps have been taken towards the creation of the Eurasian Economic Union. The book analyses developments to date, noting the achievements as well as the challenges.

Modern trends in geopolitics have raised serious questions about the future global and regional architecture of the world system. In the case of the Eurasian Economic Union, these questions bring up important issues for debate: What is the Eurasian Economic Union? What theoretical concepts could be applied for modern Eurasian integration? Why is the Eurasian Economic Union forming? Most importantly, what prospects does this Union have in the framework of the modern geopolitical situation? This book explores the process of Eurasian integration in the modern global world. The creation of the Eurasian Economic Union has become a topical issue in modern Russian foreign policy. Neo-Eurasianist ideas can be viewed as a geopolitical basis and rationale for the Eurasian Economic Union that may constitute an integrational structure, consolidating the post-Soviet area and neighboring regions. This book argues that Eurasia is a region representing an organic integrity due to close mentality, common and centuries-long history, common language of international communication, a multitude of economic ties, and an identical level of technological development across all countries within the post-Soviet area. Yet, advancement of the Eurasian integration idea into practical implementation should have new objective suppositions as well. These are defined by the contemporary economic, political, and ethno-cultural processes in the post-Soviet space.

This book explains the historical and philosophical understanding of Eurasia and its current relevance to the formation of the Eurasian Union. It considers Eurasia's historical underpinnings, and its current economic, political and geo-strategic relevance in world politics.

This volume examines Russian discourses of regionalism as a source of identity construction practices for the country's political and intellectual establishment. The overall purpose of the monograph is to demonstrate that, contrary to some assumptions, the transition trajectory of post-Soviet Russia has not been towards a liberal democratic nation state that is set to emulate Western political and normative standards. Instead, its foreign policy discourses have been constructing Russia as a supranational community which transcends Russia's current legally established borders. The study undertakes a systematic and comprehensive survey of Russian official (authorities) and semi-official (establishment affiliated think tanks) discourse for a period of seven years between 2007 and 2013. This exercise demonstrates how Russia is being constructed as a supranational entity through its discourses of cultural and economic regionalism. These discourses associate closely with the political project of Eurasian economic integration and the "Russian world" and "Russian civilization" doctrines. Both ideologies, the geoeconomic and culturalist, have gained prominence in the post-Crimean environment. The analysis tracks down how these identitary concepts crystallized in Russia's foreign policies discourses beginning from Vladimir Putin's second term in power.

A bold, eye-opening account of the coming integration of Europe and Asia Weaving together history, diplomacy, and vivid personal narratives from his overland journey across Eurasia from Baku to Samarkand, Vladivostok to Beijing, Bruno Maçães provides a fascinating portrait of the shifting borderlands between Europe and Asia, tracking the economic integration of the two continents into a new supercontinent: Eurasia. As Maçães demonstrates, glimpses of the coming Eurasianism are already visible in China’s bold infrastructure project reopening the historic Silk Road, in the success of cities like Hong Kong and Singapore, in Turkey’s increasing global role, and in shifting U.S. foreign policy toward Europe and Asia. This insightful and clarifying book argues that the artificial separation of the world’s largest island cannot hold.

In today's world, interstate wars are fairly rare--but when they happen, they tend to be more complicated than in the past, combining regional causes with the involvement of external actors as well. This book looks at that problem in the wake of the post-Soviet withdrawal of Russia from involvement in Eastern Europe and the destabilization of regimes in Africa, the Middle East, and the Near East. What do these changes mean for the possibility of establishing peace and security in Europe's future? What role will the growth of nationalism and populism play in those efforts? And what forms should the relationship between Europe and Russia take? Core Europe and Greater Eurasia addresses these questions and many more, assessing our current moment and looking ahead.

Between Europe and Asia analyzes the origins and development of Eurasianism, an intellectual movement that proclaimed the existence of Eurasia, a separate civilization coinciding with the former Russian Empire. The essays in the volume explore the historical roots, the heyday of the movement in the 1920s, and the afterlife of the movement in the Soviet and post-Soviet periods. The first study to offer a multifaceted account of Eurasianism in the twentieth century and to touch on the movement's intellectual entanglements with history, politics, literature, or geography, this book also explores Eurasianism's influences beyond Russia. The Eurasianists blended their search for a primordial essence of Russian culture with radicalism of Europe's interwar period. In reaction to the devastation and dislocation of the wars and revolutions, they celebrated the Orthodox Church and the Asian connections of Russian culture, while rejecting Western individualism and democracy. The movement sought to articulate a non-European, non-Western modernity, and to underscore Russia's role in the colonial world. As the authors demonstrate, Eurasianism was akin to many fascist movements in interwar Europe, and became one of the sources of the rhetoric of nationalist mobilization in Vladimir Putin's Russia. This book presents the rich history of the concept of Eurasianism, and how it developed over time to achieve its present form.