The Russian Federation in front of the 21st century security challenges: Cooperation or confrontation

Abstract

The past two decades have led to dramatic changes in Russian foreign policy, shifting it from post- communist democratization to the path of aggressive revisionism and confrontation with the West. These changes are, to greater degree, regarded with Russian President Vladimir Putin's strategic vision on Russia's future. Since 2007, Russian revisionist foreign actions progressively led to confrontation with the West, which culminated in March 2014 amid Russian annexation of Crimea. The work discusses a number of aspects the Russia-West confrontation such as economic sanctions, nuclear proliferation, proxy wars and current rapidly evolving military escalation at the Ukrainian borders. This also includes Russia's security demands presented to the United States and NATO on 17 December 2021. Simultaneously, this work attempts to connect the role of Western sanctions in worsening of domestic issues inside of Russia such as declining demography, poverty and corruption. In addition, the thesis indicates unnecessary securitization of the Russia- West and Russia-NATO relationships. At the same time, the thesis attempts to show a number of the structural level threats that should be securitized by Russia. These challenges are growing Pan- Turkism and risks of strategic partnership with China, which may pose a...