Russia Turns East:Putinism and the Making of a New Second World
Abstract
As the crucial Eurasian swing state, Russia is fast emerging as the twenty-first century ‘decider’. Early globalists took it as a foregone conclusion that Russia would swing toward the West. But increasingly it has ‘turned East’, striking a fate-ful alliance with China and other authoritarian regimes by way of a resuscitated ‘Second World’. By buttressing Putinism, globalization is helping to perform what amounts to a democratic abortion. Yet these policies are not set in stone. This study holds that another globalization is possible, and another Russia as well. To prevent the consolidation of a new Second World, every effort must be made to convince Russian leaders that democracy, far from being Russia's nemesis, could be its best geopolitical ally.