Making Global Knowledge in Local Contexts: The Politics of International Relations and Policy Advice in Russia 9780367186432, 9780429197345

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“How do we ‘know’ what we know about international politics? What social, political and institutional forces structure imaginations of the international – of policy practitioners or indeed of academics? This important book – the first detailed analysis of the politics of knowledge about the international in Russia – contributes to the important new literature in the social sciences and International Relations on the politics of knowledge production. Much is at stake: not only our understandings of Russian responses in international politics but also what imaginations of the international more generally ‘do’ for analysts, states or other interests. Also, crucially, questions of academic freedom and lack thereof, often ignored, are raised to our attention. This study will be an important reference point – and a point of provocation – for all analysts of Russia, International Relations and the Sociology of Knowledge.” – Milja Kurki, Aberystwyth University, Wales, UK “If we take seriously the notion that scholarly knowledge is produced in a *local* context, then we have to produce careful studies of how exactly that context shapes the kinds of claims that scholars make and the ways that they evaluate the validity of those claims. Kaczmarska’s remarkable book illuminates the conditions under which Soviet, and then Russian, scholars worked, and leads to an expanded appreciation of how social science works in a non-democratic environment.” – Patrick Thaddeus Jackson, American University “The book is a very detailed and comprehensive analysis of the impact of political and institutional context on knowledge production using IR in Russia as a case study. I greatly appreciate the combination of familiarity with the voluminous literature, in-depth engagement with the complex realm of the Russian academia and evidence gathered from fieldwork and interviews. The book should be welcomed by scholars of Russian studies and Science and Technology Studies.” – Vladimir Gel’man, Aleksanteri Institute, University of Helsinki, Finland

“This book is a must for everybody engaging in building an international community in the social science and humanities and in a policy-relevant dialogue across reemerged East-West divide. Katarzyna Kaczmarska demonstrates the contexts in which International Relations and other social sciences in Russia function and their striking difference with a “default” perception of social research as exiting in the West. She gives the floor to a wide variety of voices from Russian academia that demonstrate various approaches and common problems. The book is not only an important addition to the volume of the social studies of IR, but it also brings its readers closer to understanding the limits and pressures experienced by Russian scholars and thus facilitates academic cooperation in this non-academic age.” – Ivan Kurilla, Department of Political Sciences, European University at St. Petersburg, Russia

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Making Global Knowledge in Local Contexts

This book draws on extensive ethnographic research undertaken in Russia to show how the wider sociopolitical context – the political system, relationship between the state and academia as well as the contours of the public debate – shapes knowledge about international politics and influences scholars’ engagement with the policy world. Combining an in-depth study of the International Relations discipline in Russia with a robust methodological framework, the book demonstrates that context not only bears on epistemic practices but also conditions scholars’ engagement with the wider public and policymakers. This original study lends robust sociological foundations to the debate about knowledge in International Relations and the social sciences more broadly. In particular, the book questions contemporary thinking about the relationship between knowledge and politics by situating the university within, rather than abstracting it from the political setting. The monograph benefits from a comprehensive engagement with Russian-language literature in the Sociology of Knowledge and critical reading of International Relations scholarship published in Russia. This text will be of interest to scholars and students in International Relations, Russian and Post-Soviet Studies, the Sociology of Knowledge, Science and Technology Studies and Higher Education Studies. It will appeal to those researching the knowledge-policy nexus and knowledge production practices. Katarzyna Kaczmarska is a lecturer in Politics and International Relations at the School of Social and Political Science, the University of Edinburgh. Her work on International Relations theory, the sociology of IR knowledge and post-Soviet politics has appeared in International Studies Review, the Journal of International Relations and Development, International Relations and Problems of Post Communism. Before joining the University of Edinburgh, she was Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow in the Department of International Politics, Aberystwyth University (2016–19). While conducting long-term fieldwork in Moscow and St Petersburg, she was affiliated with St Petersburg State University. She obtained her PhD in 2015 from Aberystwyth University for research on the representations of international politics in Anglophone and Russian academic and policy discourses.

Worlding Beyond the West Series Editors: Arlene B. Tickner Universidad del Rosario, Colombia

David Blaney Macalester College, USA

Inanna Hamati-Ataya Cambridge University, UK

Historically, the International Relations (IR) discipline has established its boundaries, issues, and theories based upon Western experience and traditions of thought. This series explores the role of geocultural factors, institutions, and academic practices in creating the concepts, epistemologies, and methodologies through which IR knowledge is produced. This entails identifying alternatives for thinking about the “international” that are more in tune with local concerns and traditions outside the West. But it also implies provincializing Western IR and empirically studying the practice of producing IR knowledge at multiple sites within the so-called ‘West’. Naming a Transnational Black Feminist Framework Writing in Darkness K. Melchor Quick Hall NGOs, Knowledge Production and Global Humanist Advocacy The Limits of Expertise Alistair Markland Theory as Ideology in International Relations The Politics of Knowledge Edited by Benjamin Martill and Sebastian Schindler International Relations from the Global South Worlds of Difference Edited by Arlene B. Tickner and Karen Smith Making Global Knowledge in Local Contexts The Politics of International Relations and Policy Advice in Russia Katarzyna Kaczmarska For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com

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Making Global Knowledge in Local Contexts The Politics of International Relations and Policy Advice in Russia

Katarzyna Kaczmarska

First published 2020 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2020 Katarzyna Kaczmarska The right of Katarzyna Kaczmarska to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN: 978-0-367-18643-2 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-429-19734-5 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Apex CoVantage, LLC

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Contents

List of figures List of abbreviations Acknowledgements Note on translation and transliteration Introduction

viii ix xi xiii 1

1 The elephant in the room: the sociopolitical context of IR knowledge-making

21

2 State-society relations

64

3 Contested heritage: Soviet IR and the turbulent transition

112

4 Epistemic practices

157

5 The uses of knowledge

194

6 Conclusion

218

Index

227

Figures

1.1 The explanatory model proposed by Ole Wæver 1.2 The exploratory framework 5.1 The spectrum of views concerning the impact of scholarly expertise on foreign policy

45 49 208

ix

Abbreviations

ASEEES CPSU EEU EU EUSP FANO FSB HE HSE IA IDV IMEMO

Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies Communist Party of the Soviet Union Eurasian Economic Union European Union European University at St Petersburg Federal Agency of Scientific Organisations Federal Security Service Higher education Higher School of Economics Institute of Africa, Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of the Far East, Russian Academy of Sciences Primakov Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences IMRD Institute of International Workers’ Movement, Russian Academy of Sciences INION Institute of Scientific Information for Social Sciences, Russian Academy of Sciences IR International Relations ISA International Studies Association ISKAN Institute for the Study of the USA and Canada, Russian Academy of Sciences ITMO Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics KFU Kazan Federal University LGBT Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender LSE London School of Economics and Political Science MFA Ministry of Foreign Affairs MGIMO Moscow State Institute of International Relations MGU Moscow State University MVD Ministry of Internal Affairs MoD Ministry of Defence OTEI Division of Technical-Economic Research RANEPA Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration

x Abbreviations RAS REF RFFI RIAC RISA ROC RPSA RSFSR SPbGU STS SVOP US

Russian Academy of Sciences Research Excellence Framework Russian Fund for Basic Research Russian International Affairs Council Russian International Studies Association Russian Orthodox Church Russian Political Science Association Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic St Petersburg State University Science and Technology Studies Council on Foreign and Defense Policy United States

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Acknowledgements

In the course of writing this book, I have incurred numerous intellectual debts, many of which are owed to the interviewees who contributed to this study. For ethical reasons, I am not able to mention them by name or affiliation, but I would like to express my sincere gratitude for the time, knowledge and experiences they shared. I owe a considerable debt to mentors and colleagues at Aberystwyth University. I would like to especially thank Berit Bliesemann de Guevara, Inanna Hamati-Ataya, Jenny Mathers and Hidemi Suganami for being extremely generous with their advice. I am grateful to fellow academics at the Centre for the International Politics of Knowledge for commenting on the initial ideas for this monograph and for manifold inspirations. I remain indebted to Birgit Poopuu for sharing with me her unrelenting enthusiasm and knowledge of non-conventional research methods, as well as for her moral support during the final stages of writing this volume. Gratitude is due to the University of Edinburgh and the Politics and International Relations community, which I joined towards the end of the book’s making process. The University was nonetheless instrumental in that it allowed me quiet time to focus on improving the manuscript, while colleagues at the International Relations Research Group offered invaluable comments. I would also like to thank the extremely dedicated members of academic and support staff at St Petersburg State University, who helped me battle administrative obstacles that sometimes seemed insurmountable. I am grateful to the European University at St Petersburg for running such an interesting programme of public talks and academic events, from which I abundantly benefited. Outside of Aberystwyth, Edinburgh and St Petersburg, I have Stefanie Ortmann and Catherine Owen to thank for the support they lent to this project idea from its very inception and for their valuable comments and suggestions offered as this academic adventure proceeded. Ideas expressed in this book were developed thanks to conversations and comments at various workshops and conferences: the Interpretivism in International Relations (IIR) BISA Working Group workshop held in St Petersburg in 2017, annual conferences of the European International Studies Association in 2017 and 2018, and the International Studies Association annual convention in 2018.

xii Acknowledgements

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I have my undergraduate students at Aberystwyth University to thank for lessons about the viability of my take on policy narratives developing in Russia, as well as for testing my ability to communicate ideas. I would also like to take this opportunity to express my appreciation for the invaluable services of several libraries, which made the writing of this book so much easier: the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth, the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, the National Library of Finland in Helsinki, the Russian State Library in Moscow and the National Library of Russia in St Petersburg. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 705989. Elements of Chapter 5 are based on my article ‘Academic Community and Policymaking in Russia’ (Problems of Post-Communism, 66(4), 2019). My very personal thanks go to my mum and my husband, who, by shifting between the roles of discussant, assistant and mentor, had an invaluable influence on how this book came about. Last but not least, I have my mum to thank for her inexhaustible support and encouragement. Edinburgh, November 2019

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Note on translation and transliteration

I have used a simplified version of the phonetically based Library of Congress system of transliterating Russian Cyrillic. Several exceptions include the accepted spelling for surnames, towns and places. I have used Dmitry for Dmitry Medvedev but Dmitri for Dmitri Yermolenko as the latter’s name had been introduced in this way in previous English-language works. I have used the English version of institutions’ names whenever these were provided by institutions in question, for instance ‘the European University at St Petersburg’. I used transliterated Russian rather than English acronyms for institutions which are internationally recognised by these acronyms, for instance MGU, rather than MSU, for Moscow State University and MVD for the Ministry of Internal Affairs (rather than MIA), but RAS for the Russian Academy of Sciences (rather than RAN). Whenever available, I used originally provided translations of books, articles and legal bills’ titles. All other translations are my own. In cases when my own translation may not have adequately approximated the Russian formulation or when the original formulation was convoluted, I provided the transliterated Russian version in addition to my own translation.

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Introduction

Picture two scenes. The first takes place in 2019. A Russian colleague and I are having tea at a major international conference on international politics. The colleague tells a bittersweet Soviet joke: A Russian and an American converse. The American boasts: ‘In the US, I can go out and right there in front of the White House, I can say whatever I want about the US president.’ The Soviet citizen responds without hesitation: ‘I, too, can go out and in the middle of the Red Square, I can say whatever I want about the US president.’ My colleague adds: ‘The problem is that this is somewhat the same now.’ The second scene takes place just before Christmas 2017. It is another freezing winter in St Petersburg. A young student stands in the street holding a banner. She is on her own; it would be difficult obtaining a permit for a bigger demonstration, and besides, it might get her into trouble. Her banner reads: ‘My wish for the New Year is to receive a degree from the European University at St Petersburg’. A few months earlier, the government had barred the university from conducting any teaching activities. This book starts from an observation that contemporary reflection on the discipline of International Relations (IR), its theoretical debates and knowledge practices does not accommodate questions about the sociopolitical context of knowledge-making. Even research into non-Western IR knowledge tends to overlook the complex milieu of knowledge production in different locales around the world.1 This is despite the fact that the promise of an improved IR – one that is more diverse, embraces viewpoints and knowledge from different parts of the globe, and is ready to provincialize dominant perspectives on international politics – has animated scholarly endeavours for some time. Without a doubt, the opening of IR to ‘non-core’ viewpoints, and its increased reliance on concepts produced beyond the West, have already enriched the discipline by making its knowledge claims more nuanced and varied. This book series is an important testament to this embrace of knowledge produced outside of the ‘mainstream’. In addition to the positive trend of looking beyond the familiar perspectives, IR has incrementally opened up to the idea that a variety of factors shapes the

2 Introduction

2

research process and its outcomes. While invariably keen to engage with arguments about international politics, IR scholars have become interested in understanding how the social science of IR is practised. We are eager to reflect on our own epistemic practices – as well as the processes and circumstances that may shape them – and to debate not only the policy impact but also the political relevance of IR knowledge. Yet these two directions – one emphasizing the need to study IR knowledge around the world, the other stressing the importance of looking closely at epistemic practices – have not been in conversation. The growing popularity of enquiry into IR beyond the West notwithstanding, when mainstream IR problematizes and theorizes knowledge production, its focus remains on liberal democracies; debates about sociopolitical factors that influence IR knowledge production and its impact remain narrowly focused on the US and Western Europe. A serious downside is that the professed inclusion of other regions remains superficial if thinking about and theorizing IR knowledge production is undertaken solely from, and for, a liberal-democratic perspective. Literature programmatically dedicated to discussing IR beyond the West has so far focused primarily on theoretical developments. It restricted sociological analysis to IR’s institutional outlook and core – periphery arrangement of the IR discipline as it is practised around the world. The sociopolitical context within which academic institutions exist, and how this context may affect scholars’ epistemic practices, has remained largely beyond the scope of analysis. The drawback of this (otherwise fundamentally important) literature is that it tends to approach universities as closed systems that are detached or relatively autonomous from their sociopolitical setting. Given recent increases in censorship and attacks on academic freedom observed globally, it is surprising that the debate about IR knowledge production had not yet problematized the idea of an autonomous university. Appreciating and studying ideas around the world has become more popular recently in a number of disciplines. This is certainly a positive trend, even if the task itself is not straightforward. Depending on their ‘home’ discipline, scholars approach it in different ways and with diverse purposes. Some anthropologists, for example, advocate using others’ ideas to challenge the categories on which social science disciplines are built (Henare, Holbraad, and Wastell 2007), while philosophers may wish to show the world’s interconnectedness and potential for the emergence of a global philosophy (Smart 2008[1999]). There is also a variation in methods. Some argue strongly that engagement with knowledge should not proceed solely by means of sociological enquiry; such treatment, they fear, may indicate that we do not consider philosophers working outside of our own cultural realm serious thinkers (Baggini 2018, 7–8). However, to paraphrase Saussure and Bourdieu (Bourdieu 1988, 21), we can only adequately read the product of a scholar’s operation if we know what the scholar actually does. No cultural creations, including scholarly work, can be ‘divorced from the conditions of their production and utilization’ (Bourdieu 1988, xvii). This is why the commendable endeavour of getting to know IR around the world has so far been pursued

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Introduction 3

with tools and approaches insufficient for the purpose. This book shows why – and how – we need to account for the relationship between knowledge-makers and the world in which they live and work. The scholar, in other words, should be returned to the world rather than abstracted from it. It follows that an analysis centred exclusively on IR theories is not enough to claim that the IR discipline is broadening its outlook and diversifying its perspective. It is not sufficient to scrutinize solely the outcomes of a knowledgeproduction process, such as a specific ‘Western’ or ‘non-Western’ IR theory; if our goal is to engage thoroughly with knowledge about international politics, it is necessary to explore circumstances and mechanisms involved in its production and use. The narrow focus on theory and theoretical debates not only eschews questions about the broader context of knowledge production but may also paint a misleading picture of academic knowledge claims. Certain ideas may not be raised and debated not because of intellectual inability, lack of research or imagination but because of the specificities and constraints resulting from a sociopolitical setting. This setting bears on questions that can be asked and indicates subjects that are better avoided. An exclusive focus on the outcomes of IR knowledge production, such as theories, stops us from analyzing the missing or absent knowledge that may be the result of self-censorship or the incremental disappearance of certain research areas. It is only through an indepth engagement with the process and context of knowledge production, as well as in conversation with individual scholars, that we can provide a full account of knowledge-making and knowledge claims – including those that are silenced or suppressed. Scant conversation and exchange of ideas between IR and Science and Technology Studies (STS) has not helped to solve the problem of IR’s minimal engagement with context. STS has indeed broadened its outlook: from an initial focus on scientific knowledge-making processes towards an analysis of boundaries and relations between science and society. However, STS’s overreliance on empirical research into democratic states provides only a limited picture of knowledge-making and the impact that differently organized polities have on that process. The literature on hybrid and authoritarian politics, on the other hand, overlooks the area of academic knowledge production. Both this field and STS can benefit greatly from considering the co-construction of knowledge between the state and academic actors, and from analyzing scholarly practices of self-censorship and strategic uses of not knowing in social and political life. Any engagement with perspectives on international politics needs to study the sociopolitical background of their making, rather than expect these perspectives to unequivocally contribute to explaining international politics. Equally, our theories of the political relevance of IR knowledge will remain partial if a broader world of knowledge-making is not considered. Existing explanations of the policy and political relevance of IR knowledge have so far been derived primarily from the study of knowledge production in liberal democracies. We should fear not only that the ‘world’ they promise to engage with is narrow, and

4 Introduction

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continues to shrink, but also that these explanations remain indifferent to dynamic changes in the global patterns of knowledge production.

The argument and contribution of this book In this book, I argue that the sociopolitical context influences how academic knowledge is made and used. Context bears on epistemic and disciplinary practices in the study of IR and conditions scholars’ engagement with the wider public, their relationship with policymakers and their approaches to impact. Taking context into serious consideration enables me to question contemporary conceptualizations of the relationship between knowledge and politics, in particular, the theory of the political relevance of knowledge (Jahn 2017) and the fourpart model of research-policy relations (Boswell and Smith 2017). The theory of the political relevance of knowledge relies on the assumption that knowledge and politics are separate, and argues that knowledge becomes politically relevant through distancing from politics and through scholarly definition of political spaces (Jahn 2017). This book’s comprehensive engagement with the sociopolitical milieu of knowledge-making – one that problematizes the idea of university autonomy – sheds light on the poorly delineated boundary between academia and the state, allows for studying the role of state power in defining and blurring the conception of politics, and, ultimately, for developing an understanding of knowledge and ignorance construction as taking place between academia and the state. Extending the analytical gaze beyond liberal democracies, this book shows that, despite the IR discipline’s professed opening towards knowledge from beyond the West, liberal democracies remain the norm on which to build theories of knowledge in IR and conceptualizations of the knowledge-policy nexus. These theories, as well as a large body of literature discussing the knowledgepolicy nexus, rely on the assumption of a modern autonomous university abstracted from the political setting. I break with this assumption by situating knowledge production explicitly within the power-political context of the state and state-society relations. Bringing political power of the state back in, I engage critically with the Bourdieusian notion of the university as an autonomous field. I show that the political organization of the state and the arrangement of the public sphere influence scholarly knowledge-making and knowledge coconstruction between academic and state actors, as well as contribute to the emergence of knowledge gaps. The study of how the sociopolitical setting is dynamically arranged, and its implications for scholarly epistemic practices, makes it possible to problematize the extent to which academic knowledge partakes in defining and constructing the political space. The failure to attend to the specificities of the sociopolitical context in which IR knowledge is produced prevents us from accounting for the problem of missing knowledge. In other words, context may influence what is not there, rather than stimulate the production of specific ideas or claims. Delving into the practical aspects of the knowledge-policy relationship, Christina Boswell

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Introduction 5

and Katherine Smith argue persuasively that knowledge construction can proceed in four modes: knowledge shapes policy; politics shapes knowledge; co-production; and autonomous spheres (Boswell and Smith 2017). This book builds on this line of thinking adding that the relationship between policy and academia comprises the co-production of not only knowledge but also ignorance. The co-production of knowledge is understood as the state’s active role in promoting certain research areas, as well as in academic validation and positive evaluation of ideas and concepts stemming from the world of political practice. The co-production of ignorance means that certain topics either never enter the academic debate or become muted through such practices as self-censorship. Knowledge gaps and the phenomenon of muted knowledge cannot be properly studied if analytical attention is placed primarily on IR theories emerging from different regions of the globe, as has been habitually practised in scholarship to date (Acharya and Buzan 2009, 2017). At the same time, various forms of resistance and the ways in which scholars safeguard knowledge-production spaces add further dimensions to the existing conceptualization of the political relevance of knowledge. This book’s contribution is threefold. First, addressing a clear gap in the conceptualization of IR knowledge and its political relevance, the book shows why the sociopolitical context needs to be accounted for and how it influences scholars’ epistemic practices. Shedding new light on scholars’ contribution to (as well as withholding of) policy advice, this study has implications for our understanding of impact and makes a significant theoretical contribution to the debate about what IR knowledge is, how it is constructed and how to conceptualize its political relevance. Second, this study places the debate about IR knowledge produced globally on more robust sociological foundations. It does so by bringing in insights from sociological literature on knowledge-making and advancing the original Wæverian model for a sociological analysis of IR, which I employ to organize a detailed empirical study. Relying on empirical insights, the book contributes to the debate about a global IR discipline and global academic community. Rather than asserting their presence, it is necessary to enquire into the possibilities and limitations of constructing knowledge on the international, and to be attentive to problems that the positively charged notion of a global scholarly community may obscure. Finally, the book broadens the contours of the debate on IR knowledge production, by exploring the effects of a non-democratic setting for the construction and legitimation of IR knowledge and opening a line of inquiry into the workings of a hybrid regime from the vantage point of its relationship with social science.

The empirical study The book’s argument is supported by an empirical-interpretive study of IR knowledge production in Russia. Russia is a particularly worthwhile case for a number of reasons. The scholarly practice of IR – comprising both research and teaching – is well developed. The number of departments teaching IR is

6 Introduction

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close to 80. There have been, on average, more than 40 IR PhD theses defended yearly between 2013 and 2018. Two professional associations in the area of political and international studies are active domestically and internationally. The Russian International Studies Association, RISA established in 1999 and chaired by the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, MGIMO rector, is a member of the International Studies Association, ISA and has 18 different research clusters.2 The Russian Political Science Association, RPSA became the successor of the Soviet Political Science Association and now has 25 research sections, including one dedicated to geopolitics and security and a centre for political and international research.3 Both associations discuss topics pertaining to international politics at their academic events, such as the RISA biannual convention and the RPSA triannual congress.4 There are dozens of academic journals dedicated to politics and international politics. Scholars and politicians, as well as the general public, are engaged in charting and characterizing the world political system – a phenomenon usually attributed to Russia’s superpower history, which is cherished among the Russian population. The most obvious challenge for the type of exploration that wishes to account for the role of sociopolitical context in knowledge-making, is how to define the components of a given setting and which aspects to prioritise. In methodological studies, engagement with context often refers to the ‘value of simply being in the field site and learning about the environment first-hand’ (Fujii 2016).5 However, undertaking research about knowledge-making in Russia means that contexts are multiple. They involve the scientific field (with its interwoven intellectual and social determinants of research practices (Bourdieu 1999[1975])) as well as the public sphere and political governance, or what Arlene Tickner and Ole Wæver labelled ‘internal and external forces operating on the discipline’ (Tickner and Wæver 2009, loc. 9004). Exposition to those multiple contexts during fieldwork, coupled with the aim for maintaining analytical coherence, pushed me to develop a framework for mapping and exploring how these contexts bear on scholars’ epistemic practices. I employ this framework to show how, and to what effect, IR knowledge is embedded in political, social and intellectual shifts within a given society. Admitting that illiberal politics poses obstacles to scientific research but does not impede it completely, this framework facilitates an inquiry into concrete aspects of the sociopolitical context that influence knowledge production. It allows for exploring how these are reflected in epistemic practices and scholarly attitudes towards knowledge-making, knowledge popularization among wider audiences and knowledge-sharing with government institutions. The framework comprises three layers: state-society relations, historic (dis)continuity, and epistemic practices and the communication of research. The detailed composition and aims of the framework are described in Chapter 1. Accounting for the role of the sociopolitical context in knowledge production does not imply that I intend to absolve individuals of agency and responsibility. Nor do I wish to claim that a strictly causal relationship exists between this context and particular knowledge claims. I take Karl Mannheim’s sociology of

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Introduction 7

knowledge approach to this problem. Mannheim claimed that knowledge is determined by social factors. While he left the concept ‘determined’ without explanation, his criticism of the scientific method applied to cultural production suggests that the relationship he pointed to between social factors and knowledge was not of a causal type that would leave no room for argument. On the contrary, a detailed reading of Mannheim suggests he was primarily interested in how sociopolitical context frames the conditions of possibility for specific knowledges to emerge (Mannheim 2013, 1997[1925]). The study of Russia is particularly useful also to engage critically with the West/ non-West dichotomy that underlies contemporary discussion about IR knowledge.6 IR scholarship produced in Russia is rarely considered as pertaining to the Western ‘core’, but manifold inspirations from the US and Western Europe in the realm of ideas and disciplinary institutional setup, make it difficult to characterize Russian IR as clearly distinct from Anglophone IR and show how misleading and exclusionary the category of ‘non-West’ is.7 On the other end of the spectrum, scholars who self-identify as belonging to the Global South rarely count Russian counterparts into their ranks, even though they see the Global South not as a geographic term but one related to inequalities of power and perceptions (De Alba-Ulloa 2019). The International Studies Association Task Force on the Global South, in the study of its members belonging to the Global South, defined this category as ‘generally non-OECD countries’, which suggests Russia is included.8 But despite emphasizing that the IR discipline should capture and explain relations in all parts of the world, representatives of the ‘de-Westernizing’ scholarship (including the Global IR programme) seem not to pay particular attention to IR scholarship in Russia, as illustrated by the following quotation’s failure to include Russia among those ‘outside the West’: ‘There is also a proliferation of IR departments and programmes in universities outside the West, especially in large countries such as China, India, Turkey, Brazil and Indonesia’ (Acharya 2017, 76). Finally, some Russian scholars consider themselves as belonging to the Global North, not least because of Russia’s past as an ‘academic empire’ (Sokolov 2018, 6). Others prefer to make a distinction between Russian and Western ways of organizing academic life and producing knowledge, emphasizing the existence of a ‘geopolitical divide of ignorance and knowledge’, in which Russian scholars read and cite Western European and North American colleagues while few Westerners know about the former (Therborn 2017). There is a long tradition of thought that places Russia in between, rather than on either end of, the East – West spectrum.9 This tradition’s most vivid symbolical expression is the state emblem depicting a two-headed eagle looking both east and west. A significant part of Russian scholarship prior to the 1917 Revolution considered itself as belonging to the European intellectual tradition (Tolz 1997). At the same time, a group termed Slavophiles emphasized the fundamental difference between Russia and the West and pointed towards Russia’s affinity with the East (Engelstein 2009). The West/non-West distinction neglects what anthropologists identified as the cultural and discursive phenomenon of the ‘Imaginary West’ – a Soviet Russian cultural construct, or ‘imaginary world’,

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composed of knowledge and aesthetics associated with ‘the West’ (Yurchak 2013, chapter 5). Despite contemporary Russian society being much more interconnected and open to information than in Soviet times, a form of ‘Imaginary West’ still exists, and more recently it has acquired decidedly pejorative connotations for certain groups.10 And yet, acknowledging the negative power of labels and the dangers of unsophisticated dichotomies, neglecting the West/non-West divide completely is difficult for several reasons. This dichotomy pervades international politics writing in Russia. More recently, sections of the Russian academic community have become increasingly critical of what came to be identified as the Western-led international order, e.g. (Fenenko 2016; Shakleina and Baikov 2014). At the same time, comparisons of phenomena and processes in Russia to their Western counterparts abound. There is also a political economy argument to be made about how the geographical location of one’s workplace has profound consequences for academics’ livelihood. Local political economy factors place scholars working in economically less-advanced countries in a worse position than those in more affluent economies. A simple (and therefore upsetting, rather than simplistic) illustration of the complex political economy argument is the relationship between a mid-career academic’s salary and the price of an international publisher’s academic book. I describe this problem in more detail in Chapter 2. Despite sustained interest in Russia’s foreign policy and growing notice of Russian IR, academic knowledge of international politics in Russia has been spared a sustained critical reflection from a sociology of knowledge perspective. The topical literature has largely refrained from an in-depth study of the components and role of the sociopolitical context in knowledge production, concentrating primarily on tensions between Western and indigenous theoretical approaches to contemporary IR in Russia (Sergounin 2009; Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2010; Lydkin 2016; Lebedeva 2004; Omelicheva and Zubytska 2016). The most recent comprehensive study – authored by Marina Lebedeva, a seasoned practitioner and observer of Russian IR – focuses on theoretical developments, through which the author gauges the ‘general direction of thought in the field of IR studies’ (Lebedeva 2018, loc. 137). Lebedeva’s monograph emphasizes that the study of IR in Russia is influenced by the knowledge produced in the Soviet period and by the ‘situation in the world, the place that Russia occupies in the political organisation of the world, and how Russia perceives itself and others’ (Lebedeva 2018, loc. 300 and 364). The author also gives several reasons for why realism overtook liberalism as the most common approach to analyzing international relations in Russia. Among these, Lebedeva distinguishes between popular perception of liberalism and the negative connotations that popular discourse drew between liberalism and the period of uncertainty in the 1990s, as well as the ‘general emphasis on the implementation of national interests in the 2000s’ (Lebedeva 2018, loc. 1502). Lebedeva enumerates challenges to IR teaching – the commercialization of higher education among them – but refrains from a detailed discussion of the sociopolitical context in the country and its repercussions for academic knowledge production in IR.

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In terms of the relationship between scholarly analyses and policy discourse in Russia, the literature proposes that scholarly and policy discourses have become mutually constitutive (Makarychev and Morozov 2013, 330) and co-evolving (Omelicheva and Zubytska 2016, 42). Lilia Shevtsova, a political commentator and renowned critic of the Kremlin, has described high-profile experts on international affairs (mezhdunarodniki) as the ‘guardians’ (okhraniteli) of the regime (Shevtsova 2017). This book adds nuance to these representations and shows that the picture is more complex and diverse. Some academics see their role as concentrated around explaining Russia’s foreign policy to external audiences. Among scholars generally critical of the foreign policymaking process, views of their policy impact are located along a spectrum that ranges from the unwillingness to engage with the policy world to seeing impact as possible to achieve under certain conditions.

Research philosophy and methods One cannot talk about such an object without exposing oneself to a permanent mirror effect: every word that can be uttered about scientific practice can be turned back on the person who utters it. . . . Far from fearing this mirror – or boomerang – effect, in taking science as the object of my analysis I am deliberately aiming to expose myself, and all those who write about the social world, to a generalised reflexivity. (Bourdieu 2004, 4)

This book adheres to a philosophy of knowledge that speaks against linear and unidirectional explanations of social phenomena and places particular emphasis on reflexivity in the process of knowledge-making (Schwartz-Shea and Yanow 2012; Caretta 2015; Packer 2017; Hamati-Ataya 2017). Methodologically, I follow the new political sociology of science advice to use diverse methodological strategies for studying complex interactions between science and the state (Hess et al. 2017, 325). The normative argument about rigour in methods, which plays an important part in legitimizing claims to scientific knowledge, has often been interpreted as a push to conceal rather than illuminate the turbulent process of knowledge-making in the social sciences (King, Keohane, and Verba 1994). This book attends to a rigorous methodology, where rigour is understood as encompassing a detailed description of methods employed and a reflection on, and considerate observation of how, the research process unfolded (Pachirat 2017; Law 2004). This approach reinforces intellectual integrity and strengthens the appropriateness of the methods used. For instance, over the course of this research my view of what can be called participant observation changed profoundly, as did my interpretation of the concept of ethical interviewing. The empirical part of my research encompassed traditional and digital political ethnography, the mapping of academic research governance systems and interpretive analysis of IR research outputs published in Russia. During a research period in Russia (2016–18), I carried out 40 interviews with social

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sciences and humanities scholars employed at different universities and various institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow and St Petersburg.11 Forty per cent of interviewees were women.12 I supplemented these with three interviews with scholars who were based in Russia but not Russian citizens, two scholars gaining their academic degrees in Russia but now based outside of the country and four scholars with experience of running joint research projects with Russian counterparts.13 I complemented information obtained by means of interviews with reflections about academic practice published by scholars in the form of monographs, articles and opinion pieces. I acknowledge that the method of semi-structured interviews has its material limitations and that its results most closely reflect on the interlocutors and localities available to me at the time of carrying out this research. The method, however, proved useful in past research concerning knowledge production (Müller and de Rijcke 2017; Stevens, Miller-Idriss, and Shami 2018, 3) and policy processes (Owen and Bindman 2017). I conducted the semi-structured, face-to-face interviews in either Russian or English14 and following a practice termed relational interviewing (Fujii 2017), which means attending to the interaction between the interviewee and researcher rather than focusing narrowly on information passed on unidirectionally from the former to the latter. This approach includes a co-operative inquiry (Heron and Reason 2006, 144–146) and a learning process on the part of the researcher, who, through interaction and dialogue, gains insight into the interviewee’s world. Rather than providers of data, many of my interviewees were important interlocutors in the process of producing this research; I exchanged my own reflections about the difficulties involved in a sociological study of knowledge with many of them. The interviewees were selected by analyzing faculty members’ and the Russian Academy of Sciences, RAS employees’ profiles on institutional webpages, and subsequently by means of the snowball method. About 15 per cent of contacted scholars did not respond to the interview request, while some 5 per cent declined participation. Interviews involved asking about scholars’ motivation to do specific research, their experience of delivering research results to policymakers, and their assessment of the potential relevance and usefulness of research to foreign policymaking communities. Methodological debate concerning interview-based research, including interviews with experts (Bogner, Littig, and Menz 2009; Gläser and Laudel 2009), suggests that interviewees may wish to withhold information for various reasons (Napier 2010). Undoubtedly, one challenge specific to my research was that some of my interviewees were in the particularly difficult position that too much criticism on their part could undermine their own institutional setting, and, by extension, their own academic authority. However, a bigger pool of respondents in a diversity of localities (in terms of cities, institutions and disciplines) should alleviate this fallout. In most cases, my impression was that scholars sympathized with the process of collecting data and did their very best to share their experiences and assessments. The size of the interview sample allowed me to analyze interviews without resorting to specialized software. I searched for common themes and approaches

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with the aim of deriving classifications from interviews rather than attempting to fit data into pre-existing categories derived from literature. I complemented the study with monitoring opinions and debates published in Troitsky variant – Nauka, an open-access outlet covering academia-related themes, and with digital ethnography (Hine 2017). Undertaking online ethnography was motivated by the fact that critical discussion in Russia has largely moved to the virtual space (Etkind 2015, 279), even if this space, too, becomes more and more constrained. My online ethnography work encompassed monitoring scholars’ public profiles on global social media platforms and following social media discussions initiated by academic associations and groups, such as the University Solidarity Trade Union (Profsoyuz Universitetskaya Solidarnost), the Problems of Education and Science (Problemy obrazovaniya i nauki), the Ethics of Science (Etika nauki), the Social Movement ‘Obrnadzor’ (Obshchestvennoye dvizheniye ‘Obrnadzor’), the Free Historical Society (Vol’noye Istoricheskoye Obshchestvo) and the Moscow State University Trigger Group (Initsiativnaya Gruppa MGU). Throughout my stay in Russia, in addition to interviewing scholars, I participated in the workings of Russian academic institutions and observed academic practices. While analyzing IR academic outputs was part of my research, I have attempted to describe those outputs without judging their quality as I am persuaded that such judgement should be left to the scientific communities that sanction and receive this production in the first place. While I discuss the criteria of validity of academic work in Chapter 4, I do so relying primarily on assessments of Russia-based scholars and commentators on academic malpractice. With view to building my analysis with careful consideration of insights shared by scholars based in Russia, I drew on Russian-language sources in the sociology of science and political science, with special reference to expertise production and circulation. Remaining in conversation with Russian social sciences scholarship allowed me – I hope – to make my research relevant to audiences in Russia as well as beyond. In addition, I followed the ethics of an engaged researcher (Boyer 1990; Holland et al. 2010); I have attempted to coauthor work with colleagues based in Russia, delivered guest lectures at Russia-based universities, engaged in panels assembled by Russian colleagues and invited them to participate in workshops and panels that I organized. Fieldwork conducted in the era of connectivity brings certain methodological challenges. It is, for instance, not easy to determine a direct endpoint to fieldwork; even if one is no longer present at the geographic location of the ‘field site’, digitally mediated links with the field remain.15 These connections are even denser in the case of the present research because I chose digital ethnography as one of my methods of enquiry and because my research concerns the academic discipline that I myself practice. I dealt with these problems by clearly delineating the timeframe of my online ethnography, setting the end date one year after my fieldwork in Russia ended. Research I carried out in Russia, as well as my experiences of British academia, show that the same developments may be viewed quite differently – even by

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scholars working in the same institution. For instance, following a presentation of this research at Aberystwyth University, one scholar contrasted my account with their view of academic freedom as well-preserved in British academia. Another confessed that they have exercised self-censorship multiple times while working at a British university and would never use social media to share what they really think about academia. Analyzing knowledge claims, methods and contexts in which other scholars are situated creates an obligation to look at one’s own practices with even greater scrutiny. I situate reflexivity at the forefront of my scholarly practice, which is why my approach to methodology goes beyond data collection and analysis to encompass considerations of how I produce knowledge and from whence I produce it. The former requires thinking about the theoretical vantage points and methods of my research. The latter entails vigilance regarding how my practices are mediated by my cultural and professional background, institutional setting, funding and assessment requirements. Karl Mannheim’s sociology was aimed at helping to discern the bias inherent in one’s own perspective (Kecskemeti 1997[1952], 30). Following this logic, my objective was to avoid ‘othering’ and ‘orientalizing’ Russia, particularly given that different forms of orientalizing have characterized a number of scholarly portrayals of this country.16 Clearly, my own cultural and educational background have shaped the way I posed questions and went about the research, as well as my interpretation of the research material. I have also been aware of the fine line between criticism and bias (as have many before me),17 especially if this line is not simply established by the researcher but assessed by her audience. The challenges of ‘participant observation’ Extensive engagement with the academic field in Russia prompted me to reconsider the notion of participant observation. Despite the close professional ties I established in Russia, as a foreign researcher I was not subject to the same type of pressures fellow scholars were living through. Some bureaucratic practices were familiar to me, given my previous experience of higher education and diplomacy in conditions of post-communism, but my work in Russia was motivated by a different set of factors and future career prospects than that conducted by academics with Russian passports. I could simply admit my privileged position in undertaking this research; I was, after all, conducting a well-financed study that allowed me to go into the ‘field’ in the first place.18 Following several initial interviews, it became clear that I was sometimes directing my questions about research practices to scholars with far fewer opportunities to acquire funding for their desired projects, and with heavy teaching and administrative burdens impinging on their research plans. My passport and foreign payroll meant I was exempt from certain pressures. However, the relationship between myself and the scholars with whom I was in conversation, as well as between myself and the sociopolitical context of my research, were more complex and generated multiple political, practical and ethical issues.19 A foreign researcher

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may feel – or imagine (which is no less harmful to psychological wellbeing) – the ‘gaze of the state’ in ways not experienced by local scholars.20 As a foreign researcher, I was insecure about my visa, which needed to be extended multiple times while I was in Russia. My interviews show that this was a concern I shared with foreign scholars based in the country. My vulnerability was exacerbated by my age, gender and nationality, which, because of my name and surname, was recognizable to most of my interviewees, to whom I sent emails or gave business cards. I was also frequently openly identified as a Pole by interviewees who asked or commented on concrete policy moves undertaken by ‘my government’. Pavel and Andrei Tsygankov suggested, back in 2007, that ‘Western scholars could improve their understanding of the world by studying international relations as a discipline outside the West’ (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2007, 307), a point repeated ten years later by Marina Lebedeva (Lebedeva 2018, loc. 168). I have a profound difficulty in situating myself as a Western or non-Western scholar, even if colleagues sometimes use these designations, mostly taking into account my surname and accent. My paternal grandparents, who were native Lithuanian, Russian and Polish speakers, decided to polonaise their Russian surname only in the mid-1960s, after my father was bullied for it at school. I grew up in a communist system, and, over the course of ten years of fieldwork visits to the postSoviet region (which started in the 2000s), my age and national background have generally elicited two types of responses from my interlocutors. One is along the lines of: ‘You will understand this, surely’ (Dlya vas eto budet poniatno), implying affinity and my capacity to grasp what would be difficult to understand for those who lack the experience of living in a communist and transition country. The second type of reaction assumes my incomplete understanding: ‘But you have not lived in the Soviet Union’ (Vy zhe nie zhili v Sovetskom Soyuze), which emphasizes my interlocutors’ perception of difference between the Soviet system and other communist countries. I did my first degree in IR at a university that had introduced this discipline into its teaching only five years earlier. The profound confusion as to what studying IR entails accompanied me throughout my five years there, and my sense was that the lecturers (parachuted in from different departments) were similarly lost. My second MA, PhD and post-doctoral research were undertaken in the UK, affording me the experience of the cultural diversity of London and West Wales. During my most recent research visits to Russia, I felt I was a bit of an enigma to my interlocutors – not yet granted the status of a ‘Westerner’ but no longer quite ‘one of us’. Some conversations were also tainted by the politics of the day, and particularly the then-strenuous relations between (depending on the specific interlocutor’s choice) Russia and Poland or Russia and Britain. I acknowledge that several other methods could have been used to execute the study at hand, but none are without their faults. For instance, in his analysis of Russian sociology, Mikhail Sokolov relied heavily on a questionnaire (Sokolov 2018); but there are many problems related to survey-based research, including its usually rigid form of questions and the general scepticism of respondents

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towards that form of inquiry.21 The method of analyzing bibliometrics to determine citation frequency and assess the importance of certain topics in IR, may produce a distorted image. Scholars based in Russia point to the persistence of academic dishonesty, which ranges from plagiarism to establishing ‘fake’ journals in order to increase citation rates.22

Structure of the book This book comprises six chapters. In Chapter 1, I explore two developments that have characterized contemporary IR: increasing reflection on the knowledgeproduction practices and greater interest in how IR is studied beyond the West. With respect to the former, I discuss literature on the political relevance of knowledge and research-policy relations, showing that its claims are based predominantly on the analysis of the liberal-democratic state and the problematic assumption of university autonomy. In relation to the latter, I describe how otherwise valuable attempts to overcome IR’s Western-centrism stop short of studying the processes and contexts of knowledge-making. In the final section of the chapter, I introduce a three-part framework that allows for mapping the sociopolitical context and exploring its implications for scholars’ epistemic practices and their attitudes towards knowledge popularization among wider audiences and policymakers. The following empirical chapters (Chapters 2–5) make use of the three constituent elements of the framework: (I) state-society relations, (II) historic (dis)continuity and (III) epistemic practices and the communication of research. Chapter 2 considers the political and intellectual context of knowledge production in contemporary Russia, paying particular attention to state-society relations during Vladimir Putin’s third (2012–18) and fourth (2018–) presidential terms. I show how, against the background of growing limitations to civil liberties, the state has increased its control over higher education and teaching at the same time as it raised expectations for universities to climb international rankings. The chapter is concerned with the increasingly blurred boundary between academia and the state that manifests itself in organizational structures, legal and financial arrangements and the state’s dispersed interference executed by means of overregulation, strategic absences and stigmatization. Chapter 3 sets the more recent developments against the historical background of a Soviet state and the transition period of the 1990s. In the Soviet Union, the state’s control over academia, coupled with the ideological straightjacket of MarxismLeninism, limited academic enquiry into international politics, while social sciences were expected to work in the service of propaganda and devise means for justifying Soviet policy. Not all conformed but contemporary historiography of Russian IR remains divided as to whether it is justified to speak about an IR discipline in the Soviet period. I discuss how the Soviet period and certain knowledge production habits it bred continue to have a bearing on knowledge-making today. Chapter 4 considers scholars’ epistemic practices and ways in which they become affected by specific elements of the sociopolitical context. Uncertainty, caution and divisions along political lines among Russian IR community(ies) are

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among the most salient results of research in a hybrid regime. Creeping neoliberalism coupled with Soviet-style mistrust and control as well as blurred lines between what is permitted and what is undesirable, make many scholars develop a manufacturer’s attitude that favours quantity over quality. The chapter goes on to discuss scholarly responses, bringing in examples of both resistance and accommodation. How knowledge is used and the extent to which scholars are willing and able to share their research results with the wider public and policymakers are questions discussed in Chapter 5. I sketch out the relatively rich institutional setting for knowledge exchange between research and the state established in Russia for the last two decades – a setting that contrasts starkly with scholars’ general unwillingness to engage in policy advice. To address this paradox, I scrutinized scholars’ attitudes to policy impact and their assessments of relations between academia and the state in the area of foreign policymaking. I identify four major positions on the spectrum of scholarly attitudes towards impact: (a) no impact possible due to the highly centralized foreign policy process; (b) no impact, only justification of the existing policy; (c) unwillingness to have impact; and (d) limited impact possible under certain conditions. Chapter 6 draws conclusions from the theoretical section (Chapter 1) and the empirical enquiry (Chapters 2–5), noting that together they make a strong case for, and an illustration of, how to go about a context-sensitive enquiry into knowledge about international politics. In agreement with Daniel Levine and David M. McCourt’s declaration that ‘scholarly authority derives from one’s ability not to capture the truth, but to mark the space between the best accounts of a complex world one can obtain, and the actual complexity and indeterminacy of things’ (Levine and McCourt 2018, 102), it is necessary to emphasize that this book is not intended as a comprehensive and exhaustive picture of the Russian IR discipline. As noted by Marina Lebedeva, presenting a single picture of international research in Russia would be impossible (2018, loc. 108). This book is not a detailed description of academic institutions and their transformation – a task executed by Loren Graham and Irina Dezhina (2008). Nor does it provide comprehensive coverage of informal practices in the academic realm in Russia, for which I refer readers to Sergey Golunov’s work (2014). Despite these unavoidable limitations, this book fills an important gap in IR and social science studies. By pointing to the importance of context, and developing a methodological framework for researching it, the book provides a unique perspective on IR knowledge. I show how context affects epistemic and disciplinary practices in IR in Russia, conditions scholars’ engagement with the wider public and influences their approach to policy advice. Challenges related to knowledge-making and validation in Russia cannot be viewed as an anomaly but rather as part of the multifaceted relationship between knowledge and society. The production of knowledge about politics and IR takes place in variously organised political systems. In democracies, too, the decoupling of university from the wider sociopolitical context should not be the starting point for questioning knowledge production. Since democracy

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is never complete, so the relationship between universities, academic communities and the wider context in which they are placed is dynamic rather than static. What the case of Russia illuminates, is that the Bourdieusian struggle over scientific authority often takes place not within the scientific field but on the poorly delineated border between the scientific field and the state.

Notes 1 The term ‘milieu’ is used here as a synonym of context, rather than in the cultural studies sense, where it denotes social relations and possibilities for action (Grossberg 1999). 2 A rector is a position akin to that of a vice-chancellor in British terminology. The Association’s official website describes all 18 clusters: www.risa.ru/ru/about-rami/ governing-body. All links in the book, unless otherwise stated, were last accessed on 1 December 2019. 3 The Association’s official website describes all sections: www.rapn.ru/in.php? to=research_bodies. 4 Detailed lists of RISA’s and RPSA’s previous events are available at http://risa.ru/ru/ activity and www.rapn.ru/in.php?to=congresses. 5 See also Schatz (2013). 6 Only a handful of works criticize the binary opposition of ‘West’ and ‘non-West’; among these particularly noteworthy are: (Bilgin 2008; Hobson and Sajed 2017; Alejandro 2018; Katzenstein 2018; Çapan and Zarakol 2018, loc. 5832). 7 The term ‘core’ or ‘mainstream’ theorizing is used to describe theories Anglophone IR considers as forming the backbone of the discipline; they are often described as Western. At this point it is also important to note that some IR scholars emphasize that the ‘West/non-West’ opposition obscures how knowledge travels (Bilgin 2008; Smith 2018), others suggest that mainstream theories do not travel at all as they are ‘products of a specific time and place’ (Çapan and Zarakol 2018, loc. 5852). 8 The ISA Task Force on the Global South: www.isanet.org/Portals/0/Documents/ GlobalSouth/2018_GlobalSouthTaskForce.pdf 9 See, for instance, Cronin (2015), Oskanian (2018). 10 For instance, Mikhail Delyagin, head of the Institute of Globalization Problems and member of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy (SVOP), described the pension reform in Russia as resulting from Western pressures and the St Petersburg Economic Forum as no more than an assessment by Western supervisors of Russia’s performance. Delyagin’s opinion was discussed critically by Vladimir Pozner in his interview with Alexey Kudrin aired on Pervyi Kanal (state-owned federal television channel) on 17 June 2019: www.1tv.ru/shows/pozner/vypuski/gost-aleksey-kudrinpozner-vypusk-ot-17-06-2019 (10’15). The interview with Delyagin: https://izborskclub.ru/17045. 11 I use the terms interviewee and respondent interchangeably. In conformity with the ethical requirements of this research, all my interviews were carried out in adherence to the principle of anonymity. For reasons relating to participants’ safety, the interviews were not recorded; quotations provided throughout this book are derived from my handwritten notes. I reference my interviews in such a way that no one person can be identified by the date of the meeting or their workplace. To differentiate between the interviews, respondents are marked with a code symbol [R1–R40]. I presented the interviewees with an information sheet about the project and a consent form, the signing of which was optional if the interlocutor expressed consent orally. On challenges related to signed consent forms in the post-Soviet context, see Knott (2018).

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12 It was important for me to aim for gender balance among my interviewees for several reasons additional to the general aim for equality. Studies report differences in the theoretical and methodological approaches taken by men and women in the discipline of IR (Hancock, Baum, and Breuning 2013). Research has also shown that lived experiences may influence research (Leeds 2019). 13 These respondents are marked with a code symbol [RI–RIX]. 14 In some cases, the interviewee and I used both languages to make sure we meant the same thing. 15 These connections are consequential in terms of research ethics, publication and dissemination; see Knott (2018). 16 For example, see Malia (1999, 3). For a broader elaboration of simplified explanations of Russia’s politics, see (Tsygankov 2012). 17 For example, see Huxley (1949). 18 On the question of structural privilege and inequalities in research, see e.g. Fujii (2016, 1149). 19 See e.g. Pachirat (2017) for a discussion of power relations between social scientists and the worlds they analyze. 20 See Knott (2018) and Chapter 3 in this volume. 21 See the panel Krizis doveriya k sotsiologii kak zerkalu, otrazhayushchemu realii nashego obshchestva: kakimi putiyami vykhodit? (The crisis of trust towards sociology as a mirror reflecting the realities of our society: ways forward?) at the conference Trevozhnoye obshchestvo: o chem (ne) govorit sotsiologiya (The society of fear: what sociology does (not) talk about), the European University at Saint Petersburg, 1–2 December 2017, www.sociologists.spb.ru/files/spas_program_2017.pdf. 22 See the panel Empiricheskiye issledovaniya akademicheskoi nechestnosti (Empirical research of academic dishonesty) at the 10th annual conference Vystavka dostizhenii nauchnogo khozyaistva (The exhibition of scientific achievements), the European University at Saint Petersburg, 11–12 November 2016, https://eu.spb.ru/images/ vdnkh-conference/vdnh_2016/Programm_final.pdf. On plagiarism, see also Golunov (2014).

