Russia Against the Rest The Post-Cold War Crisis of World Order

In this book Richard Sakwa provides a new analysis of the end of the Cold War and the subsequent failure to create a comprehensive and inclusive peace order in Europe. The end of the Cold War did not create a sustainable peace system. Instead, for a quarter of a century a 'cold peace' reflected the tension between cooperative and competitive behaviour. None of the fundamental problems of European security were resolved, and tensions accumulated. In 2014 the crisis exploded in the form of conflict in Ukraine, provoking what some call a 'new Cold War'. Russia against the Rest challenges the view that this is a replay of the old conflict, explaining how the tensions between Russia and the Atlantic community reflect a global realignment of the international system. Sakwa provides a balanced and carefully researched analysis of the trajectory of European and global politics since the late 1980s.

Introduction; 1. Cold War to cold peace; 2. Order without hegemony; 3. Russian grievances; 4. Resistance and neo-revisionism; 5. Europe, Eurasia and heartland conflicts; 6. After the cold peace; 7. Remilitarisation and the new apocalypse; 8. America and global leadership; 9. The EU, Europe and Russia; 10. Towards a post-western world; 11. The new globalism and the politics of resistance; Conclusion.

Richard Sakwa is Professor of Russian and European Politics at the University of Kent and an Associate Fellow of the Russia and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House. He graduated in History from the London School of Economics and took a Ph.D. from the University of Birmingham. He has published widely on Soviet, Russian and post-communist affairs. Recent books include Russian Politics and Society (2008), Putin: Russia's Choice (2008), The Crisis of Russian Democracy: The Dual State, Factionalism, and the Medvedev Succession (Cambridge, 2011), Putin and the Oligarch: The Khodorkovsky – Yukos Affair (2014) and Putin Redux: Power and Contradiction in Contemporary Russia (2014). His latest book is Frontline Ukraine: Crisis in the Borderlands (2016).