Part Two: Russia’s Strategy: A Course Toward Multipolarity
Chapter V: Official Doctrines and Concepts
The Russian Federation’s Foreign Policy Concept:
The Goal Is Nothing; the Process Is Everything
The current official Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation, approved by the president in early July 2000, is definitely an improvement over the previous Concept of 1993. At least it contains no illusions about the stability of the world, it identifies directly the “authors of challenges” (the USA), and it features for the first time an appeal to proceed from the state’s capabilities in working toward specific foreign policy objectives.
Nonetheless, I must state that not one single goal or objective included in this Concept will ever be accomplished. The main reason is that it presents a distorted picture of the world and betrays a lack of understanding of the financial mechanism for implementing foreign policy. It’s not surprising because the Concept was written by people clearly unfamiliar with theories of international relations. This means that they are used to working with words, sometimes terms, but not notions and categories. For the Russian frame of mind, it is a natural type of thinking that probably can’t be escaped. I will attempt to point out some incongruities in this Concept and develop my arguments in subsequent chapters. Let me start with one “detail” related to the “concept of a Concept.” In the beginning, it says: “The highest priority of Russia’s foreign policy course is protection of the interests of the individual, society, and state.” This silliness is repeated, as noted above, in almost all official documents. The individual, the society, and the state as political phenomena actually find themselves in different political fields. The foreign policy course cannot possibly protect the individual’s interests because this course and the individual’s interests are not directly interconnected. Related to these interests are social policy, legal policy, and economic policy, but not foreign policy.
Protection of society through the state’s foreign policy course is even worse nonsense. This thing is only possible in “real socialism,” when the state and the society are in natural harmony and, at some stage, simply become one. Under a capitalist system, when the society is split into classes, as in Russia, or into strata, as in the West, in the system of “the golden billion”—state and society are in a state of constant struggle. Therefore, the state’s interests most of the time don’t coincide with the interests of at least part of the society. This is especially true of foreign policy. It is embarrassing even to have to repeat these ABCs.
It follows that the foreign policy course can only reflect the interests of the state. In the case of contemporary Russia, they are the interests of the state-oligarchic capitalism. It is no use trying to pass off black as red. The above quote should read like this: “The highest priority of Russia’s foreign policy course is defense of the state’s interests.” These foreign policy interests should then be detailed.
The Concept presents a distorted picture of international relations. In one of the paragraphs, it says that the process is under way of developing “regional and sub-regional integration in Europe, the Asia-Pacific region, Africa, and Latin America.” In fact, apart from Western Europe, there is no integration anywhere; there is only a trend toward integration in North America (through the mechanism of NAFTA) and in East Asia. The “APR” as an integral region simply doesn’t exist in the economic or the political sense. Talk of integration in Africa or Latin America is evidence of either complete lack of understanding of economic trends in these regions or failure to understand the difference between the notions “integration” and “internationalization.” Judging by the Concept, the authors don’t know what globalization is, either.
What do the authors have to say about the USA and the already tiresome subject of multipolarity? “The trend is strengthening toward the creation of a unipolar world structure, with economic and power domination by the USA.” In reality, as I have already said above, this is not a trend at all, but an established objective fact. This fact is not camouflaged in any way; it is openly stated in all of Washington’s strategic documents. This is reality, not just words; it will be demonstrated with figures below.
Here’s another remarkable sentence: “Russia will act toward forming a multipolar system of international relations that will realistically reflect the many facets of the modern world with its diversity of interests.” Some progress can be seen here compared to the assessments of the previous Concept that maintained that we already live in a multipolar world. In reality, it matters not at all whether Russia, China, or any other nation strives for multipolarity because the world is evolving toward geostrategic global bipolarity. The multipolar periods in history came to an end after World War II. Should anyone try to restore multipolarity artificially, one should be prepared for more frequent regional wars and military conflicts because multipolarity is the least stable system of international relations. A perfunctory glance at the history of the last two centuries suffices.
The intent to counteract the USA by helping form a multipolar world in reality will amount to helping Washington preserve its hegemony in the world because the “struggle” for multipolarity will lead to further waste and fragmentation of the “combatants’” resources, weakening them. The waste of resources is implied in the choice of foreign policy directions; they encompass all regions and subregions and all world problems. What is the rationale for developing economic relations with Africa, Latin America, and ASEAN countries thousands of kilometers away from Russia? We are unable to exert influence on them because trade with us accounts for no more than 1 percent of their foreign commerce. Those regions’ shares in Russia’s foreign trade are equally minuscule (about the same 1 percent) except for imports from Brazil (2 percent). The benefits of this trade are negligible when compared to the costs of conducting it (even the transportation costs alone, with fuel costs over enormous distances).
More on this topic: Why does Russia participate in 2,000 international organizations? What benefits did it ever acquire from participation in APEC? What is the payback for the annual PACE dues of $35 million? And so on, and so forth.
What objective is the state pursuing when it sends its “peacekeeping forces” to Africa (Sierra Leone, for instance), to Kosovo, and other hot spots? Is “enlightenment” the only goal? What is the price of this enlightenment? The answer offered is this: “It makes economic sense for Russia to send its peacekeepers to hot spots. First, it reduces the country’s UN dues. Second, our servicemen get to make some money for themselves.”78 The latter reason is probably the main one. What is the developed countries’ approach? The same newspaper reports: “The USA, France, and Great Britain responded negatively to the UN Secretary General’s request that they send their troops to help resolve the conflict in Sierra Leone. They referred to the spending limitations of their state budgets and their reluctance to get involved in conflicts of insignificant scale.” What a paradox: Americans have “budget limitations,” while Russia, whose budget is about the size of a large city’s budget in America, has no such “limitations.”
Speaking in principle, one can include any kind of goals and objectives in a Concept. But they will remain empty talk if one doesn’t indicate the cost of implementing these plans. Actually, the Concept itself contains a most reasonable appeal: “A successful foreign policy of the Russian Federation must be based on maintaining a reasonable balance between the objectives and the means for their accomplishment. The concentration of political-diplomatic, military, economic, financial, and other means for accomplishing foreign policy objectives must be commeasurable with their real importance to Russia’s national interests, and the scope of participation in international affairs must be adequate to its actual contribution to the strengthening of our country’s position.” Exactly. Unfortunately, these thoughts were not reflected at all even in the formulation of objectives and announced goals. To accomplish these, the sums allocated in the state budget must be increased not just by one order of magnitude, but by two.
Such is Moscow’s official view of itself and the world. It evidently has problems either with its eyes or with its brains.
78 Nezavisimaya gazeta, August 4, 2000.
The 21st Century: The World Without Russia
(Philosophical-sociological Essay)