The Belarusian Policy of Russia: the Era of Pragmatism
The Belarusian Policy of Russia: the Era of Pragmatism

Summary/Abstract: For a long time, Russia’s relationship with Belarus was an obvious exclusion from the Moscow’s CIS policy mainstream: while the model of full-fledged relations between the independent states was implemented as a basis for most post-Soviet countries, the relations with Belarus remained a “domestic matter”, and were hardly institutionalized at all. There was a sound explanation to this exclusion: Russia and Belarus declared an intention to build a common state in 1996, and this was the reason for Russia to keep the gas prices for Belarus reduced for years. The “transitional” status of Belarus was also the reason for Russia to pay the political costs for the support of the “last dictatorship in Europe” – the situation was perceived to be a temporary one, and all “was to be fixed” after the expected unification. The article analyses in depth the logic and structure of the Russia-Belarus relations, reveals the hidden, non-obvious tendencies of their development and outlines the possible scenario of the future.

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