Russian Foreign Policy, 2000-2011: From Nation-State to Global Risk Sharing

Abstract

Russian foreign policy thinking has evolved significantly in recent years. Defined throughout the 1990s by a notable lack of any clearly defined strategic course, there is now a clear vision of the type of global order that Russia wants. Russian foreign policy thinking is reaching far beyond traditional realism to embrace global risk sharing, although the extent to which the country ought to embrace a truly global security agenda is still hotly debated. Too little attention has been paid in the West to this intellectual evolution, and to what it says about Russia's long term foreign policy goals.

Keywords: CIS, Dmitry Medvedev, Energy policy, Global risk sharing, Russian foreign policy, Russian national security policy, Sovereign democracy, Vladimir Putin