Russia's Foreign Policy: Change and Continuity in National Identity
Tsygankov provides an accessible, invaluable contribution to the teaching and analysis of Russia's post–Cold War foreign policy. This relatively short book aims to provide both a historic overview and a theoretic framework for analyzing the formation and conceptualization of Russia's national interest, with particular emphasis on Russia's historic and evolving relationship with the West. The book contains a chronology of Russian foreign policy from 1985 to the present, and relies on many original Russian-language sources. The work is divided into eight chapters, with a historic overview, a basic introduction to international relations theory and its implications for understanding Russian foreign policy, as well as chapters on Gorbachev's new thinking, Russia as great-power balancer, Russia as great-power pragmatist, and Russia as an assertive great power. It concludes by analyzing prospects for change and continuity in Russian foreign policy. Recommended.(CHOICE)