Authors

Nivedita Kapoor¹;  ¹ Higher School of Economics, Russian Federation

Discussion

Since its announcement in 2016, the idea of Greater Eurasian Partnership has gained increasing currency in Russian foreign policy. Covering an area from Atlantic to the Pacific, the vision of Greater Eurasia (GE) presently sees the Russia-China partnership as its bedrock, eventually expanding to include other powers. Non-western organizations are also expected to play their role by promoting cooperation in Eurasia (EAEU, SCO, ASEAN, AIIB, BRI, BRICS). This grand strategic vision of Eurasian partnership however has to deal with the challenge posed by an equally grand idea of Indo-Pacific, with overlapping geographies in South, Southeast & Northeast Asia. Unlike other sub-regions of Eurasia, Russia has limited influence in Indo-Pacific. Here, partnering with China bolsters its role in broader Eurasia but also complicates the scenario for Moscow amid heightened US-China rivalry, the American focus on Indo-Pacific and an altered balance of threat perception among several regional stakeholders. The balancing underway in the region has further highlighted the limitations of Russian power in the region. The existing literature on GE is yet to consider the impact of developments in the Indo-Pacific, and concerns regarding nature of China’s rise, on future cooperation in Eurasia. This paper seeks to examine GE in the light of developments in Indo-Pacific, to chalk out the likely future course of Russia's ambitious vision in a disjointed region with multiple powers.