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Oskanian, Kevork K. 2018. “A Very Ambiguous Empire: Russia’s Hybrid Exceptionalism.” Europe-Asia Studies 70 (1): 26–52. Owen, Catherine, and Eleanor Bindman. 2017. “Civic Participation in a Hybrid Regime: Limited Pluralism in Policymaking and Delivery in Contemporary Russia.” Government and Opposition: 1–23. Pachirat, Timothy. 2017. Among Wolves: Ethnography and the Immersive Study of Power. London and New York: Routledge. Packer, Martin J. 2017. The Science of Qualitative Research. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schatz, Edward. 2013. Political Ethnography: What Immersion Contributes to the Study of Power. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Schwartz-Shea, Peregrine, and Dvora Yanow. 2012. Interpretive Research Design: Concepts and Processes. London and New York: Routledge. Sergounin, Alexandr. 2009. “Russia. IR at a Crossroads.” In International Relations Scholarship Around the World, edited by Arlene Tickner and Ole Wæver. London and New York: Routledge. Shakleina, Tatiana, and Andrei Baikov. 2014. Megatrendy. Osnovnyye trayektorii evolutsii mirovogo poriyadka v XXI veke (Megatrends. Basic Trajectories of the Evolution of the International Order in the 21st Century). Moskva: Aspekt Press. Shevtsova, Lilia. 2017. “Okhraniteli (The Guardians).” Radio Svoboda. 27 August. https://www.svoboda.org/a/28662872.html. Smart, Ninian. 2008[1999]. World Philosophies. 2nd revised ed. London and New York: Routledge. Smith, Karen. 2018. “The Dangers of Parochialism in International Relations.” E-International Relations. Sokolov, Mikhail. 2018. “The Sources of Academic Localism and Globalism in Russian Sociology: The Choice of Professional Ideologies and Occupational Niches among Social Scientists.” Current Sociology 67 (6): 818–837. Stevens, Mitchell L., Cynthia Miller-Idriss, and Seteney Shami. 2018. Seeing the World: How US Universities Make Knowledge in a Global Era. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Therborn, Göran. 2017. “Foreword.” In Sociology in Russia: A Brief History, edited by Larissa Titarenko and Elena Zdravomyslova. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Tickner, Arlene, and Ole Wæver. 2009. “Conclusion. Worlding Where the West Once Was.” In International Relations Scholarship Around the World, edited by Arlene Tickner and Ole Wæver. London and New York: Routledge. Tolz, Vera. 1997. Russian Academicians and the Revolution: Combining Professionalism and Politics. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press. Tsygankov, Andrei P. 2012. “Assessing Cultural and Regime-based Explanations of Russia’s Foreign Policy. ‘Authoritarian at Heart and Expansionist by Habit’?” Europe-Asia Studies 64 (4): 695–713. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov. 2007. “A Sociology of Dependence in International Relations Theory: A Case of Russian Liberal IR.” International Political Sociology 1 (4): 307–324. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov. 2010. “Russian Theory of International Relations.” In International Studies Encyclopaedia, edited by R.A. Denemark. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell Publishers. Yurchak, Alexei. 2013. Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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The elephant in the room The sociopolitical context of IR knowledge-making

Introduction We have witnessed two remarkable developments in the study of international politics. One is that we, scholars, have become more and more reflexive about our own knowledge practices. The other is that considerable effort has been put into not only getting to know but also engaging various perspectives on the international. This chapter will take a closer look at these two developments. Scrutinizing relevant literatures, it will show several gaps that need to be filled to realize their full potential. The most conspicuous of these gaps is that scholars reflecting on knowledge and epistemic practices in the discipline of IR, as well as those debating perspectives on international politics produced around the world, rarely take the wider sociopolitical context of knowledge-making as the explicit object of their research. Most analyses focus on disciplinary arrangements or the core-periphery global organization of the study of international politics. Pushing forward conclusions stemming from the existing literature, this chapter will show that it is necessary to engage with the sociopolitical context of knowledge-building, and how this can be aided by a political sociology of knowledge lens. The sociopolitical milieu has not been considered a puzzle in studies on knowledge-making for several reasons. Inspiration could hardly arrive from other disciplines. A direction taken by the sociology of science, which, with growing specialization, looked more and more deeply into scientists’ labs, has left – until recently – the wider sociopolitical environment outside the scope of its analysis. Most research in knowledge production, both in Science and Technology Studies (STS) and in the social sciences more broadly, has relied on a largely unproblematized assumption of scientific activity taking place in a democratic setting. The idea of a relatively autonomous academic field is rarely questioned, and becomes reinforced in theoretical studies on the political relevance of IR knowledge (Jahn 2017) and in literature debating the links between academic knowledge of IR and policy practice. It is, however, necessary to pay attention to the logics at play in knowledgeproduction processes beyond the liberal-democratic state, and to the effects of illiberal tendencies in established democracies. Such an analysis is important

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in its own right, in addition to speaking to and challenging assumptions dominant in English-language academia about the status and role of social-scientific knowledge, the knowledge-power nexus and the politics of truth (Amsler 2007). Broadening the purview to encompass illiberal or outright authoritarian practices has the potential to develop existing conceptions of what knowledge is, how it comes about and how to account for its political relevance. It is therefore surprising that a lack of engagement with the sociopolitical milieu also characterizes literatures discussing IR beyond the West, as well as those advancing the Global IR research programme. Prominent advocates of Global IR have a specific view of IR knowledge, presenting it as cumulative and universal. It is particularly visible in the enumeration of the main elements of a Global IR approach, the first of which is ‘pluralistic universalism (one that does not impose any particular idea or approach on others but respects diversity while seeking common ground)’ (Acharya 2016, 5). This strand requires knowledge produced beyond the ‘core’ to provide generalizable concepts that speak to perspectives wider than the local or regional.1 In research on IR around the world, emphasis is usually placed on deconstructing myths the ‘core’ may be perpetuating about IR knowledge elsewhere. This strand is also committed to drawing attention to the core – periphery arrangement of the IR discipline. The important decolonization agenda seeks, in turn, to engage with the legacies of racism and colonialism in the discipline (Fonseca 2019; Vucetic 2011). These sensibilities result in a specific orientation of research and a commendable prescription as to how IR knowledge-making should be organised but they are not free from omissions. The impact of domestic politics, if mentioned, is not prioritized. It results is certain simplifications, for instance: ‘it should be noted that contrary to what some in the core might expect, the IR discipline in the noncore is not characterized by extensive direct interference and political ordering’ (Tickner and Wæver 2009b, loc. 9019–32). The literature, moreover, pays little attention to the role of broader-than-disciplinary contexts, focusing rather on the effects of academic institutions. Interestingly, growing attention to IR around the world has produced two dissimilar observations. While some see little difference in how IR is organized, practiced and taught internationally – it is state-centric and focuses on traditional approaches to security2 – others emphasize that ‘patterns of theorising diverge across the world and reflect cultural and political assumptions of those residing in various parts of the globe’ (Tsygankov 2017, 571). The latter position, however, is asserted rather than demonstrated; it rarely results from detailed empirical enquiry into the specificities of a local context.3 Authors of the ground-breaking volume International Relations Scholarship around the World admitted that their study, given its wide scope, could offer but snapshots on the what and the how of IR knowledge in different localities (Tickner and Wæver 2009b, loc. 8978). Moreover, as the following quotation illustrates, mentions of or references to context are made with two aims in sight: to explain the dominant position of Western IR, and to emphasize the need to study locally developed knowledges:

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The second key point is that studying IR is rooted in national and sociocultural conditions. Any science, including the science of IR, is based on certain historical and cultural assumptions about the world that are common for a particular region from which such science originates. From this perspective, any search for objectivity and rationality, however important, takes place within socially and politically determined boundaries. For example, the intellectual dominance of Western IR has been possible to the extent acceptable by non-Western cultures. The more the world experiences the rise of non-Western cultures and traditions, the more likely we are to observe challenges posed to the Western idea of rationality. Finally, as an inherently cultural phenomenon, successful IR research involves a critical dialogue among scholars in national and global contexts. As the search for rationality and objectivity is culturally contested, it is essential to constantly compare various locally developed worldviews. (Tsygankov 2018a, emphasis mine) Without a doubt, there is a need to place reflections about IR knowledge-making on firmer empirical grounding (Hamati-Ataya 2017), even if the study of the sociopolitical context and its impact on epistemic practices is fraught with challenges. It is not easy to decide which aspects to focus on; nor is it immediately obvious how to link the wider context with epistemic practices and knowledge outputs. Aiming to respond to some of these challenges, this chapter draws on the sociology of knowledge and the sociology of science to construct a framework for a context-sensitive study of IR knowledge.

The missing sociopolitical context It is possible to distinguish several major currents in IR literature specializing in knowledge production. In the first, scholars enquire about the relationship between the state and academia and – more specifically – debate the relation between academic knowledge and policymaking. This strand, drawing largely on public policy as well as STS, discusses how the state uses expert knowledge (Biersteker 2014; Boswell 2009; Lowenthal and Bertucci 2014; Zambernardi 2016), how the state and experts co-produce epistemic objects (Stampnitzky 2013; Sending 2015; Allan 2017c, b) and, more broadly, how to theorize the political relevance of knowledge (Boswell and Smith 2017; Jahn 2017). The second current follows Pierre Bourdieu’s insistence on reflexivity as a vital part of scientific practice (Bourdieu 1988, 2003, 2007). It advocates awareness of the historicity and normative nature of IR knowledge claims (Hamati-Ataya 2013) and scepticism towards attaining a singular access to truth (Levine and McCourt 2018). These voices ask for a reconsideration of the epistemological premises of IR (Hellmann and ValbjØrn 2017) and a reconstruction of epistemology based on a firmer empirical grounding (Hamati-Ataya 2017). In the third strand, scholars interested in studying knowledge production discuss the impact of professional-disciplinary settings on epistemic practices (Levine and

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McCourt 2018, 94–96) and ask about the socio-epistemic conduct of research, with special reference to the effects of managerial and oversight practices such as research assessment (Bastow, Dunleavy, and Tinkler 2013; Ní Mhurchú et al. 2016; Smith, Ward, and House 2011). Let us look at each of these in some detail. IR literature discussing knowledge and its links to the policymaking world developed from the earlier dispute between ‘IR theorists’ and ‘real-worlders’.4 Over the years, the discussion has grown and become much more nuanced. Bueger (2014), Allan (2017b), Zambernardi (2016) and Jahn (2017) provide a comprehensive recapitulation of the main arguments that have driven the knowledge-policy nexus discussion. The most recent contributions to this strand of research ask sophisticated questions about the co-production of epistemic objects (Allan 2017a) and grapple with theoretical puzzles of how to conceptualize the political relevance of knowledge (Jahn 2017; Boswell and Smith 2017).5 A characteristic and long-lasting feature of the knowledge-policy debate is the division between those advocating tighter links between academia and the policymaking world (e.g. Bertucci and Lowenthal 2014; Lowenthal and Bertucci 2014; Biersteker 2014) and those critical of such ties. Advocates point to the benefits of bridging the gap between scholars and policymakers and discuss opportunities for fruitful collaboration and mutually enriching exchange in specific policy areas (Bertucci and Lowenthal 2014). Literature considers interactions between scholars and policymakers in international affairs as potentially productive, even if not always successful (Biersteker 2014). This appraisal is challenged by those who see numerous limitations to knowledge exchange between academia and the policy world. In Foreign Policy Analysis literature, such limitations have been debated since at least the early 1990s (George 1993; Newsom 1995; Walt 2005; Avey and Desch 2014; Byman and Kroenig 2016). More recently, growing political polarization, a distorted market of ideas and distrust in public institutions – including universities – have nourished the thesis about the eroding authority of traditional sources of foreign policy expertise (Drezner 2017). In Zambernardi’s summary, IR scholars may differ on the goals of theorizing and on the definition of knowledge, but they tend to agree that the ‘scientific study of politics should influence policy’ (Zambernardi 2016, 7).6 This approach finds confirmation in that some IR professional associations include the ‘application of research to policy’ as an important criterion for judging scholarly contribution.7 The major British higher-education evaluation exercise, the Research Excellence Framework (REF), assesses the impact of research outside of academia.8 Academic institutions, such as the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and King’s College London, run or host academic think tanks. LSE IDEAS is advertised as connecting ‘academic knowledge of diplomacy and strategy with the people who use it’.9 The King’s Think Tank ‘provides a platform for students to lobby for solutions . . . and be proactive in decision-making processes’ by various means, including policy workshops and a policy-recommendation journal.10 Practice-oriented approaches to the discipline of IR tend to romanticize the relationship between the state and academia. Authors delve into the possibilities

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and benefits of bridging the gap between scholars and policymakers (e.g. Bertucci and Lowenthal 2014, 240). Rather than discussing competition in determining what knowledge is and ways to legitimize specific knowledge claims, this strand focuses on opportunities for fruitful collaboration and mutually beneficial exchange between the state and academic knowledge in specific policy areas (e.g. Lowenthal and Bertucci 2014). This representation of the academia – policy nexus is based on the perception of academia as a separate sphere, distinct and autonomous from policy. It remains underpinned by the belief in a clear division of roles between ‘those who study and those who act’ (Lowenthal 2014, 1), or between ‘the two worlds of ideas and actions’ (Pastor 2014, 36). Most importantly, from the point of view of the present study, a great majority of this literature – which quite unproblematically entertains the possibility of ‘speaking truth to power’ – assumes the context of a liberal-democratic state. Such a context allows for recommending greater dialogue with the governmental sphere, focusing scholarly research on ‘questions of direct relevance to policymakers’ (Lawson 2014, 18) and ‘developing relations of trust with allies in government’ (Bertucci, Borges-Herrero, and Fuentes-Julio 2014). The assumption of a liberal setting makes it easier to suggest that there are numerous avenues for scholars to engage with policymaking, if only ‘they are willing and able to resist the many institutional barriers to doing so’ (Biersteker 2014, 137). Only under conditions of uninterrupted academic freedom may one claim that: the greatest advantage the scholar has over the policy practitioner . . . is the ability to convene meetings on controversial issues and draft reports. Even policy practitioners with far greater experience and expertise would be unlikely to undertake politically sensitive initiatives or activities of broad scope on their own. Practitioners are often less able to act independently, and while they might wish to see some issues raised, they could never do so from their institutional positions. Scholars thus can play the role of agents for some policy principals. (Biersteker 2014, 149) There are exceptions to this overly optimistic narrative. Authors admit that the relationship may be permeated with tension (Anderson 2003), especially when it comes to certain, more contested policy areas, such as security in the US following 9/11 (Whitehead 2014, 233). Some point out that the demand for policyrelevant knowledge and evidence-based policy may vary between countries (Entzinger and Scholten 2015, 60–61), and that expert advice can restrict rather than nourish discussion about different policy options (Baekkeskov and Öberg 2017). All in all, however, the practice-focused literature adds these doubts as caveats rather than systematically exploring them. Even more critical approaches to the uses of knowledge by the state share the perception that knowledge travels from academia to the policy world (Boswell 2009, 2015). While emphasizing that the state may use knowledge for symbolic purposes and to legitimize certain actors or policy preferences, rather than with

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the aim of performance improvement (Boswell 2009, 6–7), Christina Boswell’s widely acclaimed monograph did not engage the possibility of the state’s involvement in knowledge production. Admittedly, more recent work in this area discusses several models of research – policy interaction, including where research and policy are mutually constitutive (Boswell and Smith 2017). Several problems remain. This analysis does not entertain the possibility of the co-production of ignorance rather than knowledge. Being firmly set in a liberal-democratic context, this work fails to problematise the influence of the sociopolitical milieu on the research process and outputs. Situating our questions about knowledge-making in a liberal-democratic context allows us to regard scholars as willing to produce politically relevant knowledge (Jahn 2017); that is, knowledge that might be used by the state and contribute to policy enhancement (Allan 2017b). This context allows for the argument that academic research protects civil-society actors (Jahn 2017, 69) and the claim that it is possible for science to both keep a distance from politics and remain relevant to policy (Jahn 2017). The liberal separation of knowledge and politics, that rests on the assumption that scholars can share their thoughts unconditionally, has so far been a precondition for theorizing the political relevance of knowledge. IR literature that discusses the professional milieu and its implications for knowledge-making suggests that IR is shaped by different local – national or regional – factors, such as employment prospects and job security, productivity metrics, assessment mechanisms and access to funds (Levine and McCourt 2018, 96–97; Ní Mhurchú et al. 2016). Factors such as a lack of diversity among scholars are said to lead to a fairly narrow research focus (Leeds 2019). Those scrutinizing the role and effects of performance indicators and impact agendas on epistemic practices show their significant influence on research outputs (Müller and de Rijcke 2017; Bastow, Dunleavy, and Tinkler 2013; Bliesemann de Guevara and Kostić 2017). They argue, for instance, that the REF and its impact agenda make specific narratives difficult to articulate (Ní Mhurchú et al. 2016). An enquiry into the epistemic effects of performance indications in the life sciences, which claims applicability beyond this discipline, suggests that ‘thinking with indicators’ is becoming a central aspect of research activities, from planning to the social organization of the research process to determining research outputs (Müller and de Rijcke 2017). Attention to the professional context of knowledge-making is a significant advancement given that, throughout the discipline’s history mainly the realworld events were invoked as influencing the content of the academic study of International Relations (Grenier et al. 2019). Even though some doubted that a causal connection between external events and theoretical developments could be established with certainty (Wæver 1998, 692), scholars continue to point to such developments as the end of the Cold War or the rise of China as contributing to the emergence of new theoretical frameworks (Eun 2018, 1; Pan and Kavalski 2018).

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Finally, IR scholars have called for a more reflexive attitude to knowledgemaking in IR. Such a turn broadly relies on a post-positivist critique of knowledge and social reality, while the practice of reflexivity entails becoming aware of the social processes that accompany and steer knowledge production (HamatiAtaya 2013). Other formulations of this direction advocate epistemological scepticism, a position according to which no knowledge system can claim singular access to truth (Levine and McCourt 2018). An important shortcoming of IR’s reflection on knowledge is its almost complete omission of IR produced beyond Anglophone countries. Back in the days when discussions of IR oscillated around factors conducive for the discipline to ‘emerge’ in specific national contexts, factors such as a state’s power potential, international status and extensive foreign policy were considered the most important (Hoffmann 1977, 49–59). Those who recognized IR as an American social science discounted knowledge produced in other countries on the grounds that political systems in states such as the Soviet Union and China create severe obstacles for scholarship: ‘I leave aside countries like the Soviet Union and China, in which it would be hard to speak of free social science scholarship!’ (Hoffmann 1977, 48). Soviet social scientists were often cast as unable to make objective assessments, given political and ideological constraints (Labedz 1967a, b; Ashley and Orenstein 1995, 58), and the supposition that no genuine IR knowledge could be produced under non-democratic conditions was widespread (e.g. Light 1988).11 Literature on the academia – policy nexus is almost entirely constructed on the interrogation of Western democracies. When IR theorizes the political relevance of knowledge (e.g. Jahn 2017); when it speaks about policy advice (e.g. Lowenthal and Bertucci 2014; Zambernardi 2016) and reflexivity in IR knowledge production (e.g. Hamati-Ataya 2013); it has so far primarily considered the context of a liberal-democratic state, with less attention paid to states with different governance systems. Levine and McCourt use the examples of the US and Australia when referring to what they call a ‘broadly transnational’ IR academic discourse and the ‘significant cross-border movement of scholars’ (Levine and McCourt 2018, 96). Very few authors have raised wider questions about the complex relationship between social-scientific knowledge of IR and the state beyond the liberaldemocratic setting. This relationship is often assumed rather than studied. The result is a simplified picture of the academia – state nexus that ignores differences in the political organization of societies. One example is Acharya’s discussion of the field of IR in developing states: ‘Another factor is the close link between IR academics and governments in many developing countries (although this is also a feature in the West), which promotes policy-oriented research at the expense of theoretical work’ (Acharya 2017, 77). This lack of attention to specific sociopolitical contexts and the state’s attitudes towards academia results in misleading comparisons that discount such dynamics as self-censorship and unwillingness on the part of scholars to share their research with state officials. This quotation may also be read as implicitly assuming that scholars in

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developing states have similar room for manoeuvre vis-à-vis the state as their counterparts in liberal democracies. Literature dedicated to the study of IR beyond the Western ‘core’ (Tickner and Wæver 2009b) has paid relatively little attention to the role of broader-thandisciplinary settings from which knowledge emerges. Emphasis has been primarily on university institutions, the core – periphery arrangement of the IR discipline and international political and economic developments, rather than on political regimes that accompany IR knowledge-making. Thinking IR differently (Tickner and Blaney 2012) explores, for instance, how concepts about world politics become articulated in different parts of the globe (Tickner and Blaney 2012, 12–14). Globalizing IR (Peters and Wemheuer-Vogelaar 2016) delves into the absence of non-Western International Relations theory in South-East Asia and intellectual gatekeeping in Africa but authors retain their focus on what they identify as structural features of the discipline and disciplinary practices. Even works engaging closely with national contexts of IR knowledge production, including through interviews with IR scholars in India and Brazil (Alejandro 2018) and India and China (Kristensen 2019), do not account for the specificities of political organization and its consequences for knowledge production. In her fascinating study that disrupts the narrative of Western dominance in IR, Audrey Alejandro admits that local context may pose some limitations to academic work, mainly with regard to freedom of research and expression (Alejandro 2018, 129). The bulk of the analysis, however, is dedicated to institutional arrangements and dynamics within intellectual communities (Alejandro 2018). The book refers to the state mainly with respect to higher-education policies and stops short of elaborating on concrete mechanisms though which the state may attempt to influence knowledge production. The same reservation applies to Peter Kristensen’s thought-provoking account of the consequences of ‘risingness’ for IR knowledge production. When Kristensen writes about Indian scholars being more critical than their Chinese counterparts of supporting their respective state’s emerging power project (Kristensen 2019, 10), academic freedom does not feature in the explanation. Others who look to contexts outside of the US and Western Europe admit – even if only in passing – that the state may interfere with academia (Whitehead 2014, 225), or acknowledge the weak institutional autonomy of academia visà-vis politics. However, only a handful of authors (Schoeman 2009, 58–59; Kacowicz 2009) make reference to domestic political arrangements and their influence on IR knowledge. Schoeman, for instance, argues that opportunities for scholarly engagement with policymaking may grow, and the relationship between IR scholars and government may thrive, under a wave of democratization. It will, however, diminish rapidly if foreign policy issues become contested. Tensions in relations between the government and scholars result from officials’ sensitivity to criticism of a country’s foreign policy (Schoeman 2009, 58–59). Nonetheless, most analyses remain fairly optimistic about the ability of scholars to influence policy by means of better dissemination and the production of ‘usable’ knowledge (Heredia 2014, 91–93).

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Theorizing the political relevance of knowledge The liberal-democratic context is assumed by not only scholars who share the utilitarian approach to knowledge and interest in policy improvement but also those who aim to theorize the state – academia relationship. Both Beate Jahn and Christina Boswell define their aim in terms of theorizing, i.e. conceptualizing in such a way as to illuminate a wider pool of cases. Boswell writes in this regard: ‘The book develops a theory of the conditions under which knowledge is likely to be valued for these three different functions: instrumental, legitimizing or substantiating . . . in the context of policymaking and party-political mobilization’ (Boswell 2009, 8, emphasis added). Jahn, in her suggestively titled contribution Theorizing the Political Relevance of International Relations Theory, states: ‘I provide an account of the modern relationship between politics and knowledge – and, with it, an encompassing conception of political relevance’ (Jahn 2017, 64, emphasis added). Jahn’s comprehensive theoretical argument suggests that it is through the distancing from politics that knowledge becomes politically relevant: the ‘most profound political relevance of modern science . . . lies precisely in the development and maintenance of the gap between politics and knowledge through metatheoretical and methodological reflections and practices’ (Jahn 2017, 68). While Jahn recognizes that, at the epistemic level, science and politics are co-constitutive (Jahn 2017, 73), she also claims that the possibilities for political actors to shape the fields of study are narrow: ‘While societal pressures and highereducation policies shape fields of study in general, they do not have the power to force individual scholars to investigate particular problems in specific ways – thus providing an opening, for example, for critical approaches even in the United States’ (Jahn 2017, 73). Jahn acknowledges that her theory is relevant only under conditions of the ‘modern university’; that is, one that ‘was established and financed by states, yet provided with academic freedom to pursue knowledge in accordance with the logic of reason rather than in the service of particular political interests’ (Jahn 2017, 68). What Jahn terms the ‘modern context’ refers to the ideal of a liberaldemocratic state. This position does not prevent the author from stating that the analysis illuminates ‘the nature and function of IR as a modern science’ (Jahn 2017, 65), a phrase that discloses aspiration for a broad, if not universal, validity. However, if the explanation of IR as a modern science is limited to democracies, we should fear not only that the ‘world’ it promises to engage with is narrow but also that such an explanation remains indifferent to the dynamic changes in national politics and global patterns of knowledge production, particularly the growing role of countries and regions beyond the West. Glimpses of how the domestic politics of a particular state impact on knowledge production even beyond the national setting make the political context of state governance more and more difficult to dismiss or ignore. For instance, the way in which major European publishing houses responded to pressure from China to censor their journals shows that businesses may prioritize profit over academic freedom.12

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Nonetheless, the majority of literature on the links between the state and academic IR, as well as on the political relevance of knowledge, is underpinned by the assumptions of ‘modern liberal-democratic politics’ (Entzinger and Scholten 2015, 62) and ‘modern democratic governance’ (Whitehead 2014, 220). This literature presupposes the institutional autonomy of academia, with respect to policy and politics (Heredia 2014, 91), as well as the political accountability of the government. In turn, critical approaches, while exposing knowledgepower interdependencies, are predominantly characterized by high levels of abstraction away from the lived experiences and anxieties of individual scholars. In the study of propaganda, the role of the sociopolitical context is emphasized and introduced into analytical models (e.g. Jowett and O’Donnell 2014, 390), but it is a non-issue for a substantial part of IR. There are several possible reasons why questions about the sociopolitical context have been sidelined. One explanation is that studies about IR knowledge-making rarely extend to nondemocratic countries, so there has been no perceived need to problematize the context. The assumption of the relative autonomy of the academy and the modern university prevailed. As a result, questions about the relationship between a state’s political structure and the way it influences science have not been asked in the discipline of IR. The second explanation is that reflections on the extent to which theories and knowledge on IR are embedded in the local culture could not break into the mainstream of the discipline. As early in the disciplinary development as 1964, Quincy Wright warned that ‘people in thinking of international relations today usually project the civilization with which they are familiar to the whole world’ (Wright 1964, 23). Ken Booth also pointed to problems linked to viewing the world from within one’s own frame of reference (Booth [1979] 2014). This topic gained greater recognition in political theory, particularly the discussion of the role of the Enlightenment worldview (Jahn 2000), but has not been broadly debated in what in Anglophone literature is known as ‘mainstream IR’ or the backbone of the discipline.13 If IR scholars had looked to other disciplines for inspiration, they would have found little to draw on. As the following section describes in more detail, developments in the sociology of science have not been conducive to greater engagement with the sociopolitical context. On the one hand, the sociology of science narrowed its attention, increasingly specializing in laboratory studies; on the other, this field’s reflection on power relations was usually accompanied by the idea of the autonomy of the scientific field, in which power relations inside academia mattered more than those outside it. Even when the sociology of science began to explore the state – science nexus, it either focused on liberal-democratic states or assumed that globalization would create all states in the West’s image. Growing specialization in the sociology of science Karl Mannheim, a figure now recognized as one of the founding fathers of the sociology of knowledge, was puzzled with the processes through which

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collective thought patterns were constructed and found expression in political action; or, as he described it, ‘how men actually think . . . how it really functions in public life and in politics as an instrument of collective action’ (Mannheim 2013, 1). He persuasively argued that everyone’s beliefs, including those of a social scientist, are the product of the context in which they were created. Despite this early recognition of the significance of the ‘nature of the wider polity’ (Shapin, Schaffer, and Hobbes 1985, 332; Mannheim 1936, 5, 49) for knowledge construction, this line of enquiry was later (and for a considerable period of time) largely abandoned in the social studies of specialized knowledge. Mannheim’s approach was not overarching. He excluded natural sciences and mathematics from his pioneering idea that there is a sociological component to knowledge and that knowledge should be interpreted within a sociocultural setting (Mannheim 1997[1923], 1997[1925]).14 Mannheim recognized progress in mathematics and natural sciences as largely determined by ‘immanent factors, one question leading up to another with a purely logical necessity’ (Mannheim 1997[1925], 135). Many followed in his footsteps. Without denying the complexity and breadth of the sociology of science literature, an overview of memorable works across the social sciences shows that sociologists of knowledge, paying attention to the sociopolitical environment and its consequences for the work of cultural producers, exempted scientific knowledge from similar analysis. While they agreed that the speed and direction of scientific development may be affected by factors originating outside the scientific community (such as society and economy), most philosophers, historians and sociologists were sceptical about these factors’ influence on the content of scientific thought (Mulkay 1979, loc. 2225). Mulkay provides the following exposition of the logic behind this treatment of science: Scientific knowledge has been conceived as an objective representation of the physical world. The modern scientific community has been credited with an ethos which reduces social influences upon the production and reception of knowledge claims to a minimum, thereby guaranteeing the accumulation of objective knowledge. (Mulkay 1979, loc. 2225) Even those willing to include scientific knowledge in the purview of sociological research preferred to focus on norms regulating scientists’ relations to each other. The influential work of Robert Merton, for instance, conceptualized science as driven by a distinctive ethos and reward system.15 In Merton’s account, modern science, as a separate sphere of social life, was distinguishable by a complex of values and norms comprising universalism, communism, disinterestedness and organized scepticism (Merton 1973, 268–270). These inputs reinforced the image of science as developing independently of the external sociopolitical context (Merton 1973). Merton and many of his followers confined their studies to scientific institutions, motivations and organizational norms, discounting power relations outside academia.

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Merton’s project, widely recognized in the discipline of sociology, made it difficult to connect scientific discoveries with wider society. For this body of scholarship, the only aspect in which the wider context could be consequential was when it distorted science’s ideal: the disinterested pursuit of truth (Mulkay 1979, loc. 2228). The study of distortions focused on conditions under which false beliefs could dominate the scientific endeavour. The totalitarian state was mostly to blame for ‘polluting real science’, as the cases of eugenics in Nazi Germany (Weindling 1989) and Lysenkoist genetics in the Soviet Union demonstrated (Joravsky 2010[1970]; Huxley 1949). In his seminal study on social structures, Merton offered a brief comment concerning pressures on the autonomy of science and the results of politically imposed criteria of scientific validity in Nazi Germany. In his view, however, a liberal order was different. In liberal states, science was guarded by autonomy granted to ‘non-political institutions’ (Merton 1968[1949], 594–595). Thus, the task of sociologists was to explore what type of society was the most conducive to implementing and institutionalizing the scientific ethos and securing the autonomy of a research community. Such a stance led to the conclusion that democratic societies offer the best setting for scientific development. Only democratic societies were considered to share the values on which science depends for the production of valid knowledge (Mulkay 1979, loc. 2235). Many followed and developed this tradition. Karl Popper’s theory of science assumed that the advancement of science necessitates free speech and open attitudes, as it progresses by means of intersubjective criticism; that is, ‘rational control by critical discussion’ (Popper 2002[1935]; Smart 2008[1999], 320). Popper recognized that the use of political power to suppress free criticism, or the failure to protect it, harms the proper functioning of scientific institutions (Popper 2011[1945], 424–425). For a considerable time, sociological enquiry into scientific knowledgemaking has either assumed a democratic setting (and therefore withheld questions about the sociopolitical context) or explored the benefits of such a setting to science. While Popper is an example of the latter, Thomas Kuhn represents the former strand. Kuhn’s work in the philosophy and sociology of science16 has been appreciated across the social sciences and, with the conception of paradigms, has had a significant influence on IR. Kuhn, however, was rather uninterested in studying the broader context of knowledge-making, which he considered to be quite difficult to explore: ‘The relationship between the metascientific environment, on the one hand, and the development of particular scientific theories and experiments, on the other, has proved to be indirect, obscure, and controversial’ (Kuhn 1977[1976], 33). This is why Pierre Bourdieu, in his later work, criticized Kuhn for representing the scientific world as cut off from the social and political context surrounding it. In Bourdieu’s words, Kuhn introduced (albeit not in these terms) the idea of the ‘autonomy of the scientific field’ (Bourdieu 2004, 15). As the following section shows, it is possible that Bourdieu accused Kuhn of a problematic interpretation he himself was guilty of, especially in his early writing.

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STS, a burgeoning field since the late 1980s (especially in the US), seemed well positioned to return to the question of the sociopolitical context of knowledge production. Interestingly, the very idea of STS emerged in Moscow, during the International Congress of the History of Science held in 1971.17 While we could suspect that this specific location – in the heart of a totalitarian political system – would have provided fertile ground for discussions on the relationship between politics and knowledge, this is not how debates in this field developed. Rather than taking a broader look at various societies and types of polities, the sociology of science18 focused more narrowly on studying scientific instruments and practices (Biagioli 1999, xv) – an approach that led to the emergence of laboratory studies. Bruno Latour was at the forefront of this new area of enquiry. To Latour, it was not enough to look at social relations between scientists, as Merton and his followers did. Neither was Latour satisfied with the approach taken by epistemologists who investigated scholars’ mental aptitudes. What was more revealing of knowledge and knowledge-making was a detailed study of the material local setting – the laboratory, with its tools and practices (Latour 1987).19 Questions of interest to this field focused on interactions among lab researchers, their rhetorical strategies or ‘repertoires’ (Gilbert, Gilbert, and Mulkay 1984), scientific practices (Lynch 1985), the division of labour in a laboratory (Shinn 1982), the laboratory conditions of their work (Latour and Woolgar 1979; Knorr-Cetina 1983) and – most broadly – the ‘lab capital’ of their respective institutions. Studying the laboratory left even less scope for questions about the sociopolitical landscape in which the lab was situated, even if Latour aimed to rectify this omission with an attempt to account for the laboratory’s place in society (Latour, 1999).20 The assumed autonomy of the scientific field Pierre Bourdieu challenged the growing specialization of the sociology of science, criticizing laboratory studies for forgetting to account for the effect of a lab’s position within a structure (Bourdieu 2004, 36). What he meant, however, was a fairly narrow structure of the scientific field, rather than a wider sociopolitical context within which this field existed. The Bourdieusian idea of the scientific field takes into consideration scholars, scientific teams and laboratories, as well as the relations and interactions between them (Bourdieu 1999[1975]). Bourdieu presents this field as relatively autonomous, which means that the forces constitutive of the field are relatively independent of pressure exerted on the field from the outside (Bourdieu 2004, 47). The scientific field is ‘the locus of a competitive struggle’ over scientific authority. Bourdieu explains scientific authority as the ‘capacity to speak and act legitimately in scientific matters’ (Bourdieu 1999[1975], 31). The concept of the scientific field was to help Bourdieu overcome what he saw as overly deterministic interpretations – either those that coalesced entirely around an internal analysis of science or those that ascribed scientific problems to external social conditions (Bourdieu 1999[1975], 33).

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The idea of the scientific field continues to be influential in the social sciences. Without a doubt, it was exceptionally successful in undermining the idealist understanding of science as guided solely by its own internal logic. The concept made visible the coevolution of scientific ideas and power relations among scientists, as well as the parallels between epistemological and political conflicts (Bourdieu 1999[1975], 32). But it has certain limitations. The assumption of the field’s relative autonomy excludes questions about the state apparatus influencing the scientific field, as well as about the co-dependence of the university and the state. These deficiencies were corrected somewhat in Bourdieu’s later reflections, which were influenced by the writings of Michel Foucault. Bourdieu’s description of the faculties of medicine, law and theology cast them as ‘the most directly controlled by the government, the least autonomous from it’ for their role in training executive agents of crucial importance to the maintenance of the social order (Bourdieu 1988, 62–63). In Bourdieu’s view, science occupied the opposite end of the spectrum to law and medicine, and could therefore be considered autonomous. Social science faculties were located in between, combining ‘the reproduction of the cultural order’ with the pursuit of research and scholarly goals (Bourdieu 1988, 73–74). For Bourdieu, social science could not be neutral or apolitical. Moreover, Bourdieu presented its autonomy as under constant threat from both inside the scientific field and the external world (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, 51). Recognizing the political relevance of the social sciences, which Bourdieu presented in terms of its role in preventing mystification (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, 51), and emphasizing that the state’s interest in the world of science was growing, Bourdieu did not devote specific attention to the ways in which politics, and the state in particular, influenced knowledge production. He continued to return to the idea of autonomy, arguing, for instance, that in order to be politically effective ‘scientists must first constitute an autonomous and self-regulating ensemble’ (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, 54). Bourdieu’s idea of the academy’s relative autonomy had both direct and indirect critics. Edward W. Said, who contemplated the university from several regional perspectives – including in states characterized by non-democratic politics – admits that, in practice, there are numerous challenges to university autonomy: I cannot bring myself to believe that, even though it cannot be an immediately political arena, the university is free of the encumbrances, the problems, the social dynamics of its surrounding environment . . . no university or school can really be a shelter from the difficulties of human life and more specifically from the political intercourse of a given society and culture. (Said 1994, 14) In Rajani Naidoo’s view, Bourdieu’s methodology could not be easily applied to a sociopolitical setting such as South Africa, which, in the early 1990s, was

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characterized by social conflict and change. In her view, in such a setting it is impossible to think of a university that generates its own values and imperatives that are independent from forces pertaining to the economic and political fields (Naidoo 2004, 458). Though Naidoo refrains from presenting it in these terms, it becomes obvious from her analysis that Bourdieu’s methodology is difficult to transport and apply in polities not characterized by a liberal-democratic political system (Naidoo 2004, 467). The problem of political context and its consequences extends beyond Bourdieu’s theoretical considerations and can be found in how specific faculties and scholars view their independence from politics. Naidoo’s research has shown that faculty members at South African universities in late apartheid were willing to engage in a ‘collective denial of social and political factors that might impact on universities, even in a country that appeared to be on the brink of a revolution’ (Naidoo 2004, 462). Naidoo also points to the underdeveloped conceptual apparatus through which one could link the sociopolitical context (in her analysis termed sociopolitical forces and external power relations) with institutional practices (Naidoo 2004, 466). This lack of adequate conceptual apparatus adds to the list of reasons for the marginal interest in analyzing the role of the political context in academic knowledge-production processes. The persistent focus on democratic states in STS Contemporary STS is a broad and dynamic interdisciplinary area that at least since the mid-1990s has been paying greater attention to the role of the state in shaping what is scientifically researched and how (Guston and Kenniston 1994).21 STS not only enquires into the construction of knowledge and science but also pledges to speak to the science – society and science – economy nexuses. The former includes considering the role of ideology (Hess 2014), values (Jasanoff 2010), political regimes (e.g. Jasanoff 2017), public understanding of science (Bucchi and Neresini 2008) and the systems for organizing and governing science (Felt et al. 2017, part IV), including the roles of the regulatory state, citizens and social movements (Frickel and Moore 2006).22 The latter comprises the study of links between the university, industry and the global economy (Lave, Mirowski, and Randalls 2010; Evans 2010). The political sociology of science, an interdisciplinary field within STS, postulates a broader consideration of relations between science, economic-political institutions and social institutions (Blume 1974). Despite significant broadening of its purview, STS remains overwhelmingly focused on democracies. Even though STS has begun to interrogate the relationship between politics, political decision-making, science and technology, it presupposes the milieu of ‘political uncertainty, public debate, and societal decisionmaking’ (Irwin 2008, 583), which characterizes democracies rather than hybrid or authoritarian regimes. Indicative of this trend is that, even in its fourth edition (2017), The Handbook of Science and Technology Studies dedicates an entire

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chapter to science in democracies but only marginal attention to other political settings in which knowledge is made. The chapter starts with the following declaration of STS’s orientation and intent: The relationship between science and democracy occupies a central place in the canon of science and technology studies. . . . [This] heading encompasses . . . the ways in which scientific knowledge and technical expertise intersect with people’s ability to hold state power accountable to democratic values. (Jasanoff 2017, 259) Given that STS and other branches of the sociology of knowledge refrain from a comprehensive engagement with the elements and repercussions of the sociopolitical setting for academic knowledge-making, it is time to look at other fields that could potentially offer interesting insights or inroads into the topic. Standpoint epistemology is one such field, for it declares a self-conscious return to Karl Mannheim’s pioneering work. Standpoint epistemology and situated knowledge Standpoint epistemology shares with Mannheimian sociology of knowledge the conviction that all knowledge is socially and historically situated. Whereas science studies concentrate on academic knowledge, standpoint epistemology adopts a broader perspective and is prepared to challenge the worldview that takes science as a model of how to produce knowledge (Harding 1993, 56). Postulating that different forms of domination shape ways in which knowledge is produced, it sees knowledge-making as influenced by existing power hierarchies based on gender, race, class, sexuality, culture and age. Standpoint epistemology argues that relations of power are fundamental to how society operates, and advocates taking the lives and experiences of marginalized and oppressed peoples seriously in considerations of what knowledge is and how it is made (Harding 2004, 1, 1993, 56).23 Standpoint epistemology challenges the conventional view that ‘politics can only obstruct and damage the production of scientific knowledge’ (Harding 2004, 1). For standpoint epistemology, politics can be conducive to the growth of knowledge (Harding 2004, 2). As Harding explains: Standpoint epistemology sets the relationship between knowledge and politics at the center of its account in the sense that it tries to provide causal accounts – to explain – the effects that different kinds of politics have on the production of knowledge . . . prefeminist empiricism conceptualizes politics as entirely bad. . . . Prefeminist empiricists can only perceive such questions as the intrusion of politics into science. (Harding 1993, 55–56)

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This is why standpoint epistemology is often presented as ‘politically engaged research on behalf of oppressed groups’ (Harding 2004, 5). Its authors call for the conscious politicization of knowledge (Pels 2004, 273). This broad purview – and the recognition of power hierarchies based on gender, race and class as overbearing – means, quite naturally, that research underpinned by standpoint epistemology is less interested in analyzing the relationship between academic knowledge and the state. Rather, presenting knowledge as academic is the point of contestation for this body of scholarship. Conversely, the scope of standpoint critique, its definition of politics and its adoption of a political agenda make it difficult to use its unreservedly important inputs to shed light on the relationship between academic knowledge and the sociopolitical context.24 Situated knowledge, as introduced by Haraway (1988, 1219), prompts researchers to recognize the contextual and hierarchical nature of knowledge production and requires of them to reflect on their own position and their relations with others involved in the research process (Caretta 2015, 1221; Neumann 2015, 1222). While indisputably valuable, this problematisation of knowledge-making tends to focus on the scholarly self and their immediate surroundings with less emphasis on the relationship between the state and academic knowledge.

De-Westernizing the debate Having seen how various literatures have engaged with or ignored the context of knowledge production, it is time to return to the second major advancement in contemporary IR identified at the outset of this chapter: the commendable increased engagement with perspectives on international politics from outside the West. Excessive Western-centrism and parochialism have been noted regularly in philosophy (Smart 2008[1999]) and the social sciences, including in IR, but it is only recently that serious attempts have been made to overcome this state of affairs. These advances pertain to a broader critical discussion about what IR is, how it should and should not be delineated (Ling 2017), who IR scholars are and how the research topics they choose are linked to their specific backgrounds (Leeds 2019). With roots in postcolonial and decolonial scholarship, this debate re-evaluates the foundational myths of the discipline (Thakur, Davis, and Vale 2017) and calls for radically different approaches to international politics (Ling 2013, 37), including deconstructing racialized power-knowledge relations (Tucker 2018). Decolonial perspectives have an emancipatory aim; seeking to allow marginalized voices to speak and be heard, they foreground postcolonial marginalization. Some strands of the decolonial project encourage local theorization of IR in order to challenge what they see as a structural problem – scholars from the ‘periphery’ are the consumers rather than producers of theories (Aydinli and Biltekin 2018, 16). This is why questions about how certain positions and knowledges may be influenced by dynamics other than the hegemony-subordination dichotomy fade into the background (Ortega 2016; Agathangelou and Ling 2009;

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Blaney and Tickner 2017; de la Cadena and Blaser 2018). Yet acknowledging other perspectives requires a profound engagement with the power relations accompanying their construction and, as Fonseca rightly emphasises, these power relations include economic and material conditions and limitations (Fonseca 2019, 12). In other words, the due recognition of other perspectives should not be seen as incommensurate with vigilance about domestic contexts that impact on these perspectives’ production, in all their different forms – including as academic knowledge. The relationship between Anglophone IR and views from the world beyond the West has been mired in contradictions. In the IR of the 1970s and 1980s, sporadically voiced reflections on Western-centrism were not acted upon and failed to be transformed into a research agenda. It is highly likely that this is because those who voiced them were at the same time engaged in producing scholarship that, in one way or another, dismissed non-Western perspectives. For instance, Hedley Bull, while posing an important question that struck directly to the heart of IR’s Western-centrism, was also noted for openly dismissing the perspectives of others. Bull asked: ‘If the theories that are available are almost exclusively Western in origin and perspective, can they convey an adequate understanding of a world political system that is predominantly nonWestern?’ (Bull 1972) The same author, aiming for coherence in his idea of international society, dismissed the official statements of international actors such as the Soviet Union as having insignificant bearing on actions undertaken by that state in the international realm.25 Kenneth Waltz, another prominent figure of classical IR theory, took a similar approach towards the Soviet Union, claiming that Soviet views on international politics had become similar to American views and that the Soviet Union had dropped its revolutionary agenda (Waltz 1979, 173). Dismissing other countries’ stated positions and perspectives was also characteristic of security studies. Pinar Bilgin reminds us that, during the Cold War US deterrence theorists considered it irrelevant to study Soviet policymakers’ views and approaches to nuclear strategy as they presumed the Soviets played ‘the same “deterrence game”’ (Bilgin 2017). These are just a few examples of IR scholars dismissing others’ perspectives. The fact that these dismissals concerned one of the then-major powers in international politics is troubling, and may explain why the perspectives of lesspowerful states and regions could have been overlooked with even greater ease. Eurocentrism’s important incarnation, as Bilgin accurately noted, has been the disregard for conceptions of the international produced by ‘others’ (Bilgin 2016b). Western-centrism crippled IR in many other ways: through its dismissive stance towards the official rhetoric of non-Western states, through stretching the European experience to the rest of the globe and through the construction of non-Western histories in terms of their relationship to the West or to the allegedly universal explanations that, in practice, were embedded in Western contexts (Mitchell 2004, 103–104). Since the days of Bull and Waltz, interest in IR beyond European and US scholarship has grown considerably. Acharya and Buzan’s pioneering 2007

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special issue (Acharya and Buzan 2007a, b) and edited volume (Acharya and Buzan 2009) opened a broad research agenda to which many have since contributed. Scholars began to expose IR’s Euro- or Western-centrism and called for greater attention to non-Western knowledge about international politics (Tickner and Wæver 2009b; Tickner and Blaney 2013). Advocates for greater engagement with non-Western knowledge have correctly argued that the silencing, dismissal or neglect of voices stemming from outside the ‘core’ has been an important by-product of colonialism (Dabashi 2015). They have also pointed to the inadequacy of Western conceptions for comprehending the nonWest, and underscored the need to embrace marginalized ways of thinking (Shilliam 2015) and to ‘explore theoretical approaches from the margins’ (Fonseca 2019, 5). At the discipline’s centenary,26 we can state with considerable confidence that consensus has been reached as to the need to overcome IR’s Western-centric assumptions (Hobson 2012). Scholars have put forward several ideas that are united in recognizing the need to stop accounting for the experiences of others with reference to their relations with Europe and to prevent the West from taking up the role of a universal reference point (Chakrabarty 2000; Vasilaki 2012; Bilgin 2017). The themes of parochialism and the situatedness of IR knowledge have made it into IR theory handbooks (e.g. Bilgin 2016a). However, no uniform position has emerged on how to be more inclusive, or what this means for the discipline(s) of IR. One suggestion is to use different experiences to contrast and test the validity of mainstream theoretical claims (Arias 2016, 184). An opposite suggestion, proposed by Latin American scholars and pertaining to theories of regionalism, is to discard Eurocentric approaches and build a research agenda better suited to explaining realities outside of Europe (Deciancio 2016; Zhang and Chang 2016). Those who advocate greater engagement with non-Western IR knowledge emphasize the need to destabilize privileged Western historical narratives and interpretations of international politics. Correctly, they see discarding so-called ‘false universalism’ – that is, the tendency to accept West-centric interpretations and Western spatio-temporal experience as generally applicable – as imperative (Wæver 1998; Acharya 2014a, 650; Grenier and Hagmann 2016; Fonseca 2019, 4). One approach suggests that a broad opening to non-Western voices and philosophical traditions can proceed by means of unrestrained pluralism. Scholars sharing this view accept diversity and cherish the coexistence of various perspectives, theoretical accounts and representations of international politics (e.g. Jackson and Nexon 2013; Sil and Katzenstein 2010). By embracing and developing a variety of theoretical, methodological and epistemological approaches, scholars are seen as able to prevent the emergence of a singular way of interpreting politics (e.g. Zambernardi 2016, 5). Those who see the discipline from a sociological perspective, however, note that pluralism is difficult to achieve due to the uneven power relations and disciplinary hierarchies permeating the field of IR (Çapan and Zarakol 2018). These scholars suggest the best way to improve IR is through overcoming the Western

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hegemonic position. Since the bulk of the knowledge industry, comprising scholars, academic publishers and editorial boards, is located in the West, various gatekeeping practices prevent genuine diversity in the discipline; non-Western scholars are coerced into accepting specific standards and interests, which only reinforces the core – periphery division in IR knowledge production (Tickner 2003; Bleiker 2001; Ling, Hwang, and Chen 2009; Tickner and Wæver 2009a, 335). This approach has been challenged by those who recognize the narrative of Western dominance as itself Eurocentric and disempowering. This narrative, they argue, contributes to naturalizing discrimination in IR knowledge rather than overcoming it (Turton 2015; Alejandro 2018, 2017; Kristensen 2015), while juxtaposing a ‘dominant West’ with a ‘dominated non-West’ denies agency in international politics (Hobson and Sajed 2017). This literature contests the claim that scholars based outside the English-speaking core are always motivated by the ambition to join the global debate and are halted by the gatekeeping practices of the core (Alejandro 2018). The narrative of Western dominance also expects scholars located in national contexts to produce dissident, counterhegemonic arguments opposing Western dominance (Alejandro 2018, 128). Just how different perspectives on international politics from around the world actually are, and how the discipline of IR is practiced in different locales, are questions that motivate Ole Wæver, Arlene Tickner and David Blaney’s threevolume series Worlding Beyond the West.27 Scrutinizing the institutional outlook of the IR discipline, and examining theoretical inputs proposed by nonWestern scholars, these authors conclude that IR in different parts of the world shares a number of characteristics. Thematically, it is state-centric and preoccupied with the problem of security. Teaching-wise, most mainstream textbooks and IR courses are structured in a similar way. To arrive at a more comprehensive picture, Pinar Bilgin suggests that studies of non-Western knowledge should appreciate that IR knowledge around the world is not produced in a vacuum; to the contrary, it is deeply rooted in an international political context characterized by material inequalities (Bilgin 2008), and responds to descriptions and categorizations already produced by Western IR (Bilgin 2017). There is also unease that a growing focus on regional perspectives nourishes parochialism (Owen, Heathershaw, and Savin 2017). Critics of ‘national schools’ of IR suggest they foreclose ways for producing generalizable knowledge; once different perspectives become incommensurable, the possibility for global dialogue is limited (Owen et al. 2017; Acharya 2014a). Some scholars also recognize that ‘theories with national characteristics’ reflect not only nonWestern cultural traditions but also the national interests of specific states (Eun 2018, 3). A significant group of scholars suggests integrating Western and non-Western knowledge on IR, emphasizing the utility that new perspectives can bring to existing IR knowledge. The expectation is for such perspectives to enrich explanations and concepts deemed important for IR – such as war, conflict and

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sovereignty – and to ‘complement and refine understandings’ prevailing in the discipline (Tickner 2003). Experiences from outside the West are regarded as helpful to ‘revise, innovate and better inform existing IR theory’ (Smith 2009) and ‘to give some non-Western philosophical contribution towards IR theory’ (Ong 2004, 35). This group of authors emphasizes that theories originated in the Global South do not have to be ‘radically different’ to improve our understanding of international politics by means of reinterpreting existing concepts and introducing new ones (Smith 2018). The aim is to enrich IR by rooting it in ‘informed representations of both core and periphery perspectives’ (Acharya and Buzan 2007a, 427–428). These authors also wish to challenge the division of roles in which scholars of the West theorize while others remain the consumers of theory (Tickner 2003; Smith 2009; Buzan 2018). The Global IR research programme has emerged as a prominent direction within this current.

The problematic promise of Global IR Global IR is at the forefront of the de-Westernizing debate. This research direction has matured since the 2007 publication of the special issue of International Relations of the Asia-Pacific (Acharya and Buzan 2007b) and the 2009 publication of a book titled Why There Is No Non-Western IR Theory (Acharya and Buzan 2009). Global IR advocates were successful in drawing the attention of the IR community to their agenda by making Global IR the core theme of the 2015 International Studies Association annual convention. This international gathering, titled Global IR and Regional Worlds: A New Agenda for International Studies, was followed by an International Studies Review Presidential Special Issue dedicated to Global IR (Acharya, Bilgin, and Ling 2016). The programme rests on the claim that non-Western perspectives are crucial to achieving a better, more comprehensive IR (Acharya 2014b). A renewed IR discipline, proponents argue, should be nourished by concepts and theories other than those associated primarily with Western societies and cultures (Acharya 2011, 619, 2016, 6). Unlike some post-and decolonial approaches, Global IR ‘does not seek to displace existing theories, but challenges them to broaden their horizons and acknowledge the place and role of the non-Western world’ (Acharya 2017, 76). The programme’s commendable aspiration is to increase inclusiveness and diversity in the IR discipline (Acharya 2014b, 649). Global IR has been considered a welcome development and a step in the right direction (Anderl 2018; Eun 2017). Its few critics have noted its reliance on a very specific concept of dialogue (Hutchings 2011) and its insufficient explanation of how to go beyond competing theoretical particularisms (Owen, Heathershaw, and Savin 2017), and have contested the global knowledge canon the programme assumes (Anderl 2018). However, without negating the programme’s positive contribution, it is necessary to point to some further limitations.

