Building a Sphere of Influence in Its Backyard: The EU-Russia Competition in the Shared Neighbourhood

The world is changing quickly, especially the European Union’s ´Near Abroad’. New actors are (re)emerging as important poles of power, such as Russia and Turkey, potentially undermining the reforming role that the EU aims to exert. In the eastern neighborhood, the resurrection of Russia as a regional power is embodied by Vladimir Putin’s grand vision of a ‘Eurasian Union’ – a customs union among former Soviet states that would serve to become a major global player competing for influence with the United States, the EU and China.

Such a union might therefore compete with the Eastern Partnership (EaP), the EU project meant to help bring about political and economic stability and reform in some key Eastern European and Southern Caucasus countries. Is the co-existence of the EU’s and Russia’s projects bound to be a zero-sum game or can some sort of co-operation be envisaged? Armenia’s withdrawal from a free-trade deal with the EU to join the Eurasian Union seems to suggest that Russia is more a competitor, rather than a partner for the EU. If so, what factors are decisive for the European influence to prevail?

This paper, drawing upon both realist and constructivist literatures on the determinants of power, addresses these questions on power shifts in the eastern neighborhood, while offering inputs on how to better shape EU relations with Russia, one of the EU’s main partners and competitors at the same time.