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Regular version of the site

Lecture of Richard Sakwa on the topic «Reflections on Post-Cold War International Order»

Event ended

The International Laboratory of World Order and New Regionalism invites you on February 22 at 5 p.m.to visit an open lecture of Richard Sakwa on the topic «Reflections on Post-Cold War International Order».

In the quarter century of the cold peace after 1989 none of the fundamental issues of European security and the management of global affairs was resolved. As far as the ‘victors’ were concerned, there was not a problem. The despotic system of European communism had dissolved and its associated geopolitical power system had disintegrated, allowing the former ‘captive states’ to exercise their sovereign choice to align with the Atlantic community. If Russia did not like this, then that was its problem, and reflected Russia’s failure to complete its democratic transformation and its ill-founded and intemperate claims to be a ‘great power’, a status warranted neither by its economic weight nor its social power. However, as far as Russia was concerned, a unique opportunity to reshape the European security system and the quality of international politics at the end of the Cold War has been squandered. With the end of the long-term contestation between the rival ideologies of revolutionary socialism and market capitalism the era of contesting blocs could have been transcended at the global level, while domestically there was the opportunity to create a new cross-class alliance for democracy, peace and development. Instead, the struggle for power, status and resources simply took new forms. This was another of the ‘lost alternatives’ that shapes our era.

Richard Sakwa is Professor of Russian and European Politics at the University of Kent at Canterbury and an Associate Fellow of the Russia and Eurasia Programme at the Royal Institute of International Affairs, Chatham House. He has published widely on Soviet, Russian, European and post-communist affairs.

The lecture will be held on February 22, 5 p.m.

Address: 17 Malaya Ordinka St., room 315

The working language is English.

If you need a pass to the HSE, please write to:yshubin@hse.ru, Yury Shubin