Vladimir Putin and Central Asia: The Shaping of Russian Foreign Policy

by Lena Jonson

Overview

President Vladimir Putin's consent after September 11th to the deployment of Western forces in Central Asia and to the US military's use of Central Asian airfields during the US-led operations in Afghanistan represented a dramatic turban in Russian Central Asian policy. How and why did Russian policy change? Was this in part due to Russia's decline in influence on the international arena? Lena Jonson examines Putin's policy from 1999 to 2003 towards Afghanistan and the four key states that surround it - Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan and examines how Russia dealt with both the new security challenges of the region and increased foreign engagement. Vladimir Putin and Central Asia is the first book to discuss Russia's Central Asian policy and is vital reading for students, policy-makers and all those who are interested in this politically sensitive region.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781850436287
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	09/24/2004
Series:	Culture and Society in Western and Central Asia , #1
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.62(d)

About the Author

Lena Jonson is Associate Professor in Political Science and Senior Research Fellow at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs.

Table of Contents

Introduction
• Russian Central Asian Policy Under Putin
• Policy Change and Revision
• Russian Experiences of Foreign Policy Revision
• Under Gorbachev and Yeltsin
• Alexander Gorchakov as a Point of Reference
• Under Putin
• Central Asia in Russian Foreign Policy
• What Policy Change?
• The Way Problems and Concerns are Defined
• The Means of Policy
• The General Orientation
• Measuring Change
• Why This Policy Change?
• What Is Central Asia?
• The Structure of the Book
• PART I:BACKGROUND
• Chapter 2: Central Asia Gained: The Russian Conquest
• 1.Introduction
• Factors Behind Russia's Policy of Expansion into Central Asia
• Political-Strategic Factors
• Domestic Factors
• Economic Conditions Ideological Perceptions and the Policy-making Process
• The Conquest of Tashkent
• Policy Towards the Bukhara Emirate after the Crimean War
• Policy Towards the Bukhara Emirate after the 1868 Treaty
• Summary
• Central Asia Lost: Policy Under Yeltsin
• Introduction
• The Strategic Situation and the Russian Response
• The Security Situation in Central Asia and the Russian Response
• Tajikistan
• Uzbekistan
• Afghanistan
• An Evolving Anti-Extremist Agenda
• Summary
• PUTIN AND CENTRAL ASIA
• The Policy Change of 1999: 'Terrorism as the Issue'
• The Policy Shift
• Policy on Russian-led Multilateral Cooperation
• Policy on the Ground
• Uzbekistan
• Tajikistan
• Afghanistan
• Dilemmas for Russian Policy
• Policy towards the Major Powers in Central Asia
• Russia and the USA Russia and China Summary
• The Policy Change of 2001: 'The Anti-Terrorist Agenda Inverted
• 'The Shift
• A New Strategic Situation in Central Asia
• A New Security Situation in Central Asia
• Russian Policy and Multilateral Cooperation with Central Asian States
• Policy Towards Major Powers in Central Asia
• The Shanghai Cooperation Organization
• Russia and the USA
• Summary
• Post-September 2001: The Contours of a New Russian Policy
• Introduction
• Policy towards the Central Asian States
• Continued Interest in the Security Sector
• New Attention to the Economic sector
• A Common Energy Network
• Russian-led Economic Cooperation
• Improving Bilateral Relations
• Kyrgyzstan
• Turkmenistan
• Tajikistan UzbekistanPolicy Towards the USA
• The Test Case of the Iraq War
• Russian-US-Centrism: A Two Faces Policy?
• Summary
• UNDERSTANDING FOREIGN POLICY CHANGE
• Factors Behind Russia's Foreign Policy Change
• Russian Internal Factors
• The Chechnya Conflict
• The Foreign Policy-Making Process and Institutional Interests
• The Background: Foreign Policy Making Under Yeltsin
• Foreign Policy Making Since 2001
• Official Perceptions and Ideological Concepts
• On the Choice of Allies
• On the Great Power Role
• On Multipolarity and Multi-vector Policy
• Elite Attitudes
• External and Historical-Cultural Factors
• Summary
• New Challenges to Russian Policy: Dynamics of Domestic Protest in Central Asia
• Introduction
• The Secular-Political Dimension
• The Religious-Political Dimension
• The Ethno-National Dimension
• Summary
• CONCLUSIONS
• Explaining Change
• Change of Policy
• Why This Change? Possible Explanations
• The International Structure Explanation
• The Instrumental Explanation
• The Institutional Rivalry Explanation
• The Socialization Explanation
• Iraq: a Test Case
• The Shaping of a New Foreign Policy?
• Central Asian Security: Post-September 11, 2001
• Russian Policy in Central Asia: Post-September, 2001
• Prospects for the Further Revision of Russian Foreign Policy