Interview with Georgy Kutyrev
The following is an interview with Georgy Kutyrev, a senior researcher of the laboratory, a candidate of political sciences, an expert in European security, political parties in modern Portugal and Spain, and democratic transits in Europe and Latin America.
– Georgy, let's start with a few words about yourself: where are you from, where did you study and work, and also share with us your impressions about work at the Higher School of Economics.
– I was born and raised in Moscow as my parents and my grandparents. So I can consider myself as a native Muscovite. In 2010, I graduated from the Russian State University for the Humanities (RSUH) with a degree in International Relations. Then I entered graduate school and five years later I defended my thesis on the topic “Political parties of Spain and Portugal in the context of neoinstitutional transformation”. Simultaneously to my postgraduate studies, I began working as a research assistant at the Institute of Scientific Information in Social Sciences (INION RAS) in the Department of Europe and America. In total, I worked at the Institute for Scientific Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences for 6 years and was promoted to senior researcher. In addition, I worked for about three years as a senior lecturer in the Culture of Peace and Democracy Department at the RSUH. I transferred to HSE due to the Postdoctoral Fellowship Program. At the moment I am working as a research assistant at the International Laboratory on the World Order and New Regionalism. I am very pleased with my position, team, and the boss represented by Professor A. Lukin and those tasks that I directly solve.
– Tell us briefly about your research interests: what you are doing at the moment, and what are your research plans.
- Nowadays, I am working on a chapter for a next collective monograph jointly with the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Institute of World Economy and International Relations in which I analyse in detail problems and challenges faced by the modern European security system. In addition, I participate together with colleagues from the Laboratory in the implementation of the RFBR grant on the topic of «Security Architecture in “Greater Eurasia”: current situation, prospects and opportunities for Russia”. On March 15, 2019, my colleagues from the Institute of Europe and I will organize an international scientific conference "Russia and the EAEU between East and West: Development and Modernization in a Changing Geopolitical Environment." My colleagues and I also plan to submit applications for several more competitions, which are arranged by the RFBR together with ANO EISI and to the Russian Science Foundation.
- You have recently published your first monograph. In this regard, could you tell us what this monograph is and what questions it examines.
- On February 21, at the laboratory research seminar, I presented a collective monograph “The European Union: Risks and Challenges of the Current Stage of Political Evolution”, which I wrote together with colleagues from the RSUH (N.A. Yeshushevsky, G.M. Mikhaleva, M.A. Gordeeva). Among the key topics covered in the monograph, the following issues should be highlighted: the integrated challenges and risks system analysis of European Union sustainable development, the united Europe migration and security policies consideration, the analysis of party system development practices and transformation in European states, European cultural integration and common historical memory of European peoples, a tolerance culture and a gender issue, as well as the aspect of cooperation between the EU and Russia, including in the context of implementing the Eastern Partnership. Specifically, I have two chapters that consider the European security system evolution from 1945 to 2014.
– In addition to working in the laboratory, you also teach. Share with us your impressions about working with students, tell us what kind of teacher you are, and what kind of activity you are closer to in general: teaching or research.
– I have been teaching for three years already: I started at the RSUH, now at HSE. I would say that I am equally pleased to do research and teach. I see this as an important balance of work with myself and with the audience. Quite often, as a lecture, I read the texts of my scientific articles in order to get feedback from such a demanding audience as students. As for impressions, they are mostly positive: HSE students have established themselves as hardworking, executive, and inquisitive colleagues. I was overwhelmingly glad that almost all the students of the four groups who had classes came to them were perfectly prepared for the seminars. The average test showed that about 80% percent of students got “good” and “excellent” marks. This indicates their high level of training.
– Tell us about your further professional plans.
- Of course, my main task remains to continue working with HSE on an ongoing basis. I planning continue to become a full-time teacher (assistant professor) at International Relations Department, defend my doctoral thesis on European security and become a leading expert in this field.
– Georgy, you are also a huge cinephile. So could you please recommend your favorite films that are worth seeing.
- I really respect experimental cinema and art-house, and therefore my favorite film directors are (those who now are considered as mainstream) David Lynch, David Cronenberg, Stanley Kubrick, Las Von Trier, Ingmar Bergman, Takeshi Kitano and Andrei Tarkovsky. Of the recent, I would advise to watch Lars Von Trier’s scandalous film “The House That Jack Built”, which raise the question of the existence of Evil and its justification. As for the classic films, it is, of course: “The Seventh Seal”, “Highway to Nowhere”, “A Clockwork Orange”, “Solaris” and “Stalker”.