Vol 20, No 2 (2018)

Piotr Dutkiewicz is the professor of Political Science and the co-director of the Center for Governance and Public Policy at Carleton University (Ottawa, Canada). He got his education at Warsaw University and the Russian Academy of Sciences. He was a Visiting Fellow at St. Peter’s and Nuffield Colleges in Oxford and a Visiting Professor at Berkeley University, Institute for International Relations. He is a member of the Valdai Club, a group of forty renowned experts on Russia. In 2009, he received the Order of Friendship of the Russian Federation from President Dmitry Medvedev. In this interview professor Dutkiewicz will tell us about the main contradictions shaping the new world order.

In this article the author attempts to distinguish the concept of the integration-consciousness in the modern processes of supranational integration. The relevance of this concept, as an integral part of a broader scientific category of the foreign policy-consciousness, is due to the growing role of ideology in integration processes. In article has done a comparative analysis of the ideological components of the two integration systems - the EU and the EEU. It is noted that in Europe and in Russia the influence of the integration on the sociocultural and foreign policy attitudes of citizens is constantly growing. At the same time, in the situation of the so-called “Cold War 2.0”, the perception of integration processes at the level of ideological discourses is becoming increasingly massive and populist. The author comes to the conclusion that the concept of the integration-consciousness has a significant impact on the dynamics of the modern integration processes. One of the main author’s finding is that for Russia within the framework of the EEU the integration-consciousness might play an important role in the much needed geographical diversification of the integration strategy.

Separatism in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of People’s Republic of China is a very complex, multifaceted, multidimensional, multifactorial and, at the same time, little-studied problem. This article is devoted to the consideration of the religious factor as one of the factors along with a number of others provoking political instability in the Xinjiang. Given the heterogeneity of Xinjiang, an analysis was conducted of the various zones in the region, which have their own specific characteristics. So, the author came to the conclusion that it is the religious factor that is most pronounced in the Western and Southern zones. Radically-minded separatists, who use elements of the Wahhabi ideology in their political programs, have a fairly serious weight here. And the speeches in these parts of Xinjiang come from the Ferghana Valley. And in this region, anti-Chinese actions, unlike the population of Urumqi and Kuldja, often occur with the slogans of Islamic liberation. Regarding the political and legal situation of Muslims in Xinjiang, although freedom of religion is guaranteed at the official level, in practice, such legislative acts define narrow legal boundaries for religious activities, and they allow state bodies to strictly control and interfere in the sphere of religious relations. Nevertheless, there are not any additional requirements for professing Islam, the state also pays enough attention to the protection of Muslim cultural monuments, which are in large numbers in the Xinjiang.

The purpose of this article is to summarize the diverse aspects of scientific discussion revolving around the notion itself and complicated questions of the modern theory of modernization. One of the main point of discussion is the new relationship between once so dissimilar conceptions like modernization, democratization and globalization. These conceptions have been brought together in the end of the XXth century and since that time usually discussed interconnected, often maintaining a heterogeneous sense. The terms “modernization” and “globalization” have come to be emotionally charged in public discourse. For some, they imply the promise of an international civil society, conducive to a new era of peace and democratization. For others, they imply the threat of an American economic and political hegemony, with its cultural consequence being a homogenized world. Nevertheless, some distinct characteristics defining the general tendencies of the modernization process really exist. The main tendency is the changing meaning of modernity, or the emergence of “alternative modernities”. There is also the increasingly significant phenomenon of alternative globalizations that is, cultural movements with a global outreach originating outside the Western world and indeed impacting on the latter. The second trend is related to a crisis in the legitimacy of the nation-state tradition forcing to review the problem of the role of democracy in the modern world. S.M. Lipset's observation that democracy is related to economic development, first advanced in 1959, has generated the largest body of research on any topic in political science. Yet there are two distinct reasons this relation may hold: either democracies may be more likely to emerge as countries develop economically (S.P. Huntington, R. Inglehart), or they may be established independently of economic development but may be more likely to survive in developed countries. The basic assumption of the theory of modernization, in any of its versions, is that there is one general process of which democratization is but the final stage. Modernization consists of a gradual differentiation and specialization of social structures that culminates in a separation of political structures from other structures and makes democracy possible. But now a prevailing view, according to which the emergence of democracy is not a by-product of economic development (G. O’ Donnell). The protagonists of this approach do not believe that the fate of democratic rule would be determined exclusively by current levels of economic development. They maintained that, albeit within constraints, democratization was an outcome of actions, not just of economic conditions as like as historical past (A. Giddens, R.M. Unger).

