Today, there appears to be a consensus among European and Russian analysts that the concept of Russia's Europeanization has failed. Unlike the Central European states, Russia has proved utterly reluctant to have its social transformation guided and monitored from Brussels. As a result, Russia's post-communist development took a specific and clearly un-European course. Now, both the Putin administration and the EU leadership have to admit, experts argue, that the present-day Russia and the European Union represent two absolutely different politico-economic systems.
The Beslan debacle and the political moves the Kremlin took in its aftermath dramatically revealed the alarming trends that have been developing for several years but that no one was eager to analyze in detail. It has suddenly become clear, one prominent Russian commentator notes, "Despite all the official declarations, Moscow and Brussels are guided by a different logic of behavior and by different value systems; they pursue absolutely different goals and build different socio-political models."
This view, which is obviously shared by the overwhelming majority of European politicians, prompts both sides to make a policy shift. The EU appears to increasingly regard Russia as a country that "cannot be integrated in principle" and that will remain forever a natural partner or competitor beyond the easternmost limits of the European space. Such a reassessment means, some Russian political strategists predict, that the EU will act more aggressively in the western parts of the CIS, seeking to limit Moscow's influence in Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova. "In the immediate future, the EU will likely pursue policies aimed at undermining Russia's integrationist projects in the western parts of the CIS," argued a commentary in the influential foreign policy journal Rossiya v globalnoi politike.
The whole of the article, by Igor Torbakov, is here
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