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Although attentive to non-core voices, Global IR remains grounded in a specific view of IR knowledge and the discipline’s purpose. Proponents of Global IR see the discipline’s aim as producing universal knowledge about international politics. What follows is an implicit expectation that non-core knowledge should contribute to general IR knowledge. This, in turn, is seen as the best way of closing the gap between the West and ‘the Rest’. Despite the declared objective of understanding the circumstances of non-Western knowledge production (Acharya 2011, 636), the ideal of knowledge accumulation, contribution to a common pool or ‘the main body of IR theory’ (Acharya 2017, 77), is seen as more important than contextualization. This requirement transpires in the Global IR demand for concepts and approaches developed in non-Western settings to apply to and explain the world at large, thus broadening and enriching IR (Acharya 2014a, 650–651). To ‘meet the test of Global IR’, non-Western perspectives are expected to contribute ‘generalizable concepts and theories from a national or regional context that should not only be applicable to a specific country or region but must have broader generalization potential’ (Acharya 2016, 6). The authors of the Global IR programme appear to assume the existence of ‘the substance of IR’ (Acharya 2017, 78), which can be explained more comprehensively with the help of theories and concepts from outside the West. Global IR assumes International Relations to be a global discipline that, by default, produces knowledge for an international audience. This view, however, obscures dynamics taking place in and around specific IR communities. We risk losing sight of, for instance, IR knowledge that is deliberately produced for a specific local market. We may also be underestimating the phenomenon of self-sufficient research communities that are relatively immune to external influence (see e.g. Czaputowicz and Wojciuk 2017, 98–99; Alejandro 2017), or socio-institutional settings where achieving ‘intellectual autarchy’ is the goal (Tsygankov 2014, 66). Despite calling for the study of IR to be more inclusive of non-Western worlds (Acharya 2011, 620), the requirement for local voices to speak to and about global order remains. Acharya terms this process ‘local constructions of global order’ (Acharya 2014a, 647). On the one hand, Global IR adheres to perspectivism, a position suggesting that reality – or international politics, in this instance – can only be known from a specific point of view. On the other, Global IR students seem attached to the idea that some common take on, and knowledge of, world affairs is needed for people to be able to live together and for single-globe issues to be tackled. Acharya has sketched a way out of this conundrum, suggesting pluralistic universalism (Acharya 2017, 78), but this position is in need of further development – with particular reference to the distinction drawn between plurality and pluralism in recent literature (Levine and McCourt 2018). At present, the Global IR research programme embraces plurality but not pluralism. Global IR seems to be underpinned by a view of singular and attainable knowledge, rather than accepting the provisional nature of claims about the inherently complex and indeterminate social world.

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Advocates of epistemological scepticism hold that no knowledge system can claim singular access to truth (Levine and McCourt 2018). They rightly suggest that pluralism in IR must be underpinned by such scepticism, otherwise it only merits the term plurality. For this pluralism to be obtained, Levine and McCourt argue that a diverse field of International Relations needs to be situated in a ‘vigorous, diverse political culture’. Only such ‘structural conditions’ can provide the possibility for ‘a pluralism mind-set’ to emerge (Levine and McCourt 2018, 101). Authors, however, devote little more than a paragraph to discussing the components of this political culture. As such, the research presented in the subsequent chapters of this book should be a welcome contribution. A related problem is that Global IR tends to exhibit a conventional view of IR theory, which manifests itself in the language employed to describe the programme. The programme’s declared objective is to build theories about the functioning of international relations. The goal of a theory is defined as providing explanations of political, economic and security relationships (Acharya 2011, 622). Global IR follows literatures that tend to judge advances in the discipline mainly with respect to the development and improvement of theory. Contributors to the 2016 special issue on Global IR suggested ‘there is no way we can make sense of the infinitely complicated world around us without theories’ (Mearsheimer 2016, 147). To count as ‘IR theorizing’, local knowledge needs to be analytically useful beyond a particular region (Acharya 2014a, 652) – a view suggesting that theory, to proponents of Global IR, remains abstract and idealized; there seems to be little willingness to see it as a cultural product with ‘a history and a social life in this world’ (Hamati-Ataya 2016, loc. 2138). In proposing to ‘extract’ particular concepts and theories from a local context, and to include them in the ‘pool of knowledge’, Global IR reserves the right to evaluate which elements of local theories can be included. It does not take into consideration that ‘standards of evidence and knowledge are historically relative, dynamic and of our own making’ (Nelson 1993, 141–142). A focus on theories and their building blocks is not in itself a mistaken approach, but it is a limited one. It shies away from studying the processes involved in knowledge production and the ways in which sociopolitical contexts directly and indirectly impact scholars’ epistemic practices. An approach overtly focused on the products of knowledge-making, in the form of theories and concepts, prevents questions about opportunities for, and barriers to, social-scientific thinking in a given milieu. Global IR advocates have an idealized view of IR knowledge. Their expectations are to achieve a positive outcome and to reach enlightenment, prompted by others’ ‘authentic’ perspectives, to borrow Pinar Bilgin’s apt description.28 This optimism echoes mid-1980s hopes for a more cosmopolitan IR discipline – one that would be inclusive of ‘all the world’s ways of seeing and knowing’ (Olson, Onuf, and Smith 1985, 18). The premise of Global IR is that, through inviting more viewpoints and introducing non-Western concepts into the IR discipline,

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scholars can ‘celebrate the differences among its different theoretical, epistemological, and methodological approaches’ (Acharya 2014a, 656). What appears to be omitted is that other approaches to studying international politics may suffer from drawbacks similar to those that Western IR has been trying to overcome. These approaches and their authors may be equally unwilling to confront their parochialisms. Their motivations may, consciously or unknowingly, be directed by the need to defend specific national interests (Eun 2018, 3) and geared towards elevating the status of specific regions or countries. Moreover, Global IR’s general optimism may foreclose a discussion about potential normative clashes emerging from contrasting or contradictory normative underpinnings of specific IR knowledge claims. Global IR is not static. Indeed, its founder and most enthusiastic advocate, Amitav Acharya, has substantially developed the idea since its inception. In a ‘manifesto’ of what Global IR should look like, accompanied by the suggestive subtitle What is to be done, Acharya presents it as ‘collective efforts by the IR community . . . to expand the horizons of IR theory beyond the histories, ideas, identities, and practices of Europe and the United States’ (Acharya 2019, 268). In this version, Global IR ‘supersedes’ non-Western IR theory (Acharya and Buzan 2009), post-Western IR (Bilgin 2008) and the West/non-West dichotomy, with the goal of developing ‘a truly inclusive and universal discipline’ (Acharya 2019). While ambitious, this version retains the focus on theories and the goal of universality. The fixation on the outcomes of knowledge production (that is, IR theories) and the vision of cumulative and attainable knowledge are in no way specific to the Global IR research programme. The roots of these ideas are deeper, and are linked to how the disciplinary core approached theory, and to the rather slow pace at which reflexivity has entered International Relations scholarship (Hamati-Ataya 2013; Alejandro 2016; Kaczmarska 2020). The ideal of developing ‘cumulative verifiable knowledge’ (Keohane 1988) has long underpinned the discipline, as have representations of theory as a rationally obtained reflection on what goes on in world politics, and ongoing attempts to make ‘qualitative research more scientific’ (King, Keohane, and Verba 1994, 18). Progress in the discipline has been understood, following positivist philosophy, as a continuous movement of accumulation, whereas a deeper engagement of the how of knowledge-making has been relegated to the margins. However, a thorough engagement with knowledge about international politics requires an explanation of the circumstances and processes involved in its production and use. The following section suggests how to go about it.

Bringing the sociopolitical context back in To analyze the sociopolitical context and account for the role of the state in knowledge-making, I constructed an analytical framework, inspired by Ole

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Wæver’s first (and, to date, only) ‘explanatory model’ for studying IR from a sociology of knowledge perspective (Wæver 1998, 694–695).29 Figure 1.1 shows Wæver’s original proposal. Layer 1: Society and polity a. Cultural, intellectual styles b. ‘Ideologies’ or traditions of political thought c. Form of state; state–society relations d. Foreign policy Layer 2: Social sciences a. General conditions and definitions of social science b. Disciplinary patterning: disciplines and subdisciplines Layer 3: Intellectual activities in IR a. Social and intellectual structure of the discipline b. Theoretical traditions Figure 1.1 The explanatory model proposed by Ole Wæver Source: Wæver 1998, 695

In constructing his model, Wæver drew on Peter Wagner, a sociologist of science, and specifically on Wagner’s work titled Sozialwissenschaften und Staat: Frankreich, Italien, Deutschland 1870–1980 (Theorie und Gesellschaft). Wæver’s framework comprises three layers: society and polity (layer 1), social sciences (layer 2) and intellectual activities in IR (layer 3) (Wæver 1998, 694–695). This explanatory model, while undoubtedly an effect of a praiseworthy and pioneering endeavour, has several deficiencies. While the culturalintellectual dimension is described in detail, other elements lack similarly attentive treatment. The fundamental difficulty, however, is that it is unclear what the model is supposed to be doing; Wæver depicted his model’s aim as ‘explanatory’, but the account of what the model seeks to explain remains vague. There are two declared goals: first, to explain disciplinary developments (Wæver 1998, 689, 690) or evolutions within IR theory (Wæver 1998, 692); second, to account for variations of IR in national contexts (Wæver 1998, 689). These two goals are not necessarily incompatible, but one model cannot be expected to fully explain both. This is because the first aim presupposes a modicum of unity of IR theory, or universality of IR knowledge, while the second emphasizes differences resulting from divergent national contexts. There also seems to be a logical flaw in the model’s construction, as an

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element that the model seeks to explain is also an integral part of it. In this case, ‘theoretical traditions’ are both something to be explained, with the help of the model, and an integral part of the model’s structure. Composition is another problematic element of the model. What is conspicuously missing from the proposed framework is political power located in the state and its institutions. Although state-society relations are said to be central, there is no discussion of the ways in which the state interacts with or influences academia as a specific element of that society. Wæver defines political ideologies as ‘national traditions of thought about state and society’, but without reference to political power. Even foreign policy, ‘the least controversial element in the model’ (Wæver 1998, 695), is presented as a self-evident factor that influences IR knowledge production and is left without comment. Furthermore, Wæver’s model does not engage with the uses of IR knowledge. This means that questions such as why scholars produce IR knowledge, what incentives and prospects there are for this knowledge are to become relevant to policy, and how scholars define the political relevance of IR knowledge remain unaddressed. Wæver employs the model to discuss four cases, none of which is situated outside of the Euro-Atlantic context: France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States. In addition to its Western-centric application, case descriptions are brief and apply the model rather loosely. All four states under discussion have, in their post-WWII history, been characterized by a democratic political outlook. This may explain why the workings of governmental political power are left out. As a result, the model does not allow for accounting for developments in a country with discontinued statehood, changing levels of democratization and fluctuating authoritarian power. Nor does it allow for consideration of a profound ideological shift that changed the course of many disciplines in social sciences. The hasty and categorical rupture with Marxism-Leninism made it difficult – especially for social sciences – to rely on research accomplishments of the Soviet era. Sociologists, for instance, attest that as a result of the ‘tremendous paradigm change after 1991 (. . .) the previous sociological heritage was dismissed and almost forgotten’ (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, loc. 143). Wæver embraced, rather than problematized, the idea of a national context. Literature in the sociology of social sciences notes that, in non-English-speaking countries, scholars usually choose to engage with either local or global social science. This starts with the decision about which language to publish in – a choice that influences a host of other epistemic practices. In choosing their language, the scholar is also deciding on a set of journals and audiences they wish to address. Conversing with specific audiences implies engaging with particular literatures and asking specific research questions, and requires choices as to which social networks to develop and cultivate and which conferences to attend (Sokolov 2018; Beigel 2014; Hanafi 2011). These may be preceded by a choice to acquire a Master’s and PhD outside of one’s own national context. Local and global contexts intersect in many ways. Universities in many states are subject to nationally interpreted global competition to climb up university

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rankings. Scholars who have been based outside of a local context for years, but who still partake in debates about that context, may contribute to the IR discipline. There are also those who wish to partake in both native and global debates. Some scholars divide their work between commenting on Russia’s foreign policy and the Russian state for international audiences (Tsygankov 2016; Tsygankov 2018c) and partaking in the theory of IR debate in the national context (Tsygankov 2018b). I propose developing Wæver’s model with the help of new insights from the sociology of sciences (Bloor 1991; Mulkay 1979) and social sciences (Sokolov 2018). I advanced it with respect to its aim, construction and composition. My engagement with the sociology of sciences literature has been driven by two questions: how to account for scholarly motivations to choose certain perspectives and ask specific questions over others, and how knowledge is used in the course of political activity. As Michael Mulkay explains, these are some of the most important concerns for the sociology of knowledge, together with the question of how society at large influences the production of specialized knowledge (Mulkay 1979, loc. 2538). Rather than an explanatory model, I propose an exploratory framework, which aims to guide the study of sociopolitical context and its influence on knowledge produced in academia. The purpose is not to avoid ambiguity, or to suggest that the processes the model helps to map are static, but rather to stimulate thinking about aspects that have not occupied the horizon of reflection about knowledgemaking. With a firm belief that technique should not trump relevance (Desch 2015), I have introduced adjustments to the model throughout the course of my study of Russian IR. Since Wæver’s original model did not allow an account of the discontinuity of Russian statehood, as part of the necessary adjustments I added a component that would enable the analysis of both continuities and discontinuities; an account of the intellectual and institutional heritage of Soviet Russia and an attentive stance towards the consequences of the rupture of the Russian political system. Despite the seemingly across-the-board rupture with the Soviet ideology and governance system, literature studying the postCommunist transition reminds us that the legacies of the Communist past are long-lasting, especially with regard to education and knowledge-production systems (Inglot 2008; Kwiek 2012). The question (originally posed by one of the most renowned historians of Soviet and Russian science) of ‘What happens to science when the nation supporting it disappears?’ (Graham 1993, vii) is equally valid for the analysis of contemporary knowledge-making practices. The aim of placing greater emphasis on the historical context is not to embark upon a deterministic political culture argument, which would suggest that that there are ‘Russian ways’ of organizing political life. It is rather to ask questions about specific elements of the past that may affect, but never determine, the present.30 Another substantive contribution to the original model consists in incorporating insights from a critical reading of Karl Mannheim’s oeuvre, in particular his

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concept of Weltanschauung, which can loosely be translated as ‘worldview’, though to Mannheim it was a much more capacious idea. Mannheim’s Weltanschauung was the spirit of a specific historical period. To use his own words, it was ‘the global outlook of an epoch’ (Mannheim 1997[1923], 34) or ‘the totality of an epoch’ (Mannheim 1997[1923], 73). Weltanschauung did not aim to offer a causal explanation of developments in a particular sphere of social or political life; instead, Mannheim suggests that it provides a new layer of interpretation (Mannheim 1997[1923], 80–81). An object of analysis acquires a new meaning when it is seen in the context of Weltanschauung (Mannheim 1997[1923], 73). Mannheim was less clear as to how to analyze Weltanschauung. One challenge was the relation between Weltanschauung as a whole and its particular expressions: ‘We derive the “spirit of the epoch” from its individual documentary manifestations – and we interpret the individual documentary manifestations on the basis of what we know about the spirit of the epoch’ (Mannheim 1997[1923], 74). Another difficulty is describing the unity of the global outlook of an epoch without focusing on any particular sphere of cultural production. For this purpose, Mannheim advised developing concepts that would be applicable to any sphere of cultural activity and could ‘travel’ between arts, literature, philosophy and politics (Mannheim 1997[1923], 74). Mannheim developed the idea of Weltanschauung to challenge the thenwidely accepted view that cultural production cannot be subject to scientific analysis (Mannheim 1997[1923], 42). He also opposed the idea that all scientific analysis must follow the model of natural science (Kecskemeti 1997[1952], 12; Mannheim 1997[1923]). While, for contemporary readers, the original Mannheimian phrasing of the definition of Weltanschauung may seem awkward, it retains its relevance and helps us to understand the context of knowledge production. To achieve greater clarity, but at the expense of simplifying Mannheim’s original idea, I incorporated it into the framework as the ‘intellectual context of knowledge production’. The exploratory framework presented in Figure 1.2 helps us to map the sociopolitical context and to explore implications for academics’ epistemic practices, including their approach to impact on the policymaking field. The framework is composed of three sections: (I) state-society relations, (II) historic (dis)continuity and (III) epistemic practices and the communication of research. These sections are further broken down into more specific components. The first section considers the political and intellectual contexts of knowledge production. The second section analyzes the IR discipline in the pre-transition period and the institutional – disciplinary context of a post-transition university. The third section studies contemporary academic outputs and epistemic practices. As this framework has been constructed with the help of empirical evidence provided by the study of contemporary Russia, it is only natural that it will require further adaptation when applied to other states or regions. Rather than an instrument that can be used to provide a set of answers, the model is best approached as a thinking tool, which will have to be adjusted to specific contexts.

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Figure 1.1 The explanatory model proposed by Ole Wæver I. State-society relations

1. The political context of knowledge production

2.

II. Historic (dis)continuity

1.

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III. Epistemic practices and the communication of research

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a) main characteristics of the political system, including regulations of the civic sphere b) formal relationship between the state and academia (including legislative solutions and research funding) d) instances of interference with academia The intellectual context of a) the contours of the public knowledge production debate (Weltanschauung) b) the content of the public debate IR discipline under a a) degree of state control over socialist system academic institutions and research funding b) state-promoted ideology c) degree of openness to and familiarity with Anglophone IR d) epistemic practices e) the role of knowledge for policymaking a) organizational reforms The institutional– b) changes to funding disciplinary context of a university in transition Epistemic practices and a) the co-production of research outputs knowledge/ignorance b) academic community and its divisions c) criteria for scholarly validity and rigor d) scholarly responses The communication of a) the institutional framework research to the wider for cooperation with public and policymakers policymakers b) scholars’ attitudes towards policy impact c) the communication of research to the wider public

Figure 1.2 The exploratory framework

Conclusions Focusing on two unquestionably positive developments in IR – growing reflexivity and broader engagement with non-Anglophone perspectives – this chapter has shown how IR literature interested in knowledge-making has avoided

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problematizing the sociopolitical contexts in which knowledge production takes place. When IR scholars reflect on the political relevance of IR knowledge, speak about policy advice and advocate reflexivity, they have so far primarily considered the context of a liberal-democratic state, paying less attention to states with different governance systems. Moreover, the literature has only recently started to account for more recent developments in many advanced democracies, such as the decreasing pluralism of public debate and scepticism towards knowledge elites.31 Similarly, in literature on Global IR and IR beyond the West, the political context of knowledge production is largely omitted. Despite the fact that this literature wishes to open the mainstream discipline to a variety of views and ideas, it does not pay adequate attention to the political obstacles scholars may be facing in non-liberal-democratic contexts. Global IR advocates, though rightly broadening the hitherto Western-centric disciplinary gaze, have not entirely parted with the Enlightenment ideal of cumulative and universal knowledge. The Global IR agenda comes from a standpoint that knowledge is the outcome of rational processes and that, through the accumulation of different perspectives, we may reach a better – and therefore, presumably, universal – understanding of international politics. The powerful idea of the universality of knowledge stands in stark contrast to viewing knowledge as a cultural product. This chapter has demonstrated how the universality thesis impacts on expectations the IR community has regarding non-Western knowledge about international politics. It has also suggested that the gap between engagement with non-Western knowledge and a critical and reflexive stance on theorizing can be bridged by a deeper enquiry into the sociopolitical context of IR knowledge-building. This lack of attention to sociopolitical context is by no means specific to IR. For a long time, sociological enquiry into scientific knowledge-making either assumed a democratic setting, and therefore withheld questions about the sociopolitical context, or explored the benefits of democratic settings to science. The sociology of science shed light on laboratory practices and power relations within the scientific field, thereby challenging the idea of science developing according to a natural logic. Standpoint approaches disputed the conventional view that knowledge is disinterested, value-free and independent of context from a different angle. A growing specialization of the field, including the emergence of STS, contributed to the disappearance of the wider political context from view. The shift to micro-level interactions in the lab or among networked experts meant curiosity was diverted away from enquiring into the specificities and repercussions of the sociopolitical context. What used to be the driving force behind early sociology of knowledge ceased to play a role in highly sophisticated microanalyses of scientific knowledge production. However, if reflection on knowledge is to realize its full potential, it is impossible to dismiss the context and pretend it has no impact on knowledge, which emerges according to the logic of discovery, to paraphrase some of the early and new sociologists of science. Today, the Mannheimian question of why knowledge becomes organized in particular ways gains renewed relevance – especially in light of sweeping changes in academic knowledge relationships to the state, the market and the public sphere.

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Even if we cannot follow Mannheim’s over-optimistic suggestion that thinking ‘can be imputed to its sociological source in a clearly comprehensible way’ (Mannheim 1986, 31), there is a need to acknowledge the importance of analyzing knowledge-making in, rather than abstracted from, context. The next chapter will start this exploration by analyzing the sociopolitical context and intellectual climate in Russia.

Notes 1 The concept of the ‘core’ is deeply problematic, not least because it creates and reinforces a hierarchy of knowledge claims and knowledge producers. It can be used in order to describe ‘core knowledge’, i.e. that which a group of scholars predisposes, considers more important than others; or to denote to some geographic location presumably more advanced in producing or spreading certain knowledge claims. 2 Pinar Bilgin on Arlene Tickner’s and Ole Wæver’s book, International Relations Scholarship around the World. Interview for Theory Talk 61, 20 December 2013, available at www.theory-talks.org/2013/12/theory-talk-61.html. 3 The assumed-rather-than-demonstrated argument has recently also been voiced with regards to the link between developments in world politics and academic developments in IR (Kristensen 2019, 3). 4 This discussion used to depend on a dichotomy constructed between those who theorize and those who deal with the ‘real world’. In the mid-1990s, Zalewski argued that there was little dialogue between ‘theorists’ and ‘real-worlders’, and that one camp showed little appreciation for academic efforts of the other (Zalewski 1996, 340). The initial theory – practice debate was premised on little to no recognition of knowledge-production capacity in the policy world (Smith 1997, 515). 5 See also Boswell (2009) for a comprehensive overview of English-language political science literature conceptualizing the relationship between academic knowledge and policy. 6 For a dissenting voice that argues against a scholarly pursuit of policy relevance, see Bakewell (2008). Bakewell claims that in striving to achieve policy relevance, scholars privilege policymakers’ worldviews. 7 Regulations guiding the European International Studies Association (EISA) Outstanding Contribution Award, outlined in the January 2018 Newsletter, http://mailchi.mp/ eisa-net/sdq4aznz9h-2542237?e=98333916de, last accessed 13 February 2018. 8 The REF guidelines are available here: www.hefce.ac.uk/rsrch/REFimpact/. 9 The LSE IDEAS: www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/about. 10 The think tank covers foreign policy and a host of other policy-related issues: https:// kingsthinktank.com/. 11 This position is characteristic of the positivist theory of knowledge distinguishing between ideology and objective knowledge (Gieryn 1983). 12 While Cambridge University Press reversed its initial decision to submit to Beijing’s request and close access to selected journal articles, another leading international publishing house, Springer, censored the availability of their publications (Wong and Kwong 2019). 13 The expression ‘backbone of the discipline’ is borrowed from (Jørgensen et al. 2017, Conclusions), where is denotes to the IR discipline’s European roots. 14 For an exposition of the philosophical roots of the sociology of knowledge, and for an articulation of acute criticism of the field in its early years, see (Popper 2011[1945], chapter 23). 15 Merton’s contribution followed earlier reflections on the development of natural sciences cultivated in the first half of the 20th century in Central and Eastern Europe.

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21 22 23 24 25

26 27

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A broad agenda for studying science as a field of human culture was proposed by three Polish sociologists: Florian Znaniecki, in an article ‘The Subject and the Tasks of the Science of Knowledge’, published in 1923 (Znaniecki 1923); and Maria Ossowska and Stanisław Ossowski, in an article ‘The Science of Science’, published in 1936 (Ossowska and Ossowski 1964). Both manuscripts pointed to the novelty of this research field and offered ideas and plans for development, rather than concrete research results. Russian scholar Vladimir I. Vernadsky, was another internationally largely unacknowledged pioneer of the ‘science of science’. Kuhn originally mainly addressed his work on the nature of scientific change to philosophers, but was subsequently willing to admit he found it difficult to identify precisely the field to which his work belonged (Kuhn 1989, xii). The Congress established the International Commission for Science Policy Studies (ICSPS). The Commission’s major achievement was the publication, in 1977, of the first STS handbook, titled Science, Technology and Society: A Cross-Disciplinary Perspective (Elzinga 2012). Here understood as encompassing the sociology of scientific knowledge and STS. The separation of the sociology of science is done with due recognition of the ill-defined border between sociology and philosophy, which many have emphasized (Bourdieu 2004, 31). On the difficulties in defining science studies, see e.g. (Biagioli 1999). Bruno Latour adopted this framework also to the study of the work of judges (Latour 2010). In this work, Latour questions the divide between the inside and outside of the lab and describes practices we today term impact and outreach. Despite its ambitious objective, the text engages mainly with networks that facilitate the circulation of scientific facts (Latour 1999, 274). For a broader exposition of this literature, see Kleinman and Moore (2014a). For a more detailed overview of how STS broadened its outlook, from its initial Mertonian functionalist perspective to examining the boundaries and relations between science and society, see (Kleinman and Moore 2014b, Introduction). In providing this definition, I acknowledge that there exist multiple views on what standpoint theory is (Harding 2004, 4). On the challenges related to approaching feminist perspectives as both a political project and as analytical framework, see (Mahmood 2011; Avishai, Gerber, and Randles 2013; Mamadshoeva 2019). The Soviet Union behaves as a great power, argued Bull, for it displays a sense of rights and duties, mainly through its role in the United Nations and in arms-control negotiations, as well as through its contribution ‘to the settlement of political issues beyond its immediate national concern – in Europe, Asia and the Middle East’ (Bull 1977, 205). 1919 is usually presented as marking the formal establishment of the field (for example Vasquez 1998) but this chronological mark may itself be read as a sign of Western-centrism, see for instance: (Thakur, Davis, and Vale 2017; Mills 2015, 221). The series comprises International Relations Scholarship Around the World (2009), Thinking International Relations Differently (2013) and Claiming the International (2013). See also contributions to Sites of Knowledge (Re-)Production: Toward an Institutional Sociology of International Relations Scholarship, a forum organized under the aegis of the International Studies Review in 2016, and an edited volume titled Globalizing International Relations (Peters and Wemheuer-Vogelaar 2016). ‘Pinar Bilgin on Non-Western IR’, Theory Talk 61, 2013, www.theory-talks.org/2013/ 12/theory-talk-61.html. See also: (Grenier and Hagmann 2016). I am grateful to Luke March for pointing me in the direction of literature contesting the concept and uses of political culture argument. This reflection particularly concerns growing political polarization, a distorted market of ideas and distrust in public institutions. See e.g. (Drezner 2017).

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2

State-society relations

Introduction I watched a movie – the director is in prison, I read an article – the university where the author works was closed down. I discussed cooperation with another university – bang, this one closes too. Someone might say that the authorities (vlast) are afraid of intellectuals and therefore apply pressure. Unfortunately, everything is exactly the opposite. They are not afraid, and they are bold enough not to leave anyone alone. They will interfere without any genuine reason just because they can.1

In these words, a Russia-based scholar described their experience of intellectual life in Russia in 2018. This chapter examines the changing wider environment that scholars encounter as they undertake research and teaching activities in Russia. This environment emerges as a consequence of the growth of restrictive legal arrangements influencing freedom of speech and assembly, alongside regulation concerning university oversight. This chapter discusses how the type of polity and relations between the state and society, including the contours and content of public debate, affect the realm of higher education (HE) and research.2 It is, of course, difficult to precisely extricate the field of IR from other disciplines and from the broader processes affecting Russian social sciences, or indeed the sciences in general. Institutionally, IR may be located as either a self-standing faculty, department or school or within larger faculties of sociology, political science or history. Scholars identifying themselves as historians or political scientists may teach IR courses and provide commentary on contemporary international politics. Gender and area studies are interdisciplinary and should not be considered outside of IR. For this reason, certain examples and illustrations referred to in this chapter have been drawn from wider social sciences and the humanities. In this chapter, and throughout the book, I adhere to the meaning of the state developed in critical literature published by Russian scholars nationally and internationally. This meaning emphasizes the power of formal institutions whose actions – while not necessarily coordinated or centrally arranged – are usually left without explanation or justification (Gel’man 2015a; Medvedev 2017a, 2018; Etkind

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2017). These institutions have distinct prerogatives; they are entitled to make, implement and interpret laws, and their activities span legislative, executive (including security services) and judicial branches. The state is usually described as completely separate from the society3 and as an agent in its own right. Two terms tend to be commonly used interchangeably to denote the state’s agency: the ‘regime’ (rezhim) and vlast. The latter can be loosely translated as ‘the authorities’ or ‘the authority’ but its more immediate meaning is ‘power.4 Experts in Russia’s jurisprudence use the concept of state power (gosudarstvennaya vlast) to denote to the system of ‘overarching governance’, which they see as interpreted similarly in tsarist, Soviet and post-Soviet Russian law. In this interpretation, the state is not bound by law and legality. Such framing of the state in Russian jurisprudence led to a contradiction at the heart of the 1993 Russian Constitution. The constitution is said to combine incongruous provisions: that of a single system of state power, exercised by the president and the idea of the separation of powers (Pomeranz 2018, 127–129). Reification is among the serious drawbacks of employing the term ‘state’. What is in no way a singular phenomenon but rather a complex web of institutions and processes becomes presented as an entity in the possession of agency. However, for the purpose of this study, it may be a necessary simplification to make.5 Due to the formal architecture of the political system in Russia, it is difficult to follow the common terminology used in political science and describe the decision- and policymaking processes as originating in the government. Russia’s officially prescribed presidential system, where the executive consists of a president and prime minister (dual executive), developed into a superpresidential one (Fish 2000; Fortescue 2017), characterized by significant personalistic power (Wengle and Evans 2018) and the executive’s domination over the legislative (Fortescue 2017; Chaisty 2005). This book’s reliance on the term ‘state’ should not be equated with moral or political validation of this specific system of governance. It is commonly held that impaired political freedom makes the entire knowledge-production processes corrupt. Illiberal politics unquestionably poses serious obstacles to scientific enquiry; but it does not impede it, nor – except for in totalitarian political systems – is it capable of controlling it entirely (Sakwa 1989). Under such circumstances, it is important to ask which specific aspects of illiberal politics impact knowledge production and how these become reflected in epistemic practices and scholarly attitudes towards knowledge production, popularization and its potential impact on the policymaking process. From the very beginning, it is important to acknowledge that there is no simple answer along the lines that the mighty state precludes all knowledge that fails to follow the official narrative. The contemporary Russian state is less potent than the Soviet state, which supervised all forms of intellectual, scientific and artistic practice (Yurchak 2013, 12). Unlike in China or Turkey (Kadıoğlu 2018; Matei 2018; Wong and Kwong 2019), the Russian government has not fervently and openly stepped up its efforts to control research and suppress academic freedom. But the state has increased its direct control over teaching

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provision and indirect control over research. Creeping institutional coercion manifests itself in a number of ways, from growing administrative responsibilities placed on scholars to recommendations concerning hosting foreign researchers. While arrests and imprisonment are still rare, dismissals of scholars became more common. These challenges pushed scholars towards contemplating the degree of academic unfreedom in the country (e.g. Zavadskaya 2019).6 Importantly, more and more restrictive legislation, though seemingly detached from the academic setting, specifies the conditions for public debate, cultural activity and the organization of not-for-profit activities. Scholars are not shielded from this context. This chapter does not aim to paint a uniform picture; academic life in Russia is diverse, especially in the domain of the social sciences. Publishing successes abroad and international recognition of individual scholars take place alongside a significant devaluation of academic degrees and national academic publishing. Stark differences exist on several axes: between universities located in major cities and those in the regions, between state- and privately funded universities, and between departments located within the same institution. For instance, the very same year the Faculty of Philosophy at the Moscow State University (MGU) hosted a roundtable dedicated to the feminist critique of science,7 the dean of the Faculty of Political Sciences ridiculed and labelled as ‘political intrigue’ students’ demands to dismiss Leonid Slutskiy, deputy chair of the International Relations and Regional Integration Department, who had been accused of sexual harassment.8 It is by no means the intention of this chapter to conceal this diversity, but rather to draw attention to those aspects of the sociopolitical context that influence epistemic practices.

Contemporary political system in Russia To situate academic knowledge production in the wider sociopolitical context, it is necessary to characterise the contemporary political system in Russia with special reference to its repercussions for the organization of academia and academic practice. Scholarly assessments of Russia’s political system vary, not least because they attempt to reflect changes in that system over time. While authors converge on the non-democratic character of the Russian polity, they differ in describing its characteristics, the strategies used to secure regime survival and the types of dissent and contestation. Earlier literature defined the Russian Federation as a state that occupies ‘the space between authoritarianism at one end and consolidated democracy at the other’ (Ottaway 2003, 6), a dual state (Sakwa 2010) or competitive authoritarianism (Levitsky and Way 2010). More recently, the Russian polity has been variously described as a hybrid system of government (Owen and Bindman 2019); an authoritarian regime (Gel’man 2015a; Rogov 2016); an informational autocracy (Treisman 2018); a kleptocracy (Dawisha 2015); a sistema, meaning a system of informal networks (Ledeneva 2013); and a ‘fully authoritarian political system with a personalistic dictator and a cult of the leader’ (Alexander Motyl, quoted and discussed critically in

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[Laruelle and Radvanyi 2019, 4]).9 Back in 2014, Yekaterina Schulmann, explained that hybridity in Russia combines the democratic façade with a lack of genuine dictatorship (Schulmann 2014). Others noted that the regime, in addition to practices of opposition intimidation and election manipulation, uses formal democratic institutions, such as the parliament, to distribute benefits to its supporters. This means that rather than having a purely decorative function, the parliament becomes an important element sustaining the lack of democracy (Krol 2017). Some of these interpretations emphasize the continuity between the current political system and its Soviet predecessor (see Treisman 2018, 1–2). Many authors point to duality and ambivalence as key features of the Russian political system, highlighting tensions between formal constitution-based institutions and the informal distribution of political and economic power between particular factions (Sakwa 2010). Daniel Treisman (Treisman 2018), Marlene Laruelle and Jean Radvanyi (Laruelle and Radvanyi 2019) point to changes and bottom-up processes that have been taking place in Russia for the last three decades. The relationship between the regime and the society, according to Laruelle and Radvanyi, is best understood as a constantly renegotiated social contract that limits the regime’s options (Laruelle and Radvanyi 2019, loc. 110). Treisman, acknowledging that substantial modernization efforts were undertaken in Russia between 1990 and 2011, sees Putin’s return to presidency in 2012 as the beginning of a major shift in Russian politics. The conservative turn that followed Putin’s return to presidential power has very concrete political goals: to demobilize the opposition, shake up the political and business elite, and replace the appeal to prosperity with a return to traditional values and the spectre of external threats (Treisman 2018, 9). Recent international rankings are uniform in assessing the Russian governance system as authoritarian, e.g. (The Economist Intelligence Unit 2019; Freedom House 2019). While the earlier 2012 and 2013 versions of the Freedom in the World report described Russia as ‘not an electoral democracy’ (Freedom House 2013, 2012), the 2019 edition considers attempts at blocking the popular messaging application Telegram and the unexplained death of Maksim Borodin, a journalist who investigated Russian mercenaries in Syria, as important for lowering Russia’s score (Freedom House 2019). The relative freedom Russia experienced in the 1990s and early 2000s has decreased significantly, particularly since the political turmoil of 2011–12 and the war with Ukraine (Gel’man 2015b). Nonetheless, the regime has not been successful in subordinating the domestic political scene completely. Moreover, rather than stagnant, the political landscape is subject to – at times abrupt – change. Despite growing curbs,10 protest activity continues and takes many forms (Mathers 2017; Beumers et al. 2017; Gorokhovskaia 2019). In the summer of 2019 it brought two spectacular victories for dissenting citizens: one in the form of halting the construction of an Orthodox church in Yekaterinburg;11 the other in the form of releasing and the termination of criminal proceedings against investigative journalist Ivan Golunov.12 Just weeks later,

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however, opposition politicians and independent candidates were disqualified from running in the elections for Moscow’s city council, and the #dopuskay (Let them run) civic protest was organized in response.13 This was also a summer when the law on ‘sovereign internet’ (zakon o suverennom internete), bound to enter into force in autumn 2019, was hotly and critically debated (Zemnukhova 2019; Prokopenko 2019). Without doubt, state control in contemporary Russia has increased significantly under the leadership of Vladimir Putin. It encompasses, inter alia, the tendency to limit citizens’ freedoms and stifle protest activity (Bogush 2017; Schulmann 2017; van der Vet 2017), pressure on civil-society organizations (Gilbert 2016; Lipman 2016), greater determination in punishing activists, journalists and bloggers (Roache 2017; Paneiakh 2016), tighter surveillance of private entrepreneurship (Economist 2017) and rising secrecy over national spending (Movchan 2017; Tkachov 2017; Tkachov and Makarov 2017). The following sections discuss mechanisms of state’s influence and control that have a more direct impact on academia.

The return of the Leviathan: the 2000s The state, through multiple institutional and teaching arrangements, is entwined with HE and research. These links encompass the employment structure, funding, quality control and various additional roles that state institutions may directly or indirectly impose on universities.14 In terms of teaching, several state organs have their own HE institutions whose aim is to train future cadres; for instance, the Moscow University of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The state, as the main funding body for most universities and the Russian Academy of Sciences, has never been a completely detached actor. Financial dependence is coupled with hierarchical administrative organization. The Russian Ministry of Science and Higher Education oversees scientific organizations (nauchnye organizatsii) and universities but the line between overseeing and developing the relationship of subordination is fine. Some authors describe this arrangement critically in terms of the state managing universities while purposefully underfinancing specific disciplines: ‘Most universities are run by the state, which does not provide enough research funding to the social sciences’ (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, loc. 3100). Lecturers and other members of staff at publicly funded universities are considered state employees and, throughout 2018 (and similarly to other civil servants), were required by the state to switch to the Mir card-payment system to continue receiving their salaries.15 Two of the most renowned universities – MGU and St Petersburg State University (SPbGU) – are, according to federal law of 2009, federal state budgetary institutions (federalnyye gosudarstvennyye byudzhetnyye uchrezhdeniya). This law describes the Russian government as the founder of both universities (uchreditelem yavliyayetsiya Pravitel’stvo Rossiiskoi Federatsii) and gives the government the right to approve charter (ustav).16 As an illustration of the relationship

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between the government and the university, it is useful to consider the heading used by the SPbGU for all correspondence: The Government of the Russian Federation Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution of Higher Education “St Petersburg State University” (SPbGU) The provisions of the 2009 federal law clearly limit the ability of these two universities to independently govern themselves. In addition to funding, the quality of services provided by public and private HE bodies is monitored by a ministry: the Ministry of Education and Science from 2004–18 and the Ministry of Science and Higher Education since 2018. The Federal Service of Supervision in Education and Science (Rosobrnadzor) issues teaching licences, undertakes accreditation and is authorized to inspect HE institutions (Golunov 2014, loc. 173; Roshchin 2019). Prominent voices in the debate about Russian science contrast academic developments that took place between 1990 and the early 2000s, deemed an epoch ‘without the state master’ (bez gosudariya), with the increased role of the state post-2005, deemed ‘the return of the Leviathan’ (vozvrashcheniye Leviafana) (Sokolov et al. 2015). Importantly, however, the term ‘Leviathan’ – both in this context and in other areas of cultural production in Russia – is understood not as a sovereign that represents and acts in the interests of its subjects (as in the social contract part of the Hobbesian argument) but rather as pejoratively charged; it suggests17 a ruler that, while not necessarily a singular person, is largely detached from the citizens, acts in its own interests and according to its own rules. Leviathan is a metaphor for a body that wields disproportionate power without the contractual relationship with the people – and, in many instances, in direct confrontation with its citizens. It is ‘the power that comes to a citizen in the form of a bulldozer, a tank, a paddy wagon’ (Medvedev 2017a). This is the overwhelmingly powerful (yet vaguely defined) creature aptly portrayed in Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Russian film Leviathan (2014). The role of the state and its level of engagement have been changing. In the topical literature, the 1990s are described as a laissez-faire decade (Platonova and Semyonov 2018, 340) when the state administration left the academy to its own devices, including when it came to securing their financial survival. It was only from the mid-2000s onwards that state institutions were more active in designing reforms, systems of quality assurance and university oversight. This engagement had some positive results. Graham and Dezhina, in their analysis of academic developments in post-Soviet Russia, emphasize that the decline of the 1990s started reversing in the early 2000s (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 29–30), when the Russian HE system underwent a series of reforms, mostly aiming to increase its internationalization. Russia joined the Bologna Process with view to harmonizing with European education standards, and the broad governance framework was altered with the establishment of the new Ministry of Education and Science in 2004. The objective of the latter was to integrate

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the previously separate realms of research/science and teaching/HE; in other words, to bridge the gap, inherited from the Soviet system, between education and research (Platonova and Semyonov 2018, 341–342). In the 2000s, the authorities of the more affluent Russian state ascribed new roles to academia: to contribute to economic growth and to act as a prestige booster on the international stage. Some suggest academia was to play a role akin to a national sports team winning international championships (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2006, 46–47; Mäkinen 2016). With that end in sight, the government pushed for more internationally oriented research in selected universities (Platonova and Semyonov 2018, 342), and enhanced its efforts to elevate Russian universities in the world university rankings (Mäkinen 2016). As a result of this policy, universities, which were previously largely unmindful of these rankings, started paying greater attention to them and now regularly report on their progress.18 Following a 2012 presidential decree, a government-sponsored Russian Academic Excellence Project, ‘5–100’, was launched as part of a larger package of measures called mayskiye ukazy.19 This project is ongoing; its aim is to support Russian universities in maximizing their competitive position in the global research and education market. One of the project’s specific objectives is the ‘production of world-class intellectual products’.20 The expected result, to be achieved by 2020, is for at least five universities from the 21 project participants to enter the top 100 of the internationally recognized rankings: the Times Higher Education, Quacquarelli Symonds and the Academic Ranking of World Universities.21 The Ministry of Science and Higher Education separately finances the MGU and SPbGU, which are not part of the 5–100 initiative but were singled out in a separate law in 2009 as Russia’s ‘leading classic universities’.22 Some Russian academics see Russian universities’ policy of climbing international rankings as closely related to Russia’s projected self-image as a strong state [R2]. Another interviewee was more sceptical: ‘It is a vanity project – the chief concern is with prestige rather than quality’ [R6]. The 5–100 project also has other critics; the social movement Obrnadzor (Obshchestvennoye dvizheniye ‘Obrnadzor’) describes it as potentially corruptive, pointing to the links between specific council members and how the project budget is spent.23 The National Project ‘Science’ (Natsionalnyi Proyekt Nauka) is another government-sponsored programme envisaged for 2018–24.24 Its three overarching aims are to secure Russia’s place among five states leading in science and technology; to make Russia an attractive workplace for leading Russian and foreign scholars, including promising young researchers; and to increase research funding. To meet these aims, one task envisions increasing the number of Russian scientific journals included in the international databases Web of Science and Scopus, from their current level of 249 to 500 by the end of 2024.25 The project’s structure and goals show the intensifying role metrics plays in organizing and assessing academia in Russia; the preference is for quantitative, measurable terms, and specific features of scientific research – such as

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the necessary time for publishing research results – are not taken into consideration. As with other programmes pursued by the Russian government since the 2000s, the Science National Project aims to advance both Russian science and Russia’s international reputation. Criticisms directed at centrally organized projects, such as 5–100, illustrate more general divisions in assessments of state policies. Despite the fact that officials proclaim a bright future for Russian science every time the government changes the legal-institutional framework, these proclamations rarely meet with understanding by the institutions undergoing reform. At the same time, literature dedicated to HE in Russia enumerates serious deficiencies in the sector and the need for thorough changes in several areas, including the concentration of financial resources in large and super-large institutions; the centralized system of appointing university rectors; and the lack of financial independence that precludes universities from taking strategic decisions regarding their development (Abankina et al. 2012, 39; Forrat 2016). Other researchers have noted a negative impact on professional ethics, arguing that neoliberal reforms have led to opportunistic behaviour among academic staff (Kurbatova and Kagan 2016). To some, recently introduced managerial practices have contributed to Russian academia becoming an amalgam of Soviet and neoliberal practices, others describe it as a mixture of neoliberalism and conservatism (Dubrovskiy 2018). Scholars variously assess state policies and the level of state interference in academic organization and the research process, not least because some may think it necessary to downplay the state’s influence in order to protect their own academic credentials and the legitimacy of their research. Others prefer managerial language, describing the state as the ‘main agent of change in the design of the higher education system’ (Platonova and Semyonov 2018, 337). One interviewee criticized the fact that two reform strategies were being implemented simultaneously despite belonging to two different traditions of thinking: a liberal strategy, aiming to increase the competitiveness of universities, and a patriotic education strategy [R10]. Some scholars commend the state for successfully undermining the ‘oligarchic collective control system’ (oligarkhicheskii kolegialnyi kontrol’) that emerged in Russian academia in the 1990s and replacing it with a bureaucratic type of control and quantifiable methods for assessing academic activity (Lebedeva 2004, 271). One interviewee recognized that allocating state funding to universities is the key element in exercising control over scholars: In IR, it is hard to be liberal because all faculties and schools are dependent on state funding. There is a growing pressure on this discipline to serve official goals of Russian foreign policy. The Higher School of Economics [HSE] is a unique pocket of academic activities – it is progressive; it has better financial conditions; it acts according to international standards; it has huge autonomy. HSE is liberal, RANEPA [Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration] is both conservative/patriotic and liberal, Rossiiskii universitet druzhby narodov [People’s

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Friendship University of Russia], RUGN is very conservative – in fact, I don’t consider them to be independent scholars; they are part of the state bureaucracy. [R23] Public universities have also become tightly linked with state structures through rector (vice-chancellor) appointment procedures, which made universities autonomy largely superficial (Forrat 2016). The rectors of MGU and SPbGU are appointed (naznachayutsiya) directly by the Russian president. Rectors of federal universities are appointed by the federal government. At other universities, the situation is in flux as their administrations adjust to the fast-changing legal regulations. At some universities rectors are elected by academic councils with the approval of a university’s founder, meaning either the federal government, regional or municipal authorities (Gryaznova 2018, 45). These arrangements prompt rectors to build formal and informal ties with specific state structures, for instance, some join United Russia, the ruling party. United Russia, in turn, is keen to include rectors in its collegial bodies because it is considered as increasing the party’s ‘intellectual’ image (Golunov 2014, loc. 597). Rectors, described by one interviewee as ‘agents of power’ [R12], have the capacity to privilege certain areas of research. According to another of my interviewees, this type of power works differently in the regions than in big cities; rectors at provincial universities have much more to say than their counterparts in big cities, and may be willing to restrict research or repress scholars [R1]. This opinion should be supplemented with an assessment that pressures on scholars – especially with regard to their activity as public intellectuals – started at provincial universities, but has now reached even Moscow, and might soon arrive at top universities (Kynev 2019). Another respondent complained that ‘university administration think they have a say in research directions, since faculty members undertake research that is paid for by the university’ [R21]. Another interviewee described the procedure in the following way: ‘There is research money on top of money for teaching – you have to get your topic approved at an informal meeting of your department’ [R14]. However, they did not specify what kinds of considerations are key at such meetings. The perceived difference between universities in Moscow and elsewhere was mentioned several times: ‘In St Petersburg the political situation is a bit better; it is closer to Helsinki, so you have colleagues to cooperate with; political pressure is greater at MGIMO [Moscow State Institute of International Relations]’ [R20]. The general perception among the scholars I interviewed was that colleagues at MGIMO and MGU were under greater pressure: ‘There is a big difference between the position of scholars like myself and conference presentations delivered by MGIMO or MGU staff. They tend to repeat the official positions, we are freer to express our views based on our research’ [R29]. I also encountered a reflection, though not during formal interviews, that the leadership at some state universities insists that faculty write positively about Russia.

