Foreign policy

In the first period Russian foreign policy was thoroughly 'domesticated', with domestic reform taking priority over global ambitions, but gradually the outlines of a more 'balanced', or as others would put it, a more assertive if not aggressive, policy took shape. Post-communist Russian foreign policy is marked by great continuity in strategic goals, focused above all on achieving international economic integration and recognition of the attributes of a great power, but there were several tactical turning points. It is against this background that debates over Russian foreign policy unfold. It has indeed been argued that Russian foreign policy in the 1990s took on the characteristics of the 'tyranny of the weak', threatening economic and military anarchy if it did not receive substantial assistance from the West and was not accepted into global economic structures.