Authors

Discussion

How has multilateralism in Russia’s foreign policy evolved since 2014? Multilateralism, conventionally referring to the coordination of national policies for common goals among three or more states via arrangements and institutions, has been an epicenter of nondemocratic challenges to the current liberal international order in recent years. Scholars and practitioners argue that some nondemocratic regional powers utilize multilateralism to achieve their geopolitical goals – aligning with like-minded countries, consolidating regional and transregional influence, and (re)assuring great power status. As a major nondemocratic regional power, Russia’s practice of multilateralism provides an empirical case in this regard. 

Using official documents, press releases, and published data, this study identifies three trends in Russia's approach to multilateralism since its forceful annexation of Crimea and military intervention in eastern Ukraine (Donbas) in 2014. First, since 2015 Moscow has been pursuing the institutionalization of regional security and economic international organizations (regionalism) – Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) – to escape its diplomatic and economic isolation. Their institutionalization includes a dramatic increase in regular events (multilateral agreements, joint military drills, economic conferences) and the distribution of military and financial resources to member states. Moreover, the CSTO and the EAEU promote external engagements with other countries over membership and observership. 

Second, Russia has been reorienting its multilateralism from a norm-based to a practice-based model. Russia’s traditional approach to multilateralism in Eurasia was a closed club of countries with shared historical, cultural, and economic legacies to revitalize internal communication and defend Moscow’s hegemony in the region. The Greater Eurasia Partnership (GEP), a Russia-led regionalism initiative published in 2016, represents a turning point of such tradition in its engagement plans with China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). In this regard, the GEP is designed to bolster bilateral cooperation with neighboring non-Western political entities (countries and regionalisms) under ambiguous norms and identities. 

Third, the Russian government does not seek full support for its stance towards international order and core foreign policies from its partners in multilateralism. Whereas the Kremlin labels itself as the pioneering leader of non-Western and post-liberal international order, it does not request other countries to wholeheartedly endorse its geopolitical claims in established regionalisms in Eurasia and beyond. This trend became more evident in the recent membership expansion of BRICS following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.