Russia’s Propaganda in Europe and EU’s Structural Heterogeneity

Year 2019, Volume: 1 Issue: 1, 126 - 136, 22.08.2019

Muhammet Koçak

Abstract

This article attempts to examine the dynamics behind
EU’s inability towards countering Russia’s destabilizing actions in Europe.
Focusing on Ukraine, I attempt to demonstrate how does Russia’s strategy harms
the EU and how EU is unable to protect itself. Focusing on the process of the
annexation of Crimea, this article makes the case that EU’s heterogeneity
prevents the organization from taking unified action. This article begins with
a short introduction that is followed by an analysis of the domestic political
dynamics in Russia. Then, I examine Russia’s foreign policy strategy and ‘soft’
power apparatuses. In the last part, I analyze the impact of Russia’s strategy
on EU and the EU’s inability in countering Russia.

Keywords

Russian Foreign Policy, European Union, European Security

References

• ‘‘Iyul’skie Reytingi Odobreni i Doveria,’’ Levada Tsentr July 23, 2015, Accessed at December 29, 2015. http://www.levada.ru/old/23-07-2015/iyulskie-reitingi-odobreniya-i-doveriya
• ‘‘O vnesenii izmeneniy v otdel'nyye zakonodatel'nyye akty Rossiyskoy Federatsii v chasti regulirovaniya deyatel'nosti nekommercheskikh organizatsiy, vypolnyayushchikh funktsii inostrannogo agenta,’’ Ofitsial’nıy internet-portal pravovoi informatsiy, July 18, 2012, Accessed at December 15, 2015, http://pravo.gov.ru/proxy/ips/?docbody=&nd=102158302&rdk=&backlink=1.
• ‘‘Russia,’’ Freedom House Freedom in the World 2015, https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2015/russia#.Vcd3U3rMKMI.
• “Putin: Kharkov, Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, Nikolaev, Odessa ne vkhodili v sostav Ukrainy,” Segodnia, April 17, 2014, Accessed at December 27, 2015, http://www.segodnya.ua/politics/pnews/ putin-harkov-lugansk-doneck-herson-nikolaev-odessa-nevhodili-v-sostav-ukrainy-513722.html.
• Brovkin, Vladimir, Russia After Lenin: Politics Culture and Society, 1921-1929 (London: Routledge, 1998), 81.
• Brzezinski, Zbigniew, ‘‘Putin’s Choice,’’ The Washington Quarterly 31-2 (Spring 2008), 100.
• Carothers, Thomas, “How Democracies Emerge: The ‘Sequencing’ Fallacy,” Journal of Democracy 18 (January 2007),16-17.
• Felshtinsky, Yuri, The Age of Assassins: The Rise and Rise of Vladimir Putin: How Scary Are Russia's New Rulers? (London: Gibson Square Books, 2008).
• Finkel, Evgeny, and Brudny, Yitzhak M. ‘‘Russia and the colour revolutions,’’ Demokratizatsiya 19,1 (2012), 17.
• Gilligan, Emma Terror in Chechnya: Russia and the Tragedy of Civilians in War (Princeton: Princeton university Press, 2010), 13.
• Güvenen, Orhan, Graduate Lecture Notes (Ankara: Institute of World Systems, Economies and Strategic Research (DSEE), Bilkent University, 2010).
• Herpen, Marcel H. Van, Putin’s Propaganda Machinery (Lanham MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2016), 3.
• Kotz, David and Weir, Fred, Russia’s Path from Gorbachev to Putin: The demise o Soviet System and the new Russia (New York: Routledge, 2007), 276.
• Kuzio, Taras, ‘‘Soviet and Russian anti-(Ukrainian) nationalism and re-Stalinization,’’ Communist and Post-Communist Studies 48-4 (December 2015), pp. 273-336.
• Lenin, V.I. ‘Left Wing’ Communism: An Infantile Disorder (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1981), 62.
• Liñán, Miguel Vázquez, ‘‘History as a propaganda tool in Putin’s Russia,’’ Communist and Post-Communist Studies 43 (2010), pp. 167-178.
• Ljubownikow, Sergej, Peter, Jo Crotty and Rodgers, W. ‘‘The state and civil society in Post-Soviet Russia: The development of a Russian-style civil society,’’ Progress in Development Studies 13-2 (2013), 160.
• Mansfield, Edward D. and Snyder, Jack, ‘‘Democratic Transitions, Institutional Strength, and War,’’ International Organization 56-2 (Spring, 2002), 298.
• March, Luke, ‘’Is Nationalism Rising in Russian Foreign Policy? The Case of Georgia,’’ Demokratizatsiya 19-3 (Summer 2011), 190-191.
• McFaul, Michael “Eurasia Letter: Russian Politics After Chechnya,” Foreign Policy 99 (1995), 151.
• Nye, Joseph, Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), X.
• Nye, Joseph, The Future of Power (New York: Public Affairs, 2011), 168-169.
• Putin, Vladimir, Rossiya i Menyayushchiysya Mir Moskovskie Novosti (February 27,2011).
• Ross, Cameron ‘‘Putin’s federal reforms and the consolidation of federalism in Russia: one step forward, two steps back!,’’ Communist and Post-Communist Studies 36 (2003), 34.
• Satter, David, Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003).
• Service, Robert, A History of Modern Russia from Tsarism to the Twenty First Century (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009), 548.
• Shlapentokh, Vladimir, ‘‘Perceptions of foreign threats to the regime: From Lenin to Putin,’’ Communist and Post-Communist Studies 42 (2009), pp. 305-324.
• Smith, Hanna, ‘‘Democratization and War: The Chechen Wars’ Contribution to Failing Democratization in Russia,’’ Demokratizatsiya 22-4 (Fall 2014), 628.
• Snegovaya, Maria, Putin’s Information Warfare in Ukraine: Soviet Origins Of Russia’s Hybrid Warfare (Washington DC: Institute for The Study of War, 2015), 9.
• Stoner-Weiss, Kathryn, ‘‘It is still Putin’s Russia,’’ Current History 107-711 (October 2008), 315.
• Tsygankov, Andrey, ‘‘Vladimir Putin’s last Stand: The Sources of Russia’s Ukraine Policy,’’ Post Soviet Affairs 31-4 (2015), 292.
• V. Shlapentokh, ‘’Putin as a flexible politician. Does he imitate Stalin?,’’ Communist and Post-Communist Studies 41 (2008), 206.
• Wilson, Jeanne L., ‘‘Russia and China Respond to Soft Power: Interpretation and Readaptation of a Western Construct,’’ Politics 35-(3-4) (2015), 291.