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The weakness of trade unions in HE and research is a factor that limits solidarity among scholars and makes it more difficult for them to act as a player in negotiations with the state. The majority of university trade unions have limited autonomy; in practice, they act as administrative structures, dependent on a university’s leadership and unwilling to defend employees (Golunov 2014, loc. 444). Against this backdrop, the interregional trade union of university workers, University Solidarity (profsoyuz ‘Universitetskaya solidarnost’), stands out as an example of bottom-up activism and resistance to malpractices in academia. The work towards creating this independent academic trade union began relatively recently, in 2011, initiated by scholars from Russian State University for the Humanities (RGGU), MGU, RANEPA and the Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences, Shaninka. An open letter stating the aims of the trade union was signed by more than 1,000 HE employees, and a year later, in 2013, the trade union was officially established.26 The activities of University Solidarity range from defending individual academics in disputes with university leadership to publicizing cases of state interference and campaigning for better policies in the HE sector. For example, the trade union recently demanded that Rosstat, the official state agency, publish more honest data on salaries in the HE sector; Rosstat publishes data on the average salary, which University Solidarity believes paints a misleading picture of actual earnings and calls for publishing the median salary instead. The difference between the two is significant: while the average salary is 47,000 RUB/month (US$734), the median is 34,000 RUB/month (US$531). University Solidarity belongs to the federation of independent trade unions, the Confederation of Labour of Russia (Konfederatsiya Truda Rossii).27 The Confederation comments on current political developments that may be related to civil and political rights; for instance, it voiced its concerns over mass detainments following the July 2019 protests against disqualifying opposition candidates from the Moscow city council elections.28 More critical voices say the government of the mid-2000s was sufficiently wealthy to offer carrots to scholars and felt sufficiently legitimate to also use sticks (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2005, 9–10). A ‘culture of suspicion’ (kul’tura podozreniya) between state bureaucracy and non-state actors is also perceived to have characterized the returning state. Some opine that the state ‘hates’ scholars in the humanities because they can destroy the image of the world carefully produced by the state (Kurilla 2017). Irrespective of the 5–100 project-related financial boost experienced by a handful of universities, many scholars say working in the HE and research sector continues to be considered a difficult profession. The most radical assessments present the profession as being in a pitiful (plachevnoe) state – both in the specialized research system of the Russian Academy of Sciences and at universities (Golosov 2016). Academic standards overall are seen as rapidly decreasing; here, key concerns include the inflation of academic degrees, plagiarism and insufficient funds to attract talent (Golunov 2014) [R7]. Vera Afanasyeva, professor at the Saratov State University, summarised five main reasons behind the malaise in the Russian academia in a blog post titled ‘Five reasons

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why not to become a professor’, these included: the bureaucratization of the profession, diminishing prestige, low salaries, students’ attitudes towards the learning process, and constant fear ranging from insecurity related to potential job loss to the fear about the consequences of free thinking: A contemporary professor is in constant fear. He is afraid of his superiors (all who were not afraid flew away long ago). He is afraid of losing his job, and with it the opportunity to engage in science, because modern science is a collective matter. He is afraid of his innate freethinking, which abhors university leadership, party norms, ideological censorship, patriotic attitudes . . . , the Orthodox Church canons, the stupidity of officials standing above him. (Afanasyeva 2017) The pay-to-publish system is another challenge, which some universities attempt to tackle by creating ‘black lists’ of outlets ready to publish articles without attention to academic standards [R5] (this problem is discussed at length in Chapter 4). One of my interviewees pointed to a paradox whereby the political class’s high demand for acquiring academic accolades (usually obtained with the help of fake dissertations) testifies to their still-strong status despite their general loss of academic authority after the fall of the Soviet Union [R7]. Another interviewee proposed a more optimistic, yet still perturbing, assessment of how the general public sees scholars: ‘the overall public perception of academics is as victims or martyrs who work without getting paid. They are also seen as geeks who, on top of being very smart, have lost connection with the real world’ [R8]. The assessment from further afield is grimmer; Vladimir Shlapentokh, a Russian social scientist émigré to the United States, painted a bleak picture of science in the 2010s: The scientific sector in Putin’s Russia is in an abominable situation. It can be said that never in Russian history has the status and prestige of science been as low as it is under Putin’s rule. In order to understand the stance of Putin’s regime towards science, it is necessary to recognize the difference between two types of regime activity: the ‘real’ and the ‘imitative’ (or deceptive). (Shlapentokh 2010) Admittedly, not all of the problems facing HE and research can be easily attributed to concrete state actions; inaction, lack of appropriate oversight and ineffective systems of control are the other side of the same coin. The phenomenon of the same individual heading a specific faculty or school for an extended period of time is fairly common and breeds all sorts of problems, including the perception of impunity. For instance, Vladimir Dobrenkov – dean of the faculty of sociology at the MGU, whom the students described as establishing a system of personal dictatorship (lichnaya diktatura) at the faculty – was reportedly involved in, or overlooked, multiple plagiarism cases. Andrei Zayakin, an expert on academic

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malpractice, is quoted as saying that, under Dobrenkov’s leadership, the State Duma (the lower chamber of the Russian parliament) deputy Elena Nikolaeva moulded and successfully defended her dissertation from various sources (pod yego rukovodstvom byla slepena iz chego popalo dissertatsiya). The dean was eventually removed from office after 25 years.29 Dobrenkov, described by Marlene Laruelle as a ‘Soviet-style philosopher and proponent of a nationalist agenda’, was also instrumental in helping Alexander Dugin, once a professor at MGU but in academic circles recognised more as a controversial figure and criticised for his far-right ideas (Clover 2016), establish the Centre for Conservative Research at the sociology department of MGU, which functioned between 2008 and 2014. The Centre’s aim was to develop conservative ideology and counter the influence of liberal universities, such as the HSE and the European University at St Petersburg (EUSP). Dugin’s ambition was to create a ‘conservative curriculum’ that would become part of university programmes (Laruelle 2018, 96). The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) is considered the key research institution in the Russian Federation. For readers more familiar with the national science academies in the UK (the Royal Society) or the US (the National Academy of Sciences), it is important to outline the most significant differences between these and RAS. The latter is legally, financially and symbolically tied to the Russian state. The RAS charter presents it as a state academy of sciences (gosudarstvennaya akademia nauk) – an organization of science (organizatsyia nauki) that both carries out scientific management of research in the Russian Federation and conducts its own research (provodyashchaya nauchnyye issledovaniya). It is a not-for-profit organization established as a federal state budgetary institution (federal’noe gosudarstvennoe byudzhetnoe uchrezhdeniye). In the symbolic domain, the RAS charter prescribes that the RAS seal is composed of the image of the state emblem of the Russian Federation. The RAS charter presents the institution’s heritage as dating back to its founding by Peter the Great in 1724, and directly links it to post-1991 developments: The Russian Academy of Sciences was established following Emperor Peter I orders by the Decree of the Governing Senate of January 28 (February 8) 1724. It was restored by Decree of the President of the RSFSR [Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic] of November 21, 1991 No. 228 ‘On the Organization of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ as the highest scientific institution of Russia. (RAS charter 2014)30 Contemporary RAS, however, is also the successor of its Soviet incarnation. As a result, it is a colossal and multifaceted organization. Unlike in the Tsarist era, when RAS was rather small (and, in this sense, similar to other learned societies in Europe [Tolz 1997]), it grew substantially in size and complexity during the Communist era, when it functioned under the name the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Communism changed the institution’s character. Two objectives of the Communist regime made it into a centralized and purely research-oriented

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institution: the aim of controlling research and mobilizing it for accelerated industrialization, and the perceived need to separate researchers – or the intelligentsia – from teaching duties. Especially in the first decades of Soviet rule, the Communist Party was wary of the influence ‘bourgeois scientists’ might be having on mass education. The Soviet version of RAS was initially modelled on its German counterpart, but it became more bureaucratized and subordinated to the Communist Party and state apparatus (Graham 1975, 322–325). The Academy of the early 1990s was thought of as a clearly autonomous institution, as a decree signed by President Boris Yeltsin prescribes: Attaching great importance to the development of basic science (fundamentalnaya nauka) as the foundation of Russia’s economic, social and cultural development, I decree: 1. To restore the Russian Academy of Sciences as the highest scientific institution of Russia. 2. To establish that the Russian Academy of Sciences is an all-Russian self-governing organization operating under the laws of the RSFSR and its own charter. (Presidential Decree 1991, emphasis mine)31 The scholarly community is not unanimous in its assessments of the contemporary RAS. It is still considered the primary place for research activities, whereas at universities research is seen as a secondary goal. In the Soviet era, too, the production of scientific knowledge was associated with the Academy and HE teaching with universities (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, loc. 2351) (Chapter 3 discusses the organization of Soviet science in more detail). One of my interviewees described the institution in the following terms: ‘the last independent centre of knowledge, the last bastion now being destroyed by the state’ [R7]. Some present it as an institution that, even during Soviet times, had a reputation of being largely independent (Dubrovskiy 2017) [R7]. Others claim it was a comfortable hideaway for the offspring of the apparatchiks. Given how large the Soviet version of this institution was, it is highly likely it performed both these functions. Assessments of the reforms the Academy has undergone since 2012 are also divergent; some see these as necessary while others describe them as aiming to make the Academy part of the ‘vertical of power’: ‘Even if among the proponents of the reform there were some who genuinely wanted to improve the working of the Academy, judging by the effects, we know that they have not been the strongest camp. The reformists did not play the major role in the process’ [R7]. There are also stark disagreements between the government and academics as to how to re-organize RAS. In 2013, RAS became subordinated to a new super-structure, the Federal Agency of Scientific Organisations (Federal’noye Agenstvo Nauchnykh Organizatsii) (FANO). When FANO took over the administration of RAS, it started introducing changes that were met with strong opposition from scholars. More than 200 academics wrote an open letter to Vladimir Putin in July 2016 calling for a change of government policy, to include the recognition of basic science (fundamental’naya nauka) as an independent and valuable field of activity,

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placing scientific development on the list of state priorities and restoring the unity of the system of scientific institutions and the RAS.32 In another open letter to Putin in December 2017, a group of 397 Russian scientists complained about the reform of RAS and the ‘critical situation in Russian science’ that was creating an increasing exodus of young scientists from Russia. In the letter, a key criticism was the need to plan scientific activity and articles several years ahead.33 Mikhail Sadovskii (RAS) described the situation: In reality, this leads to a situation where in some institutes – I will not name them – the management is forced by the end of the year to encourage employees to publish articles anywhere; that is, in journals that we call murzilki [trash journals]. Now, there are quite a few journals in which it is possible to publish an academic article for a relatively modest amount of money, just to fulfil the state order. In general, the system works in a completely senile manner (sistema rabotayet sovershenno marazmaticheskim obrazom).34 During the 2017 election of RAS president, candidates agreed that Russian science was in crisis and, among other reforms, proposed limiting FANO’s mandate and increasing financial support for science.35 Such attitudes reflected widespread distrust in the state’s ability to implement effective reforms rather than merely introducing excessive regulation and oversight. In 2018, the administrative structure changed again. FANO became part of a new Ministry of Science and Higher Education. This was hardly a punitive move, as the former head of FANO was appointed the minister. This administrative change also meant that research and HE were finally united under one ministerial structure.

Resources (not) dedicated to research The combination of relatively low salaries and heavy teaching loads at publicly funded universities makes scholars starved of time and resources that could be dedicated to research activities. Those employed at RAS, the research-only institution, often find themselves in a situation when symbolic income forces them to undertake part-time teaching duties at universities. This is a widely recognized problem; to compensate for low income and secure a decent standard of living, many scholars are employees of several institutions at the same time (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, loc. 1918), usually in teaching-related tasks, which naturally limit the time they can dedicate to research. Several of my interviewees had more than one affiliation. Reflections about the need to supplement income from RAS at times enter the wider public debate. For instance, in 2019 Askold Ivanchik, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told the Kommersant daily that he as well a vast majority of employees of academic institutes – i.e. the components of RAS – simultaneously work at universities as part-time employees (Chernykh 2019).36

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Developing and sustaining international networks, including through conference participation, requires time and financial resources. This becomes a privilege rather than a normal practice of academic life; one usually reserved for scholars higher up a particular institution’s hierarchy. I have experienced this problem when trying to invite a scholar to participate on a panel at an international conference in the US; while willing to participate, the scholar emphasized that the funding available from the university was scarce, and would probably be dedicated to more senior scholars’ conference activities. One British scholar who worked at a university in Russia at the time of the interview provided the following assessment, built on a comparison they made with the British system: Lecturers have an insane teaching load. By Russian standards, if you teach 14 hrs/week, you are getting it easy. The norm is to teach 20 hours plus and to deliver all kinds of administrative service on top of that. . . . The ‘publish or perish’ rule is taken to the extreme in Russia. This is because if your salary is less than 30,000 rouble/month, you simply cannot cover a big city living costs. You have to rely on publishing bonuses, which only some universities provide. Publishing bonuses are scaled against Scopus rankings. Some journals may give you from 30,000 to 90,000 extra per month for a year. This is an extremely strong incentive to publish but it also creates resentment at the faculty. . . . The institution of a sabbatical does not exist or is not implemented, as far as I know. You can have half a year of unpaid leave but this means that you still have to do all your mandatory teaching in half a year. [RII] These problems are exacerbated by a largely state-organised and highly centralised grant-funding system. Researchers acknowledge that state funding dominates and that the lack of alternative sources of funding poses a significant obstacle to their work or research they could potentially undertake [R17]. Some claim that foreign sources of funding have been effectively prohibited (Zavadskaya 2019). The state-sponsored funding system has also become increasingly centralized; in 2016, the main fund for sponsoring research in social sciences and the humanities, the Russian Humanist Scientific Fund (Rossiiskii Gumanitarnyi Nauchnyi Fond), became part of the Russian Fund for Basic Research (Rossiiskii Fond Fundamental’nykh Issledovanii) (RFFI),37 whose director is nominated by the president of the Russian Federation for a fiveyear term. Although this institutional arrangement is insufficient to establish a direct link between research funding and the state’s aim of setting the research agenda, one of my interviewees indicated that a number of scholars pragmatically adjust their research to incorporate themes from the top of the official political agenda; for example, the theme of ‘patriotism’ started figuring more prominently among proposals submitted by scholars following the annexation of Crimea in 2014 [R5]. Another interviewee opined that, while the state’s

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control of funding does not necessarily dictate the narrative, it does indirectly suggest the vocabulary that researchers use [R8]. In general, however, my interviewees considered the grant-awarding process to be based on academic merit over any other criteria. One interviewee made a clear distinction between academic research that is mostly conducted according to a researcher’s own plan, albeit sometimes with a nod to the politics of a specific grant-giving body (uchitivaya politiku grantodavtsy), and think tank research, which is carried out according to a specific order: ‘the ordering party does no need critique’ (kritika zakazchiku ne nuzhna) [R13]. Another interviewee confirmed scholars’ attempts to balance their research objectives with those they assume the funding body may have: ‘Funding influences the direction of research – there are certain priorities. Academics know that they have to adapt their applications to these priorities but it does not influence the content of the research because scholars follow their own priorities in research’ [R24]. Yet another was more sceptical and concluded by referring to a Russian saying: Kto devushku kormit, tot devushku tancuyet [R8], which is closest to the meaning of English: He who pays the piper calls the tune. Even if these comments pertain to the realm of opinions and fail to reveal the actual policies and procedures, they show a profound lack of trust in the rules of the grant system. The other main drawbacks respondents pointed out were the meagre size of grants distributed via the RFFI and the excessive centralization of research funding, in particular the lack of private research-sponsoring foundations [R17; R21]. In the realm of the so-called ‘mega grants’ – those awarded by the Russian government for research projects lasting up to three years and with a budget of up to 90 million RUB (US$1.5 million) – in 2017, out of 35 mega grants, only two were awarded in the humanities and social sciences.38 State institutions have other means to promote one type of scholarship over other; for instance, through the national award system. The Presidential Award for Young Scholars in the Field of Science and Innovations, established in 2008, recognizes the scholarly work of several academics each year. In the history of the award, only two scholars in the humanities and social sciences have been recognized. In 2018, the award was granted for a contribution to the ‘study of church – state relations, the construction of monasteries and the publication of historical sources of the XV–XIX centuries’. Andrei Fursenko, presidential advisor, noted that it was difficult to find ‘valuable work’ in the humanities.39 The presidential advisor’s comment, as well as the frequency of awarding research, can be described as the strategic absence of the state; it is not interested in promoting research in these disciplines, and state officials do not sufficiently understand the scope and value of the work carried out by scholars in this area. Opinions shared by various scholars on social media, as well as those of my interviewees, confirm this assessment: Knowledge in the humanities (gumanitarnoye znaniye) at a European level exists as if it were in a ‘bubble’. It is entirely separated from the state and

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national discourse. Knowledge in the humanities is not just separate; the bureaucracy openly opposes it.40 For humanities and social sciences, the state does very little. [R8] Given insufficient state funding, another way to increase institutional budgets is by taking part in state tenders for the provision of specific teaching or research services. For instance, in September 2017, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced a tender for a teaching course titled ‘Russia’s foreign policy and international relations’, with the stated aim of improving the qualifications of civil servants. The tender was valued at almost 1.5 million RUB (US$23,000).41 Such tenders, or rather an interpretation of how to remain eligible to take part in them and potentially win, constitute an incentive for both institutions and scholars not to be excessively critical of the government’s foreign policy.

The intellectual context of academic knowledge production The contours and content of public debate in Russia shape the broader intellectual context in which academic knowledge production takes place. The extent of criticisms towards the government (published in niche outlets such as the weekly Novoye Vremya, as well as the online outlets such as Republic, Lenta and Meduza) and the richness of discussion on social media might suggest that freedom of expression is widespread in Russia. Critical commentary, however, has been relegated to the margins and is accessible to specific, rather than mass, audiences. Growing obstacles to freedom of speech and publication and increased interference in the world of mass media (Etkind 2015), art and culture narrow the remit of public debate. Even if direct censorship of the arts in Russia is rare, new cases continue to be reported (Antonova 2017; Damberg 2017). To provide just a couple of examples, in January 2018, the culture ministry revoked the distribution licence for British-made historical satire The Death of Stalin. In summer 2017, a Russian court decided to put Kirill Serebrennikov, an internationally acclaimed film and theatre director, under house arrest for alleged embezzlement – a decision that leading figures in Russia’s cultural world considered to be politically motivated (Amos 2017; Ayres 2017). The aforementioned Leviathan, nominated for an Academy Award in 2015, suffered opprobrium on part of Russian officials for showing an excessively bleak view of Russia and for its portrayal of the Church (Ikonen 2016). Russian rap artists are now on the list of those targeted and persecuted by authorities across Russia (Birger 2018). In Andrey Arkhangelskiy’s view, a ‘cultural state policy’ is emerging (Arkhangelskiy 2017), while Sergei Medvedev opines that the state, the Orthodox Church and conservative activists infringe on artistic freedom in Russia (Medvedev 2017b). A comparison of the presidentship of Medvedev and Putin is useful in showing how the content of the broad public debate has been shifting in response to changes in the official discourse. The period of ‘tandemocracy’, i.e. the

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presidency of Dmitry Medvedev and prime ministership of Vladimir Putin (2008–2012), was marked by the official narrative of modernization and the need for reforms. Then-president Medvedev contributed to this framing with a programmatic article ‘Forward, Russia!’ published in an independent online outlet Gazeta.ru (Medvedev 2009). The narrative describing Medvedev’s domestic and foreign policy agenda emphasised the government’s openness to the outside world, its cooperative stance towards partners abroad and readiness to pursue reforms and take citizens’ voices into consideration. While many of those pronouncements remained in the sphere of declarations only, they facilitated a more pluralistic public debate. Against this backdrop, Vladimir Putin’s return to presidency, announced in 2011 and completed in 2012, marked a turn towards conservative and hyper-patriotic themes. This trend was reinforced two years later after the annexation of Crimea. The official narratives during Vladimir Putin’s third (2012–18) and fourth (since 2018) presidential terms emphasised the return and reinforcement of traditional geopolitical explanations of international politics along the lines of inherently conflictual interstate relations, growing and explicit anti-Westernism and heightened critique of the European integration project (e.g. Putin 2013, for a detailed analysis of this discourse, see Foxall 2019). Popular became the assertion that ‘traditional values’, allegedly espoused and cherished by Russia, will help save Europe from the secular abyss (e.g. Putin 2012). Russia came to be presented not just in terms of a great power and strong state but also as a unique civilization or state-civilization (e.g. Putin 2012, 2019b).42 International politics has been increasingly portrayed in the official discourse in terms of growing instability, weakening institutions, Western states’ efforts to maintain their unjust privileged position in the international order (e.g. Putin 2014, 2018). The international order evolves in the direction of multipolarity but this process is accompanied by increasing inter-state competition over material resources as well as norms and values (e.g. Rossiiskaya Federatsiya 2015, 2016). Just as the state aims to control contemporary political discourse, it attempts to retain a monopoly on interpreting Russia’s past. Both are interwoven because the past is used for contemporary political purposes and reinterpreted through the political lens and aims of today (Vol’noye Istoricheskoye Obshchestvo 2017). Two aspects appear crucial in contemporary official narrative on the history of WWII, which in Russia is commemorated as the Great Patriotic War starting in 1941 and ending in 1945.43 The Russian government interprets the RibbentropMolotov pact of 1939 as a step that the USSR was forced to take because of the inaction of Western powers towards Nazi Germany and their appeasement policies. Any stipulations that Moscow’s cooperation with Berlin accelerated the outbreak of the war are fervently denounced as anti-Russian propaganda. Secondly, the Russian government regards the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazism as the cornerstone of Russia’s position in contemporary international politics. As a consequence, any challenges to the narrative of the Soviet ‘liberation’ of Central and Eastern Europe are seen in Moscow not as attempts at

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understanding of the past but as a way of delegitimizing Russia as an equal participant of international relations of today: Some have intensified attempts at privatizing the Victory, expunging from memory the Soviet Union’s role in the defeat of Nazism, condemning to oblivion the Red Army’s feat of sacrifice and liberation, forgetting the many millions of Soviet citizens who perished during the War, wiping out from history the consequences of the ruinous policy of appeasement. From this perspective, it is easy to grasp the essence of the concept of expounding the equality of the totalitarian regimes. Its purpose is not just to belittle the Soviet contribution to the Victory, but also to retrospectively strip our country of its historic role as an architect and guarantor of the postwar world order, and label it a “revisionist power” that is posing a threat to the well-being of the so-called free world. (Lavrov 2019) The conservative turn, comprising efforts to enforce religious orthodoxy on society as well as anti-feminist and anti-LGBT agendas, narrowed the space for public debate (Robinson 2017; Fish 2018). it was exacerbated by the adoption of the ‘anti-gay propaganda law’ in 2013 (Sharafutdinova 2014). According to Open Space (Otkrytoye prostranstvo na Dostoyevskogo), an activist platform, another telling example of the antagonistic agenda is that LGBT people continue to remain the only category of prisoners who had not been included in the law on the rehabilitation of victims of political repression.44 Other incarnations of the anti-LGBT agenda comprise the propagation of the pejoratively charged term Gayropa that denotes to the alleged domination of non-heterosexual minority in Europe. Comparing the situation in Russia to public debate in the US, a Russian academic noted: ‘in the US, people are accustomed to thinking about issues such as gender and historical memory because they appear in daily newspapers. In Russia, we are not accustomed to thinking about these issues at all.’45 This non-existence of certain topics in the public sphere makes academics who want to introduce them through their research look radical. Some scholars trace what they term ‘a conservative patriarchal revival’ to the early 2000s. Its effects have been noted in gender studies and in research employing feminist approaches: ‘academic feminist research is developing in a drastically unfavourable ideological climate’ (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, loc. 2623). The repercussions of the conservative revival are limited to gender studies – a field that is generally critical, reflexive and ready to express its political position (Harding 2004), and whose researchers may feel better prepared to voice their concerns than scholars in other disciplines (for an example, see Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, chapter 7). The conservative turn adversely affected other disciplines and bred patriotic over-zealousness. For instance, in 2019 a secondary-school economy textbook (dlya 10–11 klassov) was deemed insufficiently patriotic to be included in the federal list of

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recommended textbooks. According to the reviewers, the textbook’s failure was not to discuss the policy of import substitution.46 This policy, according to reviewers, is crucial because it builds students’ sense of pride in the country (Mironova 2019).47 Among other bold ideas inspired by the conservativepatriotic turn, was a suggestion to establish the University for the future (universitet budushchego). In cooperation with MGU, this new university would care for the professional and spiritual development of young statesmen and public figures. The proposal was voiced in 2018 by the Youth Council affiliated with the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC).48 Media loyal to the state are instrumental in promoting and protecting the Kremlin’s version of Russia’s identity as a great power and fuelling the antiWestern and anti-American discourse (Szostek 2017). Even media considered relatively independent and of high quality, such as Gazeta.ru, may provide unreliable information with an anti-Western bias. For instance, Gazeta.ru – ostensibly quoting the Russian Embassy in the UK – published a news report with the sensationalist headline ‘Great Britain no longer accepts diplomas issued by Russian universities’ (Posol’stvo: Britaniya otkazalas’ priznavat’ diplomy rossiyskikh vuzov).49 The press release issued by the Russian Embassy, however, concerned decreasing numbers of Russian pupils in public schools and the deadlock in bilateral talks on mutual recognition of education certificates.50 Media outlets that attempt to maintain editorial independence cannot be certain what the ‘red lines’ are. In May 2019, eleven journalists quit Kommersant, a daily generally considered independent, in protest of the dismissal of their two colleagues. The publishing house claimed that it dismissed the two journalists because they used anonymous sources in relating a story about Valentina Matvienko’s, a politician, departure from the post of the Federation Council’s chairwoman. The more plausible reason, however, may have been simple caution on part of the newspaper’s owner, oligarch Alisher Usmanov (Kolesnikov 2019). Interestingly, even the mainstream media are not entirely aware of the limits of public debate and critique. Izvestiya, a pro-government daily,51 experienced state pressure following a publication of a mildly critical analysis of an interview Sergei Shoigu, defense minister, gave to a different media outlet. The journalist who pointed out that military reforms had been initiated before rather than after Shoigu’s appointment, was reportedly dismissed and the article removed from the website soon after publication.52 Having subordinated most electronic and printed media (Gehlbach 2010; Fredheim 2017), the Russian government has been developing not only sophisticated tools to censor online engagement but also legislation that would make such censorship legal. Several legislative solutions have been of crucial importance in this regard, in particular: on the penalization of the rehabilitation of Nazism (article 354.1 of the Criminal Code, introduced in 2014),53 on extremism (federal law adopted as early as 2002 and article 282 of the Criminal Code)54 and on the ‘disrespect’ towards the state and authorities (adopted in 2019).55 There have been numerous instances of penalizing those authoring, or simply re-publishing, ‘controversial’ statements on social media. For example, one of

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the first cases of criminal prosecution under a 2014 law penalizing the rehabilitation of Nazism led to an individual, Vladimir Luzgin, being fined the significant amount of 200,000 RUB (around US$3,000) for reposting an article on his VKontakte profile (the Russian version of Facebook) that the court found to contain ‘false facts’ about the USSR and Germany’s joint attack on Poland on 1 September 1939.56 In 2017, Agora, an international human rights group, identified over 115 thousand cases of limiting freedom in the Russian internet.57 The Federal law on countering extremist activity, adopted in 2002, has been more recently used on the one hand to limit potential challenges to official narratives; on the other, it has been utilized by overzealous local authorities targeting specific institutions. For instance, in 2017, the court of St Petersburg recognized a collection of articles authored by Jan Nowak-Jeziorański, a 20thcentury journalist and writer critical of Soviet power, as extremist.58 This case could be considered peculiar, as the Polish consulate and the Polish Institute may have been the ultimate target. However, even if the state’s influence is dispersed and influenced by local rather than centralized politics, the overall effect is one of limited public discourse and cultural production. Whereas in December 2018, the law on extremism was softened,59 in March and April 2019 the Russian parliament adopted a series of bills making it easier for the Kremlin to control the digital sphere. The so-called ‘anti-fake news’ law (The federal law on amending article 15-3 of the Federal law on information, information technologies and protection of information)60 allows the authorities to block websites and penalize individuals, as well as internet media organizations, for publishing ‘unreliable socially significant information’ (nedostoverna obshchestvenno znachima informatsiya). Another bill introduces administrative liability for distribution of ‘any information that expresses in any obscene form, insulting human dignity and public morals, clear contempt for society, the state, official state symbols of the Russian Federation, the Constitution of the Russian Federation or bodies of state authority of the Russian Federation’.61 The senator who submitted the bill, Andrey Klishas, compared such online activity to selling drugs, distributing child pornography and fraud.62 These bills added to the restrictive landscape constructed by the 2013 and 2014 laws banning the use of obscene language in mass media, cinema, and theatre, and interpreted as instances of increasing control over culture and language (Beumers 2017). The most far-reaching legislation allowing the state to control the digital space is the so-called ‘sovereign internet’ law. It aims to create an infrastructure that would enable cutting off the Russian part of the internet (‘Runet’) from foreign servers (Prokopenko 2019). This legislation, signed by Vladimir Putin on 1 May 2019, follows in the footsteps of an attempt to close down the encrypted messaging service Telegram in 2018. In some cases, the authorities resort to drastic measures to counter what they deemed an illegitimate challenge to the official narrative. A member of Memorial (a well-regarded NGO) who was searching for victims of Soviet repressions, was arrested in late 2016 under charges that had reportedly been forged (Luhn 2017; Shkurenok 2017). Having spent more than 20 months in detention, he

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was ultimately acquitted in April 2018 but arrested again and charged with sexual assault several months later.63 Another historian of the Stalinist period, Sergei Koltyrin, was found guilty of a sexual crime and sentenced to nine years after a trial that took place behind closed door.64 While the intellectual discussion in contemporary Russia remains heterogeneous, the narrowing contours of public debate and obstacles to political engagement make it easier to amplify specific narratives while discouraging or silencing others. Official narratives, that is those presented in governmental documents and media appearances by high-level politicians, play an important role in guiding and moulding the content of the public debate. They establish the conditions of possibility for specific themes to enter the public debate. Admittedly, for different reasons, including the relative impenetrability of its jargon and the obscurity of publishing outlets, academic debate may enjoy greater freedom. However, it would be naïve to assume that research is entirely free from constraints affecting the public debate.

Research as a ‘political activity’ The 2012 ‘law on foreign agents’ is an example of legislation that creates indirect obstacles to research.65 The law mandates that any non-commercial organization should be placed on the register of foreign agents if it receives funding from abroad and engages in ‘political activity’. Both foreign agent and political activity are problematic concepts. In Russian, the meaning of ‘a foreign agent’ (inostrannyi agent) is pejorative, and reads like ‘a foreign spy’.66 From the outset, the law defined political activity exceptionally broadly, and a specification published in 2016 failed to narrow the category down. Research aiming to influence the government or public opinion is, according to the law, considered political activity.67 While universities have not been targeted by the ‘law on foreign agents’ – and, according to one respondent, scholars were ‘promised’ universities would not be included [R4] – the law has stimulated an atmosphere of insecurity and severely undermined confidence in the nature and objectives of legal arrangements [R37]. As one interviewee put it: ‘In the 1990s, there were some independent platforms funded by Western money, but Putin re-nationalized the public sphere and, with the foreign agent law, people are afraid of taking even a cent from abroad’ [R27]. Some may feel obliged to declare that their institutions do not receive foreign funding. For instance, Oleg Kharkhordin, the thenrector of EUSP, publicly emphasized that this university did not receive funding from abroad.68 The concern over stigmatization as a foreign agent was shared by Maria Trofimova, the EUSP dean of international programs, who was reported as saying that the EUSP would be immediately affected if it ‘accepts any money transfer from outside of Russia’.69 Further amendments to the law proposed towards the end of 2017 indicated that the category of foreign agent may be broadened to include not only organizations but also individuals, who would have to register if they distribute

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information and receive funding from abroad. Such a definition would make any scholar with international ties potentially vulnerable to prosecution under the law.70 The amendment was ultimately dropped, but it signalled to society that the authorities were seeking to strengthen their repertoire of legal tools of control. Nonetheless, a lot may depend on an individual institution; according to several of my interviewees, St Petersburg State University continued to support its scholars in applying for EU funds after 2014 [R11]. The development and maintaining of international ties have become more difficult for Russian scholars. In early 2019, in a bid to protect industrial secrets, the Russian government moved to restrict scientists’ interactions with foreigners, by requiring academics to notify the ministry, ensure at least two Russians are present and report on conversations.71 This regulation met with widespread contestation. As a result, the Ministry of Higher Education and Science tried to downplay its own decree by emphasizing that the document they issued contained only recommendations.72 The Kremlin, too, attempted to distance itself with Vladimir Putin’s press secretary, Dmitri Peskov, announcing that he considered the measures too far-reaching.73 But even if this regulation were only down to the efforts of an overzealous official rather than part of a carefully planned attack on academic freedom, it has to be considered in the wider context of developments that have adversely affected higher education and research. At the time of revising this chapter, in September-October 2019, the regulation was still in motion. The broad discussion of the regulation increased its visibility among scholars. Some will laugh it away, considering it absurd and impossible to implement, but some may feel greater unease about developing foreign contacts. The regulation leaves ample room for manoeuvre for universities’ management to use it to (selectively) apply pressure on those whose activity – at the university or outside of it – they feel uncomfortable with. One of the universities reportedly took the ‘recommendation’ to regulate contacts with foreign scholars seriously. Kazan Federal University (KFU) made use of it to construct its own regulation (reglament) requiring scholars to elaborate ‘a unified position of the Russian side’ on issues considered at meetings with foreign colleagues. Those meetings should only take place in specially designated offices. KFU governing body brazenly presented these measures as contributing to increasing the university’s effectiveness rather than as a limitation.74 Credibility and trust Knowledge production, as a fundamentally social activity, can be significantly undermined by reducing the credibility of organizations that gather and analyze data. Over the last couple of years, the state apparatus has achieved this in two ways: first, by implying that a particular research organization is acting on behalf of the West; second, by creating demand for pro-government pollster services. The latter contributed to generating a divide between expertise considered independent and that in the service of the state.75 Research, in particular the type relying on the analysis of statistical data, became severely

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undermined by diminished trust towards official statistics. The opposition leaders and non-mainstream media have reported a number of cases in which the Federal State Statistics Service, Rosstat, applied statistical methods to suit certain narratives propagated by state organs; for example, by lowering the number of people migrating from Russia or altering the definition of poverty.76 While state institutions have not necessarily repressed specific research directions, they have stigmatized some research organizations, labelling them nonpatriotic or foreign agents. The Yuri Levada Analytical Center has been among those affected. Long considered one of Russia’s most important public opinion pollsters, and an internationally recognized non-governmental sociological research organization trusted by independent and foreign researchers (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, loc. 2431)77, the Levada Center was classified as a ‘foreign agent’ in 2016 on the grounds that it was receiving foreign funding to carry out ‘political activity’. The Center was not successful in challenging this status in court (Gudkov 2017; Bocharova 2016), which triggered speculation as to the genuine motivation behind attaching a foreign agent label to this specific pollster. Political scientist Alexei Makarkin, in an interview for the Vedomosti daily (an outlet considered relatively independent from political power), suggested that the Levada Center’s inclusion on the register of foreign agents could have been the result of its research activity and dissemination practices – particularly the publication of the falling electoral ratings of the pro-Kremlin United Russia party in the period before the Duma elections of 2016 (Mukhametshina 2016). Lev Gudkov, director of the Levada Center, was quoted as saying the organization may cease to exist since independent research on electoral ratings, attitudes towards democracy or corruption would no longer be possible (Mukhametshina 2016). It must be noted that Levada Center is known for asking questions that directly concern the current political situation in Russia and its foreign policy; for instance, questions about who people would like to see as president of Russia after 2018, the assessment of the annexation of Crimea and attitudes towards Russia’s international partners.78 However, prior to the presidential elections of 2018, the Levada Center stopped publishing the results of opinion polls on the election for fear of legal repercussions. Lev Gudkov told the Russian daily Vedomosti that, while the agency was conducting election polling, it was refraining from making the results known to the public during the campaign because this could be interpreted as election meddling.79 The ‘law on foreign agents’ affected the work of a number of other nongovernmental research institutions, such as the Center for Independent Social Research in St Petersburg, the Saratov Center for Gender Studies and the aforementioned Memorial.80 Among those affected was also the Sova Center for Information and Analysis (SOVA Center), a non-governmental organization researching and monitoring hate crimes and extremist movements in Russia. This case shows that the law can be abused to threaten or silence an organization that was not in fact in violation of its prescriptions. The basis for the charge was a list of past supporters of the organization which included the National Endowment for Democracy and the Open Society Foundations, both deemed

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‘undesirable’ and banned from operating in Russia as of 2015. These organizations, however, supported SOVA Center prior to 2015 (SAR 2018, 45). The charges were later dropped but have put an unnecessary burden on an organization that, as many other independent NGOs that still operate in Russia, is starved of personnel and resources. Even more importantly, the status of ‘foreign agent’ isolates an organization. One of my interviewees explained the drastic change in attitudes towards a research centre after it was included on the list of foreign agents: The law influenced our activity to a significant extent. Ordinary people whom we wanted to interview no longer wished to speak to us. A while ago, it was cool when you had money from the EU and German foundations. Everyone considered it important to support you. Now they usually decline to participate. . . . An NGO that was included in the register after 2014 managed to escape the registry, but no one wants to work with them anymore; they are still considered a national traitor (vrag naroda), like in the Soviet times. [R37] One of the results of stigmatization is that it divides the broader knowledgeproducing community and is a serious obstacle to solidarity-building among various institutions. One of the interviewees explained that a research centre they worked for refrained from expressing solidarity with EUSP after its teaching licence had been revoked (the following section discusses the EUSP case at length): ‘Just imagine, if a foreign agent supports you, you are going to be in an even bigger trouble. We are afraid to work with each other. You can easily spoil someone else’s good work’ [R37] (see also Dubrovskiy 2018). In addition to stigmatization as a foreign agent, a number of organizations have been banned from Russia as a consequence of the so-called undesirable organizations law introduced in May 2015. One of these organizations is George Soros’s Open Society Foundation, OSF.81 Among the many educational activities supported by the Soros Foundation (The Soros Foundation 2000, 67– 75) was funding for translating scholarly works into Russian, including International Relations Theory Today, edited by Ken Booth and Steve Smith. Professor Nikolay Vakhtin, who remembers the difficulties Russian academia experienced during the 1990s, commented on the Foundation’s activities in the following way: ‘Maybe I do not know everything about Soros’s activities, but I will always be grateful to him for the fact that in the early 1990s, about 500 talented scientists remained working in Russia. His grants supported Russian science at a time when the state was still incapable of doing so.’ Banning OSF in Russia has repercussions beyond the country. I am familiar with a case when a research organization based in the EU that benefits from the OSF’s support, had been weary of employing scholars based in Russia to undertake research activity. The organization was concerned about both these scholars’ wellbeing and reputation, if they agreed to cooperate, as well as the

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prospect of their own institution’s stigmatization as a foreign agent. Such alertness bordering on fear – clearly the result of a specific state policy – does not bode well for developing international research collaborations.

Confronting academic institutions The academic year 2016/17 witnessed a direct confrontation between the state and one particular HE institution. In 2016, the EUSP lost its teaching licence and its accreditation, a decision assessed as one of the most significant developments in Russia’s domestic politics over the past several years (Gel’man 2018). The university’s legal status is that of a non-profit autonomous HE organization. The university was created on the basis of a 1994 decree issued by St Petersburg’s then-mayor, Anatoly Sobchak. The EUSP, even if small in size (in terms of student numbers), gained national and international recognition for its research and teaching quality.82 The university has widely been considered a liberal forum for discussing domestic and international affairs, and developed a network of cooperation with universities outside of Russia. The revoking of the licence by Rosobrnadzor, the supervisory governmental body in education and science, triggered a debate about pressure exerted on social science in Russia (Aronson 2016; Meyer 2017). The reasons behind the university’s problems are unclear, which only adds to the climate of insecurity the case has generated. The official complaint to the prosecutor’s office was made by Vitaly Milonov, then-deputy to St Petersburg Legislative Assembly, from the pro-Kremlin United Russia party. Milonov is reported as having expressed dissatisfaction with the university allegedly ‘forcing’ students to write about protecting the rights of sexual minorities, which he likened to the formation of a fifth column in Russia.83 Since the complaint, the university has undergone inspections by a number of state agencies. Rosobrnadzor found 120 violations of norms and rules, including ‘untimely certification of employees, as well as insufficient qualification structure of lecturers of political science and sociology faculties’,84 and seemingly improbable concerns over the lack of visual information on the university’s premises about the dangers of alcohol consumption.85 One of the violations concerned enrolment for BA programmes,86 even though the university offered no such programmes. In addition to the over-complicated control system, the EUSP affair has been variously attributed to the potentially lucrative building in which the university was located, the tendency among state officials to apply rules without a degree of flexibility, and the activity of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and infighting within the ruling regime (Kolesnikov and Albats 2017). One person linked to the university said the institution was promised pressure would end after the 2018 presidential elections. Commentators also linked the case to the research interests pursued at the university, in particular those related to LGBT issues, which were increasingly unpopular among conservative circles in Russia. The latter finds confirmation in a plea issued by Andrei Anokhin, a member of St Petersburg Legislative Assembly, in September 2017; Anokhin urged the

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prosecutor’s office to act because ‘Western values’ were being propagated on the university’s website.87 Another interpretation of the EUSP’s problems points to funding the university allegedly received from abroad (Aronson 2016). The university, however, had withdrawn from receiving foreign funds. In comparison, from 2009–11 the EUSP was largely Western-funded (Sokolov 2018, 9). In 2008, the university was closed for several weeks after failing a fire-safety inspection. In their official letter to the governor of St Petersburg, the EUSP alumni association expressed their opinion that the decision was based on selective law enforcement and motivated by considerations external to fire-safety issues [R14; R27].88 Many have linked the closure to a EUR 700,000 research grant EUSP that Grigorii Golosov, professor at the EUSP, received from the European Commission for a project to improve election monitoring in Russia (Kelly 2017). One interviewee commented on this affair in the following way: It was linked to a political science scholar, who received a grant from the European Commission for setting up centres to train election observers. They were to teach Russian election rules. Putin was not satisfied and even commented on the case. [R21] Among other interpretations of the university’s recent problems is one suggesting that the EUSP, generally considered Alexey Kudrin’s89 pet project, was used as a tool in the political struggle between him and his political opponents prior to the 2018 presidential elections [R17]. One academic commented on the situation on social media in the following way: Kudrin’s last column. The title is clear. For such is not something that the EU – in general, all universities except the FSB Academy can be closed. I explain: I do not agree with Kudrin and I think that the public sector should be radically reformed, not privatized. But Putin’s friends are not happy with both. It is just that nobody seriously intends to reform the public sector (even at the level of declarations), but privatization and Kudrin is already a real threat. Here all means are good.90 Complexity is added by the fact that president Putin expressed support for the university. This presidential expression of support, however, did not bring any concrete results (Mironova 2018). The number and variety of interpretations available allows those willing to save the university to choose the most convenient narrative [R5]. This was illustrated in a documentary aired on state television (Rossiya24), which emphasized the university’s contribution to research concerning Russian culture – and failed to mention LGBT- or gender-related research (Rossiya24 2017). In addition to the bureaucratic-legal campaign against the EUSP, some media outlets worked on defaming the university. Digital outlet PolitEkspert claimed it

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interviewed a former EUSP lecturer and quoted him as saying the EUSP ‘practically declared the ideology of LGBT and radical feminism and actively imposes Western political trends on its employees and students’.91 This radically conservative line suggests that ideological and moral aspects of the EUSP’s research and teaching contributed to a backlash against it. Statements such as this are in line with the determinedly conservative sociocultural direction Russian authorities have embraced over the past several years. The EUSP’s problems provoked either outrage or a feeling of resignation among academics. The situation has been described by scholars as systematic discrimination against private research universities by the Russian state (Guba and Zavadskaya 2017), and the EUSP as an ‘exemplary victim’ [R27]. Another interviewee was even more pessimistic in this regard: ‘The EUSP is not perceived as a Russian university, it is considered a foreign agent; there is the feeling of “us” and “others”’ [R26]. Contrary to this trend, one of my interviewees from outside the EUSP admitted they were not following the issue at all, as they did not consider it important. In their view, private universities in Russia have mushroomed and contributed to lowering the quality of teaching [R14]. Academics generally agree that HE institutions delivering low-quality teaching programmes have flooded the academic market since the early 1990s, and that buying and selling degrees without students completing their teaching programmes became ‘part of normal life’(Roshchin 2019). The fact that the government authorized Rosobrnadzor, Russian education watchdog, to tackle this problem is not nearly a sufficient explanation for why Rosobrnadzor decided to suspend the teaching licence of one of the leading universities in Russia (Roshchin 2019). The EUSP’s plight elicited international response in the form of letters of support issued by scholars, universities and professional associations worldwide. All of these emphasized EUSP’s well-deserved international reputation. The Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, (ASEEES) in a statement of support issued by its Executive Committee, underlined: ‘Our Association’s three-thousand members hold the European University in the highest esteem and consider it a vital partner.’92 A letter of support issued by the European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, reaffirmed that: The European University of St. Petersburg has a truly impressive track record. Within a few years of operation it has become an internationally renowned center of excellence for research and education in the social sciences and humanities. More and more EUSP research output is nowadays published in world leading academic journals, which is a major achievement given the high hurdles for publication in the most distinguished outlets. EUSP students show an excellent and internationally competitive performance.93 The European Consortium on Political Research issued a statement in which it called on ‘the Russian educational authorities to allow the EUSP and its

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faculty to pursue their scholarly work without interference, and to work with the EUSP’s staff to resolve any real administrative impediments’.94 The British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies termed the revoking of a teaching license ‘a blow on the cause of quality higher education in the Russian Federation, from which the whole sector will suffer’ and emphasised that it ‘harms the reputation of academic scholarship in the Russian Federation more broadly by landing a fatal blow on the numerous varied and innovative programmes of international cooperation and collaboration in research, teaching and learning that have been painstakingly built over the past two decades’.95 A group of scholars from the University of Oxford expressed their concern over the EUSP’s planned eviction from its premises at the Small Marble Palace: We, the undersigned Oxford academics, wish to express our surprise that the European University at St Petersburg is facing a legal threat to terminate the tenancy of its premises at the Small Marble Palace. The European University has a well-deserved international reputation, and we understand that its authorities have made a strenuous effort to comply with their architectural and financial responsibilities. A tenancy termination would have an extremely damaging effect. We ask you to do what you can to relieve the current pressure on the European University and its staff and to enable it to continue its productive scholarly and education work in its current premises.96 Importantly, while many foreign and international institutions issued statements of support, there was no strong voice in support of the EUSP among Russian universities. Director of the HSE campus in St Petersburg, Sergei Kadochnikov, wrote a short letter of support to the EUSP community and the university’s then-rector Oleg Kharkhordin, in which he emphasized that the EUSP is one of the best in Russia, conducts excellent training of graduate and postgraduate students, and makes a significant contribution to research in the social sciences and humanities.97 The letter did not direct any criticism at, nor comment on, the government institutions or their conduct. The case of the EUSP – which regained its teaching licence in August 2018 and, a year later, managed to regain its accreditation, had to leave the building it occupied and terminate contracts with foreign lecturers98 – illustrates the extent to which non-state universities still depend on state authorities, who have the power to both cause harm and save the institution. Moreover, no unambiguous explanation had been provided by Russian authorities for the University’s closure. There is little doubt that the affair exacerbated insecurity in Russian academic circles. It is illustrated by the fact that primarily external actors continued to demand explanation. For instance, the President of the European University Institute, Renaud Dehausse issued a letter to Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and Olga Vasilyeva, the then minister of education and science, with the following statement:

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I am writing to express my concern about the recent decision of the Russian authorities to close the European University at St. Petersburg. To my great relief, the recent decision of a high court in Moscow annulled that unfortunate decision, but I understand that the controversy around the EUSP has not been completely resolved.99 The EUSP was not the only non-state university the authorities considered threatening. The Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences (so-called ‘Shaninka’) lost its accreditation in June 2018. Rosobrnadzor argued that some of the programmes taught at Shaninka did not meet federal standards of HE, including lecture hall space and faculty credentials.100 The loss of accreditation is not identical with the loss of a teaching licence; without the former, the university can still conduct teaching activities, but the lack of accreditation implies a low quality of teaching that does not meet even the standards set by the government. The lack of accreditation makes it impossible for Shaninka’s male students to defer military service while attending this university (SAR 2018, 44). The first deputy of the Duma committee on education and science, Oleg Smolin, commented on this situation: ‘Rosobrnadzor does not check the quality of education, but the quality of paperwork’, and called for changes in Rosobrnadzor’s regulations.101 Creating standards that are impossible to attain makes the functioning of educational institutions insecure and dependent on arbitrary whim. Academics sometimes share photos on social media of rooms filled with piles of documents that academic and support staff need to prepare to meet official accreditation requirements. Gazeta.ru commented on these cases in its editorial, pointing to Rosobrnadzor’s complete freedom to close down any HE institution if it wished to do so, as none of these institutions was capable of fulfilling all the criteria. The editorial went on to add that, currently, the choice has been to closed down universities ‘oriented to Western values and distinguished . . . by the atmosphere of free thinking’.102 In July 2018, the Association of Leading Universities in Russia and the Association ‘Global Universities’, together representing more than 50 of Russia’s biggest universities, appealed to Vladimir Putin to abolish the existing system of accreditation. The head of Rosobrnadzor dismissed this appeal, stating simply that concerns voiced by the academic community are greatly exaggerated.103 While neither the EUSP nor Shaninka are state universities, there is also evidence of excessive control wielded over state universities and research institutes. In January 2018, a protest called for the return of academic freedom to SPbGU, whose rector’s activities were regarded as a way for him to secure a ministerial post following the end of his term.104 One interviewee commented that at state universities, in addition to institutional and budgetary pressures, certain teaching curricula and textbooks have been changed and some modules closed down. There have also emerged some new-but-old instruments of control; for instance, requiring universities to provide education on aspects of students’ private lives, such as hygiene [R2].

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Direct engagement with individual scholars In addition to the influence exerted by the state over research institutions, there have been cases of direct engagement with individual scholars through cooptation or punishment. While the most prominent cases attract international attention, the majority go unnoticed. Two internationally discussed incidents concern Sergei Guriev and Andrei Zubov. Sergei Guriev served as rector of the Moscow New Economic School, and has been praised for helping to shape one of the best universities specializing in the study of economics in Russia. He left the country for Paris in 2013, following interrogations about a report he helped to write that criticized the prosecution of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Russian oligarch turned political activist.105 In Russia, the general reading of his departure was that it signalled the beginning of the government’s willingness to take on independent-minded and critically inclined scholars. Another prominent case materialized the following year. Andrei Zubov, philosophy professor at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations University (MGIMO), was dismissed after comparing Russia’s annexation of Crimea to Nazi Germany’s Anschluss of Austria in 1938. Zubov expressed his views in an article published by the Vedomosti daily. MGIMO’s justification for dismissing Zubov was that his comments on the developments in Ukraine and on Russia’s foreign policy caused indignation.106 One of Zubov’s former colleagues recalls: ‘In the case of Zubov, I asked why he was fired. They told me he violated corporate ethics, and I went to the legal department to ask about the ethical code, but they didn’t have one. I thought I needed to know the borders, but uncertainty is an important instrument – you never know’ [R20]. A number of cases have remained unreported by international media. For instance, since 2015, Yurii Pivovarov – director of a research institute at RAS and outspoken critic of contemporary political developments in Russia – has been under investigation for various types of mismanagement at the institute.107 In 2017, Vera Afanas’eva, a professor at the Saratov State University, was accused of corruption two months after she published a critical article, Five Reasons Not To Become a Professor, in which she condemned the widespread practice of civil servants and local and federal assembly deputies acquiring forged academic degrees.108 Lyudmila Kolesnikova, a university lecturer at RANEPA, is reported to have been dismissed from the Academy after she discussed gay persecution in Chechnya and protests organized by Alexey Navalny in one of her lectures.109 In 2019, Valery Solovei, a political scientist and until recently a professor at MGIMO, quit his job under pressure from the university. In an interview for the Russian Service BBC, he explained: I was told that, for political reasons, the institute considers it highly undesirable for me to work in it. In particular, I was accused of conducting subversive activities, doing anti-state propaganda and undermining political stability.110

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These are but a few examples. Alexandr Kynev, in his interview for Znak, mentioned two other scholars: historian Alexei Petrov of Irkutsk State University and political scientist Gleb Yarov of Petrozavodsk State University (Kynev 2019).111 Describing his own case, Kynev emphasized: ‘I am sure that in my case there was no order from any official. In my case, this is an internal story, when, using the general trend, they [not explained who or which institution] are trying to clear a place for the “right” friends and take under control an important segment of the university.’ One of my interviewees mentioned yet another case of a scholar’s dismissal, which I was unable to confirm from news releases [R11]. However, the fact that Russia-based scholars are aware of cases concerning the treatment of fellow academics suggests that, even if infrequent, these incidents contribute to creating an atmosphere of heightened alertness; one that makes scholars anxious and aware of the risks of speaking out on controversial issues, be those in the realm of politics or university governance and the organization of research. I develop this argument further in chapter four. It has also become more common to open criminal and administrative cases against scholars. In May 2017, the trade union Profsoyuz Universitetskaya Solidarnost’ issued a statement protesting a criminal case opened against Dmitry Bogatov, a lecturer at the Moscow University of Finance and Law. The union stated: Restrictions on the freedom of speech, arbitrary repression based on unfounded accusations are a threat to civil society, including independent trade unions. We are increasingly witnessing the opening of criminal cases for publishing statements on the internet. . . . These criminal and administrative cases are within an extremely disturbing trend of restricting the freedom of speech and other political rights and freedoms, which also include a permanent ban on holding rallies by independent trade unions. . . . We believe that the case against Dmitry Bogatov is a politically motivated act of intimidation of Russian citizens. We are categorically against freedom of speech violations, in particular against censorship on the internet.112 The most severe consequences are attached to accusations of treason. For instance, 75-year-old Viktor Kudryavtsev was arrested in 2018 and charged with handing over ‘secrets’ to the Brussels-based research institute his organization worked with, in the framework of the FP7-SPACE programme, back in 2013. According to those close to Kudryavtsev, the authorities used this accusation as intimidation in order to force him to testify against one of his colleagues.113 Little is publicly known about Kudryavtsev’s accusations (Demina 2019). Investigators refer to two emails in which the researcher allegedly shared secret information with foreigners. According to Kamanda29, a human rights NGO specializing in treason and spying accusations, Kudryavtsev coordinated an international research and collaborated with scientists from India, Brazil, China, France, the Netherlands and Belgium. In 2013, the project was completed and its results were published in Russia and abroad. Kudryavtsev,

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as part of the contract, sent two reports to project partners in which he described research results. To do so, he was required to obtain permission of two commissions: the internal at the institute and the governmental commission for export control. Both gave permission, noting that the reports contained no confidential information. In 2018, however, the Federal Security Service, FSB, decided otherwise. In July 2019, the court extended Kudryavtsev’s arrest for another three months.114 Memorial considers Kudryavtsev a political prisoner.115 This is an extreme case, most of the times the pressures are relatively mild, but they are nonetheless harmful to an individual’s career. One of my interviewees said they were not allowed by their own university to give lectures at the Free University, Berlin [R20]; another mentioned a case in which their colleague had not received permission from the university administration to attend a conference in Ukraine [R37]. Foreign scholars researching aspects of Russian politics are not entirely protected from the gaze of the state (Knott 2018). Just as it is with local academics, the approach to foreign scholars is hardly uniform. On the one hand, they are eligible for state-sponsored research grants. Foreign researchers can apply, together with Russian research institutions, for substantial financial support within the Megagranty framework, a major Russian programme for research. For instance, in 2017 William Wohlforth, Dartmouth College, received funding for a project titled Transformation of the system of international relations in the context of a changing technological structure.116 On the other hand, some researchers may occasionally find themselves entangled with institutions of the state more closely than a standard visa-issuing process would require.117 They may fall victim of worsening bilateral relations between Russia and another state – as was the case with Henryk Gł bocki, a historian at the Institute for National Remembrance, who was asked to leave Russia following Poland’s extradition of Dmitry Karnaukhov (SAR 2018, 35). Gł bocki’s treatment mobilized criticism among Russian scholars. In the national media, a Russian academic reminded the audience that scholars are not civil servants (uchenye ne yavliyayutsiya gossluzhashchimi) and should not be subject to the tit-for-tat dealings that may be part of diplomatic exchanges.118 On social media, the commentary pointed to uncertainty resulting from the opaque procedure, as Russia’s Federal Security Service failed to disclose the grounds on which the scholar was asked to leave the country. Intimidation and various restrictions are not the only ways in which the state engages with individual scholars. Some may decide to change their career. Dmitry Suslov, for instance, has been mentioned by interviewees as an example of an academic who left St Petersburg State University, joined the Foreign and Defence Policy Council (pereshel v struktury) and, according to one interviewee [R2], substantially changed his rhetoric following this change of workplace. Others can be actively coopted and Andrey Koshkin, who heads the Department of Political Science and Sociology at the Russian Economic University, may serve as an illustration. In 2017, he was invited to head the educational platform of the United Russia ruling party.119 More striking is perhaps the

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figure of Andrey Klishas, a senator at the Federation Council (the upper chamber of the Russian parliament) since 2012 and a professor at the Faculty of Law at the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia. On the university’s website he is presented as ‘the author of more than 35 scientific papers related to the problems of constitutional law’.120 Klishas was the official proponent of the law on administrative liability for ‘disrespect’ towards society, state symbols and the authorities, a legislation that explicitly contributes to limiting the freedom of expression.

