Month: March 2025

Seminar with Ángel Torres-Adán: Language or ideology? Studying the sources of the ethnic gap in geopolitical preferences in the Association Agreement countries. Evidence from Georgia (2015-2021), March 25

  By

When? March 25th, 15:15-17:00

Where? Seminar room 9th floor, Niagara or online: https://mau-se.zoom.us/j/65864362451

Speaker: Ángel Torres-Adán

Ángel Torres-Adán is a research fellow at the Institute for Sociology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences in Bratislava. He recently completed a Ph.D in Politics, Policies and International Relations (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona). He also hold a Bachelor’s degree in Geography (Universidad de Castilla-la Mancha) and a Master’s degree in International Politics (Universidad Complutense de Madrid). His research is focused on individual geopolitical preferences in post-Soviet Europe.

Abstract:

The existence of differences in geopolitical preferences between the titular nationalities and ethnic minorities has been thoroughly documented for the Association Agreement countries and other post-Soviet states. This paper goes beyond simply identifying the existence of this “ethnic gap” in geopolitical preferences, by also testing some of the common theories that try to explain it. To do so, I use different regression analyses based on survey data from Georgia (2015–2021). The results of a first multivariate analysis that aims to explain the ethnic gap show that the linguistic differences between the titular nationalities and the ethnic groups explain a higher percentage of the gap in support for the EU than differences related to ideology, values, and information. Furthermore, a second analysis that divides the sample into different ethnic groups reveals that certain variables influence the geopolitical preferences of members of the titular nationalities and members of each of the studied ethnic minorities in different ways.

Welcome!

Russia Reverts to Muscovy: What if We Drop “Russia” from the Discourse? – RUCARR seminar with Prof. Stefan Hedlund

  By ,

Stefan Hedlund: “Russia Reverts to Muscovy: What if We Drop “Russia” from the Discourse?”

Time: 18th March, 15.15 – 17.00

Place: NI:C0315 or online: https://mau-se.zoom.us/j/66754621955

Abstract

The presentation expands on three of the main themes of the book Russia Reverts to Muscovy: What if We drop “Russia” from the Discourse?, all of which converge in an argument that we should stop talking about “Russia” and revert to the old name for northeastern Rus, which is “Muscovy.” The first is that so much of the territory of the former Russian Empire has now been lost that it is only logical to refer to the remnants as Muscovy. The second is that the present-day Russian Federation has reverted almost fully to the institutional order that marked old Muscovy, thus adding to the relevance of using that name, and the third is that continued use of the name “Russia” implies acceptance of the Muscovite claim to a sphere of interest that includes Ukraine.

If the present-day Muscovites want to call themselves “Russians” then that is of course their prerogative, much as others have a right to refer to themselves as Ukrainians or Belarusians. Where it goes unacceptably wrong is when it is claimed that all Eastern Slavs are “Russians,” and that those “Russians” must not only accept this distinction but also submit to being ruled from Moscow.

Stefan Hedlund is Professor Emeritus of Soviet and East European Studies at IRES, Uppsala University. He has published more than two dozen books, mainly but not exclusively on themes relating to Russian developments, and he has published more than a hundred articles on similar themes, in various forms and shapes. His works have been published in Russian and Chinese, and he has been a frequent commentator in various media across a number of countries. His most recent book, Russia Reverts to Muscovy: What if We drop “Russia” from the Discourse? (Routledge, 2025), is the latest instalment in a series of books on institutional developments in Russia and Ukraine, the previous volume being Ukraine, Russia and The West: When Value Promotion met Hard Power (Routledge, 2023).

 

Book launch with Isabell Burmester, Understanding EU and Russian Hegemony in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus, March 11

  By , ,

Understanding EU and Russian Hegemony in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus 

When? March 11st, 15:15-17:00

Where? Niagara, NI:A0311 or online: https://mau-se.zoom.us/j/68505534320

What drives the European Union’s and Russia’s influence in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus? How do their strategies compare, and what does this tell us about the broader regional dynamics that ultimately culminated in Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine? The talk will present the main findings of the forthcoming book EU and Russian Hegemony in the ‘Shared Neighbourhood’: Between Coercion, Prescription, and Co-optation. It will explore how the EU and Russia exert power in their shared neighborhood, using the concept of hegemony to make sense of their competing approaches. By examining the mechanisms of coercion, prescription, and co-optation, this study provides a comparative analysis of how both actors have shaped the political and economic trajectories of Moldova and Armenia since the early 2000s. Bringing together insights from EU neighborhood policy, Russian foreign policy, and international relations scholarship, the book presents an innovative framework for understanding regional power struggles. By making EU and Russian strategies analytically comparable, it sheds light on how these interactions have evolved—and what they reveal about the ongoing shifts in regional order.

 

The book will be out open access in March: https://link.springer.com/book/9783031754876

Dr. Isabell Burmester is currently a post-doctoral researcher at the Université Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris.