Russian President Vladimir Putin’s policy toward his country’s “near abroad” and the West has been badly misunderstood. Instead of focusing on broader geopolitical patterns – in particular, the effect of the 2007-08 financial crisis on global politics – commentators have been turning Kremlin policy into a psychodrama that can be understood only through a deep exploration of the Russian soul.
The result has been rampant misconceptions about what drove Putin’s shift from what seemed to be a modernising, conciliatory, and even pro-Western stance to aggressive revisionism.
Two such flawed explanations for Russia’s current foreign policy have been offered. The first, proposed by …read more
Source: European Voice