Conclusions Making use of the first part of the exploratory framework, this chapter considered the political and intellectual context of knowledge production in contemporary Russia. Taking into consideration growing limitations to citizens’ freedoms and harsher punishment of dissent, I discussed the poorly delineated border between academia and the state, exacerbated by public universities’ administrative and financial dependence on the state, the centralization of resources for research and the government’s role in rector appointments. I examined the ways in which state institutions target particular institutions and individual scholars. The Russian state does not appear to have a thorough and consistent program for HE and RAS reform, nor has it elaborated a coherent policy of repressing academia. The state’s engagement with knowledge-production processes is best described as disperse interference that is at once clustered and diffuse; it appears clustered around specific HE institutions, yet its workings are diffuse and amorphous. Indirect interference is executed by various means, including stigmatization, overregulation and strategic absences of the state in areas crucial for research survival, such as funding. As commentators of electoral authoritarianism have noted, manipulations of formally democratic electoral procedures in Russia may follow top-down orders but they may also stem from unplanned activities of lower-tier state agents, which lead to incoherence and tension (Dollbaum 2019, 6). It is highly likely that the same mechanisms are in place when it comes to the state’s engagement with academia. The reasons for interference in the sciences are not clear, and commentators point to different potential motivations. Some emphasize that the targeting of universities might be motivated by a desire to curb civil society (Lobanov 2017; Forrat 2016, 321). A number of my interviewees identified state practices as purposeful: ‘It is all part of the system. They are not stupid. This is all planned’ [R20]. Others believe the state activities are largely uncoordinated. Maria Trofimova, the then EUSP dean of international programs, compared the state to a three-headed monster from a Slavic fairy tale: ‘One head doesn’t know what the other head is doing’.121 The state may also be attempting to limit the influence of foreign, particularly Western, countries and institutions over teaching and research – a policy executed, in particular by reducing foreign financing of the social sciences (Golosov 2016).

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It would be difficult to boil down the complex processes taking place at the intersection of academia and the state to a simple unidirectional relationship of coercion and subordination. More compound and multifaceted associations have evolved. Margarita Zavadskaya opines that academics who decide to research ‘uncomfortable’ topics are not considered a problem per se; they only ‘become a problem when university bureaucrats begin to see them as an unnecessary risk’ (2019). In Zavadskaya’s view, this is the result of contractual relationships developed between universities and the state. Even private universities enter into contracts with the state, which makes those academic institutions more vulnerable and their administrations more risk averse. It would also be impossible to absolve individuals completely from responsibility, or at least from facilitating certain developments. Relations between scholars at various levels of academic hierarchy and the organs of the state are influenced by, but also more complex than, coercion originating in state institutions. These relations include political economy factors, such as the need to earn a living, often by means of juggling several jobs at different institutions. In some cases, they may be affected by the drive for personal enrichment. Zavadskaya points to competition or even in-fighting in academic circles for prestigious administrative positions (2019). As central and regional authorities have a say in the rectors’ selection and appointment process, candidates or incumbents are motivated to build connections with federal and regional governing structures to either secure appointments or diminish potential competition (Golunov 2014, loc. 471). Two conclusions stemming from this chapter are the most consequential for our understanding of academic knowledge-making and its political relevance. One is the increasingly blurred boundary between academia and the state that manifests itself not just in organizational structures or financial arrangements but also in dual allegiances of some university rectors and professors. The second is that political activity has been legally defined by the state and presented as undesirable. Since research aiming to influence the government or public opinion is, according to law, considered political activity, it follows that the state – rather than scholars – defines the boundaries and content of the political and expects knowledge to remain outside of this realm. While it would be too far-fetched to write about the state’s oppressive treatment of the academy in Russia, especially if we compare the situation to steps taken by the Turkish government post-2016 coup, direct and indirect measures introduced in Russia have an effect on academic practice. The awareness of cases when various state organs target not only institutions but also individual scholars makes academics anxious about speaking out on controversial issues in the realm of politics, university governance or the organization of research. In combination, developments described in this chapter influence and reconfigure epistemic practices in Russian academia, a theme developed in more detail in Chapter 4. Importantly, however, in order to better understand these processes and their effect, it is necessary to consider them with due attention to their historical background. Insiders, including a number of scholars interviewed as part of this research, continue to invoke the Soviet past as an important factor

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determining how research is done and what the aims of academic endeavour are. Understanding how knowledge was produced in the Soviet Union is the aim of Chapter 3.

Notes 1 Facebook public profile update, translation mine, June 2018. 2 While respecting the difference between the Russia Academy of Sciences, RAS and HE, I use the terms academics and scholars interchangeably. I also use the term academia with reference to the combined system of research and higher education. 3 ‘Bit’, sazhat’, shtrafovat’: repressii kak otvet na probuzhdeniye interesa k politike [To beat, to arrest, to fine: repression as a response to the awakening of interest in politics]’, the lecture by Ella Paneiakh in the Sakharov Centre, 22 October 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLquMNerlq8. 4 See also (Sakwa 2014, 61; Cheskin and March 2015). 5 For a critique of reification in the discipline of International Relations, please see this author’s previous work (Kaczmarska 2019). 6 The Russian language version of Margarita Zavadskaya article is Nesvobodnaya politologiya (The unfree political science) and this language version is available at: www.ridl.io/ru/nesvobodnaja-politologija/. 7 Feministskaya kritika nauki (The feminist critique of science), roundtable, 1 November 2018. 8 Leonid Slutskiy is an active politician and chairman of the Duma’s Foreign Affairs Committee. He was appointed deputy chair of the International Relations and Regional Integration Department in 2015. The news report: https://zona.media/ news/2018/03/09/politolog. 9 These scholarly assessments, of which I have only provided a sample, can be further supplemented by insights shared by those with practical experience of Russian politics. For instance, Gleb Pavlovsky, a political consultant working for the Kremlin between 1996–2011 described Russia’s governance till 2012 as a ‘managed democracy’ and the post-2012 governing style as ‘indirection and interpretation rather than command and control’ (Pavlovsky 2016). 10 Under Russian law, since 2004 the only form of public demonstration that does not require giving prior notice to the authorities is a so called one-person protest (odinochnyi piket). As emphasized by the European Court of Human Rights in 2016, even these forms of protests are often limited by the police and their organizers fined by the courts (Simons and Voorhoof 2016). The text of the federal law on gatherings, meetings, demonstrations, processions and pickets (Federal’nyy zakon o sobraniyakh, mitingakh, demonstratsiyakh, shestviyakh i piketirovaniyakh): https:// rg.ru/2004/06/23/miting-dok.html. 11 The news reports – as of 16 May 2019: www.gazeta.ru/comments/column/s77233/ 12356941.shtml; as of 15 May 2019: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48276170. 12 The news report, 11 June 2019: www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/06/russia-dropscharges-investigative-reporter-ivan-golunov-190611144238246.html; see also (Chernykh and Rubnikovich 2019). 13 The Moscow Electoral Commission refused to register several candidates, including Ilya Yashin, Lyubov Sobol and Dmitry Gudkov, claiming that the signatures of support they had gathered were invalid. The University Solidarity Trade Union supported the civic protest. For details, see: http://unisolidarity.ru/?p=8029. For more details see: (Pertsev 2019) and the following news reports – from 16 July 2019: www.rferl.org/a/russian-opposition-politician-barred-from-election-to-moscowcity-council-vows-to-appeal/30058054.html; from 20 July 2019: www.rferl.org/a/

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protesters-rally-in-moscow-for-barred-opposition-city-council-candidates/30066377. html; from 28 July 2019: www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-politics-navalny/russianopposition-leader-navalny-may-have-been-poisoned-doctor-idUSKCN1UN0E9. For broader analysis see Gorokhovskaia 2019 and Dollbaum 2019. Such entwinement between the state and HE is not specific to the academic realm only. Researchers argue that it characterizes other spheres of social organisation, for instance the operation of the not-for-profit sector (Ljubownikow and Crotty 2017) and that it became part and parcel of political contestation (Cheskin and March 2015). Mir, a national payment system established by the Central Bank of Russia, was devised after several Russian banks were denied services by Visa and MasterCard following the introduction of a sanctions regime by the US government. Mir is operated by the Russian National Card Payment System, a subsidiary of the Central Bank of Russia. Mir is not only actively promoted but in many instances mandated by the Russian government. Legislation available at: www.msu.ru/upload/pdf/docs/msu-spbgu.pdf. I use the term ‘suggest’ rather than ‘describe’ deliberately. In my experience, critique is less directly and overtly expressed in the Russian linguistic and culturalpolitical context than in other contexts I am familiar with. See, for instance, the Higher School of Economics (HSE) press release concerning its Times Higher Education rankings: www.hse.ru/en/news/edu/210397732.html. In 2017, St Petersburg State University reported that its administrative bodies analyse THE indicators to determine necessary improvements and the future development of the University. Materialy rektorskogo soveshchaniya ot 25.09.2017, Pozitsii SPbGU v reytinge THE [The minutes of rector’s meeting of 25.09.2017. SPbGU’s place in the THE ranking]. http://spbu.ru/openuniversity/documents/materialy-rektorskogosoveshchaniya-314#p1, last accessed 25 January 2018. Presidential decree of 7 May 2012, On measures to implement the state policy in the field of education and science, available at http://pravo.gov.ru/proxy/ips/? docbody=&nd=102156333. For a critical analysis, see (Flikke 2018). The project’s webpage, listing its aims and expected results, is available here: http:// 5top100.com/about/more-about/. The other goals, too, are tightly linked to internationalization: to have at least 10 per cent international faculty members, and to have at least 15 per cent international students in each university’s student body. The project is overseen by a special body, the Council on Competitiveness Enhancement of Leading Russian Universities among Global Research and Education Centres. Universities benefiting from the 5–100 project created an association to coordinate and consolidate their efforts in improving HE and scientific activities, Ustav Assotsiatsii «Global’nyye universitety» 2015, available at the Association’s webpage: www.globaluni.ru. This legislation is available here: www.msu.ru/upload/pdf/docs/msu-spbgu.pdf. This is the same legislation that prescribes that the Russian government is the founder of both universities. A report commenting on the project is available here: http://xn–80abkm1aeflf. xn–p1ai/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/5–100-doklad-chast-1.pdf. Among English-language translations, one may also come across the term ‘The National Project “Research”’. Information on the programme is available in the programme’s ‘Passport’, approved on 24 December 2018 by The President of the Russian Federation Advisory Council on Strategic Development and National Projects, available on the following webpage: http://static.government.ru/media/files/vCAoi8zEXRVSuy2Yk7D8hvQbpbUSwO8y. pdf. The trade union’s webpage can be found at: http://unisolidarity.ru/. The Confederation’s webpage can be found at: http://ktr.su/.

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28 The Confederation’s declaration can be found at: http://ktr.su/content/news/detail. php?ID=6408. 29 The news report, 27 June 2014: www.gazeta.ru/social/2014/06/27/6089569.shtml. 30 The Charter of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Ustav) is available at the RAS webpage: www.ras.ru/about/rascharter.aspx. 31 The decree is available at: www.ras.ru/decree1991.aspx. 32 The letter is available at: www.kommersant.ru/doc/3046956. 33 The letter is available at: www.kommersant.ru/doc/3509262. 34 Mikhail Sadovskii, Akademik RAN o glupostiyakh i obmane v rossiiskoi nauke, Deutsche Welle, 5 February 2018, https://p.dw.com/p/2q2TM. 35 Alexandr Chernykh, ‘«FANO – razognat’, finansirovaniye – uvelichit’, vernut’ vse kak bylo do perestroyki»’, Kommersant, 25 September 2017, www.kommersant.ru/ doc/3421421. 36 The article also discusses problems facing those employed on a part-time basis at the Moscow State University. 37 News report at: https://ria.ru/20160301/1382267100.html. The RFFI’s official webpage is available at: www.rfbr.ru/rffi/ru/. The creation of the RFFI in 1992 is described as one of the most fundamental shifts in the financing of science in postSoviet Russia (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 33). 38 These grants are open to Russian and foreign scholars. 39 News reports: https://indicator.ru/news/2018/02/05/premiya-prezidenta-rf-v-oblastinauki-i-innovacij/; https://philologist.livejournal.com/10046998.html. 40 Public posts shared on Facebook by senior scholars in social sciences and humanities, November 2017. 41 The description of the tender is available at: http://zakupki.gov.ru/epz/order/notice/ ep44/view/common-info.html?regNumber=0173100002217000059. 42 Interestingly, the passage has been omitted in the official English-language translation (Putin 2019a). 43 The Great Patriotic War has often been described as the foundational myth of Putin’s Russia (Liñán 2012, 21–23). 44 Open Space social media post published in the year marking the 85th anniversary of the beginning of the Stalinist terror against LGBT people: www.facebook.com/ spbopenspace/posts/1851215391654244. 45 The conference took place at the European University at St Petersburg on 1 December 2017. 46 A policy introduced by the Russian government in 2014 in response to sanctions imposed by the EU and US. 47 Before 2018, the Russian Academy of Science participated in setting up the list of recommended textbooks. Since 2018, the Ministry of Enlightenment, which is responsible for primary and secondary education, broadened the review process and included the Russian Academy of Education (Rossiyskaya Akademiya Obrazovaniya), an institution founded by the Ministry. 48 Pavel Astakhov, ‘Sovet po delam molodozhi pri patriarkhe predlagayet sozdat’ Universitet budushchego’, RT na russkom, 19 November 2018, https://russian.rt.com/ russia/news/574629-sovet-universitet-buduschego. The idea seems to have been dropped as neither MGU nor ROC commented on it further. 49 News report: www.gazeta.ru/social/news/2018/04/28/n_11468917.shtml?updated. 50 The official webpage of the Russian embassy in London: https://rusemb.org.uk/ fnapr/6513. 51 Izviestiya is usually described as of a higher quality and oriented towards specialized audiences, as opposed to dailies targeting mass audiences (Malinova, 2015). 52 News report: www.svoboda.org/a/30183529.html. 53 The legislation is available at: https://rg.ru/2014/05/07/reabilitacia-dok.html.

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54 The legislation is available at: http://kremlin.ru/acts/bank/18939. 55 The legislation is available at: http://kremlin.ru/acts/news/60085. 56 This case was discussed in detail by the Kommersant daily: http://kommersant.ru/ doc/3026212. See also ‘Legal Case of the Week: Vladimir Luzgin’, Rights in Russia, 4 July 2016, www.rightsinrussia.info/legal-case-of-the-week/vladimirluzgin. On the vagueness of the concept of extremism, see (Verkhovsky 2010). 57 ‘115706 faktov ogranicheniya svobody interneta zaregistrirovano v Rossii’ [115,706 facts of restricting Internet freedom registered in Russia], Agora, 5 February 2018, www.agora.legal/news/2018.02.05/115-706-faktov-ogranicheniya-svobodyinterneta-zaregistrirovano-v-Rossii/663?mc_cid=01c54ca20a&mc_eid=74c4 132861. 58 These two cases were discussed by the Kommersant daily: http://kommersant.ru/ doc/3026212 and www.kommersant.ru/doc/3391586. 59 News report: https://ria.ru/20181227/1548827192.html. 60 The text of the legislation is available at: http://publication.pravo.gov.ru/Document/ View/0001201903180031. 61 The federal law on administrative liability for spreading information expressing contempt for society, the state and official state symbols, text of the legislation: http://en.kremlin.ru/acts/news/60085. News report: www.bbc.com/russian/news47480998. 62 Interview with Andrey Klishas, www.znak.com/2019-02-15/senator_andrey_ klishas_o_svoih_iniciativah_po_regulirovaniyu_runeta_intervyu. 63 News report: www.svoboda.org/a/30008379.html. In September 2019 the case was still ongoing. 64 News report: www.rferl.org/a/russian-scholar-of-stalin-s-crimes-sentenced-to-nineyears-on-child-sex-conviction/29967261.html. 65 The legislation is available at: https://rg.ru/2012/07/23/nko-dok.html. 66 For a native Russian speaker and political scientist’s take on the ‘foreign agent’ concept, see transcript of an interview with Ekaterina Schulman, available at: https://echo.msk.ru/programs/status/2091696-echo/. 67 Official webpages: http://api.duma.gov.ru/api/transcript/1000884-6 and http:// regulation.gov.ru/projects#npa=45477. 68 Quoted in news report: https://lenta.ru/articles/2016/12/18/evroagenty/. 69 Quotation provided in (Foley 2018). 70 News report: https://meduza.io/feature/2017/12/20/gosduma-hochet-priravnyat-ksmi-inostrannym-agentam-obychnyh-lyudey-vseh-lyudey?utm. 71 News report: https://meduza.io/en/news/2019/08/14/russia-imposes-new-restrictionson-scientists-contact-with-foreign-colleagues. The Ministry’s decree was made public by Troitskiy Variant and is available at: https://trv-science.ru/2019/08/13/ inostranec-snimaj-chasy/. 72 News report: https://tass.ru/nauka/6761905. 73 News report: https://rg.ru/2019/08/14/peskov-prokommentiroval-trebovaniiaminobrnauki-k-uchenym.html. 74 News report: www.kommersant.ru/doc/4118019. 75 With regards to sociology, the division between liberal sociologists and ‘service sociologists’ has been described in (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, chapter 6). 76 News report: www.svoboda.org/a/29713531.html. Another example of what opposition leader Alexei Navalny termed ‘Putin’s statistics’ (putinskaya statistika) was Putin’s 2019 speech to the Federal Assembly. Navalny pointed to a number of inconsistencies between Putin’s declarations and other official data: www.youtube.com/ watch?v=cEQ7HD4XvSw (5:50), last accessed 24 February 2019. 77 In cases when a Kindle version of a monograph does not indicate page numbers, location (loc.) in the electronic text is used instead. 78 See the Center’s webpage: www.levada.ru/en/.

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79 News report: www.rferl.org/a/russia-levada-polliing-stops-election-foreign-agent/ 28979140.html; Gudkov’s interview for Vedomosti is available at: www.vedomosti. ru/politics/articles/2018/01/16/747868-vibori-bez-sotsiologii. 80 Since the law’s publication in 2012, over 150 Russian non-governmental organizations have been classified as foreign agents. The law has been amended several times, which necessitates NGOs workers constantly monitoring their obligations stemming from this legislation (Skibo 2017). See also news reports: www.bbc. com/russian/news-37550284; http://rustelegraph.ru/news/2015-06-22/Tcentr-nezavi simykh-sotciologicheskikh-issledovanii-iz-Peterburga-vklyuchili-v-spisok-NKO32925/; https://ria.ru/society/20131128/980411846.html. 81 News report: https://ria.ru/20151130/1332527547.html. 82 For instance, the EUSP was ranked 151st worldwide, and 2nd in Russia, in the QS subject rating in sociology: https://ria.ru/abitura_world/20180228/1515427856. html. 83 News report: https://lenta.ru/articles/2017/10/04/eu_spb/. 84 Rosobrnadzor representative, Sergei Rukavishnikov, in an interview for the TASS information agency: https://tass.ru/obschestvo/3866531. 85 News report: https://lenta.ru/articles/2017/10/04/eu_spb/. 86 Rosobrnadzor representative, Sergei Rukavishnikov, in an interview for the TASS information agency: https://tass.ru/obschestvo/3866531. 87 News report: https://m.lenta.ru/articles/2017/10/04/eu_spb/. 88 The letter is available at: http://polit.ru/article/2008/02/26/vipusk/. 89 Alexei Kudrin, current chair of the Account Chamber (Schetnaya palata), former long-term finance minister and close associate of Vladimir Putin, is considered to be a leading figure of an informal ‘liberals’ faction within Russia’s ruling elite. 90 Kudrin’s opinion in Vedomosti: www.vedomosti.ru/economics/blogs/2016/12/07/ 668518-stavka-goskompanii. 91 News report: https://politexpert.net/62312-ekspert-prokommentiroval-vozvratevropeiskomu-universitetu-paketa-dokumentov-na-licenziyu. 92 Letter of support available on the ASEEES website: www.aseees.org/advocacy/ aseees-supports-european-university-st-petersburg. 93 Letter reprinted on the EUSP website: https://eu.spb.ru/images/news/2017/docs/ EUSP_rec_letter.pdf. 94 The statement is available at: https://ecpr.eu/news/news/details/374. 95 The statement is available at: http://basees.org/news/2017/3/24/basees-statement-onthe-the-european-university-at-st-petersburg. 96 Letter reprinted on the EUSP website: https://eu.spb.ru/en/news/17777-oxfordacademics-support-eusp. 97 Letter reprinted on the EUSP website: https://eu.spb.ru/en/news/17503-hse-stpetersburg-supports-eusp. 98 To apply for a working visa for an employee from abroad, the university needs a valid accreditation and a teaching license. 99 This part of the letter was reprinted on the EUSP website: https://eu.spb.ru/en/news/ 17191-eui-supports-eusp. 100 ‘Moskovskuyu vysshuyu shkolu sotsialnykh i ekonomicheskikh nauk lishili akkreditatsii’, Vedomosti, 21 June 2018, www.vedomosti.ru/politics/news/2018/06/21/ 773434-moskovskuyu-visshuyu-shkolu-lishili-akkreditatsii. 101 News report: https://nsn.fm/society/society-gd-rosobrnadzor-izmenit-pravila-iz-zashaninki. 102 ‘Znaniye – siloi’, Gazeta.ru, 25 June 2018, https://gazeta.ru/comments/2018/06/ 25_e_11813947.shtml. 103 News report: www.kommersant.ru/doc/3739892.

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104 Public post shared on Facebook by a scholar in social sciences and humanities, January 2018. 105 News report: www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/losing-sergei-guriev. 106 News reports: www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-professor/russian-professorsacked-over-criticism-of-actions-in-ukraine-idUSBREA2N1BM20140324; www. vedomosti.ru/politics/articles/2014/03/24/professor-zubov-uvolen-iz-mgimo. 107 News report: https://echo.msk.ru/blog/echomsk/1959920-echo/. 108 Nikolay Podosokorsky, The police interrogates SGU Professor Veru Afanas’evu for her comments on the Russian science, available at http://philologist.livejournal.com/ 9168582.html. 109 News reports: https://republic.ru/posts/82155 and https://openrussia.org/notes/ 708671/. 110 News report: www.bbc.com/russian/news-48696366. 111 For an interview with the latter, see: www.karelia.news/news/2121290/a-ponimalcto-mena-mogut-posadit-prepodavatel-petrgu-i-zurnalist-gleb-arovoj-rasskazalpocemu-emigriroval-v-finlandiu. 112 The full statement: http://unisolidarity.ru/?p=5042. Bogatov, a lecturer at the Moscow University of Finance and Law, was falsely accused of calls for rioting and terrorist acts (the court acquitted him in 2018). News report: https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/ 2018/05/20/76538-otbili. 113 The news report: www.interfax.ru/russia/642293. 114 Kamanda29 webpage describing the case: https://team29.org/court/delokudryavtseva/. 115 Memorial’s declaration is available at: https://memohrc.org/ru/news_old/memorialpriznal-uchenogo-viktora-kudryavceva-politzaklyuchennym. 116 https://indicator.ru/news/2017/11/30/pobediteli-shestogo-konkursa-megagrantov/. 117 My expatriate interviewees emphasized ‘visa uncertainty’, meaning that, even if on work contracts, they were unsure about the prospects for visa prolongation. 118 News reports: www.kommersant.ru/doc/3481922; https://wiadomosci.wp.pl/ historyk-ipn-dr-hab-henryk-glebocki-zostal-zatrzymany-w-rosji-6191996650292865a. 119 The news report: https://iz.ru/640862/konstantin-dorofeev/edinaia-rossiia-privleklak-rabote-politologa. 120 The university’s webpage: http://55let.rudn.ru/news.php?id=62. 121 Maria Trofimova is quoted in the following news report: https://themoscowtimes. com/articles/turmoil-on-st-petersburg-campus-strands-foreign-students-59294.

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Gryaznova, Anna. 2018. “Supervisory Boards in Russian Universities: A Development Instrument or Another Tool of State Control?” Higher Education 76 (1): 35–50. Guba, Katerina, and Margarita Zavadskaya. 2017. “Luchshe byt’ neeffektivnym, chem negosudarstvennym: kak Rosobrnadzor nakazyvayet vuzy (It Is Better to Be Ineffective Than Non-State: How Rosobrnadzor Punishes Universities).” Analiticheskiye zapiski po problemam pravoprimeneniya’. https://eusp.org/news/luchshe-byt-neeffek tivnym-chem-negosudarstvennym-kak-rosobrnadzor-nakazyvaet-vuzy. Gudkov, Lev. 2017. “In Russia, Sociology Isn’t Just About Figures.” OpenDemocracy Russia. 7 August. https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/in-russia-sociology-notjust-figures/. Harding, Sandra. 2004. “Introduction: Standpoint Theory as a Site of Political, Philosophic, and Scientific Debate.” In The Feminist Standpoint Theory Reader: Intellectual and Political Controversies, edited by Sandra Harding, 1–15. London and New York: Routledge. Ikonen, Susan. 2016. “The Reception of Leviathan in Light of Two Soviet ‘Cultural Scandals’: A Revival of Soviet Rhetoric and Values?” Transcultural Studies 12 (1): 92–114. Kaczmarska, Katarzyna. 2019. “Reification in IR: The Process and Consequences of Reifying the Idea of International Society.” International Studies Review 21 (3): 347–372. Kadıoğlu, Ayşe. 2018. “Academic Freedom: The Global Challenge and the Case of Turkey.” In Academic Freedom: The Global Challenge, edited by Michael Ignatieff and Stefan Roch, 55–62. Budapest: CEU Press. Kelly, Éanna. 2017. “European University in Russia Faces Closure.” Science & Business. Knott, Eleanor. 2018. “Beyond the Field: Ethics after Fieldwork in Politically Dynamic Contexts.” Perspectives on Politics. Kolesnikov, Andrei. 2019. “How ‘Loyalty’ Ensnared Russia’s Journalists and Media Owners. Carnegie.ru, 28 May. Kolesnikov, Andrei, and Yegeniya Albats. 2017. “EU: Rosobrnadzor i Poltavchenko protiv Putina (European University: Rosobrnadzor and Poltavchenko Against Putin).” New Times. https://newtimes.ru/articles/detail/119423. Krol, Gerrit. 2017. “Legislative Performance of the Russian State Duma: The Role of Parliament in an Authoritarian Regime.” East European Politics 33 (4): 450–471. Kurbatova, Margarita Vladimirovna, and Yelena Sergeyevna Kagan. 2016. “Opportunizm prepodavateley vuzov kak sposob prisposobleniya k usileniyu vneshnego kontrolya deyatel’nosti (Opportunism of University Professors as a Way to Adapt to the Strengthening of External Control).” Zhurnal institutsional’ykh issledovaniy 8 (3): 116–136. Kurilla, Ivan. 2017. “Gumanitarii i propagandist: konflikt interesov (A Humanist and a Propagandist: The Conflict of Interest).” Gefter, 6 March. http://gefter.ru/archive/ 21392. Kynev, Alexandr. 2019. “V takikh usloviyakh ni odna nauka normal’no sushchestvovat’ ne mozhet (No Science Can Exist In Such Conditions).” Znak. https://www.znak.com/ 2019-06-25/izvestnyy_politolog_rasskazal_chto_segodnya_ugrozhaet_gumanitarnymi_naukami_v_rossii. Laruelle, Marlene. 2018. Russian Nationalism: Imaginaries, Doctrines, and Political Battlefields. London and New York: Routledge. Laruelle, Marlene, and Jean Radvanyi. 2019. Understanding Russia: The Challenges of Transformation. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

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Lavrov, Sergei. 2019. “World at a Crossroads and a System of International Relations for the Future.” Russia in Global Affairs, 20 September. Lebedeva, Marina M. 2004. “International Relations Studies in the USSR/Russia: Is There a Russian National School of IR Studies?” Global Society 18 (3): 263–278. Ledeneva, Alena V. 2013. Can Russia Modernise?: Sistema, Power Networks and Informal Governance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Levitsky, Steven, and Lucan A. Way. 2010. Competitive Authoritarianism: Hybrid Regimes after the Cold War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Liñán, Miguel Vázquez. 2012. “Modernization and Historical Memory in Russia: Two Sides of the Same Coin.” Problems of Post-Communism 59 (6): 15–26. Lipman, Maria. 2016. “At the Turning Point to Repression.” Russian Politics & Law 54 (4): 341–350. Ljubownikow, Sergej, and Jo Crotty. 2017. “Managing Boundaries: The Role of NonProfit Organisations in Russia’s Managed Democracy.” Sociology 51 (5): 940–956. Lobanov, Vladislav. 2017. “For Russia’s Students, the Price of Protest Can Be High.” Open Democracy, 25 July. Luhn, Alec. 2017. “Gulag Grave Hunter Unearths Uncomfortable Truths in Russia.” The Guardian, 3 August. Mäkinen, Sirke. 2016. “In Search of the Status of an Educational Great Power? Analysis of Russia’s Educational Diplomacy Discourse.” Problems of Post-Communism 63 (3): 183–196. Malinova, Olga. 2015. “Kto formiruyet obshestvennoye lico professii (Who Shapes the Profession’s Public Face).” Politicheskaya Nauka 3: 225–236. Matei, Liviu. 2018. “Three Ideas of Academic Freedom.” In Academic Freedom: The Global Challenge, edited by Michael Ignatieff and Stefan Roch, 29–39. Budapest: CEU Press. Mathers, Jennifer. 2017. “Even the Toys are Demanding Free Elections: Humour and the Politics of Creative Protest in Russia.” In Cultural Forms of Protest in Russia, edited by Birgit Beumers, Alexander Etkind, Olga Gurova and Sanna Turoma. London and New York: Routledge. Medvedev, Dmitry. 2009. “Rossiya, vpered! (Russia, Forward!).” Gazeta.ru, 10 September. Medvedev, Sergei. 2017a. Park krymskogo perioda. Khroniki tret’ego sroka (The Park of the Crimean Period. The Chronicles of the Third Term). Moskva: Individuum publishing. Medvedev, Sergei. 2017b. “Russian Art Under an Illiberal Regime.” Eurozine, 23 November. Medvedev, Sergei. 2018. “Biopolitika tranzitnogo perioda (The Biopolitics of a Transition Period).” Rossiiskiye realii: gosudarstvo, sotsium, grazhdanskoye obshchestvo (Russian Reality: State, Society, Civil Society), 15–16 December 2018. https:// www.colta.ru/articles/society/20042-biopolitika-avtoritarnogo-tranzita. Meyer, Irina. 2017. “Russian Social Sciences Under State Pressure.” The Russia File, July 7. Mironova, Kseniya. 2018. “Universitetu prepodali urok (The University Was Taught a Lesson).” Kommersant, 5 February. www.kommersant.ru/doc/3539999. Mironova, Kseniya. 2019. “Uchebniku po ekonomike ne khvatilo patriotizma (The Economy Textbook Deemed Unsufficiently Patriotic).” Kommersant, 6 February. www.kommersant.ru/doc/3874571. Movchan, Andrei. 2017. “Decline, Not Collapse: The Bleak Prospects for Russia’s Economy.” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Mukhametshina, Yelena. 2016. “Ne tak oprashivali (They Conducted Polls in an Incorrect Way).” Vedomosti, 6 September.

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Ottaway, Marina. 2003. Democracy Challenged: The Rise of Semi-Authoritarianism. Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Owen, Catherine, and Eleanor Bindman. 2019. “Civic Participation in a Hybrid Regime: Limited Pluralism in Policymaking and Delivery in Contemporary Russia.” Government and Opposition 54 (1): 98–120. Paneiakh, Ella. 2016. “No Room.” Russian Politics & Law 54 (4): 404–413. Pavlovsky, Gleb. 2016. “Russian Politics Under Putin: The System Will Outlast the Master.” Foreign Affairs 95 (3). Pertsev, Andrei. 2019. “Moscow Protests: A Crisis of the Authorities’ Own Making.” Carnegie.ru, 25 July. Platonova, Daria, and Dmitry Semyonov. 2018. “Russia: The Institutional Landscape of Russian Higher Education.” In 25 Years of Transformations of Higher Education Systems in Post-Soviet Countries: Reform and Continuity, edited by Jeroen Huisman, Anna Smolentseva, and Isak Froumin, 337–362. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Pomeranz, William. 2018. Law and the Russian State: Russia’s Legal Evolution from Peter the Great to Vladimir Putin. London: Bloomsbury Academic. Prokopenko, Aleksandra. 2019. “Zakon o suverennom runete. Kak on voznik i k chemu privedet (The Law on the Sovereign Runet. How It Emerged and What Are Its Consequences).” Carnegie.ru, 18 April. Putin, Vladimir. 2012. Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly. Putin, Vladimir. 2013. Meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club. Putin, Vladimir. 2014. Meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club. Moskva. Putin, Vladimir. 2018. Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly. Putin, Vladimir. 2019a. Meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club. Moskva. Putin, Vladimir. 2019b. Zasedaniye diskussionnogo kluba “Valday” (Meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club). Roache, Madelin. 2017. “Punitive Psychiatry: How Russian Leaders Deal With Their Opponents.” Open Democracy, 10 July. Robinson, Neil. 2017. “Russian Neo-patrimonialism and Putin’s ‘Cultural Turn’.” Europe-Asia Studies 69 (2): 348–366. Rogov, Kirill, ed. 2016. Politicheskoye razvitiye Rossii 2014–2016: Instituty i praktiki avtoritarnoy konsolidatsii (Political Developments in Russia 2014–2016: Institutions and Practices of Authoritarian Consolidation). Moskva: Fond “Liberal’naya missiya”. Roshchin, Evgeny. 2019. “Academic Freedoms and Regulation of the Higher Education in Russia.” International Studies Association Venture Research Workshop – Academic Freedom, IR Knowledge and Policy Advice in the ‘Post-Truth’ Era, Toronto. Rossiiskaya Federatsiya. 2015. Ukaz Prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii ot 31 dekabriya 2015 g. N 683 “O strategii natsionalnoi bezopasnosti Rossiiskoi Federatsii.” (The Decree of the President of the Russian Federation, 31 December 2015 “On the National Security Strategy of the Russian Federation). Moskva. Rossiiskaya Federatsiya. 2016. Kontseptsiya vneshnei politiki Rossiyskoi Federatsii (utverzhdena Prezidentom Rossiyskoi Federatsii V.V.Putinym 30 noyabrya 2016 g.) (The Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation). Moskva. Rossiya24. 2017. “Dvorets nauki. Spetsial’nyy reportazh Anny Afanas’yevoy (Palace of Science. Special report by Anna Afanasyeva).” https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=43oHwj46eu0. Sakwa, Richard. 1989. Soviet Politics: An Introduction. London and New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

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Sakwa, Richard. 2010. The Crisis of Russian Democracy: The Dual State, Factionalism and the Medvedev Succession. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sakwa, Richard. 2014. Putin Redux: Power and Contradiction in Contemporary Russia. London and New York: Routledge. SAR. 2018. “Free to Think: Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project.” Scholars at Risk. https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/resources/free-to-think2018/. Schulmann, Ekaterina. 2014. “Gibridnyye rezhimy – imitatsiya demokratii i diktatury (Hybrid Regimes – An Imitation of Democracy and Dictatorship).” Kasparov.ru, 7 November. www.kasparov.ru/material.php?id=53EDA74872D4D. Schulmann, Ekaterina. 2017. “Chernaya kassa Putina i sekretnyi byudzhet (Putin’s Black Money and a Classified Budget).” In Status, edited by Michael Naki. Moskva: Ekho Moskvy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9qTUsiWyKs. Sharafutdinova, Gulnaz. 2014. “The Pussy Riot Affair and Putin’s Démarche From Sovereign Democracy to Sovereign Morality.” Nationalities Papers 42 (4): 615–621. Shkurenok, Nataliya. 2017. “The Historian Who Dug Too Deep.” Open Democracy. Shlapentokh, Vladimir. 2010. “Russian Geopolitical Claims and the State of Science in Putin’s Russia: The Crass Incongruence.” Vladimir Shlapentokh, 27 June. https:// shlapentokh.wordpress.com/2010/07/27/russian-geopolitical-claims-and-the-state-ofscience-in-putin%E2%80%99s-russia-the-crass-incongruence/. Simons, Daniel, and Dirk Voorhoof. 2016. “One Man Banned: Russia’s Treatment of Solo Protests Scrutinised in Novikova v Russia.” Strasbourg Observers, May 9. https:// strasbourgobservers.com/2016/05/09/one-man-banned-russias-treatment-of-soloprotests-scrutinised-in-novikova-v-russia/. Skibo, Daria. 2017. “Five Years of Russia’s Foreign Agent Law.” Open Democracy, 14 August. Sokolov, Mikhail. 2018. “The Sources of Academic Localism and Globalism in Russian Sociology: The Choice of Professional Ideologies and Occupational Niches Among Social Scientists.” Current Sociology 67 (6): 818–837. Sokolov, Mikhail, Katerina Guba, Tatyana Zimenkova, Mariya Safonova, and Sofiya Chuykina. 2015. Kak stanoviyatsiya professorami: akademicheskiye kar’ery, rynki i vlast’ v pyati stranakh (How to Become a Professor: Academic Careers, Markets and Power in Five Countries). Moskva: Novoye Literaturnoye Obozreniye. The Soros Foundation. 2000. “Soros Foundations Network 1999 Annual Report”. Szostek, Joanna. 2017. “News Consumption and Anti-Western Narratives in Russia: A Case Study of University Students.” Europe-Asia Studies 69 (2): 284–302. Titarenko, Larissa, and Elena Zdravomyslova. 2017. Sociology in Russia: A Brief History. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Tkachov, Ivan. 2017. “Minfin uvelichil sekretnyye raskhody byudzheta na 680 mlrd rub. (The Finance Ministry Increased Classified Budget Expenditures by 680 Billion Roubles).” RBK Gazeta. www.rbc.ru/economics/03/10/2016/57f299729a7947f49c 75b319. Tkachov, Ivan, and Oleg Makarov. 2017. “Pravitel’stvo poprosilo na voyennyye raskhody bol’she 3 trln rub (The Government Asked for Military Expenditures Over 3 Trillion Roubles).” RBK Gazeta, 6 October. www.rbc.ru/economics/06/10/2017/59d7b3469a 7947df4ead56f6. Tolz, Vera. 1997. Russian Academicians and the Revolution: Combining Professionalism and Politics. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press.

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3

Contested heritage Soviet IR and the turbulent transition

Introduction The Russian academic community is usually presented as one that rejected Marxism-Leninism after the fall of Communism (Golosov 2016). While there is no doubt that the monopoly of the Marxist-Leninist doctrine ended, this book’s engagement with IR during Soviet times is justified for several reasons. For 70 years of the Soviet Union’s existence, the official state ideology of Marxism-Leninism, in spite of its many inconsistencies, dictated not only theoretical frameworks but also the aims of science and the role of academics.1 The Soviet system of governance ascribed a special role to the Communist Party in all aspects of social and political life, including academia. These two characteristics left a durable mark on institutional and epistemic practices. Scholars tend to agree that the Soviet heritage remains an important factor shaping Russian academia (Sokolov et al. 2015, 471) and IR studies (Lebedeva 2004; Makarychev and Morozov 2013, 332; Lebedeva 2018) [R24; R29; R9] in both institutional and intellectual terms. There is also a relatively widespread perception that Soviet scholarship, including Soviet IR [R9], should be analyzed more systematically (Kharkhordin 2015, 1284). Several problems straddle the debate about Soviet IR. The first broad theme concerns the discipline of IR and whether it is legitimate to speak about an academic discipline of IR at all, what epistemological assumptions the debate about international politics rested on and how familiar Soviet scholars were with Western IR, given the lack of access to that knowledge and official criticism of ‘bourgeois’ Western science. The second broad theme concerns the state’s approach to science, the commitment to and role of ideology, and the level of control and censorship. This chapter will discuss Soviet science with special reference to the IR field, situating it explicitly in the sociopolitical context of the Soviet state. Zooming in on several interesting figures and institutions at the intersection of political power and (social) science – such as Trofim Lysenko, Vladimir Vernadskii, Pavel Milyukov, Dmitri Yermolenko, Vladimir Shlapentokh, the Institute of World Economy and World Politics of the Academy of Sciences, and the Commission on the History of Knowledge – the chapter will illustrate some of the most significant characteristics of knowledge production in the Soviet Union.

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Soviet science and social science Soviet IR cannot be considered in isolation from the broader context of science in the USSR. This science – including the most extreme case of Soviet genetics under its infamous ‘founder’, Trofim Lysenko – generated many controversies in the world of thought throughout the 20th century. Accounts of its relationship with political power were documented by various groups of scholars: science practitioners who migrated from the USSR, mostly to the US (e.g. (Birstein 2009)); Western scientists concerned with how their research field, and science in general, had been politically manipulated in the Soviet Union (e.g. British geneticist Julian Huxley (Huxley 1949)); specialists in Russian Studies (e.g. Vera Tolz (1997)); and historians of science (e.g. Loren Graham (1993)). These accounts were mostly framed as either cautionary tales (Huxley 1949; Birstein 2009) or appeals for broader public attention to be paid to the plight of Soviet Biology (Medvedev 1979). The debate about Soviet science is not without contentions. Some authors explicitly distance themselves from ‘official Soviet historian[s], who might attempt to magnify various achievements while avoiding real analysis and concealing any failures whenever possible’ (Medvedev 1979, x). Who can be considered a scholar in the Soviet Union also remains disputed. Some authors opt for the term ‘academicians’,2 which often denotes not those actively engaged in research but rather those holding official leadership positions of either a director or president. The following excerpt provides several examples of such position-holders: V.A. Engelgardt (eighty-six years old), at present the director of the Institute of Molecular Biology, did his most important work about fifty or sixty years ago; N.N. Semenov (seventy-nine), director of the Physical Chemistry Institute, and P.L. Kapitsa (seventy-eight), director of the Institute of Problems of Physics, also started their research work in 1923–1924. A.I. Oparin (eightyseven), who is still director of the Institute of Biochemistry in Moscow, became well known after his theory of the origin of life was published in 1924. (Medvedev 1979, x) Allowing for the concentration of institutional power in the hands of a few scholars was among many instruments employed by the Soviet state in its drive to control the realm of science. Few academics were able to resist the temptation to add new functions to their portfolio that reinforced their roles as gatekeepers in particular disciplines. For instance, Nikolai Vavilov, a biologist, was at the same time ‘president of the Agricultural Academy, director of the Institute of Plants, director of the Institute of Genetics, [and] president of the Geographical Society’ – and these were only his key functions (Graham 1993, 154). Holding such important functions was not without its risks and in the case of Vavilov, it ended tragically. Vavilov became a victim of Stalin’s repressions and died in Saratov prison.3

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The relationship between the Communist Party and the scientific community was influenced by the ruling regime’s aspiration to control the ‘intelligentsia’, a term usually applied to educated intellectuals, who were thought to adhere to high ethical standards and to have a moral obligation to popular education (Birstein 2009, 1). Soviet attempts to steer the direction of scientific developments, coupled with the perception of scholars as potentially subversive and dangerous to the regime, repeated, to a certain extent, the practices of the Tsarist era. From the very beginnings of institutionalized science in Russia in the 18th century, even outstanding academics could be sent into oblivion if they overstepped the boundaries of what the authorities considered justified critique, or if they engaged in political activities (Graham 1993, 157–158; Tolz 1997, 14– 15). Peter Chaadaev, often presented as ‘the father of Russian philosophy’, was banned from writing by the censors following the publication of his Philosophical Letter in 1829 (Smart 2008[1999], 309–310). There were even certain similarities between documents created by the Tsarist police and the Soviet secret police with regards to scholars under surveillance (Birstein 2009, 307). Pavel Milyukov – a historian who, although overlooked by the historiography of Russian IR, can nonetheless be considered one of Russia’s first researchers of international politics and themes considered key to disciplinary IR (see later in “Was there a discipline of IR?”) – endured both administrative pressure and prison sentences as a result of his ‘too active’ participation in public life (Stockdale 1996). Loren Graham, in his study of science in Tsarist and Soviet Russia, maintains that science develops differently in ‘distinct environments’ (Graham 1993, 1); but he also points to enduring patterns. In his assessment, practices that emerged in the early 18th century remained largely unchanged in later history, namely: the authoritarian method of promoting science, the effort by Russia’s leaders to catch up with Western science and technology without losing their own cultural and political identities, and the greater success of Russia in mounting large centralized projects such as explorations of the Arctic and Siberia than in fostering scientific creativity in a broad spectrum of official and unofficial organisations. (Graham 1993, 2) The careers of prominent Tsarist- and Soviet-era scientists reveal that alternating patterns of state rejection/embrace and repression/support are characteristic of Russia (Graham 1993, 158). Similarities with the Tsarist era notwithstanding, it must be noted that the Soviet regime was unparalleled in the scale of repressions exercised towards its most gifted scientific minds (Graham 1993, 197–198; Tolz 1997, 54–57; Birstein 2009, chapter 1). Under such circumstances, the undeniable achievements of Soviet science were even more paradoxical. These are often ascribed to the foundations laid before the 1917 revolution and in the early years of Soviet rule. The effects of the Stalinist-era purges on science were felt only in

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later decades, seriously weakening Soviet science from the mid-1970s (Graham 1993, 199–201). Others acknowledge that some Soviet scientists were able to influence the policymaking process, which undermines the ‘total control’ view of the Soviet leadership (Roberg 1998, 116–117). Juxtaposing strengths and weaknesses of Soviet science, Graham and Dezhina characterize the science system in the USSR as one prioritizing ‘quantity over quality, seniority over creativity, military security over domestic welfare, and orthodoxy over freedom’ (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 6). These observations are further nuanced in an account of the meta-studies of science (naukovedenie) in the Soviet Union. Alessandro Mongili, an anthropologist who visited the USSR in the 1980s, used methods developed in laboratory studies to describe knowledge production practices in the Institute for the History of Science and Technology (Institut istorii estestvoznanija i tekhniki), the leading center of science studies (Aronova 2011). His observations were devastating. Among other things, he noted the absence of the culture of interaction or open peer criticism. “The only criticism that existed’ Mongili added ‘came from above, presented as the position of the periodical, which had the power to end a career (and, going back several decades, even a life). In this climate of control, censorship and self-censorship, texts tended to become more and more irrelevant, little more than conveyers of cryptic messages (. . .)” (Mongili 1998). The internal Soviet security apparatus and secret police – which evolved from the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission (Cheka) and People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs to form the Committee for State Security (KGB) – played a disproportionate role in not only the direct repression of scientists but also the everyday functioning of science. The precise extent of control exercised by these institutions remains disputed. Some see it as overwhelming and point to its most dire consequence, such as the experiments on humans conducted between the 1930s and 1950s in the so-called ‘poison laboratory’ (Birstein 2009). Zhores Medvedev adds that subjects such as human genetics were ‘completely destroyed in 1936–38’, mainly by means of scholars’ imprisonment: ‘When the Gulag camp-prison system was dismantled by Khrushchev in 1965’, he writes, ‘not one of them was found alive’ (Medvedev 1979, 221–222). Vadim Birstein declares that he personally knew some geneticists and evolutionists who were unwilling to succumb to political power and spent ‘many years in Soviet labour camps because of their anti-Lysenkoist positions’ (Birstein 2009, 13). In addition to requiring permission to embark on specific research, academics in science, technology, engineering and mathematics had to obtain permission to publish the results abroad. However, according to Yuri Yarim-Agaev, a former employee of the Soviet Institute of Chemical Physics, the most effective tool of Soviet censorship was secrecy. Once an area of research was declared secret (a frequently used strategy), a scientist publishing without authorization could be charged with divulging state secrets – and, in extreme cases, even with espionage (Yarim-Agaev 1989, 72). Soviet science suffered greatly as a result of the political system of control, censorship and delays in receiving scientific information that was generally

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openly available in foreign academic journals (Medvedev 1979, 118). Entire disciplines were not only dubbed ‘bourgeois pseudoscience’ but also entirely forbidden as research fields, and even as subjects for discussion (such as cybernetics) (Medvedev 1979, 53). The ruling ideology of Marxism-Leninism added another layer to the control the Communist Party exercised over science. The official division of science into ‘Soviet’ and ‘bourgeois’ followed Lenin’s principle of partisanship, according to which ‘no philosophical theory could be neutral in class struggle’ (Tolz 1997, 39). Drawing such a distinction was justified by the claim that new social conditions were giving rise to new kinds of scientific theories and new kinds of science (Huxley 1949, 227). The example of the so-called ‘Lysenko controversy’ is illustrative of several fundamental problems at the intersection of knowledge, ideology and political power. The involvement of the Communist state in scientific matters was such that the Communist Party proclaimed one supposedly scientific doctrine to be officially valid and scientifically true. Let us describe the Lysenko case in some detail, given that it is broadly considered one of the most dramatic examples of how the authorities and ideology interfered with science in the Soviet Union. Its illustrative character notwithstanding, scholars today see its consequences as persisting (Borinskaya, Ermolaev, and Kolchinsky 2019, 10). The Lysenko controversy Trofim Lysenko, a Soviet agronomist, claimed to have made a number of discoveries that could have significant practical implications for Soviet agriculture. These claims, aided by his peasant background, made him a hero of an article published in 1927 in the main Communist newspaper, Pravda (The Truth). However, his ‘discovery’, described in the article, was already known to scientists and farmers. Lysenko’s other beliefs – such as that acquired traits are inherited, that heredity can be changed by ‘educating’ plants and that genes do not exist – turned out to be unfounded (Huxley 1949; Birstein 2009, 48–49; Borinskaya, Ermolaev, and Kolchinsky 2019). Lysenko never clearly explained his methods, and he considered standard scientific methods (including statistical analysis) as harmful for Biology (Huxley 1949; Birstein 2009, 47). This did not stop the Communist Party from pursuing Lysenko’s line. Lysenko rejected Mendelian genetic inheritance theory and developed horticulturist Ivan Michurin’s ideas about hybridization. Despite the rejection of Michurinism by scientists throughout the world, by 1948 the Communist Party declared a defeat of neoMendelism and adopted Michurinism as the official doctrine in the sphere of genetics and evolution (Huxley 1949, 35). This meant that state authorities not only directly interfered with scientific arguments but also prohibited research in genetics. Researchers were made to work with research standards and methods from half a century earlier and without the possibility of communicating with foreign colleagues, having lagged behind in the most promising fields of genetics (Borinskaya, Ermolaev, and Kolchinsky 2019, 1, 10).