The article is devoted to the problems of legitimacy of anti-government protests and the new power coming on a wave of radical mass forms of social protest both from the point of view of legitimization of a protest, and from the point of view of constant search of the legitimate bases for the new power. History of formation of the principles of legitimacy of the power in science, and also transfer of these principles to the field of radical mass forms of social protest, overthrow of the power and formation new is observed. The author considers the principle of the Euhemerus and an euhemerization which is put forward in psychology as important categories and for political science, especially in the sphere of problems of legitimization and the ideology providing it.

The paper critically analyzes certain approaches in political science literature to understanding the efficiency. Moreover, there are certain problems of its operationalization and quantitative measurement. The authors question accuracy and “objectivity” of the existing concepts and methodologies used by empirical databases on an assessment of state efficiency. The research sets the purpose to reach the “more objective” efficiency which would respond the principles of valuable neutrality (absence of normativism), relevance and generality (suitable for any case regardless of a political regime, form of government, etc.), creating the conceptual frame and operationalization. Authors take an attempt to represent an approach to the “objective” efficiency as the ability of the state to transform its resources into socially significant results with minimal costs. This is supposed to be possible with Data Envelopment Analysis, which provides the production function of effectiveness by using input and output empirical data.

The presented research is devoted to the topic of shortcomings in the formation of the Russian policy of memory. The purpose of this work is to identify the problems existing in this field, and to develop proposals for their elimination. The article was based on materials from 10 expert interviews. Methodological base of work is formed by expert interview and descriptive analysis. The effectiveness of the memorial policy is evaluated by experts from pragmatic positions: Russia’s positive image on the domestic and foreign policy arena, the formation and strengthening of national-state identity and the consolidation of society are positioned as its main tasks. Attempts to use the policy of memory as an instrument for settling international relations by concessions are assessed negatively by experts. The building of a national memory policy is assumed solely on the basis of the “memory of the winners”. The appeal to the discourse of “the memory of the vanquished” is seen as a destructive approach fraught with serious political risks. Among the latter include the erosion of Russian identity, the particularization of society, the growth of social anomie, the increase in the influence of political and religious radicals. As the main “pain points” of Russia's memorial policy, its opportunistic nature, the controversial, complex nature of the content side, ignoring foreign experience and the presence of obsolete elements in the toolkit impact on the target audience are highlighted. The necessity of qualitative mastering of new formats of communication with the target audience is grounded (video blogging, creation of comics, multi-serial animated films targeting young people and adult audiences). The most positive examples of building a memory policy are the cases of the USA and Japan.

The article analyzes the theoretical foundations and components of the phenomenon of “national branding”, identifies the strengths and weaknesses of the concept, evaluates the methodological foundations of the country's reputation management. The goal of the article is to assess the current image of the Russian Federation. The author proposed the concept of adequate image positioning of the country in the world community.

The new book by Yu.A. Nisnevich, PhD in Political Studies, is of both scientific and practical interest to political analysts, politicians, federal and regional government officials, students in higher educational institutions. This book by the full professor of the Department of Political Studies in the National Research University “Higher School of Economics” successfully attempts to instrumentally conceptualize and measure corruption. It analyzes the quality of implementing polyarchic democracy rules today, it offers a comparative analysis of authoritarian-like states. By taking the corruption factor into account, it provides empirical cauterization if democratic states. The author raises topical issues: analysis of corruption as a dominant factor of the world political process. The following issues are of particular interest: analysis of motivation of corruption in the public sphere and measures to counteract this behavior.