EU-RUSSIAN RELATIONS: WHAT IS MISSING?

What kind of Russia does the European Union wish to see as its neighbour, and, crucially, on what basis does the EU wish to engage and/or re-engage with Russia? The obstacles to an effective EU-Russia relationship centre on the paradox that the two are close enough neighbours not to be able to ignore each other, yet on the whole neither currently perceives itself to have a pressing need for the other. In particular the EU has failed to elaborate clear objectives and incentives that can overcome this lack of motivation and thus drive serious engagement. EU institutions and successive presidencies have not expressed a coherent line and consequently there has not been a consistent message delivered to Russia. Three issues explain the fundamental obstacles to a substantive and energetic relationship. First, Russia and the EU talk different languages and articulate their interests in different ways. Russia’s view of relations with the EU is fairly instrumental: how can cooperation with the EU serve to strengthen Russia domestically and internationally? Russia is fairly clear on what it wants from the Union.

As an actor Russia is a highly traditional, sovereignty-conscious state, very sensitive to the divide between international politics and its own internal affairs. The EU, on the other hand, is a very different kind of actor. It is not a unitary state, but a complex system of supra-national and inter-governmental policymaking. Being part of the EU system entails a blurring of the clear divide between the external and internal: sovereignty is not absolute and the domestic politics of one Member State is the business of other Member States to a far greater extent than elsewhere in the international system.

There is a clash between how the two sides see the ‘rules’ of the game: to oversimplify, the norm of interference stands against the norm of non-interference. The two entities approach each other on different premises, creating significant friction. Second, the way the EU formulates its external policy and its inability to coherently pursue that policy makes the Union an inefficient actor and a difficult partner.

There is a lack of synchronization, in fact, the policies of individual member states (e.g. France, Germany, the UK and Italy) often contradict the EU position. The Union fails to clearly articulate where it stands to gain something. Without a clearly articulated, positive incentive to cooperate with Russia, Member States do not feel the ‘pull of necessity’ towards a common EU line. Russia has been quite comfortable exploiting its bilateral ties with Member States. In the end, however, both Russia and the EU stand to lose by such divide-and-rule tactics. The EU’s inability to engage in a coherent and focused manner may at times give Russia short-term gains, but in the long-term it prevents the development of a substantial, meaningful partnership which would provide a much-needed frame of reference for Russia too. Finally, the basic problem is that the European Union and Russia do not perceive themselves to have an urgent interest in each other or at least, the areas where they do have interests do not often coincide. This deprives the overall relationship of an automatically strong driving force.

In order to re-energise EU-Russia relations, the EU must make some moves towards the kind of political, interest-driven approach that comes more naturally to Russia. The Union cannot simply follow a technocratic reform policy . As long as it does, this will clash with its broader external relations with Russia that are driven essentially by individual Member State interest.

For the European Union, being clear on its interests and adopting a more comprehensive and operationalized strategy means two things. Firstly, it will create a stronger centralising impulse to mobilise the Member States around a common EU position. Secondly, by articulating principles as interests, it will be possible for the European Union and Russia to engage each other by speaking the same language. The relationship can in this way move on to a more realistic basis, where both sides understand what the other wants and what limits there are to their cooperation.

The EU and Russia are very different bodies with very different interests. Realism is needed to overcome this fundamental fact and still make progress on the issues of substance that lie between the two sides.