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Birstein argues that Lysenko controversy should be considered in political and sociological, rather than in scientific, terms. Grasping it requires an understanding of Soviet politics under Stalin, whose goal was to create a community of scientists easily manipulated by Soviet leaders (Birstein 2009, 46). It should also be associated with the hope of ending food shortages, and with conflicts over Soviet Biology among schools (Borinskaya, Ermolaev, and Kolchinsky 2019). It was not until 1964 that genetics returned to educational and research programmes, and a tacit ban on Lysenko’s criticism persisted until the mid-1980s. In 21stcentury Russia, attempts have been made to present his arguments as scientifically valid and to reclaim his significance for Russian science. Books published with the support of the Russian Ministry of Culture portray Lysenko as a great scientist and the bearer of virtues propagated in today’s Russia, such as a religious worldview, patriotism and loyalty to Russian geopolitical interests. Despite criticism from the Russian scientific community, Lysenkoism is also promoted in the mass media (Borinskaya, Ermolaev, and Kolchinsky 2019, 2, 8–9). Borinskaya et al. link these recent developments to sociopolitical factors, in particular the spread of anti-Western rhetoric and the fact that those who produce proLysenko writings studied from textbooks written by – and began their careers in institutes controlled by – Lysenkoists. In these authors’ opinion, ‘science is again out of favor among Russia’s rulers’ (Borinskaya, Ermolaev, and Kolchinsky 2019, 9). Social sciences, too, were greatly affected by Soviet politics, as Vladimir Verdanskii’s career and the trajectory of the Commission on the History of Knowledge illustrate. Back in 1893, Verdanskii, a geochemist by training, decided to devote his intellectual strength to developing the history of science. Verdanskii’s research interests gave impetus to the creation of the Commission on the History of Knowledge at the Academy of Sciences in 1921. Vernadskii was a pioneer in accounting for the significance of context to scientific development. To him, ‘genius’ was necessary but not sufficient for the advancement of sciences; what was needed were appropriate political and social conditions (Vernadskii 1927, 1988; Graham 1993, 137–138). In 1930, Nikolai Bukharin replaced Verdanskii at the Commission. Bukharin had been engaged with revolutionary causes since his teenage years, and he authored books that established him as a major Bolshevik theorist in his twenties. In the field we today call science studies, Bukharin was critical of concepts such as ‘pure science’ and ‘science for its own sake’; in his view, science should not be extracted from the society from which it emerges, for it is heavily mediated by social, economic and political factors (Graham 1993, 140). Bukharin presented his sociological interpretation of the development of science at the Second International Congress of the History of Science in London in 1931. The conference hosted one other Soviet scholar, Boris Hessen, who maintained that economic factors determined the development of science. Bukharin’s interpretation of science as a social product ‘anticipated by several decades the work of historians of science in the West who developed the view that science is a social construction’ (Graham 1993, 141).

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In 1932, the Commission on the History of Knowledge was converted into the Institute of the History of Science and Technology. Despite its achievements, four years later it was declared a centre of an anti-Soviet conspiracy and its researchers labelled ‘enemies of the people’. In 1937, Bukharin – previously expelled from the ruling Politburo of the Communist Party – was expelled from the membership of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, brought to trial and executed. In the same year, the Institute of the History of Science and Technology was shut.4 The crackdown and repressions of the late-1930s Stalinist era prevented Soviet scholars from any greater engagement with the political and social context in which science developed (Graham 1993, 140–143). As a result, science studies (naukovedeniye) in the Soviet Union was never allowed to live up to its potential.5

Was there a discipline of IR? In the historiography of Soviet/Russian IR, there is little agreement on either its intellectual heritage or the role Marxism-Leninism played in IR knowledge production in Soviet times. This historiography also diverges on the subject of who should be counted as contributing to IR thinking in the Soviet period. Some authors include key political leaders on the list of IR thinkers (Lynch 1987; Light 1988; Tsygankov 2018);6 others focus solely on academic debates (Lebedeva 2018).7 Opinions also diverge on whether it is legitimate at all to speak about an academic discipline of IR, and the cognate field of political science, in a state dominated by one party and its ideology. Russia-based scholars identify several starting points in the history of IR in Russia (Lebedeva 2004; Lebedeva 2006, 2013; Lebedeva 2018). A prominent moment was the foundation of the Faculty of International Relations at the Moscow State University in 1943. A year later, the faculty was transformed into a separate institute (under the auspices of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and named the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO). Another opening is sought in the Perestroika years and in early-1990s Russia, when the fall of Communism enabled a departure from the (previously obligatory) Marxist interpretation of world events, opened up space for diversified disciplinary approaches and presented opportunities for scholars to read and travel more widely. These two moments can be further nuanced. Some prominent figures continue to be unaccounted for in the historiography of IR in Russia. One example is Pavel Milyukov – a Russian professor of history, liberal Duma deputy, foreign minister in the Russian Provisional Government in 1917. Milyukov was also a member of the International Commission to Inquire into the Causes and Conduct of the Balkan Wars,8 which operated from 1913–14 under the auspices of the Carnegie Endowment of International Peace. Milyukov was the only Russian national to serve as a member of the Commission. His academic specialization and research concentrated on the history of the Balkans and the region’s local languages. He drafted four chapters of the Commission’s final report, in

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which he covered the history of the conflict, the role of nationalism and violations of international law (Stockdale 1996, 213–216). As such, Milyukov can be considered one of the first researchers of a subject now understood as fundamental to IR as an academic discipline (Andrä 2019). Even before he was invited to join the Commission, Milyukov had been thoroughly engaged with issues of international politics. He delivered lectures and published on topics central to the study of IR, such as war and peace, the role of great powers and nationalism. Among these works were Russia and its Crisis (Chicago, 1905), The Balkan Crisis and Policy of A.P. Izvolsky (Balkanskii krizis i politika A.P. Izvolskogo) (St Petersburg, 1910) and The Armed World and the Limitations of Armaments (Vooruzhennyi mir i ogranicheniye vooruzhenii) (St Petersburg, 1911). The latter was a dialogue with two key works on war and peace of that period: Norman Angell’s The Great Illusion (1910) and Alfred Fried’s Die Grundlagen des revolutionaren Pacifismus (The Foundations of Revolutionary Pacifism) (1908). Milyukov made an argument for peace based on states’ self-interest and ‘realistic argumentation’ rather than moral imperatives. He argued that changing beliefs about war was the best means of solving international conflicts (Riha 1969, 207). While he embraced disarmament as leading to peace, he saw it as a long-term process (Stockdale 1996, 211–212), close to what we today term ‘arms control’. After the outbreak of WWI, Milyukov changed his pacifist position, declaring support for the Tsarist government (Riha 1969, 214–218). His moment of greatest political influence came in February 1917, when he became the first foreign minister of the Provisional Government, if only for three months. In this new position, he was determined to continue Russia’s participation in war (Riha 1969, chapter 8). Following the Bolshevik victory, he chose exile and returned to research, focusing on inter-ethnic relations and the role of great powers (with particular attention to Central Europe and the Balkans (Milyukov 1927, 1928)) and analyzing the influence of Western political thought on developments in Russia (Milyukov 1926). For students of Russian history, Milyukov is first and foremost the champion of liberalism and constitutionalism in late-imperial Russia; he helped to establish the first liberal political party, led the faction in the Duma and edited the influential daily, Rech. His biographers present him as unambiguously pro-Western: ‘Milyukov deeply admired Western democratic political orders and was unflaggingly confident that Russia would eventually enjoy such an order, too’ (Stockdale 1996, 275). If we locate the birth of the IR discipline in seeking knowledge for peace,9 and in the urge to understand or study war, Milyukov should not be omitted from Russian IR historiography. Dmitry Kachenovsky should also be added, if we were to trace IR’s roots further down in history. He lectured at the Kharkiv University, published on international law, the US, and what we would now term the history of international relations (Kurilla 1995, 2005, 397–399). Another moment that adds nuance to the beginnings of international political studies in Russia can be located in 1924, when the first analytical institution

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dedicated to international affairs – the Institute of World Economy and World Politics (Institut mirovogo khoziyaystva i mirovoi politiki) – was established.10 In the historiography of Russian IR, the Institute is remembered as the first institution to provide foreign policy advice to Soviet politicians (Lebedeva 2004, 265). The Institute functioned until 1947, and the reasons described in the literature for its closure offer a unique window into the workings of the Soviet state and its discretionary use of ideology. The Politburo (the collective decisionmaking body of the Communist Party) decided to terminate the Institute’s activities, arguing that its head, Evegenii Varga, failed to provide scientific evidence confirming the ‘weathering away of capitalism’ (Cherkasov 2002). This led to a decade-long break in studies of international politics. Only after the end of the Stalin era was IR research gradually reintroduced, and even encouraged by the Communist Party, in the Soviet Union (Zimmerman 1969). The common narrative about the English-language origins of IR emphasizes the discipline’s sense of vocation, driven by the wish to avoid war, and the underpinning ‘liberal-pragmatic consensus’ on the need to secure peace (Haas and Haas 2002, 581; Levine and McCourt 2018, 98).11 When an affluent family from Wales – David Davies and his two sisters, Gwendoline Davies and Margaret Davies – funded the first chair in international politics, at Aberystwyth University in 1919, they described their aim as ‘the study of those related problems of law and politics, of ethics and economics, which are raised by the prospect of a League of Nations and for the truer understanding of civilization other than our own’.12 In contrast, the origins of IR in the Soviet Union, if we locate them in the Institute of World Economy and World Politics, are closely linked to the need for international political-economy analysis. The historiography of Russian IR lists its geographical concentration in Moscow and the separation of research from teaching among the important characteristics of IR knowledge production in Soviet times. This separation of teaching from research was characteristic of the Soviet science and higher education (HE) system more broadly (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 2). Alex Kuraev, in his review of the administrative organization of Soviet HE, argues that Soviet HE was different from the European notion of the university; with its aim of becoming an efficient nationwide conveyor of a professional workforce, Soviet HE focused on providing practical training, and the system was both uniform and administered in a top-down manner (Kuraev 2016). The IR teaching sector was composed of Moscow-based MGIMO and Moscow State University (MGU). History, economics and law formed part of the official curriculum, with history having pride of place (Lebedeva 2018). Research was the domain of institutes of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, primarily the Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO), the Institute for the Study of the USA and Canada (ISKAN), the Institute of Oriental Studies (IV), the Institute of the Far East (IDV), the Institute of International Workers’ Movement (IMRD), the Institute of World Socialist System, the Institute of Africa (IA) and the Institute of Europe (established only in 1987) (Checkel 1997, 20; Tyulin 2005, 49). These centres, even if few

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in number, employed a substantial number of researchers; for instance, in 1987, 600 scholars worked at IMEMO and around 150 at ISKAN (Schneider 1987). The concentration of research institutes in Moscow contributed to the centralization of Soviet IR (Zimmerman 1969, 56). This trend was reinforced when, in 1971, the Soviet leadership made IMEMO the key research hub responsible for the study of the capitalist world. IMEMO was tasked with coordinating research into these issues at ISKAN, IA, IMRD and IDV. Some make a functional and methodological distinction between IMEMO and ISKAN, claiming that the former was oriented towards theory-related and empirical research while the latter focused on policy-applied research (Checkel 1997, 20). In the late 1980s, all these institutes were transferred from the Division of Economy at the Academy of Sciences to a new Division of the Problems of World Economy and International Relations (Cherkasov 2016, 411–412). The Academy of Sciences institutes received state support and, in practice, monopolized research and publishing in ‘their’ subject areas (Tyulin 2005, 49). Some authors writing on the state – knowledge nexus in the Soviet Union criticized institutions such as IMEMO or the Institute of Eastern Studies (Institut Vostokovedeniya) for moving away from academic research and towards policy analysis. Vadim J. Birstein argued that IMEMO, under the leadership of Nikolai Inozemtsev and Yevgeniy Primakov, lost its academic orientation and took up ‘the analysis of current political international events’ instead. Institut Vostokovedeniya evolved along similar lines when Primakov was appointed its director (Birstein 2009, 185).13 In addition to journals published by institutes of the Academy of Sciences, a prominent IR-themed journal Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn was re-established in 1954 (appearing in English as International Affairs as of 1956), published by the All-Union Society for the Dissemination of Political and Scientific Knowledge under the aegis of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.14 There was limited cooperation with other academic centres; in addition to links with Moscowbased MGIMO and MGU, IMEMO established a network of contacts with universities located in Leningrad, Tbilisi and Rostov (Cherkasov 2016, 412–413). A number of Soviet authors explicitly defined their own work as belonging to the discipline of IR. For example, a publication authored by IMEMO on the postWW2 history of international politics asserted that IR was a ‘young science arising at the intersection of a number of social sciences’ (Zimmerman 1969, 45). Non-Russia-based authors who attempted to recapitulate the state of and debates within Soviet IR recognized the existence of the discipline, although their views differed regarding its origins and maturity. Zimmerman had no doubts regarding the existence of IR as a discipline in the Soviet Union (one of his chapters was even titled ‘The Emergence of International Relations as a Discipline’ (Zimmerman 1969)); he located it in the post-Stalinist period and pinpointed its emergence to the Khrushchev era, following the 20th Party Congress (Zimmerman 1969, 25): ‘After 1962 one could speak of the existence in the Soviet Union of international relations as a self-conscious discipline’ (Zimmerman 1969, 275–276). Zimmerman refers to such turning points as the reconstitution of IMEMO in 1956,15 the establishment of the journal Mirovaya

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Ekonomika i Mezhdunarodnyye Otnosheniya (World Economy and International Relations) in 1957 and the growing number of publications on IR-related topics in the late 1950s. However, Zimmerman was critical of the collective and centrally managed nature of IR in the Soviet Union, including its concentration of scholars in Moscow, which became a ‘production centre’; its obliging of scholars to study topical and present-day issues relevant to ‘state interests’; and its increase in collectively authored works, which allowed for greater control of their substance (Zimmerman 1969, 56).16 Margot Light, in turn, located the emergence of IR as a legitimate field of academic study in the Brezhnev era (late 1960s) (Light 1988, 12). Assessing the state of Soviet IR in the late 1980s, she spoke of a new discipline with a sizeable number of practitioners, made up of both academics and theorists working in the Central Committee apparatus (Light 1988, 316). Allen Lynch also traced the evolution of IR concepts back to the late 1960s; in his account, discussions of IR as a separate discipline go back to at least 1969. Lynch identifies two Soviet scholars – Yelena Modrzhinskaya and Dmitri Yermolenko – who made considerable efforts to establishing the grounds for an empirically oriented study of IR, accompanied by interdisciplinary methodology. He adds that Soviet scholars termed this field of study ‘the Sociology of International Relations’ (Lynch 1987, 49). Questions about the existence of IR as a discipline are further complicated by the fact that, under the Soviets, academic disciplines in the social sciences ‘appeared and re-appeared’ (Theen 1971). Some acquired only tentative and limited official recognition. In Vladimir Shlapentokh’s account, efforts to establish sociology as a modern social science met with continuous resistance. Sociology could re-emerge as an ‘accepted’ discipline in the early post-Stalin years only because the programme proposed by sociology’s advocates served Khrushchev’s plans to repudiate his predecessor. Irrespective of the discipline’s formal recognition, sophisticated political manoeuvring continued to be a necessary part of scholarly activities (Shlapentokh 1985, v–vii), as were disputes concerning the ramifications of the discipline and its links to historical materialism and scientific communism (Shlapentokh 1985, 22). One of the legitimizing strategies for a ‘new’ discipline was to mount a critique of how this discipline was arranged and studied in the West (Theen 1971, 684–685). It is possible that the authors of Contemporary Bourgeois Theories of International Relations: A Critical Analysis (Gantman 1976) used such a legitimizing strategy. The book had a significant circulation – 3600 copies (today, the usual print run of IR monographs is 1000 copies) – and was prepared by a collective of authors (avtorskii kollektiv) comprising over 20 scholars, which suggests that IR was not a niche subject. In terms of publishing outlets, there seems to have been no clear boundary between IR and political science. Articles focusing on IR topics, including theory and area studies, were published in the yearbook of the Soviet Political Sciences Association. For instance, the 1987 edition discussed international implications of the scientific-technological revolution (Kerimov 1987), whereas the 1985 edition focused on the topic of the state (Kerimov 1985). This picture

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becomes even more complex. Some authors argue that the discipline of political science had never been formally recognized in the USSR (Zimmerman 1969, 27–28; Hill 1980, 1–2), and that the field’s subordination to the needs of the Communist Party and the lack of quality research disqualified its academic credentials (Golosov 2016). Officially, the Soviet Political Sciences Association was formed in 1960; its members participated in international political science conferences and, in 1979, hosted the eleventh world congress of the International Political Science Association. Even if not all are willing to acknowledge the academic contribution of this Association, the literature points to the work of scholars in law, economics and philosophy as contributing to political science (Hill 1980). Another factor complicating debates on the existence of the IR discipline in the Soviet Union is that scholars were permitted to do academic work on IR within a recognized academic field, termed the ‘Theory of Scientific Socialism and Communism’ (Teoriya nauchnogo sotsializma i kommunizma), which was situated within the discipline of philosophy. This field, unlike political science and International Relations, had its own official classification code (09.00.02) that allowed the awarding of scientific degrees (kandidat nauk). One of my research visits to Leninka (the Russian State Library, in the Soviet times named after Vladimir Lenin) resulted in an accidental discovery that Andrei Tsygankov, a leading contemporary IR scholar and an important voice in the discussion about Russian IR, defended his thesis in the 09.00.02 field in 1990.17

State control David Zil’berman, a Soviet-American philosopher and sociologist, described the complex mechanisms characterizing the relationship between the state and academia as science’s ‘impenetrable quality’. In Zil’berman’s view, one could grasp how the relationship worked only once one knew the ‘inner life and intellectual atmosphere’ in which Soviet social scientists worked; its distinct features were simply incomprehensible to an outside observer, and could only be understood through participant observation (Zil’berman 1975, 136). Without denying the complexity of the state – academia nexus in the Soviet Union, I would like to suggest a simplification that enables illumination of certain aspects of this relationship. I will propose that social scientists in the Soviet Union found themselves under two types of pressure: the first emanating from the state and the state’s understanding of the role of science, and the second (inexorably linked to the first) from Marxist-Leninist ideology. Despite the state’s overbearingly powerful position in the state – academia nexus, it is important to emphasize that the Soviet authorities’ view of social sciences and their role in the Soviet state was neither consistent nor constant (Hill 1980). According to the official rhetoric, science was not considered an autonomous activity but one subordinate to the needs of the working class. Scientific activity was understood as a means for reaching economic and defence goals (Sokolov et al. 2015, 474), and it was to be objective, goal-oriented, and both guided by and reinforcing of Marxism-Leninism. The social sciences played a

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special role, because – from the point of view of the Soviet leadership – their goal was to contribute to citizens’ ‘proper’ political education and to develop key concepts derived from Marxism-Leninism. While the Soviet state generally approached science in a utilitarian fashion, the precise role of social sciences changed over time, as did the degree of pressure exerted on academics. In 1961, the Communist Party decreed that such journals as Mirovaya Ekonomika i Mezhdunarodnyye Otnosheniya and Voprosy Istorii (The Questions of History) must publish sections that assisted propagandist activity (Zimmerman 1969, 59–60). A 1982 book, The Current Problems of Contemporary Political Development (issued in 5000 copies), was presented as targeting ‘civil servants, employees of civic organizations, university lecturers and propagandists’ (Dlya rabotnikov gosudarstvennogo apparata, obshestvennykh organizacii, prepodavateleii vuzov i propagandistov) (1982, book description printed on the back matter). Among the functions of the yearbook of international political and economic affairs (Mezhdunarodnyi ezhegodnik), published since 1958, was reinforcing the perception of Soviet international success and peaceful intentions. In the 1982 edition of the yearbook, we read about the need for ever-tighter cooperation between brotherly socialist countries (bratskiye strany sotsializma) (p. 4). The USSR, it was claimed, was pushing back against excessive imperialist militarism and continuing to implement a policy that aimed to liberate the nations from the threat of world war (p. 5). In 1985, the yearbook’s authors claimed that the Soviet Union was continuing its primary objective of decreasing the potential for war, limiting the arms race and constructing its relations with countries of different social systems on the principle of peaceful coexistence. Cooperation between brotherly socialist countries continued to broaden and deepen, while relations with newly independent countries were flourishing (p. 3). The Party required social sciences to work directly in the service of propaganda and with the aim of justifying Soviet policy. The leading ideologue of the Khrushchev era, Leonid F. Ilichev, described the development of social sciences as ‘the business of the whole Soviet people, the whole party, its theoretical staff – the Central Committee of the CPSU [Communist Party of the Soviet Union]’, rather than of scholars and their collectives (quoted in Zimmerman 1969, 10–11). As Margot Light observed, the political and academic establishments in the Soviet Union were intertwined, with the most influential theorists being not only CPSU members but also members or candidate members of its collective leadership, the Central Committee (Light 1988, 15). Ronald Hill relates an interesting incident that illustrates shifting approaches to social science. At the twenty-third Party Congress, held in 1966, Brezhnev elaborated on the importance of social sciences in the following manner: It is necessary to put an end to the notion, current among part of our cadres, that the social sciences have merely a propagandistic significance, and are called upon to explain and comment upon practice. (Pravda, 30 March 1966, p. 9 quoted in Hill 1980, 5)

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This phrasing proved contentious enough that it was removed from the stenographic record of the congress. As Hill notes, the deletion of this passage suggests that Brezhnev may have gone too far in ‘freeing social science from its explicit political role’ (Hill 1980, 5). The degree and impact of coercion and censorship varied from discipline to discipline, and the Party resorted to different levels and means of controlling scholarly activity. On the most general level, the requirement for social scientists to develop the Marxist-Leninist ideology made everyone – those who attempted to comply with this aim and those who tried to subvert it – prone to some form of reprimand. Ideology could easily be called on to criticize even the most eager-toplease social scientists; for instance, social scientists were scolded for failing to elaborate the concept of ‘developed socialism’ when the Communist Party established that the Soviet Union was undergoing this phase in the 1970s (Kneen 1984, 92). According to an insider’s account, the Party apparatus was deeply involved in sociological research, in particular through local party committees closely supervising surveys and monitoring data collection. The Party also insisted on greater number of scholars becoming party members, as the threat of expulsion from the Party was a form of gaining leverage over scholarly activity (Shlapentokh 1985, 60). Another form of punishment was the withdrawal of the opportunity to travel abroad (Kneen 1984, 99). Vladimir Shlapentokh, one of the leading Soviet sociologists, was affiliated with the USSR Academy of Sciences Institute of Sociological Research from 1969 until his emigration to the US in 1979. In a study prepared for the Delphic Émigré Series,18 he blamed politics, rather than ideology, for a specific way in which Soviet academic disciplines developed (Shlapentokh 1985, 3). Two quotations from his study explain the link between politics and research: The role of politics in sociology is two-fold. On the one hand, political power – particularly that embodied in the state – exerts important direct and indirect influence on the activities of sociologists. On the other hand, the outcome of social research is also affected by the political orientation of the investigator. . . . But in a country like the Soviet Union, the state has nearly total control over the research conducted by social scientists . . . a Soviet social scientist will be prevented from carrying out a study which is not supported by the state. It is not so much ‘internal factors’, such as the technical competence of sociologists, which have determined the evolution of Soviet sociology, but ‘external’ ones, with politics being the most important. (Shlapentokh 1985, 4) Shlapentokh recognized ideology as an element of the wider political context that influenced the quality and direction of sociological research. As the main instrument of the state, it was flexible enough to justify any action the Soviet leadership decided to take, and was used to restrict sociological research or

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direct it towards the interests of the Communist leadership (Shlapentokh 1985, 3). Shlapentokh suggests that what may, to outsiders, have looked like ideological duels should not always be taken at face value, as ideological arguments were often summoned by antagonists to ‘advance their interests through officially accepted lexicon’ (Shlapentokh 1985, 4). Understanding the significance of ideology in (social) scientific production may be difficult for those who have never experienced its power. Birstein, for instance, writes that some American historians of science had difficulties grasping its profound role: ‘Although Adams [Mark Adams, American historian of biology] visited Moscow several times and collected incredibly valuable materials, including priceless interviews with old geneticists, he never worked as a Soviet employee and evidently never understood the whole picture’ (Birstein 2009, 50). Apart from supervision by the Communist Party and its Central Committee’s Division of Science and Universities, Soviet power structures played an important role in exercising control over research. In the case of IMEMO, ties with the Ministry of Defence (MoD) were particularly close. In its first years of existence, a special division for the study of ‘problems of militarization of economies of capitalist states’ was created within IMEMO. The MoD reserved the right to nominate discharged generals and higher officers to this new IMEMO research unit. In 1960, it was renamed the Division of Technical-Economic Research (OTEI) and employed 90 staff members (the entire IMEMO staff numbered below 400). OTEI was located separately from IMEMO and maintained a separate library, with foreign publications, to which other IMEMO workers had no access. Pyotr Cherkasov, an insider to the workings of IMEMO, writes that IMEMO leadership exercised limited control over the division. At the same time, in Cherkasov’s view, most of IMEMO’s staff were rather sceptical towards the quality of such ‘secretive’ work, perceiving OTEI as a convenient pre-retirement haven for MoD staff. It was only the new director and close associate of Mikhail Gorbachev, Alexander Yakovlev, who prevailed over the MoD. Yakovlev closed OTEI down in 1985, transferring its staff to the Institute and making militaryand security-related research more transparent (Cherkasov 2016, chapter 6). A visit to the Museum of Russian Secret Services in St Petersburg allows a glimpse into the secretive atmosphere surrounding research. The Museum presents a photograph and short description of the work carried out by Yelena Borisovna Kozelceva. She is described as the pro-rector (pro-vice-chancellor, in British terminology) of the MGU – and, simultaneously, an active KGB colonel. The descriptive label further informs us that, during her work at the university, Kozelceva ‘conducted operational work among students’, ‘ensured the safety of research’ (obespechivala bezopasnost’ issledovanii uchenykh) and ‘travelled abroad for special missions’. In an interview, Kozelceva described her position at MGU as based on cooperation with the rector and reminisced about her work in the following terms: Did I actually make arrests? Yes. A student of the physics department was filmed at the airport with a passport of a foreign power (I will not name

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which one, because we are now sort of integrating into Europe). He was passing on really top-secret information. The worst thing is that he was not a bad person, he just wanted to go to Europe. Of course, an experienced foreign intelligence agent came out for him. He loved to drink, and he loved girls. . . . Now he is probably already free. It is a pity that this student ruined himself like this.19 The Department for Classified Research was one of the first units created after the establishment of the Institute for Concrete [Fundamental] Social Research. In the account of Vladimir Shlapentokh, the unit was under the direct supervision of the KGB (Shlapentokh 1985, 60–63).20 In addition to the category of classified research was that of undesirable questions. Shlapentokh provides the example of Leonid Rybakovskii, who, despite his political loyalty, was criticized by the Communist Party for asking ‘tactless’ questions in his research. These questions concerned food supply (Shlapentokh 1985, 88). Tight supervision and reprimanding even well-established sociologists, for instance, for ‘inappropriate questionnaire items’, resulted in the emergence of a ‘bottom-up’ system of censorship. Sociologists were the first, and the most critical, censors of their own questionnaires; they avoided questions that might ‘offend their superiors’, for the simple (and understandable) reasons that they could jeopardize their professional standing and limit opportunities for further empirical research (Shlapentokh 1985, 88); and they were concerned about respondents’ fears of providing sincere replies to questions they might perceive as politically sensitive (Shlapentokh 1985, 92).

Access to, and familiarity with, Western scholarship Another contentious issue in the historiography of Soviet IR and political science is the question of access to scholarship produced on the other side of the Iron Curtain. The Soviet Union’s governing bodies were concerned about the availability and circulation of foreign publications. Access to Western literature was managed by controlling printed materials entering the Soviet Union. Scholars based outside of the Soviet Union recall that, on crossing the border, foreign visitors were regularly questioned as to whether they were bringing in books (Choldin 1989, 29; Friedberg 1989, 23). Despite the fact that condemnation of Western thought was continuous,21 critics did not necessarily have access to the works they deplored. It is an oft-repeated thesis that, throughout the Soviet period, researchers were largely detached from theories and methods developed in the West. As those who started their academic careers in the Soviet era attest, English-language specialized literature was difficult to acquire. Grigoriy Golosov reminiscences that the few available books on political sociology were in translation from Polish, but even if access to foreign monographs had been greater, it would have been of little use because researchers were rarely trained in foreign languages (Golosov 2016). Publications critical of Marxist thought were only available under the Party’s supervision (Tsygankov

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and Tsygankov 2005a, 28–29, 2006, 16–17). A handful of experts had access to key English-language publications, which were kept in special library sections with limited access, called spetskhrany (Nevskaya 2016, 115). On the other hand, an analysis of bibliographical notes suggests that some IR works published in the Soviet Union made use of foreign literature. The bibliography of Contemporary Bourgeois Theories of International Relations (Gantman 1976), published in 1976, contains more than 600 scholarly works published in English, German and French. These included 7 pieces by Zbigniew Brzeziński, over 20 by Karl Deutsch, 5 by Henry Kissinger, 9 by Hans Morgenthau and 10 by James Rosenau, as well as articles and books by Ole Holsti, Stanley Hoffman, Reinhold Niebuhr and Kenneth Waltz.22 In Zimmerman’s account, the 1960s translations into Russian included books by William Kaufmann, Henry Kissinger and Bernard Brodie, and the themes of translated works mainly concerned strategy, security and nuclear weapons (Zimmerman 1969, 52–54). Reviews of English-language books published in Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn or Mirovaia Ekonomika i Mezhdunarodnyye Otnosheniya were another way of gaining insight into Western IR scholarship. Last but not least, the Institute of Scientific Information on Social Science of the Academy of Science, INION, especially in the late Soviet period, compiled bibliographies and provided short summaries (referaty) of foreign scholarship in economics, law, state and administration and area studies. For instance, one such collection of Referaty issued in 1978 was titled Scientists of the capitalist countries on the creation of the latest weapons of mass destruction (Uchenyye kapitalisticheskikh stran o sozdanii noveishikh sredstv massovogo unichtozheniya) and engaged mainly with German language scholarship.23 This brochure was labelled “for professional use only.” Margot Light showed that a number of scholars, such as Kokoshin (1975), Petrovsky (1976), Chirkin (1980) and Shakhnazarov (1984), engaged with scholarship coming from the West (Light 1988, 249–250). Those who had access to foreign publications had to bear in mind, however, that theories such as realism were considered Western – that is, alien and potentially threatening – and therefore could not simply be used for research purposes. It was probably unthinkable to analyze Soviet foreign policy through a bourgeois lens. Gantman’s 1976 volume provides an overview of Western IR,24 but it describes all the approaches covered with the blanket term ‘bourgeois’ (Gantman 1976). Yury Polsky, a former junior employee of IMEMO, provides an insider’s look at the Institute’s day-to-day operations (Polsky 1987). On his account, IMEMO’s library, which was open to staff and visitors with an IMEMO pass, kept holdings of the US Daily World and the French L’Humanite, as well ‘publications by the Western left whose views on key international issues did not conflict with the official Soviet position’ (Polsky 1987, 48). The Special Materials Room, accessible only to staff, contained, inter alia, the TASS News Service (based on dispatches by leading Western news agencies) and copies of Western periodicals including The Economist, Time, International Herald Tribune, US News and

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World Report and Der Spiegel, as well as Foreign Affairs, Current History, The Middle East Journal and The Journal of Conflict Resolution. These materials, as well as ‘Western’ books on international politics and economics, were available to IMEMO researchers upon request and on a ‘need to know’ basis. They could neither be taken home nor used in any other part of the library. The most difficult to access was the special collection that comprised Russian translations of books by foreign statesman and IR experts, including Zbigniew Brzeziński. Books in this collection were classified ‘for official use only’, and IMEMO staff needed special permission to access them (Polsky 1987, 48–49). Despite restricted access to publications, Daniel Matuszewski, responsible for academic exchange with the Soviet Union at the International Research and Exchange Board in the 1970s, attests that researchers from key institutes of the Academy of Sciences (such as IMEMO) were frequent visitors to Western states. He notes that IMEMO had a substantial foreign currency budget, allowing for the purchase of foreign literature and materials as well as sending its experts on regular foreign trips (Matuszewski 1982, 38). Researchers employed at ISKAN regularly travelled to the US for conferences and meetings, and received temporary posts at the Russian Embassy in Washington and at the Russian Mission to the UN in New York (Matuszewski 1982, 42). Matuszewski’s assessment seems, however, rather uncritical; he presents a picture of a flourishing IR community in the Soviet Union, for which he provides no concrete evidence or examples. Another way to mediate access to foreign ideas was through translation. Marianna Tax Choldin, a translator and political researcher, shows in her analysis of Russian-language translations of several foreign works, including William Fulbright’s 1966 The Arrogance of Power, that significant structural and textual changes were made in the texts of translations. Through these changes, the censors achieved the goal of presenting the Soviet Union in a more positive light while simultaneously skewing the image of the West (Choldin 1989, 40–48).

Attitudes and uses of official ideology The most fervent critics opine that ideology precluded science in the Soviet Union. In the words of Julian Huxley – a British geneticist and firm believer in the unity and international character of science, subordinating science to philosophical orthodoxy – made the former redundant: So far as I am aware, in modern times it is only in the USSR (and, though to a somewhat lesser extent, in Germany under Hitler) that science has lost its inherent intellectual autonomy, in the sense that the admissibility of its theories, laws and facts is judged not on their scientific merits but in relation to political and philosophical doctrines, and research and scientific thought are subordinated to the derivatives of a political party. (Huxley 1949, 189)

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The significant role ideology played in the Soviet Union and its sciences is not to be underestimated; but the picture is more complex than that presented by Huxley. As many others attest, ideological commitment to Marxism-Leninism framed ‘what may be investigated and what may be said’ (Hill 1980, 10), and ideology could neither be disregarded, used freely nor challenged (Light 1988, 320). At the same time, however, the most striking feature of the MarxismLeninism ‘straitjacket’ is how contradictory and flexible it was, in terms of both its conceptualization and its use. Articulated almost habitually, it lacked precision. Given that Soviet ideology was not a neat and unchanging interpretation of Marx’s or Lenin’s theses, ideological pronouncements were frequently narrowed down to sloganistic simplifications (Light 1988, 1–5). One important expression of the ideological organization of the Soviet state was the conviction that theory and practice were interdependent. Practice could not exist without theory, especially given that theory was believed to have an ‘organising, mobilising and transforming’ function (Light 1988, 4). Soviet policy was deemed scientific because it was guided by Marxist-Leninist ideology. This ideology was presented as based on objective laws of social development and as revealing the objective truth.25 It was believed that Soviet theory enabled Soviet decision makers to anticipate the direction and outcome of international affairs. Policy, in turn, was to have a feedback effect on theory. Observers noted, however, that the claim of a close relationship between theory and practice was not substantiated; the connections between particular foreign policy actions and their relevant theoretical grounds remained unexplained (Light 1988, 1–8, 316). Excerpts from an anonymous 1973 volume, published by the official news agency Novosti with the English title Political Science: Fundamentals of Political Knowledge, serve as an example of the contradictions pervading writing about ideology and theory. The volume attests to the links between theory and practice in the following way: The thinkers of the past sought to develop complete theories. The idea was to furnish the ultimate answer to all questions. But there is no theory for all instances. Reality changes all the time, and the frontiers of knowledge keep expanding. If a theory fails to take into consideration new facts and turns into a system of fossilized dogmas, it detaches itself from reality. It becomes useless and even harmful, since it no longer gives a true picture of life. Therefore, theory should be based on practice. (1973, 10) While the argument about the impossibility of producing a universally valid and complete theory is persuasive, it seems to be introduced with the sole purpose of explaining why Lenin’s ideas were important elaborations of Marx’s thinking: In his fight against the dogmatists . . . he [Lenin] enriched Marxism with new ideas. He developed Marxist philosophy, studied the laws governing the

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course of imperialism as the highest stage of capitalism and evolved [sic] a theory of socialist revolution. . . . Last, but not least, he developed all aspects of Marxism and elevated it to a new stage. That is why we now speak of Marxism-Leninism. (1973, 11) Despite the insistence on the impossibility of developing complete theories, a few lines later the volume declares that Marxism-Leninism is, indeed, the science of the laws governing human progress: Half a century has passed since Lenin died. There have been great changes in the life of mankind since then. The balance of forces between socialism and capitalism has altered dramatically. New nations, winning their freedom from colonial oppression, have come on to the world scene. These new conditions have called for the further development of Marxism-Leninism – this great science of the laws governing the progress of human society, which throws light on the prospects before the world. Today Marxism-Leninism is being enriched by the practical and theoretical activities of the communist and workers’ parties the world over. (1973, 12) The statement about the impossibility of comprehensive theories is further contradicted when the volume declares that: ‘the Marxist theory of the laws that govern society’s development, the theory known as historical materialism . . . [can help determine] the inner objective logic of history’ (1973, 13). Indeed, references to historical materialism were often used to attest to the scientific validity of specific claims, and the term ‘materialism’ was used as a certificate of value (Huxley 1949, 175). For instance, infamous Soviet biologist Trofim Lysenko frequently contrasted the materialist nature of his observations with the mystical, scholastic or metaphysical ideas of Gregor Mendel. These derogatory terms were often added to a list of others aiming to diminish the value of specific ideas, such as bourgeois, foreign reactionary, anti-scientific, obscurantist or hostile to us (Huxley 1949, 52, 176). In addition to inconsistencies in its assumptions, there were contradictions in how ideology was used. Without a doubt, some used ideology pragmatically, and with considerable dexterity, to introduce topics they deemed genuinely important for discussion. Ideology was also used habitually; that is, simply because it was common practice to do so. However, it is virtually impossible to discern the motives for using ideology by reading texts written decades ago. It is also very difficult to assess the extent to which ideology was employed instrumentally and the extent to which it was internalized and prevented other ways of reasoning. Kharkhordin, writing about the humanities in the Soviet Union, described the main form of intellectual production during the mature Soviet system

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(which he situated as between Stalin’s death in 1953 and 1973) in the following way: exegesis of sacred texts was the starting point of any endeavour. . . . Whether one inserted a few lines from the classics of Marxism-Leninism and recent Communist Party congresses at the beginning of one’s exposition or went for a full-blown theoretical treatise on some aspect of Marxist dogma, one had to initially acknowledge the sacred text . . . the first step was to figure out what Marx and his apostles said. This type of exegesis provided fertile ground for high scholasticism. (Kharkhordin 2015, 1284) On the other end of the spectrum, the ideological ‘cover’ ‘facilitated the publication of moderately critical ideas which could never appear in print if they derived from the pen of a “dissident”’ (Hill 1980, 10). In addition, the ‘founding fathers’ could be used to support particular approaches in a scientific endeavour. For instance, Dmitri Yermolenko quoted Lenin’s writing about the need to learn from the bourgeoisie with the view to ‘justify his plea for a more sociological approach’ to IR (Yermolenko 1977, 62, quoted in Light 1988, 43). Similar references to Lenin’s thought were used to legitimize the study of ‘bourgeois’ theories of IR and their development (Gantman 1976, 458). The tensions related to ideological commitments can be illustrated using an article by Alexey L. Narochnitski,26 in which he comments on theoretical and methodological issues in IR. That the article was re-published for an Indian audience may suggest its significance; originally published in Russian in a 1976 edition of Voprosy Istorii (The Questions of History), the article reappeared five years later in a compilation of Russian-authored works published in English by the Indian Council of Social Science Research, with the stated aim of broadening Indian scholars’ access to ‘social science perspectives, concerns, paradigms and methods of the non-Anglo-Saxon world and the non-Western world’ (Parthasarathi 1981).27 Narochnitski opens his piece with a statement of ideological commitment, which we would generally expect of works published at that time: The theoretical and methodological foundation of modern Soviet studies in the overall philosophical plan is dialectical and historical materialism, the theory of Marxism-Leninism and Scientific Communism. (Narochnitski 1981, 41) Narochnitski bases a significant part of his analysis on Lenin’s works, but his engagement with Lenin’s ideas goes far beyond superficial declarations; his article provides a detailed analysis of Lenin’s oeuvre, approached as a theory of IR. At the same time, the quotations Narochnitski includes from thenSoviet leader, Leonid Brezhnev, look like a ritualistic invocation aiming to facilitate publication (Narochnitski 1981, 57).

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It is a widespread view that the insistence on Marxism-Leninism as the sole proper method and theory was rather unsophisticated, but Narochnitski’s engagement with Lenin shows not only that referencing specific leaders may serve different purposes but also that ideology was malleable in the hands of scholars – they could make it speak in support of specific and changing policies of the Soviet leadership. For instance, Narochnitski presents Lenin’s thesis about the inevitability of the simultaneous existence of socialist and capitalist states: ‘Socialism will be victorious . . . originally in one or a few countries, but the rest of the countries for some time will remain bourgeois or prebourgeois’ (Narochnitski 1981, 52). This usage of Lenin’s work allows Narochnitski to present the need for thinking conceptually and practically about the coexistence of different states. In addition, Narochnitski uses Lenin to show the need for a departure from war towards creating a universally ‘just and democratic peace without annexation and retribution’ (Narochnitski 1981, 52). This might be interpreted as a scholarly attempt to support and justify the policy of détente, which the Soviet leadership started propagating in 1970s. In addition to general statements about Marxism-Leninism, another way to introduce a book or a chapter was to refer to a speech delivered by a Soviet leader or to a revision in the Communist Party programme. For instance, the aforementioned Contemporary Bourgeois Theories of International Relations (1976) opens its Introduction with a reference to Brezhnev’s speech at the 25th Party Congress. In this instance, the more or less explicit aim of such an opening is to legitimize the need to study foreign theories of IR. Authors of the Introduction justify their scholarly endeavour by pointing out that Brezhnev spoke about the ideological struggle; according to the authors’ collective, problems related to IR occupy an important place in this struggle (vazhnoe mesto v borbie ideologii zanimayut problemy mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii), and should therefore be studied in detail (Gantman 1976, 3). Yu A. Tikhomirov opens his chapter, ‘The State in Contemporary International Society’, with a reference to an updated version of the Communist Party programme. Using excessively convoluted language, he links changes in the programme to the need to study the state’s role in IR: The Communist Party supports the creation and use of international mechanisms and institutions that would allow for balancing the national and state interests with those pertaining to the common humanity. A special role in such circumstances acquires the study of the role of states in contemporary international process, the dialectics of their class and general tasks, the mutual influence of the international environment and the state. (Tikhomirov 1987, 35) Some works aim to fulfil two goals: explaining the Communist Party position and analyzing empirical material. For example, a highly uncritical book, The Current Problems of Contemporary Political Development (Aktualnyye

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problemy sovremennogo politicheskogo razvitiya) (1982), is presented in the following way: The book is dedicated to the analysis of decisions taken by the 26th Communist Party congress about the political development of the USSR and political processes in the international arena. On the basis of extensive factual material, the book characterizes the ways of perfecting the Soviet political system and its role in governing the society, increasing the effectiveness of civic organizations, workers’ collectives and national control. The book shows the growing role of political culture in Soviet society. It explains the political course of the Soviet state on the international arena. The book provides a critique of contemporary bourgeois political theories and anti-Sovietism. (Shahnazarov and Tikhomirov 1982, book description on the back matter) The book was edited by G.H. Shahnazarov and Yu. A. Tikhomirov and reviewed by B.V. Dreyshev and M.N. Marchenko, all of whom held scientific degrees in legal studies (doktor yuridicheskich nauk). Nine other contributors to the volume were presented as holding degrees of doktor or kandidat in legal studies, history or philosophy. The book’s largely hagiographic outlook can be illustrated with several quotations. Its very first sentence refers to the 26th Communist Party Congress, claiming that its decisions and materials contain an ‘all-encompassing characteristic of political processes in the country and abroad’ (V reshenyakh i materialakh XXVI syezda KPSS dana vseobeymuiushaya kharakteristika politicheskikh processov v nashej stranie) (Shahnazarov and Tikhomirov 1982, 3). The subsequent paragraph refers to Lenin, who is claimed to have discovered the nature of politics (V.I. Lenin vsestronne raskryl prirodu politiki) (Shahnazarov and Tikhomirov 1982, 3). In the chapter dedicated to the international strategy of the Soviet Union, G.H. Shahnazarov writes that it had not been subject to change since the Soviet state’s very inception; according to the author, the Soviet strategy had always been geared towards ‘creating the most optimal conditions for the construction of socialism and communism, the relentless battle for peace (neustannoy barbie za mir) and international security, solidarity with all revolutionary and liberation movements, the confirmation of just and democratic principles in international affairs’ (Shahnazarov and Tikhomirov 1982, 125). Among a plethora of uncritical work, some Soviet IR writing has been recognized for its dissenting position. Dmitri Yermolenko stands out in the historiography of Soviet IR, in that his work is mentioned not only by contemporary contributors to that historiography but also by Russian and British scholars of his time (e.g. (Narochnitski 1981, 62–63; Light 1988)). Historiographers of Russian IR attempting to ‘excavate’ non-orthodox interpretations of IR that went beyond the official framework of Marxism-Leninism point to Yermolenko’s work. Both Marina Lebedeva and Pavel Tsygankov refer to Dmitri Yermolenko and his late-1960s arguments that world problems could be discussed within the ‘sociology of international relations’ and IR approached as social processes (Lebedeva 2004, 269; Lebedeva 2018, loc. 565; Tsygankov 2019). Given

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that these works present little detail and discussion of Yermolenko’s ideas, a closer analysis of his two books is appropriate. It will also serve as an illustration of the ideological framework in which arguments were often ‘boxed’. This ‘boxing’ makes it exceptionally difficult to discern valuable ideas from casual or purposeful ideologization. Yermolenko’s English-language publication, titled International Relations in the Era of the Scientific and Technological Revolution, was published in 1973 by Novosti Press Agency Publishing House. I quote from the English-language version for two reasons: first, it allows me to provide the exact phrasing of a source printed in Russia, in addition to relying on my own translations (offered in other parts of this chapter); and second, it allows me to present the complexity of academic IR prose in a language that was polished for a foreign audience. It is, of course, possible that the original work was produced in Russian and that it was to some extent altered, or even censored, through translation. However, academic form and style does not differ markedly from other works in Soviet international and political studies published in Russian. There are marked similarities between ideas presented in this work and Yermolenko’s 1977 monograph Sotsiologia i problem mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii (The Sociology and Problems of International Relations). Without a doubt, International Relations in the Era of the Scientific and Technological Revolution was aimed at a foreign audience. In addition to the language of publication, the volume contains a reader’s questionnaire, to be returned to the publisher’s headquarters in Moscow. The questionnaire asks, among other things, which aspects of life in the USSR and the Soviet people the reader would like to know about, and the reader’s opinion of the subject matter of this publication and the quality of its translation. The opening of the book does not diverge from the established model. The first page refers to then-secretary general Leonid Brezhnev’s speech at the 24th Communist Party Congress. The first chapter contains numerous references to Lenin’s collective works (Yermolenko 1973, 18, 25, 26, 28, 33, 38, 46) and extended quotations from Brezhnev (Yermolenko 1973, 24, 27, 32, 36, 45). There is also a reference to Karl Marx’s Capital, from a 1954 edition published in English by the Foreign Languages Publishing House in Moscow (Yermolenko 1973, 15). The volume has no bibliography; its scarce footnotes refer to the following English-language publications: Bernal’s Science in History, 1954; Bell’s The Measurement of Science and Technology: Indicators of Social Change, 1968; Brzeziński’s Between Two Ages: America’s Role in the Technetronic Era, 1970; McHale’s The Future of the Future, 1969; Tunstall’s Media Sociology, 1970; Ellul’s Technological Society, 1964; and Mulkay’s Functionalism, Exchange, and Theoretical Strategy, 1971. The author makes a few references to Monograph No. 10 of the American Academy of Political Sciences, titled A Design for International Relations Research: Scope, Theory, Methods and Relevance, 1970, two to the Journal of Conflict Resolution, one to Contending Approaches to International Politics, Princeton, 1969 (without specifying any of the editors or contributors to the edited collection) and one to an article by Gordon A. Craig published in The New York Times in 1972.

