ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that geoeconomical and geostrategical competition can exist at the same time, and can be mutually supportive. To illustrate this phenomenon, it considers the troubled relationship between the European Union (EU) and the Russian Federation, with particular stress on the period of the third presidency of Vladimir Putin. The chapter briefly revisits Luttwak's thesis from 1990 and some authors who responded to it. It develops a brief geopolitical and geoeconomic analysis of the relations between the EU and Russia between 1994 and 2012. The chapter investigates in depth the evolution of the relationship between the EU and the Russian Federation, especially focusing on the Ukraine crisis since the end of 2013. Luttwak seemed to suggest in 1990 that in the post-Cold War era, geostrategic struggle would be subservient to geoeconomic strife. The chapter shows rather that geoeconomical and geostrategic competition can exist at the same time, and can be mutually supportive.
