Martin Kragh, Deputy Director of the Stockholm Centre for Eastern European Studies (SCEEUS) and Senior Research Fellow at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs, reviews Ingerid M. Opdahl's book, The Russian State and Russian Energy Companies, 1992–2018 (Routledge, 2020).
Abstract: What has Remained of the USSR – Exploring the Erosion of the Post-Soviet SpaceFlemming Splidsboel Hansen (Danish Institute for International Studies) reviews What has Remained of the USSR – Exploring the Erosion of the Post-Soviet Space, edited by Arkady Moshes and András Racz.
Abstract: Political Culture in the Baltic States. Between National and European IntegrationEglė Kesylytė-Alliks (researcher at Institute of International Relations and Political Science, Vilnius University) reviews Political Culture in the Baltic States. Between National and European Integration written by Kjetil Duvold, Sten Berglund and Joakim Ekman.
Emil Edenborg (Swedish Institute of International Affairs and Department of Ethnology, History of Religions and Gender Studies at Stockholm University) reviews The Shortest History of Russia: From the Vikings to the Present Day (Den korteste historien om Russland: fra vikingene til våre dager) by Peter Normann Waage (published in 2020 by Wigmostad & Bjorke).
This article begins by examining strategic culture studies, in particular Alan Bloomfield's concept of different sub-cultures in strategic culture. It then focuses on the border between Russia and Finland and how Finnish EU membership was made possible by Finland's decision not to challenge the WWII border treaty with the Soviet Union after the Soviet collapse. Next, it investigates the debates and public opinion relating to Finland's 1994 EU referendum, to see how the dynamics changed three strategic cultural sub-groups: "self-defence", "Westernisers" (including Western international organizations) and "Reassurance and Dialogue with Russia". In conclusion, it is argued that EU membership altered the hierarchy of these strategic culture sub-groups in Finland, as well as their substance. These changes were, however, more evolutionary than revolutionary.
Abstract: EU Actorness in the South Caucasus: Possibilities and LimitationsDespite significant institutional changes and refinements since its creation in 2004, the ENP (European Neighborhood Policy) remains a major tool available to the EU for providing incentives for reform and stability in non-member states through the diffusion of its norms and rules. Earlier studies, drawing on the Europeanization conceptual framework, have been mostly concerned about how and by which mechanisms compliance with EU rules takes place, rather than focusing on whether and to what extent it occurs. By contrast, this article assesses the actorness of the EU in three countries of the South Caucasus (Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan), viewing actorness as composed of three dimensions – capability, opportunity, and presence – enabling and constraining the aspirations of the EU to be an international actor in the South Caucasus.
Aksel V. Carlsen arbetade som forskare vid Institutet för internationella arbetarrörelsen under de två sista decennierna av den sovjetiska eran. I boken IMRD – min arbejdsplads i Moskva berättar han om kollegor, forskningsprojekt och den komplicerade relationen som institutet hade till den politiska regimen i det auktoritära sovjetsystemet. Ett intrikat nätverk mellan "sextitalisterna", som strävade efter socialistiska reformer av systemet, och de toppstyrda rigida politiska maktstrukturerna omgav och definierade IMRD:s verksamhet.
During the two final decades of the Soviet era, Aksel V. Carlsen worked as a researcher at the Institute for the International Labor Movement (IMRD). In IMRD – min arbejdsplads i Moskva (IMRD: my workplace in Moscow) he writes about colleagues, research activities and the institute's complicated interaction with the authoritarian Soviet regime. An intricate network existed between members of the 'sixties generation', who aimed at reforming the Soviet system, and the centralized rigid power structures – a network that enveloped and determined the work of the IMRD.