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In the book, Yermolenko asks about the impact of scientific and technological progress on interstate relations; however, its descriptive introduction does not make this aim absolutely clear until page 50, where it is described in the following way: Having examined some general ideas concerning the essence and significance of scientific and technological revolution in contemporary society, we can now proceed to briefly analyse the impact this revolution has on international relations. (Yermolenko 1973, 50) The introduction also comprises a complex explanation concerning the necessity of socialism for achieving scientific progress: The country’s striking achievements in the advancement of science and technology graphically show that it takes socialist social relations to accelerate the rate of scientific and technological development and provide highly favourable conditions for more rapid, all-round scientific and technological progress for the benefit of man. (Yermolenko 1973, 7) A message presumably written with a Western audience in mind is delivered early on in the book. Its function is to convince the reader of the many scientific and economic successes of the Soviet Union, achieved despite obstacles set up by capitalism and Western states: More than half a century ago when the Soviet people set about building a new society they, too, were faced with capitalism’s attempts to hamper their scientific and technological progress. The Western states persuaded eminent scholars to emigrate from Russia and did their best to prevent Soviet researchers from obtaining scientific information. Nevertheless, the USSR made spectacular progress in science, technology and many other spheres of life. (Yermolenko 1973, 7) The book also contains an extended promotion of the five-year plan and a detailed list of its achievements: Representing a new important stage in Soviet society’s further advancement to communism, in building its material and technical basis, in augmenting the country’s economic and defensive might, the ninth five-year plan (1971–75) calls for a further marked development of the productive forces accompanied by a complex of social measures. The main task of the fiveyear plan is to secure a considerable rise in the living standard and cultural level of the people on the basis of high rates of growth of socialist

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production, increase in its effectiveness, scientific and technological progress and accelerated growth of productivity of labour. In the five years ending 1975 the national income is to be increased by 37–40 per cent, industrial output will rise by 42–46 per cent and the average annual agricultural output by 20–22 per cent, while real per capita income will go up by nearly one-third. This will signify an important step forward in the Soviet Union’s competition with capitalism, in utilizing the vast potentialities latent in the scientific-technological revolution. It is planned to increase the output of electric power to 1,030,000–1,070,000 million kilowatt-hours, with atomic power stations accounting for 12 per cent of the total increase in capacities. The output of steel will amount to 142–150 million tons. (Yermolenko 1973, 34–35) The enumeration of planned achievements continues, but is accompanied by a critical reflection on the slower-than-expected pace of implementing scientific advances in the Soviet Union. Delays are attributed to the ‘periodic aggravation of the international situation’, which makes it necessary ‘to divert considerable resources from constructive purposes’. The CPSU Central Committee’s plenary session of 1973 is then quoted, with its message about ‘the need to maintain constant vigilance and be ready to foil any schemes of aggressive reactionary imperialist circles’. Soviet people, Yermolenko contends, strive for ‘durable peace on Earth’; here, he adds a quotation from Brezhnev about the continuation of class struggle, and the necessity of shifting that ‘historically inevitable struggle’ off the war course (Yermolenko 1973, 35–36). The message about coexistence and struggle is repeated by the author elsewhere in the text, but the term ‘class struggle’ is replaced by ‘ideological struggle’ without explanation as to whether these are synonyms (Yermolenko 1973, 84). The coexistence thesis is accompanied by accusations of aggression, somewhat diluting the message of peace and cooperation also present in the volume: The peaceful coexistence of states with differing social systems by no means rules out the ideological struggle. More, in present-day conditions a number of bourgeois leaders try to promote ideological aggression against the socialist countries, doing their utmost to use the latest developments of the scientific and technological revolution to this end. (Yermolenko 1973, 84–85) Yermolenko reinforces this message by adding a quotation from Brezhnev’s speech to the 24th CPSU Congress: We are living under conditions of unbaiting ideological struggle, which imperialist propaganda is waging against our country, against the world of socialism, using the most subtle methods and powerful technical means. (Brezhnev quoted in Yermolenko 1973, 85)

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Classes and ideological blocks are not the sole element of analysis in Yermolenko’s monograph. While the author maintains that scientific and technological progress serves capitalism as means of struggle against the socialist world, he also mentions a possible conflict erupting between capitalist states (Yermolenko 1973, 37, emphasis added but these exact words are used in the monograph). One of the messages the book advances is that: ‘Peaceful coexistence and competition of states with differing social systems is now the only alternative to the arms race and to the growing danger of world war’ (Yermolenko 1973, 39, emphasis added). In addition to delivering this message, the book attempts to engage critically with arguments presented by Daniel Bell and Zbigniew Brzeziński. However, only a few paragraphs are dedicated to the discussion of their work, and the line of attack is somewhat predictable. These scholars, Yermolenko writes, examine the development of science and technology without taking into consideration the relations of production. They thereby provide ‘a distorted picture of objective reality’ (Yermolenko 1973, 46). Yermolenko returns briefly to these authors, describing them unfavourably as ‘bourgeois ideologists of the Rightist variety, including Daniel Bell and the like who were the first to proclaim the “end of ideology” slogan’, and reprimands them for ‘their farfetched mythological schemes’ that go beyond ‘the bounds of direct verification’ (Yermolenko 1973, 91). The philosophical assumption of an objective reality, and the related position that assumes it is possible to describe the essence of social reality, is present throughout the volume, starting from the title of Chapter 1: ‘The Essence and Significance of the Scientific and Technological Revolution’. It is repeated and developed in the opening to Chapter 3: The march of history has repeatedly confirmed the exceptional significance of Marxism-Leninism as a science elucidating the objective laws governing the statics and dynamics of society and illumining the workers’ path towards a classless society. (Yermolenko 1973, 104; emphasis mine) The book’s reliance on Marxism-Leninism is enmeshed with references to official programmes of the Communist Party. In Chapter 2, the author extensively quotes tasks articulated by Brezhnev for ‘the Soviet policy of actively upholding peace and enhancing international security’, particularly emphasizing the struggle for an end to the conventional and nuclear arms race, which ‘continues to be one of the most important trends in foreign policy activity of the CPSU and the Soviet state’(Yermolenko 1973, 56). Yermolenko’s Sotsiologia i problemy mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii. Nekotoryye aspekty i voprosy sotsiologicheskikh issledovanii mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii (The Sociology and Problems of International Relations: Some Aspects and Questions of Sociological Research of International Relations) was printed by Izdatelstvo Mezhdunarodnye Otnoshenia in 1977 in Moscow. Its colophon states: ‘the book is dedicated to the analysis of theoretical problems of international relations’ (Yermolenko 1977). The book ends with a section titled ‘Instead

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of a Conclusion’, which was (and remains) a common way of concluding academic monographs. Here, we read that: The march of history repeatedly confirms the exceptional correctness (iskluchitelnnuju pravilnost) of the Marxist-Leninist theory. The creative application of the Marxist-Leninist theory in foreign policy and international relations, the Communist Party and the Soviet state . . . (uvierienna nahodiat viernyi i pravilnyi kurs). (Yermolenko 1977, 213) These extensive quotations from Yermolenko’s writing illustrate the most serious problem in analyzing Soviet scholarly texts on IR: when an author resorts to ‘Soviet stylistics’,28 their genuine aims and motivations for doing so remain unknown. On a favourable reading, this author succeeded in ‘smuggling’ in several ideas from Western scholarship; for instance, a brief introduction of systems analysis (p. 120), and some valuable critical commentary regarding the excessive ‘mathematization’ of IR research (p. 122–123). But the paragraphs concerning systems analysis lack references to specific literature, and these fragments are difficult to come by in the excessively complex prose, which mixes political statements with ideological commitments. Moreover, a valuable critical stance is often immediately followed by a reference to ‘objective’ laws, as the following fragment illustrates: Bourgeois specialists too are attempting to use the systems approach as a specific method, but it is only the Marxist-Leninist world outlook that adequately reflects objective reality and gives the only correct interpretation of natural and social phenomena and of the processes of thinking. (Yermolenko 1973, 120–121) To an outside observer, it is impossible to tell whether there was a code for deciphering this type of prose, and who might have been adept in using it. It also remains unclear whether genuine commitment to Marxism-Leninism pushed the author towards a hasty dismissal of bourgeois ideas or whether this was an example of a pragmatic and utilitarian use of ideology to secure publication. The challenge of grasping the language in which Soviet scholars expressed their ideas has been noted by authors who dealt with works influenced by ideology. Vadim Birstein, who commented extensively on the Lysenko affair, emphasized (after quoting one of Lysenko’s passages): ‘Please note that these are not poor translations from Russian. In Russian, these statements sound as absurd as they do in English’ (Birstein 2009, 48). The practice of inserting references to classical ideological texts in the social sciences has been criticized by contemporary Russian scholars. Some describe it, with a dose of humour, as cladding intellectual production in a ‘veneer of ideologically acceptable quotations and platitudes’ (Kharkhordin 2015, 1284). But individual motivations behind such practices may have varied, and must have been influenced by many different factors, including anxieties related to the

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security of employment and the fear of having one’s reputation tarnished on the grounds of breaking the rules of ‘proper’ academic conduct. Arguably, scholarly engagement with ideology went much deeper than strategic quoting. A specific version of Marxist-Leninist ideology in Soviet society was instilled not solely through policy speeches but also through the education system, mass media and the arts. It thus had, in the words of Vladimir Shlapentokh, ‘an undeniable impact on the cognitive structure of every member of the society’ (Shlapentokh 1985, 4). Its overbearing presence must have affected people’s attitudes towards what the official viewpoint. While ideology did not have a uniform effect on intellectuals, in Shlapentokh’s account, some intellectuals genuinely believed this official viewpoint. In some cases, ideology was linked to a pragmatic attitude (a ‘careerist accommodation with the system’ [Shlapentokh 1985, 4]); in others, it shaped fundamental understandings of social life, without scholars fully realizing the extent to which they accepted it. Shlapentokh writes that Soviet sociology was ‘born in direct confrontation with Marxism’ (Shlapentokh 1985, 55). Sociologists rejected many Marxist tenets, particularly the insistence on the decisive role of the relations and forces of production, which left little room for analyzing culture and politics as factors impacting on social life. However, despite rejecting these fundamentals, Shlapentokh opines that Marxism did impact the thinking processes of Soviet sociologists: even committed opponents of Marxism are not fully free of Marxist ideas – something which becomes clear when former Soviet intellectuals find themselves in the West. . . . Soviet sociologists most critical of Marxism will find that they imbibed from their education, from the home, from their environment, etc., some of the fundamental notions of Marxism. They take them for granted, and are unaware of their origin. As a result, for example, there is general acceptance of the centrality of conflict in social life. . . . It follows that Soviet scholars, even the anti-Marxists, hold to the notion that social science is crucially shaped by social and political struggle. (Shlapentokh 1985, 56–57) If we apply these observations to paragraphs from Yermolenko’s work, it becomes clear that the concept of struggle dominated Yermolenko’s analysis. In institutional politics, ideology was used, as Shlapentokh suggests, to disguise real political conflict and justify the state’s actions. On the individual level, ideology influenced not only reasoning but also cognition. This account, as well as the conflicting views apparent in the historiography of Soviet IR, illustrates the complexity of academic and intellectual life in the Soviet Union – a complexity is often muted by simple (albeit persuasive) accounts of the overbearing power of ideology.

What were the subjects and methods of IR’s analysis? One debate in the historiography of Soviet IR concerns the ontological assumptions informing the Soviet study of international politics. In the Soviet Union,

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agitating for the expansion of Communism to the rest of the world required taking the class system, rather than states, as the primary frame of reference for the organization of political relations. English-language literature on Soviet IR (Zimmerman 1969; Eran 1979; Lynch 1987; Light 1988) offers additional insights. Zimmerman directly asked how Soviet scholars identify key actors in IR and how they reconstruct ‘the power pyramid’ (Zimmerman 1969, 21–22). He argued that Soviet theorists, especially in the 1950s and 1960s, did not view states as occupying an unchallenged position as the most prominent actors in IR. Zimmerman also emphasized that Soviet scholars placed states, rather than classes or camps (socialist and capitalist), as central actors in IR (Zimmerman 1969, 79–80, chapter 3, 276). Paradoxically, even if Soviet IR writing was based on Marxism, we can hardly speak of a Marxist school of IR in the Soviet Union. A significant portion of Soviet analysis was manifestly state-centric (Lebedeva 2004, 269). Lebedeva argues that state authorities largely used Marxism to reaffirm and maintain the sociopolitical status quo, which made it impossible for scholars to explore and use Marxism’s critical potential. In such conditions, the work of IR scholars was often limited to the interpretation of policy statements issued by the Communist Party (Lebedeva 2004). The Marxist idea of a gradual decline of the state system was replaced by the need to strengthen the socialist state, which came to be regarded as a ‘national mission’, framed in similar terms as the need to strengthen the empire in Tsarist Russia (Bogaturov 2005[1999], 297). In Allen Lynch’s opinion, scholars such as Yelena Modrzhinskaya and Dmitri Yermolenko, working in the 1960s and 1970s, attempted to reconcile a classdeterminist interpretation of IR with the study of relations between states (Lynch 1987, 49–51). Margot Light, in turn, explored Soviet categories used by the Communist Party and Soviet scholars to present international affairs. She emphasized changes in Soviet IR theory and stressed the difficulties of reconciling particular principles, which distorted theoretical coherence (Light 1988, 317). Research in the Soviet IR was additionally complicated by the close intersection of academia and policy worlds. In spite of its emergence as an autonomous discipline, IR theory had to be based on Marxism-Leninism and, as such, remained ‘the preserve of the CPSU’ (Light 1988, 12). As a consequence, key concepts – such as peaceful coexistence – tended to come from top leaders (Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev and Brezhnev), and only later were developed by scholars (Light 1988, 64–66). Light takes issue with Soviet scholars’ claim that Soviet foreign policy is based on a theoretical underpinning (Light 1988, 1). The key concept – peaceful coexistence – was difficult to reconcile with international class struggle, but Soviet scholars put a lot of effort into defining the concept, listing its realworld successes and arguing that the class struggle would benefit from it (Light 1988, 51–55). Light recognizes that, despite impressive literature on the topic, Soviet IR scholars have not developed the concept fully. On the one hand, they could not question Soviet foreign policy behaviour; on the other, the concept itself was incompatible with other aspects of Soviet theory (Light

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1988, 66). Soviet theorists found it difficult to theorize relations among socialist states because different interests of these states were problematic to reconcile with proletarian internationalism and world revolution (Light 1988, 165). Allen Lynch (Lynch 1987) attempted to study Soviet ideas on IR on their own terms, and concluded that ‘Soviet analyses of world politics’ departed from Lenin’s understanding that prioritized class relations (Lynch 1987, 140). Soviet intellectuals dealing with international politics recognized the need to move beyond the repertoire of Soviet categories of political economy. Lynch summarizes this evolution as the concession towards politics as independent of its economic base, the growing role of the state as opposed to classes, and understanding of IR in systemic terms (p. 140). Pointing to the theoretical inconsistency of Soviet IR, some scholars emphasize that the officially required focus on Marxism and programmatic anti-Westernism did not preclude some theoretical borrowings, an ‘unknowing’ engagement with realism and even a ‘symbiosis’ of Marxism-Leninism with neorealism (Lebedeva 2006). Marina Lebedeva argues that scholars relied on the realist/power-political paradigm unknowingly. Their conceptual apparatus developed without a prior reading of Western literature, but still comprised the idea of national interest. Scholars approached power relations between states as the key defining feature of international politics. Lebedeva aptly terms these scholars the ‘unacknowledged and unknowing realists’, and links their state-centric views with the idea of étatism present in the intellectual discussion of Tsarist Russia, as well as with Lenin’s early advocacy for the enhancement of state power in service of the proletarian class (Lebedeva 2004, 269; Lebedeva 2018, loc. 502). Vladimir Gantman, on the other hand, confirms that at least some Soviet scholars were familiar with realism and presented it as a theory of IR that facilitated American expansion. Realist theory ‘helped justify the move from cooperation with the Soviet Union to “Cold War” against it, to arms race, to fight for establishing global hegemony of the US’ (Gantman 1976, 102). Some borrowings were pragmatic – including specific concepts, such as deterrence theory (Light 1988, 224) – and used to provide greater sophistication rather than to undermine or question the official interpretative framework (Lynch 1987, 31).29 Borrowings were not limited to the conceptual framework, however; in Zil’berman’s account, anthropologists borrowed factual information from Western literature but refrained from engaging with and reflecting on broader conceptual schemes. If critique was undertaken, it was partial and appeared to be preconceived (Zil’berman 1975, 136). Despite the insistence on the objectivity of Marxist-Leninist theories, the Marxist framework pushed Soviet scholars towards approaching knowledge produced outside the Socialist Bloc as context-specific. Gantman comments on this process in the following way: The task was to illustrate how those or other ‘new ideas’ stemmed ‘logically and historically from worldviews and history as their necessary continuation’.

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[kakim obraz te ili inyye ‘novyye idei’ vyrastali ‘logicheski i istoricheski iz predshestvuyushchego mirovozreniya i predshestvuyushchei istorii kak ikh neobkhodimoye prodolzheniye’] (Gantman 1976, 458) The analysis of ‘bourgeois’ IR knowledge emphasized the role of capitalist context in informing knowledge claims (see e.g. Yermolenko 1973, 46; Gantman 1976, 458). Gantman wrote, for instance, about the ‘exclusive closeness between bourgeois science of international relations and bourgeois politics and its ideological underpinnings’ (Gantman 1976, 460). Yermolenko pointed to the need to examine scientific progress with due consideration of the relations of production (Yermolenko 1973, 46). While to Yermolenko context played a role primarily in capitalist systems, without doubts the sociopolitical milieu of scholarly work under the Soviet state, with its specific limitations and pressures, had a marked effect on the epistemic practices of Soviet IR scholars. The Soviet period left an imprint on the conceptualization of research, theoretical approaches, research methods and communication. The preference for description and the gathering of abundant factual material dominated social sciences, to the detriment of interpretation and critical engagement. Since information about the external world was extremely limited, Soviet researchers were often required to do the impossible: inform and explain without having access to data. Yefim Hesin, a researcher at IMEMO, reminisces: It was difficult to write economic reviews of the countries that were required for applications to our magazine. There was practically no information. I had to think up something myself, somehow connect the available meagre data. But this was my plus. When the information is limited, and you need to write a survey, you are trying to somehow create a general picture of the state of the economy on the basis of a few data. (Nevskaya 2016, 116) Hesin describes how IMEMO was asked to brief the Central Committee of the CPSU on the 1956 Suez Crisis. Having no access to outside sources of information, analysts had to rely on Soviet news agencies’ correspondents (Nevskaya 2016, 116). Another epistemic practice quite common among Soviet scholars was a largely uncritical engagement with a given subject or literature. While some Soviet scholars castigated ‘bourgeois theories’, they did so in a rather crude manner and according to a well-developed model: these theories are bad because they come from the capitalist world and aim to legitimizing imperialist expansion. What was not developing on a larger scale was a sceptical assessment, relying not on a self-satisfied fault-finding attitude but rather on careful analysis, comprising deliberate inquiry and aiming to drawing sound conclusions. The application of scepticism to not only the subject of analysis but

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also one’s own assumptions, evidence and other aspects of one’s own thinking was not a widespread practice. Suppression meant there was little competition in the realm of ideas and interpretations. As a result, the knowledge and understanding gap between Russian IR scholars and their foreign colleagues widened (Bogaturov 2000; Lebedeva 2004, 270).

The difficult transition: IR and political science in the new Russian state The transition period for the society at large, and for Russian academia as its part, started during the Perestroika years. As early as the 1980s, scholars – particularly those in junior positions – were more vocal about the weaknesses of a highly centralized and hierarchical system controlled by a relatively small group. There was, however, no agreement as to how science and HE should be organized (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 12). Post-1991, Russian academia underwent momentous changes. Its impressive Soviet scale – 1.5 million individuals were classified as researchers or faculty (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 1) – was unsustainable in a country building a market economy. The centralized system of management was dismantled, and it became possible to establish private HE and research institutes, including the European University at St Petersburg, which dates back to 1994. It was also a time when the Russian government, prompted by a group of scholars, decided to establish a new school of economics, one that would teach and research market economy. From its very inception in 1992, and even before the Higher School of Economics gained the status of a university in 1995, the faculty took part in international internships at leading European universities.30 The 1990s saw an increase in academic autonomy and freedom. Many younger Russian scholars received access to Western publications and a chance to attend international conferences, many (for the first time in the post-1917 history) decided to obtain their degrees from Western universities. According to Graham, another of the many significant changes concerned the introduction of a peer-review process (Graham and Dezhina 2008, ix). These positive developments were accompanied by a series of challenges, the most consequential of which was a substantial drop in state funding available to academic institutions (Graham and Dezhina 2008; Sokolov et al. 2015, 479– 491). Social sciences were weakened, both materially and in terms of status, in the early years of the new Russia (Golunov 2014; Sokolov et al. 2015; Dubrovskiy 2017). It faced several monumental and interrelated challenges, centring on the need to fit the new realities of a market-oriented economy and the necessity to shed the previously pervasive Marxist-Leninist ideological orientation. The lack of financial resources made both challenges very difficult to overcome (Lebedeva 2004, 270). Financial difficulties undermined the potential to turn public universities into important centres of research. Teaching was the primary way to survive, in that it allowed universities to receive governmental funding, which was distributed on a

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per-student basis. Throughout the 1990s, lecturers were poorly remunerated and received few incentives to develop their careers beyond teaching duties. This dramatic worsening of financial conditions led to a widespread ‘brain drain’, with scholars choosing either to migrate abroad or to leave science in favour of other career paths (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 23–25). This transition exerted multiple pressures on all areas of the state’s social and political organization. Against such a background, practising science was seen as a luxury; scholars’ protests were repeatedly submerged under waves of discontent stemming from far more ‘significant’ quarters. As Graham explains, when the miners strike and there is a danger of military forces dissenting, the power structures push all other spheres – including science – into the background, and the government does not even attempt to maintain minimum living standards for researchers (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 35). Whereas Soviet scholars had only limited access to the outside world, depleting resources in the aftermath of the Soviet Union’s breakup contributed to reducing external ties; for instance, with regards to journal subscriptions or international conference attendance (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 20). From the mid-1990s on, the demand for HE degrees increased rapidly, due to the rise of the wage premium for those with HE qualifications. The growing number of students was accommodated by the introduction of additional tuition-paying tracks in both the old public and new private HE institutions (Platonova and Semyonov 2018, 344–345). The weight of university diplomas, however, was quickly undercut by proliferating cases of substandard teaching at some newly established universities and university branches, and even forged academic degrees (Golunov 2014; Sokolov et al. 2015). These developments contributed to a radical drop in the status and prestige afforded to academia (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 18). The ethos of academic expertise in the social sciences also suffered severe damage because of its previous Soviet entanglement with Marxism-Leninism [R7]. Ideological positions defended by Soviet scholars on scientific grounds were now entirely undermined. Moreover, the sudden divorce from the Soviet state ideology resulted in a number of hasty moves. For instance, the academic discipline of political science as an was created largely by renaming scientific communism departments, rather than according to a plan of how to advance knowledge in that area (Golosov 2016). Since textbook democracy was also not materializing in Russia, political science lost even more of its legitimacy; in the eyes of students, it was failing to deliver a more plausible picture of reality than scientific communism in the previous era (Golosov 2016). Grigoriy Golosov locates the roots of the (still-popular) thesis that Western political science is unsuitable for the analysis of Russian realities in this time period, adding that this thesis was ‘formed against the background of almost complete absence of ideas about Western political science’ (Golosov 2016). On a more positive note, the opening of the political system in the 1990s was conducive to establishing IR teaching and research beyond key Moscow-based institutions (Lebedeva 2013). In 1994, the Faculty of International Relations

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was established in St Petersburg. Education in IR started to be offered in Nizhni Novgorod, Vladivostok and Ekaterinburg, to name but a few examples. In 1999, the Russian International Studies Association was established with the aim of coordinating IR education (Sokolov et al. 2015, 479–483), and the late 1990s and beginning of the mid-2000s witnessed a rapid proliferation of teaching programmes in IR (Tyulin 2005, 53; Lebedeva 2006). In 2006, Marina Lebedeva calculated that IR programmes were offered by 40 universities across the Russian Federation. By 2018, teaching programmes and research outputs had grown even more considerably, with close to 80 universities were offering degrees in IR.31 Political science and IR also continued to develop in their own institutional homes, comprising separate journals and professional associations (Golosov 2016). A number of US and European foundations have been involved in supporting Russian scholars. Their arrival, in the aftermath of the Cold War, not only created a lifeline for a number of Russian institutions and individual scholars but also introduced different research and quality assessment standards: Foundations and organizations headquartered in more than twenty different countries have pumped the equivalent of several billion US dollars into Russian science. But these foundations and agencies did not just give money; they brought their own political, even ideological, principles, and these have been important factors in the debates about change within Russian science and higher education. In the process of rendering aid, foreign foundations have introduced principles that were entirely new to Russia, such as peer review and open competition for grants. (Graham and Dezhina 2008, vii)32 Political transformations in Russia stimulated not only the creation of IR teaching programmes but also the opening of state-affiliated research institutes and think tanks. A presidential decree established the Russian Institute of Strategic Studies (Rossiiskii Institut Strategicheskikh Issledovanii) in 1992. The Council on Foreign and Defence Policy (Sovet po vneshnei i oboronnoi politike), established in the same year, gathered researchers and political figures. Among the most prominent research institutions established at that time were the Centre for Policy Studies, Carnegie Moscow Center and the Gorbachev Foundation (Lebedeva 2004, 273–274). The absence of state financial support was at least partially compensated by support from foreign foundations, such as Soros, McArthur, Carnegie, Adenauer, Friedrich Ebert, and the TACIS and TEMPUS programmes of the European Union (EU) that aimed at the modernization of higher education (Tyulin 2005, 52). The burgeoning sector of ‘expertise’ had its downsides, however. Once the state monopoly on knowledge production was dismantled, a group of largely self-appointed experts and so-called ‘independent research centres’ (nezavisimyye issledovatel’skiye tsentry) emerged in response to growing demand for expertise in international politics. Opinions unsupported by sufficient academic

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training were quoted by the media under the term politolog (political scientists) (Malinova 2015). This open market in consulting, public relations and forecasting contributed to greater pluralism of debate, but it also further diminished the significance of academic knowledge on international politics and lowered standards (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2005b, 9). Since the main incentive was financial, speedy production rarely went hand in hand with good-quality research and expertise (Tyulin 2005, 56–57). These processes spurred the perception that academia was concerned with abstract theorizing and incapable of adapting to new realities, where practical application of knowledge was paramount. At the same time, the state’s withdrawal created an oligarchic system in science. Critics of Russian academia often point to an important drawback characterizing this highly hierarchical structure, whereby those higher up in the hierarchy – for instance, deans – find it relatively easy to create a broad network of supporters. Post-Soviet developments in the social sciences have been subject to harsh critique. Gel’man and Golosov agree that political science in its majority is best described as ‘science without research’ (Gel’man 2015b; Golosov 2016). Some academic publications in sociology have been considered pseudoscience. Authors of critical assessments have such a high position in academic hierarchy that their status legitimizes substandard research, and even enables these texts to be considered exemplary (Zhuravliyev 2017). Despite the fact that some progress has been made as a result of the state’s policy of encouraging international publication activity, academic standards overall have been rapidly decreasing; the inflation of academic degrees, plagiarism and insufficient funds to attract talent continue to represent chief concerns in this area [R7]. The list of problems that political science and IR have faced includes serious criticism voiced by Russian scholars themselves regarding the approach to research. Taken together, these diverse challenges have hindered the building of a strong academic community – one that would be able to resist outside pressure and defend professional ethics.33 The construction of such a community has been further undermined by weak academic labour unions.

Conclusions This chapter engaged with debates in the historiography of Soviet IR and presented them in the wider context of the complex relationship between political power, ideology, and the definition and development of the sciences in the Soviet Union. Soviet science and Soviet IR are not assessed uniformly; indeed, it would be surprising if they were, given that analysis of 20th-century Russian history is fraught with conflicting opinions and – as Shlapentokh reminds us – has polarized all branches of the social sciences, from history and economics to sociology (Shlapentokh 2001, loc. 84). Engagement with some of the most unsettling characteristics of scientific production in the USSR, this chapter has particularly focused on the role of MarxistLeninist ideology and the high level of control exercised by the Communist Party. The former allowed science to be divided into ‘Soviet’ and ‘bourgeois’;

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the latter often led to the severe repression (and even complete elimination) of disciplines and institutions, as well as the jailing and killing of individuals. The Communist Party, with its immense administrative and security apparatus and claim to legitimacy resting on Marxist-Leninist ideology, largely decided what could be studied, how and to what end. Its influence changed over time. In periods when the regime (for various reasons) was becoming especially hostile to science, entire research directions – such as genetics, sociology and international politics – could be deemed unworthy, and even dangerous. Scientific institutions, such as the Institute of the History of Science and Technology, could be declared centres of anti-Soviet conspiracy and scrapped. Scientists who failed to provide the required evidence or fell out with those holding power, such as Evgenii Varga, jeopardized the future of entire research institutions. Against this background, this chapter has sought to understand how the study of international politics proceeded. I looked at assessments and debates in the historiography of Soviet IR and what they tell us about its starting points, main protagonists and debates. To reconstruct the sociopolitical context of social science knowledge production, and to gauge scholars’ familiarity with literature produced outside of the Soviet Union, I relied on reports of professional experiences from scholars who migrated to the US. Borrowings and semiclandestine openings to Western thought existed, alongside a much stronger trend to pressure social scientists not to engage with ideas castigated as ‘foreign’. IR was, perhaps, more crippled than other disciplines in this regard because of its ‘proximity to power’ (Lebedeva 2004, 266, 270; Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2005b, 10–11). Nonetheless, certain borrowings and transfers of ideas existed, particularly regarding some core tenets of realism and deterrence theory. On the ideological front, IR scholarship relied on a series of doctrinal tenets drawn directly from Lenin and Marx; but the depth of engagement with their writing, and the aim of using Marxism-Leninism, were not the same across time or between individual scholars. A closer analysis of the writings of Dmitri Yermolenko, a scholar recognized for his contribution to Soviet IR, has shown the difficulty of distinguishing between valuable ideas and ideological pronouncements. Knowledge producers were largely uncritical and unreflexive about their epistemic practices. Scarce competition in the realm of ideas stimulated the copying rather than challenging of approaches. Certain epistemic practices and intellectual preferences developed under the Soviet Union have never waned away and seem to have gained legitimacy under the conservative turn, not least because of their traditional anti-Westernist leanings. Historical materialism, description instead of argumentation and the mounting of unsupported clams are not uncommon practices of today. A number of IR scholars who continue their academic work today seem to have been socialized into claiming – and perhaps also thinking – that the ‘laws governing the development of history’ are capable of accurately explaining what objectively takes place in the world, rather than but an interpretation of complex social phenomena and processes. It is not uncommon to hear proclamations along the lines: ‘This is the objective law of historical development’ and

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‘There is a dialectical unity of the main laws’. If questioned whether it is legitimate to speak about contemporary complex social processes in terms of laws of historical development, one scholar responded: ‘Yes, because these laws exist.’ This is particularly true of those who started their academic career under the Soviet Union. This group is also more accustomed to mounting strong claims that lack support in argumentation or evidence. For instance, I was once told: ‘You [me and my fellow researchers in the West] do not do research into these areas because you work under authoritarian conditions.’ It was never explained what authoritarian conditions and who constructs those. This group is also more eager to interpret any type of international event in terms of the US wanting to gain more power. For instance, one scholar interpreted the Maidan protests in Kyiv in terms of Washington’s meddling with the aim of preventing China from gaining influence in Ukraine and contributing to building unity across the Eurasian continent.34 The fact that some of the Soviet practices persist should not be entirely surprising. Problems specific to Soviet academia did not disappear with the abrupt dissolution of the Soviet Union. It is also difficult to change overnight intellectual perceptions and practices built over decades. Not all members of the academic community may agree that it is necessary to change them in the first place. Moreover, throughout the 1990s, academia was largely striped of its elite status, starved of resources and experienced a number of challenges linked to abrupt marketization. These challenges weakened the sector instead of providing the necessary resources and motivation for building wider perspectives.

Notes 1 For an overview of unresolved philosophical problems in Soviet Marxism-Leninism, including those stemming from confusions around the exact sense of the Russian word sovpadenie (used by Vladimir Lenin to define the relationship between dialectic, logic and the theory of knowledge), see e.g. (Blakeley 2013, 18–27). 2 There is no consistency in how this term is used. Vera Tolz used the term ‘old academicians’ to refer to 46 full members of the Russian Academy of Sciences in October 1917, of whom 36 decided to stay in Russia after the Bolsheviks seized power (Tolz 1997). 3 I am grateful to Ivan Kurilla for pointing out this important fact. 4 The Institute was reinstated after the end of WWII, and Bukharin was restored posthumously to membership of the Academy in 1988 (Graham and Dezhina 2008, 142). 5 On the history of Soviet science, see also (Vucinich 1982). 6 Among commentary on the canon of IR, in the mid-1980s Alker and Bierstecker called for the incorporation of proletarian internationalism, including Lenin’s writing on imperialism, alongside other key approaches to analyzing international politics (Alker Jr and Biersteker 1984). 7 Compare with literature on Chinese IR, where Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping’s thoughts are usually regarded as IR’s theoretical resources (Eun 2018, 4). 8 I would like to thank Christine Andrä for drawing my attention to this figure. 9 For this view of the origins of IR as a discipline, see for instance the transcripts of talks delivered at Aberystwyth University as part of the Department of International Politics centenary celebrations: www.aber.ac.uk/en/interpol/about/centenary/events/.

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10 The Institute was preceded by pre-revolutionary voluntary scientific societies for regional study (kraevedeniye), which might be considered precursors of area studies (Tolz 1997, 33). 11 Noticeably, this account has been challenged by postcolonial scholarship, see for instance (Thakur et al. 2017). 12 See Aberystwyth University’s webpage: www.aber.ac.uk/en/interpol/about/centenary/ interpollegacy/timelineofevents/. 13 Birstein also challenged Primakov’s academic credentials, arguing that Primakov was not an economist by training, even though he belonged to the Economic Division of the Academy of Sciences. Birstein adds that, due to the Communist Party’s control over the Academy, there were many cases of appointments being made without taking into consideration scientific credentials (Birstein 2009, 186–187). 14 Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn was initially published between 1922 and 1930 as a bimonthly journal of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. See the journal’s webpage: https://interaffairs.ru/jauthor/material/638. 15 IMEMO was established on the basis of the Institute of World Economy and World Politics (Institut mirovogo khoziyaystva i mirovoi politiki), which was closed down in 1947. 16 For an example of collective leadership, see (Gantman 1976). 17 His thesis’s title was Problema demokratizatsii v kontekste sotsialno-klassovoi dinamiki obshchestva (opyt sravnitelnogo analiza SSSR i SshA [The problem of democratization in the context of social and class societal dynamics (the comparative analysis of the USSR and the US)]. 18 According to the publisher’s description introducing Shlapentokh’s volume, the Delphic Émigré Series comprised works by migrant scholars, selected by Delphic Associates, who, upon arrival in the US from the Soviet Union, had ‘unusual educational and professional backgrounds’ (Shlapentokh 1985). 19 The reprint is available at: http://webground.su/rubric/2012/05/27/sport_badminton/retro/. 20 For more on the links between the Communist Party and the KGB’s oversight over research, see (Shlapentokh 1985, 60–63). 21 For example, V.G. Kalenskii, Politicheskaia nauka v SShA: kritika burzhuaznykh kontseptsii [Political Science in the USA: A Critique of Bourgeois Conceptions of Power], Moscow, Iuridicheskaia literatura. 22 Other examples of resorting to English-language sources include a piece by Roshchin (1987). 23 The issue is available at the INION webpage: http://heritage.inion.ru/storage/pdf/12. pdf. 24 The volume analyzed, in particular, the historical evolution of IR science; theories of foreign policy; systemic approaches to the study of IR; the study of conflict in the Western IR; and theoretical approaches of Western IR to the problem of peaceful coexistence. 25 Importantly, the term ‘scientific’ functioned as a term of approval. It was used as a label signalling high value, irrespective of whether the activity to which the label was attached had been conducted according to the rules of science (Huxley 1949, 175–176). A quotation Pierre Bourdieu uses to open the Postscript to his Homo Academicus suggests that the term ‘professor’ functioned in a similar way. Bourdieu quotes from Leon Trotsky’s My Life, where an academic describes Vladimir Ilyich Lenin as ‘a real professor’ with the aim of paying him ‘the greatest possible compliment’ (Bourdieu 1988, 194). 26 He is remembered as a scholar who showed limitations of the class approach in the analysis of foreign policy and emphasized the continuity of the geopolitical interests of the Russian Empire and the USSR http://mpgu.su/scientists/narochnitskiy-alekseyleontevich/.

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27 The edited volume mistakenly refers to Narochnitski with the initials A.H. rather than A.L. – Alexey Leontievich. 28 I introduce this term to describe invocations of Marxist-Leninist ideology and references to Soviet political leaders and programmes. 29 Light, comparing the Soviet ‘correlation of forces’ and Western ‘balance of power’ theories, noted that both are based on a zero – sum concept of power and ‘define the components of power in very similar ways’ (Light 1988, 286). The major difference is that the ‘correlation of forces’ refers to not only states but also classes (Light 1988, 288). 30 On the basis of the HSE’s official webpage: https://www.hse.ru/info/hist. 31 University rankings webpage: Vuzoteka, https://goo.gl/WL2JxA, last accessed January 2019. 32 In his earlier publication, Graham mentioned that science in the Soviet Union was not based on peer review and research grants, but rather on ‘block funding of entire institutions’ (Graham 1993, 5). 33 By ‘community’, I mean a group of scholars that takes a collective, professional, ethical position. Examples worldwide include resistance to Cambridge University Press’s withdrawal of selected The China Quarterly articles from its Chinese webpage and widespread critical reaction to the publication in Third World Quarterly of an article praising colonialism, which involved the launching of a petition titled ‘Call for Apology and Retraction from Third World Quarterly’: www.change.org/p/ third-world-quarterly-call-for-apology-and-retraction-from-third-world-quarterly. 34 Observations conveyed in these two paragraphs are not derived from interviews but stem from my interaction with scholars at conferences and talks. This is largely due to the fact that such gatherings were my primary point of contact with more conservatively oriented scholars.

References 1973. Political Science: Fundamentals of Political Knowledge. Moscow: Novosti Press Agency Publishing House. Alker Jr, Hayward R., and Thomas J. Biersteker. 1984. “The Dialectics of World Order: Notes for a Future Archeologist of International Savoir Faire.” International Studies Quarterly 28 (2): 121–142. Andrä, Christine. 2019. “A Genealogy of War as a Problem of International Politics.” PhD, Department of International Politics, Aberystwyth University. Aronova, Elena. 2011. “The Politics and Contexts of Soviet Science Studies (Naukovedenie): Soviet Philosophy of Science at the Crossroads.” Studies in East European Thought 63: 175–202. Birstein, Vadim J. 2009. The Perversion of Knowledge: The True Story of Soviet Science. London: Hachette UK. Blakeley, Thomas J. 1964. Soviet Theory of Knowledge. Dordrecht: D. Reidel Publishing Company. Bogaturov, Aleksei. 2000. “Desiat Let Paradigmy Osvoenia (Ten Years of the Mastering Paradigm).” Pro et Contra 5 (1). Bogaturov, Aleksei. 2005[1999]. “The Syndrome of ‘Absorption’ in International Politics.” In Russian Foreign Policy in Transition: Concepts and Realities, edited by Andrei Melville and Tatiana Shakleina, 291–310. Budapest: Central European University Press. Original edition, Pro et Contra, 1999, no. 4, pp. 28–48. Borinskaya, Svetlana A., Andrei I. Ermolaev, and Eduard I. Kolchinsky. 2019. “Lysenkoism Against Genetics: The Meeting of the Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural

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Sciences of August 1948, Its Background, Causes, and Aftermath.” Genetics 212 (1): 1–12. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1988. Homo Academicus. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Checkel, Jeffrey T. 1997. Ideas and International Political Change: Soviet/Russian Behavior and the End of the Cold War. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Cherkasov, Pyotr. 2002. “Kak i pochemu byl zakryt Institut mirovogo khosaystva i mirovoi politiki (How and Why the Institute of World Economy and World Politics Was Closed).” Mirovaya Ekonomika i Mezhdunarodnyye Otnosheniya 5: 92–109. Cherkasov, Pyotr. 2016. IMEMO. Ocherki istorii (IMEMO. The Essays on Its History). Moskva: Ves’ Mir. Choldin, Marianna Tax. 1989. “Censorship Via Translation: Soviet Treatment of Western Political Writing.” In The Red Pencil: Artists, Scholars, and Censors in the USSR, edited by Marianna Tax Choldin and Maurice Friedberg, 29–51. Boston: Unwin Hyman. Dubrovskiy, Dmitry. 2017. “Escape From Freedom. The Russian Academic Community and the Problem of Academic Rights and Freedoms.” Interdisciplinary Political Studies 3 (1): 171–199. Eran, Oded. 1979. Mezhdunarodniki: An Assessment of Professional Expertise in the Making of Soviet Foreign Policy. Ramet Gan, Israel: Turtledove. Eun, Yong-Soo. 2018. What Is at Stake in Building “Non-Western” International Relations Theory? London and New York: Routledge. Friedberg, Maurice. 1989. “Soviet Censorship: A View from the Outside.” In The Red Pencil: Artists, Scholars, and Censors in the USSR, edited by Marianna Tax Choldin and Maurice Friedberg, 21–28. Boston: Unwin Hyman. Gantman, Vladimir I., ed. 1976. Sovremennye burzhuaznyye teorii mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: kriticheskii analiz (Contemporary Bourgeois Theories of International Relations: A Critical Analysis). Moskva: Mezhdunarodnyye otnosheniya. Golosov, Grigoriy. 2016. “Politologiya v Rossii: ne ochen’ radostnyy yubiley (Political Science in Russia: Not a Very Joyous Jubilee).” Troitskiy variant – nauka, 15 November. https://trv-science.ru/2016/11/15/politologiya-v-rossii/. Golunov, Serghei. 2014. The Elephant in the Room: Corruption and Cheating in Russian Universities. Vol. 132. New York: Columbia University Press. Graham, Loren R. 1993. Science in Russia and the Soviet Union: A Short History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Graham, Loren R., and Irina Dezhina. 2008. Science in the New Russia: Crisis, Aid, Reform. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Haas, Peter M., and Ernst B. Haas. 2002. “Pragmatic Constructivism and the Study of International Institutions.” Millennium 31 (3): 573–601. Hill, Ronald J. 1980. Soviet Politics, Political Science and Reform. New York: M. E. Sharpe, Inc. Huxley, Julian. 1949. Soviet Genetics and World Science. London: Chatto & Windus. Kerimov, D.A., ed. 1985. Gosudarstvo i obshchestvo, Ezhegodnik/Sovetskaya assotsiyatsiya politicheskikh nauk (State and Society. Yearbook of the Soviet Political Science Association). Moskva: Sovetskaya assotsiyatsiya politicheskikh nauk. Kerimov, D.A., ed. 1987. Politicheskie nauki i NTR, Ezhegodnik/Sovetskaya assotsiyatsiya politicheskikh nauk (Political Science And Scientific-Technological Revolution. Yearbook of the Soviet Political Science Association). Moskva: Sovetskaya assotsiyatsiya politicheskikh nauk.

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Kharkhordin, Oleg. 2015. “AHR Roundtable. From Priests to Pathfinders: The Fate of the Humanities and Social Sciences in Russia After World.” American Historical Review 120 (4): 1283–1298. Kneen, Peter. 1984. Soviet Scientists and the State. Albany: State University of New York Press. Kuraev, Alex. 2016. “Soviet Higher Education: An Alternative Construct to the Western University Paradigm.” Higher Education: The International Journal of Higher Education Research 71 (2): 181–193. Kurilla, Ivan. 1995. “Amerikanskaya tema v nauchnoi i obshchestvennoi deyatelnosti D.I. Kachenovskogo (The American Problematique in Scientific and Social Activities of D.I. Kachenovsky).” In Amerikanskii yezhegodnik 1994, edited by N.N. Bolkhovitinov. Moskva: Nauka. Kurilla, Ivan. 2005. Zaokeanskiye partnery: Amerika i Rossiya v 1830–1850-e gody (Partners Across the Ocean: America and Russian in 1830–1850s). Volgograd: Tsentr amerikanskikh issledovanii “Americana”. Lebedeva, Marina M. 2004. “International Relations Studies in the USSR/Russia: Is There a Russian National School of IR Studies?” Global Society 18 (3): 263– 278. Lebedeva, Marina M. 2006. “IR Education in Russia: New Dimensions and Prospects.” In Post-Cold War Challenges to International Relations, edited by Yuri Akimov and D. Katsy, 180–191. St Petersburg: Saint-Petersburg State University Press. Lebedeva, Marina M. 2013. “Rossiyskiye issledovaniya i obrazovaniye v oblasti mezhdunarodnykh otnosheniy: 20 let spustya (Russian Research and Teaching in International Relations: 20 Years After).” Rossiiskii Sovet Mezhdunarodnykh Del. https://russiancouncil.ru/activity/workingpapers/rossiyskie-issledovaniya-i-obrazovanie-v-oblastimezhdunarod/. Lebedeva, Marina M. 2018. Russian Studies of International Relations: From the Soviet Past to the Post-Cold-War Present. Stuttgart: Ibidem Press. Levine, Daniel, and David M. McCourt. 2018. “Why Does Pluralism Matter When We Study Politics? A View From Contemporary International Relations.” Perspectives on Politics 16 (1): 92–109. Light, Margot. 1988. The Soviet Theory of International Relations. Brighton: Wheatsheaf. Lynch, Allen. 1987. The Soviet Study of International Relations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Makarychev, Andrey, and Viatcheslav Morozov. 2013. “Is ‘Non-Western Theory’ Possible? The Idea of Multipolarity and the Trap of Epistemological Relativism in Russian IR.” International Studies Review 15 (3): 328–350. Malinova, Olga. 2015. “Kto formiruyet obshestvennoye lico professii (Who Shapes the Profession’s Public Face).” Politicheskaya Nauka (3): 225–236. Matuszewski, Daniel C. 1982. “Soviet International Relations Research.” In Foreign Area Research in the National Interest: American & Soviet Perspectives, 31–44. New York: International Research and Exchange Board. Medvedev, Zhores A. 1979. Soviet Science. New York: W.W. Norton. Milyukov, Paul. 1926. “The Influence of English Political Thought in Russia.” The Slavonic Review: 258–270. Milyukov, Paul. 1927. “The World War and Slavonic Policy.” The Slavonic and East European Review 6 (17): 268–290. Milyukov, Paul. 1928. “A New Slavonic Policy.” The Slavonic and East European Review 6 (18): 481–495.

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Mongili, Alessandro. 1998. “Perestrojka and Science: A Moscow Institute and Its Transformations.” Studies in East European Thought 50 (3): 165–200. Narochnitski, Alexei L. 1981. “About Theory and Methodology of History of International Relations.” In Soviet Studies in Social Sciences, edited by Zafar Imam, 41– 68. New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company. Nevskaya, A. 2016. “. . . IMEMO vnes ochen’ bol’shoi vklad v . . . deideologizatsiyu obshchestvennoi mysli, v pridaniye yey nauchnykh osnov (intervyu E.S. Hesina). (IMEMO Had Enormous Impact on . . . Deideologization of Social Thought, Putting It on a Scientific Basis (An Interview With E.S. Hesin)” Mirovaya Ekonomika i Mezhdunarodnyye Otnosheniya 60 (7): 113–120. Parthasarathi, G. 1981. “Foreword.” In Soviet Studies in Social Sciences, edited by Zafar Imam, v. New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company. Platonova, Daria, and Dmitry Semyonov. 2018. “Russia: The Institutional Landscape of Russian Higher Education.” In 25 Years of Transformations of Higher Education Systems in Post-Soviet Countries: Reform and Continuity, edited by Jeroen Huisman, Anna Smolentseva and Isak Froumin, 337–362. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Polsky, Yury. 1987. Soviet Research Institutes and the Formulation of Foreign Policy: The Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO), Monograph Series on Soviet Union. Sponsored by Delphic Associates. Falls Church: Delphic Associates. Riha, Thomas. 1969. A Russian European: Paul Miliukov in Russian Politics. Notre Dame and London: University of Notre Dame Press. Roberg, Jeffrey L. 1998. Soviet Science under Control: The Struggle for Influence. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press LTD. Roshchin, S.K. 1987. “Nekotoryye psikhologicheskiye problemy mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii v yadernyi vek (Some Psychological Problems of International Relations in the Nuclear Age).” In Politicheskiye nauki i NTR, edited by I.G. Shablinskii, 28– 35. Moskva: Nauka. Schneider, Eberhard. 1987. Wichtigsten zentralen Westforschungsinstitute der UdSSR. Koeln: Bundesinstitut für Ostwissenschaftliche und Internationale Studien. Shahnazarov, G.H., and Yu.A. Tikhomirov, eds. 1982. Aktualnyye problemy sovremennogo politicheskogo razvitiya (The Current Problems of Contemporary Political Development). Moskva: Institut gosudarstva i prava AN SSSR. Shlapentokh, Vladimir. 1985. Sociology and Politics: The Soviet Case. Falls Church, VA: Delphic Associates. Shlapentokh, Vladimir. 2001. A Normal Totalitarian Society: How the Soviet Union Functioned and How It Collapsed. Armonk: M. E. Sharpe, Inc. Smart, Ninian. 2008[1999]. World Philosophies. 2nd revised ed. London and New York: Routledge. Sokolov, Mikhail, Katerina Guba, Tatyana Zimenkova, Mariya Safonova, and Sofiya Chuykina. 2015. Kak stanoviyatsiya professorami: akademicheskiye kar’ery, rynki i vlast’ v pyati stranakh (How to Become a Professor: Academic Careers, Markets and Power in Five Countries). Moskva: Novoye Literaturnoye Obozreniye. Stockdale, Melissa Kirschke. 1996. Paul Miliukov and the Quest for a Liberal Russia, 1880–1918. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Thakur, Vineet, Alexander Davis, and Peter Vale. 2017. “Imperial Mission, ‘Scientific’ Method: An Alternative Account of the Origins of IR.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 46(1): 3–23.

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Theen, Rolf H. W. 1971. “Political Science in the USSR: ‘To Be, or Not to Be” Some Reflections on the Implications of a Recent Soviet Critique of American Political Science.” World Politics 23 (4): 684–703. Tikhomirov, Yu.A. 1987. “Gosudarstvo v sovremennom mirovom soobshchestve (The State in Contemporary International Society).” In Politicheskiye nauki i NTR, edited by I.G. Shablinskii, 35–45. Moskva: Nauka. Tolz, Vera. 1997. Russian Academicians and the Revolution: Combining Professionalism and Politics. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press. Tsygankov, Andrei P. 2018. Russkaya mezhdunarodnaya teoriya. Tri traditsii (Russian International Theory. Three Traditions). Vtoroye izdaniye, pererabotannoye i dopolnennoye ed. Moskva: Rusajns. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov. 2005a. “Postsovetskiye issledovaniya mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii v Rossii: plyuralisatsiya, vesternizatsiya, izolyatsionism (Post-Soviet Research on International Relations in Russia: Pluralisation, Westernization, Isolationism).” In Rossiiskaya nauka mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: novyye napravleniya (Russian Science of International Relations: New Directions), edited by Andrei P. Tsygankov and Pavel A. Tsygankov, 19–48. Moskva: PER SE. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov, eds. 2005b. Rossiiskaya nauka mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: novyye napravleniya (Russian Science of International Relations: New Directions). Moskva: PER SE. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov. 2006. Sotsiologiya mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii. Analiz rossiiskikh i zapadnykh teorii (The Sociology of International Relations. The Analysis of Russian and Western Theories). Moskva: Aspekt Press. Tsygankov, Pavel, ed. 2019. Mezhdunarodnyye otnosheniya: teorii, konflikty, dvizheniya, organizatsii (International Relations: Theories, Conflicts, Movements, Organizations). 4th ed. Moskva: KnoRus. Tyulin, Ivan G. 2005. “Institutsionalnoye izmereniye rossiiskoi nauki MO (The Institutional Dimension of the Russian Science of International Relations).” In Rossiiskaya nauka mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: novyye napravleniya (Russian Science of International Relations: New Directions), edited by Andrei P. Tsygankov and Pavel A. Tsygankov, 49–67. Moskva: PER SE. Vernadskii, Vladimir I. 1927. “Mysli o sovremennom znachenii istorii znanii (Thoughts on the Contemporary Meaning of the History of Knowledge).” In Trudy komissii po istorii znanii (The Works of the Commission on the History of Knowledge). Leningrad: Izdatelstvo AN SSSR. Vernadskii, Vladimir I. 1988. Trudy po vseobshchei istorii nauki (The Works on the General History of Science). Moskva: Nauka. Vucinich, Alexander. 1982. “Soviet Marxism and the History of Science.” The Russian Review 41 (2): 123–143. Yarim-Agaev, Yuri. 1989. “Coping with the Censor: A Soviet Scientist Remembers.” In The Red Pencil: Artists, Scholars, and Censors in the USSR, edited by Marianna Tax Choldin and Maurice Friedberg, 71–78. Boston: Unwin Hyman. Yermolenko, Dmitri. 1973. International Relations in the Era of the Scientific and Technological Revolution. Moscow: Novosti Press Agency Publishing House. Yermolenko, Dmitri. 1977. Sotsiologia i problemy mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii. Nekotoryye aspekty i voprosy sotsiologicheskikh issledovanii mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii (The Sociology and Problems of International Relations: Some Aspects and Questions of Sociological Research of International Relations). Moskva: Izdatelstvo Mezhdunarodnye Otnoshenia.

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Zhuravliyev, Oleg. 2017. “Rossiiskaya sotsial’naya psevdonauka: reiting khaltury (Russian Social Pseudoscience: The Rating of Trashwork).” Troitskiy variant 18: 11. Zil’berman, David. 1975. “Ethnography in Soviet Russia.” Dialectical Anthropology 1 (1–4): 135. Zimmerman, William. 1969. Soviet Perspectives on International Relations, 1956–1967. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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Epistemic practices

Introduction The following excerpt, from a casual conversation with three students, sheds light on how the state’s disperse activities affect concrete lives, research careers and, ultimately, the process of producing knowledge: I was hoping to start my MA in anthropology in September 2017, but my university was forced to suspend all teaching. I used to be a PhD student, but the programme was suspended before I finished my dissertation. I concluded my PhD dissertation, but I did not have a chance to defend it before the licence was revoked.1 In Chapter 2, which discussed the elements of the sociopolitical context salient for knowledge production, I described how two internationally recognised universities, St Petersburg-based EUSP and Moscow-based Shaninka had to withhold teaching activities. Given the scale of HE in Russia (in 2018, HE institutions enrolled 1.1 million students),2 these two universities are minuscule but it does not mean that problems they have been facing are insignificant or go unnoticed. While their plight will not be broadcasted by mainstream media in Russia, niche outlets, social media and solidarity on part of many international scholarly associations helped information about these institutions spread at least in academic circles. Withdrawing a teaching licence as well as revoking official accreditation were generally interpreted as a warning signal. The indirect longterm effect on research is that such actions prompt both scholars and students to consider issues other than their scholarly interests when choosing their research topic, MA or PhD programme, and the university they want to study or work at. Uncertainty regarding the underlying causes of the EUSP’s problems boosts the feeling of insecurity, even if these causes are not associated with the university’s specific research directions or international ties. Scholars at Risk, an international network of academic institutions, in its Free to Think annual report of 2018, concluded that these actions on part of the Russian state ‘represent serious threats to academic freedom and institutional autonomy’, emphasizing that when

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institutions are threatened with closure, the resulting harm extends to the entire HE sector and to society (SAR 2018, 45). Interpreting epistemic practices as the socially organized ways of constructing, communicating, assessing and legitimizing knowledge claims (Kelly and Licona 2018), this chapter looks at those, which are induced or hindered by the sociopolitical context. That knowledge production may be forestalled and that knowledge and ignorance production take place at the intersection of academia and the state are among the major consequences of the state’s entanglement and interference in epistemic practices. I define the co-production of knowledge in terms of academic validation and positive valuation of ideas stemming from the policy world or ingrained in political discourse, manifested in academic outputs such as teaching programmes, conferences, articles and monographs. The production of ignorance (non-knowledge, knowledge gaps, missing knowledge), in turn, means that certain topics never enter the academic and public debate, that they can be muted through practices such as silencing and self-censorship. Since ignorance is wilful – that is, actively produced and perpetuated – it cannot be remedied simply through knowledge acquisition. Science and Technology Studies, STS has shown that the interests of some industrial actors may lie in continued not-knowing. Missing knowledge may concern, for instance, lowcost medical treatment for certain diseases (Ottinger 2013). The case of Russia illustrates that the state is actively, if not always directly, engaged in the production and promotion of not-knowing. Admittedly, institutionalised ignorance is rarely immediately apparent (Frickel 2014). It can, however, be rendered more visible in particular through studying how it comes about. I begin this chapter by exploring how the climate of uncertainty elicits practices of self-censorship, how excessive demands and misplaced oversight lead to declining academic standards and diluted criteria for academic validity and rigour. Next, I discuss how state practices exacerbate divisions in the academic world, making it difficult to speak about an IR community in Russia. These divisions are reflected in the debate about ‘Western’ IR theory in Russia. Making use of the example of EU studies, I show changes in research directions and outputs and explain how they can be attributed to the sociopolitical context of contemporary Russia. The final part of the chapter describes scholarly responses that take the form of accommodation and resistance.

