Carnegie Moscow Center
In 2014, Russia broke out of the post–Cold War order and openly challenged the U.S.-led international system. Moscow’s new course is laid down first and foremost by President Vladimir Putin, but it also reflects the rising power of Russian nationalism.
Ukraine may be heading not toward federalization or decentralization, but feudalization. To avoid this, the focus should not only be on central, macro-level reforms but also on building civil society to make those larger reforms sustainable.
In the new ideological cleavage that has opened up between Vladimir Putin’s Russia and Western countries, one idea divides them like no other: the meaning of regime change.
U.S. foreign policy in a more difficult, intrusive world.
The financial troubles of the ruble represent the most striking and dangerous strategic challenge facing the Russian state since the conflict in Ukraine began.
In Donbas, there is mostly a tactical operation aimed at reinforcing rebel positions, not preparation for a full-fledged war. The West may not have a better solution than to accept to freeze Donbas for the winter.
The crisis in Ukraine has betrayed fault lines in the Visegrad Group. Unless Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic change course, the “golden age” of Central Europe may come to an end.
Over the next few years, the European Union will have to revamp its neighborhood policies completely. The ambition is not only to prevent state failure, but to help build functional political systems that can strive economically, provide essential services, guard individual freedoms, and maintain social peace.
Ukraine is not a cause, but a symbol of the serious and deepening crisis between the United States with its allies and Russia. As this crisis may become a permanent state, it is time for permanent crisis management.
The Ukrainian government retains the prerogative to exclude violators of public trust from further government service while new political and economic institutions are built. It remains to be seen how lustration and anti-corruption laws will be implemented.