Geopolitical and geoeconomic aspects of Finnish-Russian interaction Dmitry Zimin

Geopolitics: construction of global and regional political alliances and their interaction Geography influences international relations + focus of military security; Competing geopolitical visions: North Atlantic Community versus “Eurasia from Dublin to Vladivostok”

Geoeconomics: construction of economic alliances and their competition From the geoeconomic point of view, “geopolitics is outdated”: nowadays competition takes place mainly in the economic field and by economic means. Creation of macro-regional economic blocks (e.g. the EU, NAFTA, ASEAN) and their competition are the essence of present-day geoeconomics.

Finland’s geopolitical position: A small country seeking to find a right balance between EU integration and her relations with Russia. Special relationship with Russia (Finnish strategy towards Russia, adopted in April 2009). Finland does not follow the examples of some openly “anti-Russian” EU members. EU membership: how to react to the ideas of EU federalization and to the crisis of euro? Finland’s relations with NAT O

Russian geopolitical position - two views: Conservative alarmism: Russia faces disintegration and, therefore, she urgently needs to begin “new mobilization” and/or to align with the West and/or China; Liberal pragmatism (Putin): there is no real threat of disintegration, Russia needs to focus on liberal economic reforms and on integration with the EU and with Russia’s ex- Soviet neighbours (e.g. Belarus, Ukraine).

Great Limitrophe: buffer zone between Russia and “the West” Vadim Tsymbursky: “Russia is an ‘island civilization’ surrounded by a ‘sea’ of very diverse countries stretching from Finland to Korea. This belt of sovereign states is ‘The Great Limitrophe’: a kind of buffer zone separating Russia from the true centers of both European and Asian civilization.” AND, allegedly, the United States tries to exploit the Limitrophe in order to prevent an alliance between the EU and Russia.

Alarmist view (Malinetsky Model Forecast – Russia’s disintegration by 2030):

Geoeconomic considerations: Global economic crisis: where is a solution? (History suggests that such crises usually lead to world wars…) Can Russia propose her own new geopolitical project? Or should she join some other project (which was one of main ideas of Gorbachev’s perestroika – e.g. “Our common European home”)? Can Russia finally learn to exploit its geographical space more efficiently?

Russian economic strategy: Declared orientation on the development of high-tech sectors, particularly: energy- saving technologies; nuclear- and nano- technologies, space-related technologies; new healthcare technologies; and new ICT (e.g. supercomputers and software). In reality: focus on large-scale export- oriented energy projects + an increase in spending on military purposes.

Two large high-tech projects: Skolkovo Innovation Centre near Moscow: exterritorial status + 5 billion euro (+Nokia & Microsoft); Attraction of scientists to Russia: each selected scientist gets 4 million euro for research purposes; At the same time: insufficient funding to existing research institutes…

Russian energy strategy: 1.Asset swaps: foreign companies can get access to extraction of Russia’s natural resources only in exchange for their assets abroad: –Example: German companies BASF and E.ON have got a stake in the Yuzhnorusskoe gas field in exchange for giving Gazprom a stake in German gas distribution networks.

Russian energy strategy 2.To diversify Russia’s export routes with the aim to bypass all transit countries (e.g. Belarus, Ukraine and the Baltic states) and to involve Western elites into joint projects with Russia (e.g. Schröder, Lipponen, Berlusconi) + new pipelines in the Far East; 3.To promote exports of Russian energy equipment (esp. for nuclear power plants); 4.Struggle for control over natural resources in the Arctic.

Nord Stream: underwater gas pipeline

Southern Stream

New Baltic seaports

Baltic Oil Pipeline (BTS-1)

Baltic Oil Pipeline (BTS-2)

Oil and gas fields in the Arctic

Transport and geoeconomics: Northern maritime route (can eventually become commercially viable, thanks to global warming); Trans-Siberian railway: built in , but still is not widely used for traffic between Europe and Asia.

Northern Maritime Route

Trans-Siberian railway

Sub-national regions as actors of geopolitics: In the EU: powerful regionalist movement – “Europe of the regions” In Russia: “centralization – regionalization” cycle + unequal treatment of regions by Moscow

Sub-national regions also try to participate in geopolitics: Barents Euro-Arctic Region; Euregio Karelia; Baltic Sea Subregional Cooperation.

Euregio Karelia

Euregio Karelia: signing of the agreement in 2000

Euregios in the Baltic Region