ABSTRACT

The story of Russia’s engagement with Asian and Pacific institutions can mostly be told in realist terms. Moscow has viewed regional bodies as instruments to promote national interests or at least affirm Russia’s status as a great power. Russia’s main emphasis has been on institutions with a political-security agenda, while its participation in regional economic arrangements, such as FTAs, has been minimal. While realism undoubtedly remains the main foundation of Moscow’s strategic thinking, some constructivist elements have lately begun to feature more prominently, impacting Russia’s approaches to Asian and Pacific institutions. This is noticeable in Russia’s efforts to design and promote the vision of “Greater Eurasia,” which, to a significant extent, is being constructed as the antithesis to the Western-dominated world order. Moscow also continues to have a stake in institutions that center on East Asia and the Pacific. Similar to continental Greater Eurasia, Russia’s vision for the Asia-Pacific order is essentially that of a concert of powers. To construct such an order, the entrenched structures of the US hegemony in the Pacific need to be undone first. This is why Moscow is tirelessly promoting the narrative of an Asia-Pacific security architecture that should be “open, transparent, equal, non-bloc.”