Russia and the European Union: The Sources and Limits of "Special Relationships"

Authored by Dr. Cynthia A Roberts.

February 2007

141 Pages

Brief Synopsis

Russia and the West have avoided renewed confrontation despite many post Cold War crises, but illiberal trends in Russia rule out any prospect of developing a mutual agenda for closer integration. Russian engagement with the leading Euro-Atlantic institutions on a special, but still subordinate, nonmember basis remains a clever yet suboptimal substitute. Such relationships, as this monograph about Russia and the European Union explains, tend to produce shallow collaboration, symbolic summitry and costly standoffs. Closer cooperation is blocked by an ongoing dispute over terms, which is rooted in asymmetries in power, ambivalent preferences, uncertainty about the distributional costs and benefits of deeper engagement, and Russia’s continued unwillingness or inability to lock-in the liberal domestic structures necessary to make credible commitments. Moscow’s renewed self-confidence and geopolitical ambitions, bolstered by sustained economic growth and high energy prices, complicate the bargaining and further strain these special relationships which persist for lack of a realistic, superior alternative.

Summary

More than 15 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union and two decades after the last Soviet President, Mikhail Gorbachev, raised hopes that Russia would liberalize and join a common European home, Moscow again resorts to authoritarian means amid the continuing absence of a mutual agenda for Russia’s integration into Western institutions. Since the end of the Cold War, Russia and the West have averted renewed confrontation but managed only to craft a series of half-formed, suboptimal partnerships—with the European Union (EU), the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and the Group of 7—in which Russia is neither anchored by democratic rules nor fully excluded by Western institutions. These “special relationships,” which have been often turbulent, are now seriously strained by Russia’s stronger geopolitical position, boosted by sustained high economic growth and market power in energy, and newly-emboldened rulers, who seek to renegotiate terms.

Why did “special relationships” materialize between Russia and the dominant Euro-Atlantic institutions instead of a Concert of Europe, a Cold Peace, full integration into Western institutions, direct confrontation, or a different outcome? How durable is the present, second best equilibrium? Which factors would increase the prospects for a mutually-beneficial agenda for integration? What are the risks that a more authoritarian and nationalist Russia will grow defiant and revanchist over its unfavorable terms of engagement, leading not to closer cooperation but a reemergence of two Europes, one led by the EU and NATO as the core and the other centered on Russia, relegated to the periphery and tempted to act as a spoiler and a closer ally of rogue regimes in Eurasia and elsewhere?

This monograph, which focuses on Russia and the EU, explains why such special relationships tend to produce shallow collaboration, symbolic summitry, and costly standoffs. It underscores the bargaining problems which block closer cooperation in areas of mutual interest, from managing energy interdependence, instability in the Balkans, and nuclear proliferation in the Middle East, to negotiating a new partnership and cooperation agreement. The ongoing disputes are over terms, not just enforcement, and rooted in asymmetries in power, uncertainty about the distributional costs and benefits of engagement, and mistrust generated by Russia’s continued unwillingness or inability to lock-in the liberal domestic structures necessary to make credible commitments or converge to European norms.

Domestic interests and political veto players further work against deep cooperation. Russia’s autocrats and dominant elites who gain phenomenal wealth from their positions of power have a stake in a nontransparent, illiberal Russian state and eschew international agreements requiring strict conditionality and accountability. Russia even has shown its willingness to cut the flow of energy supplies to two key transit states, Ukraine and Belarus, over price disputes, notwithstanding the disruptions to its EU customers farther west. For its part, the EU often is unable to impose discipline on the national politics and domestic interests of 27 member states, making it easier for Moscow to cut myopic, bilateral deals such as the German-Russian energy cartel which is building a gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea, bypassing Ukraine and Poland, which depend heavily on Russia for energy. Warsaw, in turn, has been willing to use its EU veto to block the start of negotiations on a new EU-Russia partnership and cooperation treaty, underscoring political and economic disputes with Moscow. For both the Europeans and Russians, mistrust persists, and both sides are profoundly ambivalent about the desirability of deepening their relationship. Thus, it remains to be seen whether Russia’s special relationships with the EU and other Euro-Atlantic institutions will succumb to the negative pressures or persist in their present imperfect form for lack of a realistic, superior alternative.

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