The co-production of knowledge and of ignorance The co-production of knowledge between academia and the state takes many different forms, some of which are direct. The following communication, issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2016, is an example of a direct form of knowledge co-production. The communication concluded a session of the Scientific Council of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a consultative body which aims to involve expert community in the process of foreign policymaking. The Council, according to one of its participants, is supposed to act ‘in order to

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conduct a scientific examination of pressing issues of Russian foreign policy and international relations’.3 The communication read: We held an exchange of views on the main directions of development of the international situation in the medium term. The participants noted the dynamism and profound nature of changes in the international arena, increasing instability and aggravating contradictions associated with the redistribution of the global balance of power and increased competition in all areas of international life. The thesis on the formation of a polycentric system of international relations as an objective trend of the current stage of world development was confirmed. Against this background, the relevance of the provisions on the necessity and relevance of a fairer, more stable world order, based on the rule of law in international relations and collective approaches to solving key problems, while respecting the cultural and civilizational diversity of the modern world, was stressed.4 (emphasis mine) The text of the communication does not make a reference to any concrete research but repeats slogans already circulating in Russia’s foreign policy discourse, in particular the emphasis on the ‘existence’ of a polycentric or multipolar world order.5 Other instances of knowledge co-production are academic journal publications that validate political slogans. For instance, in an article published in a wellknown journal Polis: Politicheskiye issledovaniya (Polis: Political Research), one author addressed the controversial concept of sovereign democracy in a way that amounted to its positive appraisal. The term, the author rightly explains, was introduced by a Russian politician, Vladislav Surkov. Whereas critical literature presents ‘sovereign democracy’ as one that facilitates closing Russia off from any engagement with Europe (Averre 2007, 181–182), according to the author, it is ‘an instrument aimed at protecting society from foreign influences’ (Chugrov 2016, 186). In the article, we also read that the concept originates from a state where the parliament is democratically elected and where the state is opposed to any international meddling. Among conspicuous examples of the practice of knowledge co-production between the state and the academic world is the concept of the Russian World (Russkii Mir), a prominent feature of political discourse (Laruelle 2015), which also started to figure as a research subject (e.g. Bordyugov and Kasayev 2014; Ershov 2017), appears in module handbooks (e.g. Omarova 2011), conference titles and PhD theses.6 A handbook of international politics, published under the auspices of the Faculty of National Security at the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, dedicates one chapter to the Russian World and presents it as a ‘civilizational-cultural phenomenon’ (Buyanov 2015), therefore reaffirming rather than questioning it. Confirming rather than nuancing official anti-Western narratives can be interpreted as another example of knowledge co-production. An emphasis on

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confrontation with the West, exhibited in the state’s official rhetoric (see Skalamera 2018, 11), is discernible in academic discourse. A recent monograph edited by well-regarded IR scholars, argues for instance that, in order to weaken and isolate Russia, the US resorts to provocations, direct threats, political and economic pressure and mass-scale information attacks (Tsygankov 2017, 12). Russia is identified as the target of the West’s hybrid warfare (protiv Rossii razvernuto gibridnoye nastupleniye) (Tsygankov 2017, 15), and international sport organizations are presented as under the command of the US and the EU, which use them to discredit Russia (Tsygankov 2017, 15–16). Another chapter portrays the ‘colour revolutions’ as one of the key problems of international and Russian politics. These revolutions are explained as ‘technologies of organizing coups d’état under conditions of artificially created political instability’ (Manoylo 2017, 51); they cannot be considered ‘genuine revolutionary movements, which result from objective development of historical process’, but technologies applied by the West (Manoylo 2017, 51–52). There are multiple examples of foreign policy experts openly supporting the regime. At the time of revising this book, one of the more broadly discussed was Sergei Karaganov’s article published in the government’s official newspaper, Rossiiskaya Gazeta, titled Remembering the Revolution. Political scientist on the first conclusions that can be drawn following the opposition protests. In this text, Karaganov, presented as dean of the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs, National Research University Higher School of Economics and Honorary Chairman of the Presidium of SVOP,7 is critical about protests that erupted in Moscow in the summer of 2019. On the one hand, Karaganov criticises ‘elites and authorities’ (elity i vlast’) for economic stagnation, closing the social lifts and growing inequality. On the other hand, he makes a quick link between the protests and the West. Karaganov claims that the West is doing everything to weaken and bring Russia down. . . . This fight against Russia is conducted without moral principles, decency and rules. Everyone who weakens [Russia], directly or indirectly, is supported [by the West]: the pro-Western liberal young demonstrators, alleged communists and radicals of all stripes’. (Karaganov 2019)8 Organized ignorance of domestic political and social challenges on part of political figures is widely recognized by Russia observers. They often note that ‘Putin never mentions [Alexei] Navalny [the most prominent opposition leader] by name’ and that ‘silence surrounds the name and killing of Boris Nemtsov [a fierce critic of Vladimir Putin, former governor and minister], at least in official government circles and outlets’.9 It is also generally expected that certain subjects, even if of primordial importance for the country, will not feature in presidential addresses; for instance, corruption was completely avoided in Vladimir Putin’s address to the Federal Assembly in February 2019 (Putin 2019). Active production of not-knowing has affected academia. The

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following examples show how a research theme may be relegated to the margins and how scholars refrain from researching and discussing specific areas of Russia’s external relations. Uncertainty and caution Cases of targeting individual scholars by the state described in Chapter 2, while isolated, contribute to an environment in which critique is raised cautiously or not at all. Academics may not personally fear the coercive apparatus of the state intruding on their affairs, but there is discomfort and insecurity that state bureaucracy might jeopardize their promotion prospects, or even employment, if they overstep the mark or are not cautious enough regarding how they frame their opinions or criticism [R12; R13]. Scholars’ experiences of the state’s presence are felt differently depending on not only personal qualities but also the institution that is their workplace, where they are located in the university hierarchy, the number of subordinates whose career prospects they feel responsible for, the extent to which they are internationally recognized, and their assessments of career prospects outside of academia. There will be winners in every system of power distribution. Without doubt, not all institutions and not all academics will be experiencing the same type of pressures and many will see opportunities to thrive. As a few of my interviews show, some academics may either not be concerned about the sociopolitical context and its repercussions, or, quite understandably, may not be prepared to share their opinions with an interviewer. While not all interviewees were willing to engage with a deliberately broadly formulated question as to whether politics influences research, many pointed to self-censorship as one of the epistemic practices they found themselves unwillingly undertaking. The way scholars interpret and account for self-censorship allows little doubt that this practice is triggered by the sociopolitical context in which research activities take place. Whereas the state does not put a ban on specific research, scholars self-impose limitations on the scope and directions of their academic activity for material-political reasons, such as the fear of losing a job and the perception of what is expected given that research is state-funded. Two academics I discussed these issues with, ascribed the content of IR research in Russia to self-censorship: Writing according to the government line should not surprise you. People do not want to take risks; their employment depends on it. They know they would find it difficult to get a job elsewhere; they cannot compete with those with PhDs from good foreign universities. [R16] Science is entirely dependent on state funding, so the state dictates the narrative, or rather comes up with buzzwords, which researchers then use; some genuinely believe in it, some do it pragmatically, and then there are

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hybrids. . . . Scholars take a deliberate decision not to call Russia ‘authoritarian’. [R8] Other interviewees expressed different levels of concern about self-censorship, as well as distinct understandings of it, which were linked to research, teaching and public appearances: You always have to think twice. I understand self-censorship also as responsibility for students. I introduce libertarian ideas to them and always think where this may take them. I don’t want to push them into traps, because then they go to the streets, they get caught, and then we try to help them; we even pay money for them. [R26] I do not introduce the subject of present-day sanctions to students and I do not know what I would do if one of them asks me about it directly. [R11] There has recently been an incident which illustrates this problem [selfcensorship], but please do not refer to it in your research. [R13] I get invited by mainstream media a lot, but I never go because this would boost their legitimacy and would not contribute to the discussion in any meaningful way. I would be used as a provider of alternative views, which would then be spectacularly destroyed. I also do not want to make their job easier; I will not do the analysis for them and not get paid. [R12] Admittedly, some of my interviewees denied any obstacles to the freedom of expression [R22]. Others shared contradictory assessments regarding selfcensorship, for instance, ‘I can say whatever I want here’, referring to the university where the interview took place, followed by the comment ‘I will never be able to present my book here’ [R27]. Opinions about state interference in the research process were by no means unanimous. One of my interviewees claimed that they were not afraid to speak openly: ‘I know the Kremlin has many towers’ [R5]. ‘Having many towers’ is a widely used metaphor that refers to the architecture of the Moscow Kremlin, a fortified complex, to denote to multiple, rather than one, centres of power in Russia. These may be in some competition with one another and it is assumed that they may grant protection to different people and viewpoints (Ledeneva 2013, 56–59). Even the experiences of individual scholars working on similar topics can differ significantly. Whereas one of my interviewees reported that their suggestion of a report on the effects of sanctions, to be produced with a Russian think tank, was rejected by a funding body [R20], another

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confirmed that their project on the topic of sanctions received state funding [R21]. The key problem is that neither interviewee ascribed these decisions solely to academic merit of the work proposed. In a public post on social media, one academic shared their experience of an editor changing the title of their publication so that it did not contain the term ‘authoritarianism’ with reference to the political regime in Russia.10 Although the academic later clarified that changes introduced to his article should be attributed to the world of academic intrigues, rather than political censorship, in this scenario the two seem to be intertwined. One interviewee mentioned an instance in which a rector asked for the title of an academic conference to be altered so it would not attract unsolicited attention when published on the university’s website [R13].11 Another interviewee mentioned a similar case: We stopped talking about some issues. We had to start adjusting the titles of conferences so it was not obvious that they were on gender or on Ukraine. I presented my research at a friendly organization, and did everything not to include Ukraine in my title, because you don’t know who is going to be at the audience, you don’t want to harm the organization. I did not put the word ‘Ukraine’ in the conference presentation title because I didn’t want the hosting organization to get into trouble. [R37] Some scholars admit they have heard of cases of censorship that make them feel uncomfortable: I don’t see it myself but I have heard about it. For instance, I think the author of an article about bitcoins was fined or even imprisoned. You do not feel comfortable when you hear such stories. [R11] In some cases, self-censorship is linked to a specific HE institution and its links to the government. As one of my interviewees put it: In [name of an academic institution], we have to respect the position of the MFA and not criticize. If you do not agree, you can work for Carnegie. We can voice critique but we need to be politically correct; it needs to be formed in a specific language. [R14] Self-censorship can be ‘compartmentalized’. One of my interviewees told me that they teach global governance to students, but that they stopped presenting this topic at conferences in Russia ‘because the concept is associated with conspiracy theories (teoriya zagovora) and the US-led international order’ [R29]. The unsolicited presence or even interference of various state institutions in some sectors of higher education is at times contrasted with the state’s

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absence in the sphere of research. One of my interviewees commended the state’s absence from research, seeing this as ultimately beneficial to scholars: A university combines two different types of activity: education and research. Education is highly regulated. Rosobrnadzor decides how you need to educate people. Research, in turn, is not regulated. There are no standards of scientific activity. On the one hand, this leads to doubts regarding what knowledge and science actually are. But, thank God, there are no standards. If there were rules, researchers would be told by the state what it wants. [R37] Other conversations partially affirmed this opinion but also pointed to dynamic changes taking place due to the government’s ambition to elevate Russian universities in international rankings: Up until very recently, research has been of no importance to the bureaucrats. It was not part of their obligatory reporting system; the evaluation of student performance has been the most important part. Universities do not pay for research and they are not too interested in it; the university as a body has largely been disinterested in research. But this started changing. [R7] The rising importance of research outputs that would enhance a university’s ranking position was confirmed in other conversations: ‘Salary is linked to publishing and foreign journals are graded higher’ [R14]. At the same time, my interviewees pointed to the growing role of the state in influencing what kind of research scholars conduct. One of them emphasized the sensitivity of research to political signals: ‘shifts in the directions of Russia’s foreign policy can be expected to generate “aftershock waves” in the academic community’ [R6]. Others commented on the effects of state pressure in the following way: Research has become politicized – researchers choose ‘safe’ topics or follow the official line (ofitsialnaya tochka zreniya). It is not that criticizing state policies already in place has become impossible; it is just that such critical voices do not exist. If they try to re-appear, they get criticized as unpatriotic. There is also no tendency to offer alternatives. [R3] Does politics influence research? Yes, definitely. In IR and political science, the influence is significant; all kinds of academic activity are vulnerable and susceptible to changes in political situations. Here at [the name of the university] we live in a relatively safe space. If we keep to purely academic activities and publish abroad, few Russians will read us. It is safe. We have no impact on the domestic situation and no visibility. At the same

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time, publishing internationally gives the impression of academic freedom in Russia. An institution like ours is a façade of a hybrid regime. We lower the tension within Russian society; our university acts as a safety valve; it is a way for students to leave the country. Any person has three options of how to behave towards the state: (i) voice an open protest – Navalny; (ii) exit – building your own world of intellectual freedom or continuing an academic career abroad; (iii) acceptance. It is not the worst situation I have ever lived in; I could probably compare it to the times of Perestroika. [R23] Another respondent pointed to prevailing uncertainty: ‘It is not that being in opposition would immediately put you in jail, but you just do not know what may happen. Plus you get hate comments on social media and you do not want to be the target of hate speech’ [R7]. To some, research is more severely and directly restricted: ‘You are then forced to “trade” only in topics that are tolerated by the state. Often falling into this category in the Russian case is research into youth studies, international security, harmonization of interethnic relations, etc.’ (Zavadskaya 2019). It is much more difficult to research, for instance, political opposition to the current government. An interview I conducted in late 2019 provided an important insight in that regard. While formally outside of my research timeframe, this interview also testifies to the continually shrinking space for academic freedom and is therefore impossible to ignore. After a group of scholars undertook to research the supporters of Alexey Navalny by means of an on-line survey and secured ethical clearance for their project, one of them was asked to step down from this research initiative. The interviewee presented the case as linked to political ambitions of specific members of the university governing body who, at the time of the projects’ launch, competed in Moscow Duma elections and were keen to avoid any potential risks.12 Research into opposition groups is not officially forbidden but it may encounter obstacles due to individual or institutional (that is at a specific university or by a non-academic institution) interpretations of what may be dangerous or risky at a specific pint in time. While in this instance, research obstruction seems to have been situational, such instances accumulate over time. Around the same time, Karine Clément, a sociologist with long-standing roots in Russian academia, was heading from France to a conference in Moscow to give a presentation about the Yellow Vests movement. She found herself stopped at the border and barred from entering Russia for ten years on the grounds that she posed a threat to Russia’s security.13 The excerpts presented earlier from conversations with scholars and from published commentary illustrate that the state can be quite effective in indirectly influencing what kind of content will be researched. It may also have an impact on teaching practices. Problems encountered by the EUSP made this university more cautious. For instance, Boris Vishnevsky, in an interview for Radio

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Ekho Peterburga, described how his employment at the EUSP lasted no more than two months. Invited to lecture in political science at the beginning of 2019, he delivered just one lecture in February of the same year. In Vishnevsky’s own account, following this lecture, the university leadership disclosed to him that several denunciations were written against him and sent off to Moscow (na menya napisali piat donosov v Moskvu) condemning the content of his lecture. Vishnevsky maintains that the lecture covered the same topics he tackles in his publications, mainly civil liberties and how they are violated by the executive power in Russia. Vishnevsky is also a long-serving member of an opposition party – the Russian United Democratic Party Yabloko. He was actively involved in the party’s governing and programming structures and headed the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St Petersburg when the incident occurred. While I have not discussed this issue with an EUSP representative, it is possible that Boris Vishnevsky was offered employment in order to amend one of the violations identified by Rosobrnadzor, namely the too low a percentage of faculty whose primary occupation is practical work in the field in which they teach. This did not prove to be the right tactic. In Vishnevsky’s words, the university leadership was told that if he continued lecturing, the teaching licence would have to be withdrawn again (im tonko nameknuli chto yesli Vishnevsky ostanetsa, to im ne dadut licenziyu opiyat). Not willing to put the university into more trouble, Vishnevsky resigned. In his own assessment, the denunciations were related to the content of the lecture rather than to his political affiliation and activity. In the interview, he maintained that it should be possible to deliver such content to students, especially given that he was doing so at a private, as opposed to state, university.14 One more aspect of this particular interview merits attention. There was no mention during this conversation as to who might be the author of such denunciations, nor who exactly was their recipient. Vishnevsky did not explicitly state who or which institution suggested that the teaching licence might be withdrawn. The journalist conducting the interview did not pose these questions to her interviewee either. There was a tacit agreement between the interviewer and Vishnevsky that the amorphous body of the state was the agential party behind the affair. Growing state supervision of the HE sector shapes knowledge-production also by limiting the amount of time that scholars can devote to research. Scholars often and vocally complain about administrative burden (administrativnaya nagruzka). A survey of scholars working at one of the most prestigious universities, the Higher School of Economics, HSE, conducted in late 2016, showed widespread dissatisfaction with their workloads. Scholars identified five key problems, the most important of which was academia’s shift away from a ‘free’ and intellectstimulating profession to an office- or factory-like job, with continuous reporting, a ‘pipeline’ of tasks and a greater number of unplanned assignments. Scholars complained of teaching overload and the need to fulfil their work obligations in their free time (Abramov, Gruzdev, and Terent’ev 2017). These developments are among the consequences of the imperative of control that is coupled with institutional lack of trust towards scholars. The survey found out that of those

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dissatisfied, 90 per cent said they would like to devote more time to scientific research (Abramov, Gruzdev, and Terent’ev 2017). The most far-reaching consequence is that administrative duties are seen by scholars as replacing knowledgeproduction practices, at the same time as the pressure to publish increases. This judgement found confirmation in another of my interviews: ‘there are contradictory demands on part of the state (konfliktnyye trebovaniya so storony gosudarstva). Excessive teaching load is combined with the push to publish extensively’ [R24].15 The downside of these practices is that academic standards are generally assessed as decreasing. Those who delved deeply into the way sociology as a discipline developed in Russia argue that its trajectory depended to a large extent on the government’s attitude towards this field of research. The relationship of ‘struggle and dependence’ between sociology and government impacted not just on institutional disciplinary arrangements but also on the academic community, exacerbating divisions along political lines among scholars (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017, loc. 195).

Divisions among scholars Internal divisions are a characteristic feature of almost any academic community. In the case of Russia, however, the sociopolitical context exacerbates and to some extent shapes these divisions. Conversations with scholars and a cursory overview of IR production in Russia show stark divisions between scholars along political lines. Some interviewees emphasized that these divisions are purposefully constructed. When asked about a distinction between pro-Western/liberal versus patriotic/derzhavniki16 scholars, they answered in the following way: This classification exists but it has been conceived in order to cause offence. The spectrum is skewed towards pro-government scholars. Liberals/Westerners are portrayed in bad light. This division has to do with Russia’s recent foreign policy actions, especially in Crimea, which increased ideological tensions. These tensions translated in other spheres, including academia. If you label someone a liberal, you diminish the strength of their argument. European/liberal started carrying negative connotations. It is an attempt at undermining academic argument by calling scholars names. A number of scholars within state universities tend to use this classification. They may sincerely think that this battle also takes place in academia, and that some scholars are agents of the West. [. . .] There simply is a lot of poor scholarship that uses this classification to defend itself. [R21] Another scholar linked the liberal-versus-patriotic division to ruptures in the wider society and to funding mechanisms in place: The distinction between statist versus liberal scholars is a specificity of the social and political situation. In social sciences our political views are in the

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open, and they lead to conflicts, such as between liberals versus patriots/ statists. In IR, it is hard to be a liberal because all faculties and schools depend on state funding. There is a growing pressure on this discipline to serve official goals of Russian foreign policy. Political science is more open. [R23] Some interviewees mentioned attitudes towards foreign – mainly ‘Western’ – science as an important dividing line: What divides scholars is their attitude towards Western science. There are those who prefer to focus on Russian society and its problems and Russian-specific features. They focus on Russia even if they know their research will not be useful for other scholars. They find Western theories not applicable because they were constructed on the basis of a different subject. These scholars need their own, home-made theories. Others look more broadly, taking into consideration other scholars outside of Russia. This determines what they read, which conferences they attend. These two groups do not cross each other’s paths. [R24] Internal divisions among Russian academics seem to be entwined with aspirations to speak to domestic or international audience. A significant and consequential choice IR scholars face – one that determines which community they would belong to – is whether to address their research to a local or an international audience. One of my interviewees elaborated on this topic: Some see research as contributing to a wider, universal discussion. I situate myself within this group. You can do two things – either write in Russian, or write internationally [that is, write in English]. This is a difficult choice, but there are many people who want to be accepted as partners abroad. The system, however, creates barriers. [R20] Research into Russian sociology has shown that even within one city, communities of scholars may be isolated and refrain from communicating with each other. Mikhail Sokolov termed these groups Eastside, Westside and the Zone-inTransition (Sokolov 2012, 80–81). More recent research attributes the adoption of either localist or globalist professional perspectives in sociology to a set of general political and cultural attitudes along conservative or liberal lines (Sokolov 2018). Scholarly localism or globalism, this research shows, is less likely to be influenced by social position. In the discipline of International Relations, internal divisions and the choice concerning audience are intertwined with the changing assessments of ‘Western IR’. The following section discusses these changes in some detail.

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Changing attitudes towards ‘Western IR’ and international collaboration There is an ongoing reflection about the state of IR discipline in Russia, with special reference to the reception and application of ‘Western IR theories’ (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2006, chapter 7; Tyulin 2005, concluding chapter, Lebedeva 2004; Lebedeva 2018) and a debate about the prospects for and intellectual content of a Russian school of IR. In his discussion about the development of Russian philosophical thought, Vladimir Zenkovsky argued that the presence of a rich philosophical life in the West very strongly influenced – in both positive and negative ways – Russian philosophical creativity (Zenkovsky 2003, 2). A similar claim can be made about the discipline of IR. Its rapid development in Russia in the early 1990s took place in the context of burgeoning scholarly activity in the ‘transnational-American discipline’.17 The sheer quantity of Englishlanguage IR production, in addition to its variety, must have been an overwhelming background against which to develop formal study of international politics in Russia. To paraphrase Zenkovsky’s claim regarding philosophy, not only a rich past but also a vital present stood before Russian scholars in such strength and abundance that it repressed and hampered interests at the same time as it aroused them (Zenkovsky 2003, 2). The need to establish a Russian school has been a recurrent theme at least since the 2000s (Tsygankov 2002, 12). Back then, Russian scholars identified it as a failure that IR in Russia had not developed a national school, nor offered its own ‘big idea’, comparable in its significance and recognition to the democratic peace theory or international society (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2006, 8–13). Some voices lamented Russian IR’s lack of a ‘core intellectual tradition’ or paradigm, akin to democratic peace (developed in the US), international society (UK) or the harmonious world (China) (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2005, 390–391). Scholars saw three main challenges as hindering the development of Russian IR: the absence of mid-range theorizing, too little empirical research, and excessively abstract theorizing (abstraktnost obscheteoreticheskich razrabotok) (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2005, 386–387). Discussing the need for a Russian school of IR is accompanied by a reflection on the applicability of social theorizing to the specific Russian context. Some scholars take a critical stance towards what they term epistemological selfsufficiency: ‘any theory designed as purposely non-Western is bound to remain self-referential and, in the final analysis, irrelevant’ (Makarychev and Morozov 2013, 333). Andrei Tsygankov argues that isolationism of IR knowledge leads to pseudoscience, conspiracy-type thinking and dogmatism (Tsygankov 2014, 66). Against this backdrop, one specific trend has been more visible over the past decade and a half. From the early 2000s to 2019, Russian IR underwent an important shift: from being open to dialogue with Western IR towards a greater emphasis on nativist knowledge and, in some cases, confrontation with Western IR approaches. Back in 2002, Russian IR scholars recognized the contribution of Western IR and declared their readiness to engage in a conversation.

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Pavel and Andrei Tsygankov described Western IR theory as the most advanced; they saw a need for Russian IR to develop by means of both a dialogue with Western IR and the advancement of Russian theoretical concepts that would enrich global discussion (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2006, 8). A debate in Pro et Contra, an academic journal, about attitudes towards Western social science in Russia concluded in the following way: The variety of opinions expressed during the discussion does not cancel out the fact that none of its participants rejected the need to master the achievements of Western thought and did not consider this task as one already accomplished. Nobody doubts the need for a dialogue with Western social science. (quoted in Tsygankov 2002, 11) This position was repeated on several occasions. Some authors emphasized that Russian IR theory should reflect on its ‘products’, with special reference to Western theoretical and conceptual approaches. This was justified by the assumption that Western IR is more systematized and analytically mature (Tsygankov 2013, 12). More recently, authors have expressed admiration for Chinese accomplishments in overcoming IR’s Western-centrism. They also started calling for dialogue between Russian IR and not only Western but also Eastern ideas concerning international politics: ‘The optimal way for Russia is a dialogue with the dominant and critical international theories in the West and in the East’ (Tsygankov 2018, 15). Some underline that this endeavour should not translate into rejecting international achievements in IR, nor into the construction of anti-American or anti-Western approaches (rech’ ne idet ob otkaze ot mirovykh dostizhenii v izuchenii mezhdunarodnoi politiki ni o sozdanii chego-to antiamerikanskogo ili antizapadnogo v nauke) (Tsygankov 2017, 36). The latter view contrasts starkly with more radical positions. Some scholars express disappointment with the process of domesticating ‘Anglo-Saxon theoretical approaches’, and describes a perceived bias in Western scholarship against Russia and against publishing work authored by Russian scholars (Fenenko 2016). Work published in a prominent IR journal Mezhdunarodnyye Protsessy (International Trends) calls for the development of national interpretations and national methodologies. Claiming that Anglo-American and Russian paradigms of thinking about IR diverge, the author attributes this divergence to the fact that the first camp largely shares the ‘liberal faith’, whereas Russians and Chinese do not (Fenenko 2016, 176). There are no grounds, the argument goes, for engagement between an American professor and someone who does not consider liberal democracy to be a progressive political system, and who would like to see the US defeated in a military conflict and who approaches the annexation of a territory a ‘normal instrument’ of international relations (Fenenko 2016, 174–175). This view has been contested by scholars but this contestation took place on social media rather than in academic outlets. Moreover, one of my interviewees

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commented that, under the worsening political climate and tense relations between Europe and the US, concepts associated with the West are dismissed out of hand: With respect to my regional interests, there is a concept of co-governance but it is very difficult to present to Russian scholars. It is perceived as Western and therefore immediately dismissed. Even though some of our Russian concepts are very similar to the Western ones, those Western ones are simply not accepted. [R29] The position critical or even antagonistic towards Anglo-American IR scholarship extends beyond assessing the intellectual content of an argument and the use and meaning of specific concepts. It resurfaces also in the assessment of practical aspects of conducting research. For instance, Andrey Kortunov, the Russian International Affairs Council’s head, advocated greater integration of Russian social sciences into international research collaboration. The starting point for such advocacy was the view that collaboration to date has existed along neocolonial lines: Even in cases where real scientific cooperation has taken place, the content of the work all too often reveals its ‘neo-colonial’ nature. Russian participants in such projects are mainly there to produce intellectual ‘raw materials’ (by carrying out sociological surveys and field studies and collecting statistics), while their Western partners put themselves in charge of handling the empirical data and presenting the final product to the international academic market. (Kortunov 2017) While such relations are by no means an exception in the deeply unequal world of knowledge production (Kristensen 2015), Kortunov provided no concrete data or examples. Interviews with participants on a project conducted by an institution based in Western Europe and a Moscow-based university allow to draw a more complex picture. The project, according to my interviewees, sought to engage both sides on equal terms from the start; both sides agreed on specific research themes, and both were to contribute financially in compatible ways. However, the project was undermined at the initial stage of implementation because the Russian side received cuts to the budget from their sponsoring agency. The Russian team also unilaterally introduced a topic that was not part of the original joint proposal. The Western European team’s impression was that it was a senior figure from the university, rather than their immediate partners, who influenced those changes: There are certain politically sensitive topics that no one is willing to touch because you cannot be critical about government policy. So you cannot

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really do analytical work on it. There is no room for academic criticism or suggestions for policy improvement. [RVIII; RIX] There was also a significant difference in the amount of time both teams could dedicate to the project: Our Russian partners have a lot of teaching duties and little time to write, even though they are required to publish a certain number of papers. As a result, they develop a productivist approach. What counts is quantity, not quality’ [RVIII; RIX] Critical commentary concerning joint research projects is accompanied by the perception of bias allegedly shared by Western publishers. In September 2017, Izviestia, a pro-government daily, published an article in which it claimed that scientific journals in Europe and the US had begun rejecting publications by Russian scientists. Izviestia based this news on interviews with five leading scientists from RAS and Russian publishers working in the field of physics and chemistry who, according to the newspaper, linked the trend to sanctions imposed by the West. Scientists were also quoted as saying that, against this backdrop of sanctions, they were denied foreign grants (Pogosyan and Kolesnikov 2014). Social science scholar Vladimir Gel’man, experienced in publishing outside of Russia, explained the situation by referring to Vladimir Putin’s 2012 decree on the need to increase the share of Russian publications listed on the Web of Science by 2015.18 The decree was virtually impossible to implement by the set deadline for the simple reason that the publishing cycle – from submission to publication – may take as long as two years. The sanctions presented a more or less viable excuse, and were employed as such by the academic community (Gel’man 2014). Confirming this view, Maxim Nikitin, who published in Nature Nanotechnology and was granted the presidential award in science in 2018, opines that the state-led pressure to publish in high-impact journals does not take into consideration how long that process takes.19 As in many other instances, there is no unanimity when it comes to judging intellectual and practical dialogue between Russian and foreign academia. However, given that reasons for criticism are not always clearly explained or supported with data, it is reasonable to argue that the changing sociopolitical context has played a role in stimulating more critical positions. The following section takes a closer look at the evolution of the EU studies in Russia with the view to examining IR subfield more closely. EU studies in Russia The study of the EU and EU-Russia relations has evolved significantly over the last two decades. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the institutional basis for EU

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studies grew substantially, including through the establishment of new research centres and the creation of the Association for European Studies in 1992, which now boasts as many as 28 regional branches.20 Moscow emerged as the hub of knowledge on the EU, with most of the research conducted at MGIMO, MGU and HSE; other centres include Tomsk State University and Immanuel Kant Baltic State University in Kaliningrad [R4] and St Petersburg State University, which was the first to open a Master’s programme in European studies. One of the interviewees emphasized that the major push for the development of EU studies in Russia came from the outside. The interest was triggered and to a significant extent sponsored by the European Commission, including through its Erasmus Mundus and Jean Monnet programmes [R35]. Alongside institutional developments grew the expert community. In the 2000s, Russian scholars conducted research on a variety of EU-related topics, including the economy, monetary integration, justice and internal affairs, police cooperation, energy policy, and agency in foreign policy, among many others [R3]. A new generation of scholars emerged, who consider themselves well integrated into the international scholarly community; as one of my interviewees put it: ‘They write in English and take part in international research projects. They travel in Europe and Russia for scholarly events’ [R28].21 This area of research grew to such a substantial extent, that it generated meta-research about the field (e.g. Romanova 2015; Dekalchuk and Khokhlova 2019). In the years of worsening political relations between Russia and the EU, and especially following the 2014 Ukrainian crisis, the dominant media and political discourse in Russia has routinely vilified the EU. It started downplaying the role of EU-Russia economic and political ties (e.g. Kosachev 2017); portrayed the EU as determined to deny Russia equal standing in mutual relations (e.g. Putin 2014); almost routinely criticized the EU’s lack of values and morals (e. g. Putin 2013) and the excessive centralization of the EU’s decision-making process (e.g. Putin 2016); emphasized growing instability and chaos in the EU, with examples ranging from Brexit to Catalonia’s independence referendum (e.g. Putin 2017). All in all, this discourse focused primarily on the fragility and instability of the EU and called into question the entire European integration project (Belokurova 2017). This anti-EU discourse has been part of the intellectual climate in which scholarship on the European integration in Russia has been evolving. Political discourse by itself does not need to influence research directions or conclusions. We would also expect the rise of tensions in Russian – European relations to generate more interest and more demand for expertise. It is only a combination of this discourse and a specific sociopolitical context that may change epistemic practices of scholars. On the basis of my conversations with Russian academics, I have identified several trends that started characterizing the study of the EU, European integration and Russia-EU relations since the early 2010s. The first is a decreasing interest in studying the EU and EU-Russia relations, visible at least since 2012. One may speculate that research in this topic is not looked upon favourably by the government and there is less demand for it.

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What supports this claim is that one of the most often provided reasons for dwindling interest in the EU studies was a drop in available funding [R4; R18], as well as fewer opportunities for Russian scholars to engage in research exchange. As the Russian government became less interested in sponsoring EUfocused research, individual scholars had to become more active and determined if they wanted to pursue this line of research: The best way is to have a visiting position, fellowship in one of the EU countries. You need a network, be part of the project and learn. You have to integrate; for example, they like inviting me because they know I am not biased, I speak foreign languages. But for this, you need extreme amounts of energy and devotion. You have to make an extra effort; no one is waiting for you there. We may all be Europeans but we have different starting conditions. [R20] Another interviewee noticed that, after 2014, it was still possible to receive grants to study the EU but the focus of the projects that won funding was specific; for instance, ‘something along the lines of the EU as a business partner under non-conducive political conditions’ [R31]. For those studying relations between the EU and Russia’s regions, increasing centralization of the decision-making process led to the loss of their field of research: In the 1990s, when receiving money from TACIS [the EU programme of technical assistance to post-Soviet states], local people were passive and unprepared. Post-2000, they already had the experience and were interested in the long-term development of this cooperation. But towards the end of the 2000s, the vertical of power [a political slogan denoting greater centralization of power] was announced – Moscow decided to take over all communication with the EU. We lost our field of research. [R19] Some scholars changed the subject area of their research entirely, focusing on other thematic or geographic directions, for instance the Arctic or the Far East. The second trend consists in an altered assessment of the EU and the broadening of the meaning of integration. As one of my interviewees observed: ‘They [some researchers] started underlining the many crises in the EU, such as the euro crisis, migration crisis, Brexit and asking when the EU will fall apart. In the 1990s the approach was much more idealized – the focus was on integration’ [R3]. Another interviewee elaborated on these changes in a similar way: In terms of research, the perception of the EU has changed. We are interested in the internal problems of the EU, euro crisis, migration, Brexit, the Lisbon treaty as a substitute for the failed EU constitution treaty. [R28]

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One respondent criticized their academic colleagues for not adapting fast enough to what they identified as a changing EU: Our assessment of the EU changed. Some of my colleagues are in a difficult process of adapting their views to changes in the EU. For example, [name redacted] is still one of the best experts on the EU, but needs to adjust [their] approach to the actual change in the EU. Their initial approach was based on a too-optimistic hypothesis, but it needs revision because of the EU. [R39] The worsening relations between Russia and the EU have also been reflected in the content of research and teaching programmes. As observed by one of my interviewees: Very little is left of the formerly well-developed research programmes dedicated to the EU and organized largely with the help of the EU’s funding. Only modules (profilnyye programmy), which are stripped of politics, remain; these tend to approach the EU in a technical rather than political way, concentrating on the formal process of integration. [R2; emphasis mine] Another interviewee confirmed this new orientation and pointed to the emerging trend of studying integration not just with respect to the EU but also Eurasia: Our approach has become more practical. We want to gain practical knowledge. We are also interested in how to link European and Eurasian integration, how to turn competition into a process that would be conducive to the development and strengthening of the international position of Europe as a whole. [R28] While the concept of integration was previously used mainly to denote the EU, it is now commonly used to describe the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) and the Greater Eurasian Partnership (also known as Greater Eurasia). As some of my interviewees observed: European integration no longer means the EU for us. There are other integrational initiatives in Europe: European Economic Area, Northern Cooperation, Eurasian Economic Cooperation. [R15] The EU is no longer regarded as the only possible model of integration. [R28]

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One interviewee ascribed changes in the research agenda primarily to growing specialization among researchers. They also pointed towards the need for practical knowledge about integration: Research on the EU has evolved in a natural way; the change in subjects should be attributed to increasing specialization. The first steps were to get acquainted; this is why studies were focused on broad descriptions, something we may call a 101 style. Now the approach is more detailed. It is also more pragmatic – what is useful, i.e. what will have a direct influence on Russia and ‘good practices’ that could be used, even if later no one admits that this or that was copied from the EU. [R11] Other interviewed scholars laid blame explicitly on the EU but without providing a more thorough explanation: ‘The EU has done everything it could so that we study it less’ [R31]. The shift in research was either prompted or accompanied by institutional changes. At MGIMO, the Department for European Studies was established in 2003 (initially with the name Department of European Integration). At that time, it was the first department in Russia conducting research in the area of European integration studies. Professor Olga Butorina, the department’s founder, headed it between 2003 and 2012. In January 2015, the department was renamed the Department for Integration Studies. Quite symbolically, the word ‘European’ was chopped. The Department’s current research interests span a broad spectrum from European integration to ‘the development of the second integration core – the Eurasian Economic Union’.22 Presenting the EEU as an ‘integration core’ is in agreement with Russia’s official policy of insisting on the similarity between the EEU and EU. Another institutional development mentioned in the interviews is the European Studies Institute (Evropeyski Uchebnyi Institut) at MGIMO. According to one interviewee, the institute used to be ‘pro-European’, but it evolved and took a decidedly anti-European direction – exposed, for instance, in the All Europe (Vsiya Evropa) journal it houses [R18]. The institute used to be cofinanced by the EU and Russia. During its first decade, 2500 individuals received a diploma, including 800 state officials and civil servants (gosudarstvennye sluzhashchiye). Since January 2015, the institute no longer receives EU funding and has been reorganized. Its focus is on the EU and Eurasian integration projects. According to information available on its website, it continues to apply for the EU funding within the Jean Monnet programme.23 During one interview, the changing fate of European studies was described in blunt terms: The boom for European studies was in the 1990s, when Russia declared itself to be part of the European family. Back then, the key word was experience; we need experience. There were no academics who knew about

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European institutions. The Institute of Europe, RAS was created in the 1980s, but there were no academics there. It was all about writing policy memos (spravki); there was no theory, it was not academic research. Now they are biased ideologically; they do not publish in peer-reviewed academic journals; they loved the EU in the 1990s, now they hate it. They argue that this European order does not work; they criticize liberalism. [R20] Asked about the assessment of changes in academic discourse on Russia-EU relations, an interviewee described the situation in the following way: The analysis has become saturated with advocacy. The borderline that existed between research and propaganda is no longer that visible. Many scholars degenerated into propaganda warriors. That affects the general discourse. But there is still a group of scholars who try to continue pursuing solid research. This is difficult when the overall environment is so polarized and the key question is: ‘Are you with us or against us?’ This is not a productive starting point for research or debate. This is the most disturbing evolution that I have seen. We should establish some criteria for scholarly decency and quality. [R30] While a substantial number of interviewees pointed to the decreasing interest in the EU studies, quantitative analysis of research outputs did not entirely confirm this. Quantitative analysis of two prominent IR journals Mirovaya Ekonomika i Mezhdunarodnye Otnosheniya (World Economy and International Relations) from 1999–2017 and Mezhdunarodnyye Protsessy (International Trends) from 2004–2017 showed no significant decrease in the number of articles dedicated to the EU. This may suggest that the academic community studying the EU remains substantial and quantitative changes will only become visible over a longer period of time.The following part provides broader context to interviewees’ comments concerning scholarly decency and quality.

Criteria for scholarly validity and rigour The amalgamation of complex Soviet heritage, post-Soviet underfunding, attempts at reform and creeping neoliberal managerialism have left a mark on what is considered to be appropriate academic standards. The inflation of academic degrees and plagiarism are considered among the most salient challenges to scholarly practice in contemporary Russia (Golunov 2014). The development of the pay-to-publish system is also a matter of great concern to those scholars who do not view it as a legitimate way of advancing research. According to one of my interviewees, the latter has become so pervasive that some universities attempt to tackle it by creating blacklists of outlets that publish articles without any attention to academic standards [R5]. In an interview for Realnoye

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Vremiya, Anna Kuleshova, a sociologist and chairman of the Council on the Ethics of Scientific Publications,24 affiliated with the Association of Scientific Editors and Publishers (predsedatel’ soveta po etike nauchnykh publikatsiy assotsiatsii nauchnykh redaktorov i izdateley), describes the situation in the following way: ‘Science turned into a phantasmagoria, we arrived at a point when it became impossible to rely on scientific publications. Any nonsense could be published without a review in a journal that calls itself scientific’ (Kuleshova 2019). In Kuleshova’s view, the difficulty lies primarily in the fact that plagiarism has become normalized, which she attributes to rising expectations as to the number of articles a researcher is expected to produce and publish: ‘Many scientific articles are published without any reviews at all. I think there are more than one hundred thousand such articles a year so that you understand the scale.’ Kuleshova notes that the techniques used to game the publishing system are varied and include adding co-authors who did not participate in the research and using the work of a researcher without their permission (especially if they are lower in the academic hierarchy) and presenting it as your own: Sometimes this is a gift of co-authorship, when a person says that this is ‘my supervisor, he is elderly, and if I add him as a co-author, he will receive a monetary reward’. This is more or less harmless, although it introduces distortions in scientometric indicators. Presently, Kuleshova opines, there is less plagiarism than a couple of years prior, but ‘there are no fewer “junk” articles and dissertations’. In her view, not everyone is prepared to discuss the issue publicly: When I talk about this in my presentations, I often receive applause. And this is a litmus test, because it is not customary to talk about it directly (pryamo govorit’ ob etom ne prinyato), but the problem is real and it is on a large scale: at universities, people are divided into labourers and owners (v vuzakh lyudi delyatsya na “batrakov” i “khozyayev”). A person may work and write good articles without resorting to plagiarism, and then they add the name of the rector or head of the department. She adds that the practice dates back to the Soviet times: In the Soviet Union, attributing the names of the directors of institutes to scientific publications was a regular affair (pripisyvat’ familii direktorov institutov k nauchnym publikatsiyam bylo svyatym delom). This is like a tradition, good manners; and when you say that ascribing the authorship is not proper, the answer is: ‘But how can I not acknowledge the boss, he will not publish anything, he is too busy with administrative work, he will simply throw us out!’ (Kuleshova 2019)

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Problems related to academic standards are not widely debated but a conference held in 2018, titled Problems of the Quality of Scientific Work and Academic Plagiarism, was an example of an open discussion about plagiarism and other markers of declining academic standards. Its participants pointed out that, in general, plagiarism tends to be dismissed as a problem of little importance (Viktor Vasilyev, head of the Russian Academy of Science’s Commission for Countering the Falsification of Scientific Research). Another speaker, Ivan Kurilla, professor at the EUSP, described a phenomenon he termed ‘networks of pseudoscience’ or ‘socialized pseudoscience’ (sotsializirovannaya psevdonauka). These networks produce their own journals, have their own dissertation councils and systems of mutual support. The state, even if it were interested in rectifying the situation, does not have the adequate tools to do so. From the perspective of a bureaucratic apparatus, opines Kurilla, there is no easy way of distinguishing science from pseudoscience because the latter is prepared to fulfil all the formal criteria. Discussing possible solutions to the problem, Kurilla pointed to publishing abroad: ‘We do not trust our science. Those who publish in international journals are scientists (uchenyye); those who do not, are not scholars’ (2018). Some of my interviewees reiterated this point: Publishing in an international journal is a clear sign of quality. Other criteria are formal – the Higher Attestation Commission (Vysshaya attestationnaya kommissiya) has a list of academic journals, and your academic activity is defined by publishing in one of them. This criterion does not work practically, though, because many of these journals are of low quality and it is hard to differentiate good from bad. [R23] Your social network is the most important, especially in terms of a quality check. If you want to hire a team member for your project, you will only use your social network (doveriye tol’ko po setiyam). If there is a publication in a Western journal, there is trust. [R24] Other interviewees shared their pessimism regarding ongoing attempts to raise the quality of research, seeing the reversal of positive trends in the last decade: I no longer think there are specific journals in Russia that could be considered of high quality. The quality of published work will vary within one journal. Ten years ago, we knew what academic knowledge was; right now, we no longer know. [R37] In terms of research quality, ethics committees should play a role, but they are not effective; they are not part of research process. You can research whatever you want, however you want to do it. I never went through an

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ethics committee with my research. Ethics committees are not included in deciding what counts as knowledge. [R37] Both opinions are perturbing but the former exposes more than just a regret about the diminishing status of academic knowledge. The interviewee, commenting on developments in the academic realm, is no longer certain what could be deemed academic knowledge. The lack of functioning and trustworthy qualitycontrol mechanisms forces scholars to rely on either their personal networks or publications outside of Russia in the process of determining quality work and reliable collaborators. The case of Vladimir Medinsky’s dissertation One has to look no further than the nationally debated case of a doctoral dissertation authored by Russia’s Minister of culture (2012–2020), Vladimir Medinsky, to show how the criteria for scholarly validity can be influenced by powerful figures from within the state apparatus. While Vladimir Medinsky’s dissertation is in the field of history, rather than IR, Russian scholars attest that this case illustrates processes that extend beyond any specific discipline. The case gained further prominence because of Vladimir Medinsky’s activity in the sphere of education; he was the deputy chairman of a working group set up by the Russian Historical Society in early 2013 with the aim of elaborating the standards for a unified history textbook.25 Medinsky has figured in Russian politics since the early 2000s. In addition to his political activity, he authored a series of books titled Myths about Russia with a print run of more than 1 million copies (Ivakhnik 2016). These publications were criticized for their erroneous treatment of specific events, the distortion of facts and for functioning as propaganda rather than an information or education resource. Replying to one of his critics in 2012, Medinsky claimed: You naively believe that facts are the main thing in [learning about] history. Open your eyes: no one has been paying attention to them for a long time! The main thing is their interpretation, the angle of view and mass propaganda. This propaganda is widely conducted – some do it because of thoughtlessness; others to execute grants; yet others, who are clearly on some payroll, do it against our country.26 Medinsky employed similar rhetoric when his academic credentials were doubted. In 2011, he defended his higher doctoral thesis (doktorskaya rabota) at the Russian State Social University. In this work, titled Problems of objectivity in covering the Russian history of the second half of the XV–XVII centuries, Medinsky claims to have exposed fraud in notes that foreign travellers wrote about Russia. Initial criticisms of this work appeared in early 2012, but it was only several years later that a group of historians pursued a formal path of

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depriving Medinsky of his doctoral title. In 2016, three historians – two based in Russia, one based in Italy – sent a letter to the Ministry of Education and Science formally asking them to revoke Medinsky’s academic title. They enumerated mistakes in Medinsky’s dissertation, argued that it had not conformed to the academic requirements for the degree and pointed out fragments that may have been plagiarized. They also discovered that five monographs Medinsky listed as of his own authorship in order to fulfil the formal criteria of obtaining the degree, did not exist. Critics quoted one characteristic statement in the thesis in which Medinsky explicitly declares that historians should evaluate their research according to the criterion of Russian national interests: The criterion of a positive or negative evaluation, according to one of our contemporaries – the famous Russian scientist and thinker, O.A. Platonov – can only be one of the national interests of Russia. The first question that historical science has to honestly answer is how much this or that event or act meets the interests of the country and the people. Weighing on the scales of the national interests of Russia makes for the absolute standard of truth and authenticity of historical work.27 Twenty-four members and corresponding members of the Russian Academy of Sciences supported the plea to revoke Medinsky’s academic title in an open letter published in October 2016 in Kommersant, a leading independent Russian daily. The president of RAS, Vladimir Fortov, however, felt obliged to emphasize that the letter did not reflect RAS’s official position. All the letter’s signatories were also members of the July 1 Club (Kluba 1 iyulya), an informal association of academics and RAS corresponding members who disagree with a reform that placed RAS under tighter bureaucratic control.28 The signatories to the letter worked mainly in the area of natural sciences, but Askold Ivanchik – historian, RAS corresponding member and one of the letter’s signatories – explained that this problem extends far beyond any particular discipline and concerns ‘the protection of science and the scientific worldview from pseudoscience’ (Ivakhnik 2016). In their open letter, they declared that Medinsky’s work cannot be considered as meeting the criteria of scientific research: Even apart from numerous errors and inconsistencies in the text of the thesis (which experts have already commented on); and apart from formal violations, such as the inclusion of non-existent works in the list of publications; the main methodical principle underlying this work attracts special attention: the author declares that compliance with the ‘interests of Russia’, which he gives himself the right to determine, is the main criterion of truth and authenticity of historical work (kriteriyem istinnosti i dostovernosti istoricheskogo truda). V.V. Medinsky repeatedly and openly proclaimed as his principle the contempt for historical facts and readiness to replace them with myths, if they correspond to his own idea of national interests. . . . Obviously, works based on such principles are outside of the realm of

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science/scholarship (stoyat za predelami nauki), and if they claim to be scientific, then it can only be a matter of pseudoscience.29 Contrary to his initial promise, made in November 2016, Medinsky did not hand in the text of his dissertation to the Faculty of History of the Moscow State University (MGU), which was supposed to judge the quality of this work.30 Instead, the case was referred to the provincial Belgorod State University. Medinsky only replied to his critics in July 2017, several days before his case was due to be discussed. In an article in Rossiyskaya Gazeta, a daily published by the government of Russia, Medinsky made three simultaneous moves: relativized the study of history, quoted president Putin and launched a tirade against his critics: And why does this discussion start now? My work was written and defended in 2010–2011. Back then I was an ordinary Duma deputy and a publicist, and probably very few people were interested. But after all, no one ever tried to challenge it later, at the peak of the Dissernet’s activity, even in the first years of my work as the Minister of Culture. Why now? What happened? Has another grant come up? Is the election nearing? Or has the topic itself – the reliance on national interest, sovereignty in pursuing cultural and historical policies – become more urgent with increasing external pressure on Russia? ‘We see that attempts are being made to recode the society of our country, and this cannot be unrelated to attempts to rewrite history, to brush it under someone’s geopolitical interests,’ said V.V. Putin at a meeting with historians. We know this is not for the first time. Who manages history manages the future. So it was in the days of Nestor, and Lomonosov, and Pokrovsky, and today. And we are well aware that a true historian is not just studying the past, not just trying to understand it, to comprehend, learn and systematize the lessons of the past. He, through the prism of past experience, interprets the present and offers a programme for the future. For it is said: WITHOUT THE PAST, THERE IS NO FUTURE. (Medinsky 2017; capitalization in original) The Dissertation Council of Belgorod State University discussed the dissertation and declared (22 members for, three abstaining) that it met all the necessary criteria. Several months later, in October 2017, the Expert Council on History of the High Attestation Commission (VAK) took the opposite position and called for Medinsky’s academic title to be revoked. However, a body higher up in the hierarchy – the VAK Presidium – disagreed, and decided to uphold the doctoral degree in history awarded to Medinsky. The Ministry of Education and Science confirmed this decision.31 The debate surrounding Medinsky’s dissertation shows that research integrity remains the core value for many Russian scholars. But it also shows that powerful political players have the upper hand; they can win the support of certain academics and bend or manipulate the criteria of scientific validity. As one of

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my interviewees put it, it became evident that academia was not a powerful enough actor and lacked the strength to fight back: ‘no one believes he [Medinsky] is a historian, but the case of his dissertation remains in limbo’ [R7]. Medinsky’s case triggered a broader debate. An article published in Kommersant, described research in the social sciences as ‘imitation’, arguing that its status continues to be degraded by the state, which monopolizes the funding and has little interest in high-quality expertise. This situation, according to Kommersant, contributes to the creation of ‘research factories’, which produce poorquality or ‘fake’ research en masse: And why dig deep, why adhere to scientific honesty, conduct high-quality research, if the results of your research may end up on the table of, for example, the Minister of culture Vladimir Medinsky, who in his dissertation writes that ‘national interests’ are of greater value than the knowledge of history? (Ruvinskii 2017)32 This journalistic commentary confirms opinions expressed by scholars. Declining academic standards coupled with detrimental state policies and power-political practices prompt concerns about the proliferation of pseudoscience. As a result, scholars are less and less certain of the defining qualities of academic knowledge. Still, it would be too simplistic to conclude that the sociopolitical context breeds corrupt practices and therefore outputs produced under such circumstances should be dismissed out of hand. By far not all scholars engage in forms of malpractice. Margarita Zavadskaya makes a valid point when she asks: ‘Is a career in political science worth it if you live in Russia?’, and concludes that while her answer is in the negative, it is also important to consider what is one to do if they already work in the field (Zavadskaya 2019). Those who embarked on their studies years ago had not foreseen that the political system in their country would change in this particular direction and at this speed. As the following part explains, scholars have reacted differently to the changing sociopolitical context, some through adjustment, others through contestation.

Scholarly responses: accommodation and resistance Against the backdrop of challenges to knowledge production stemming (directly or indirectly) from state policies, a relatively widespread coping strategy is to ‘just get on with it’. This type of accommodation means that scholars do what they can, given the circumstances, and research what they consider possible or acceptable. One of the interviewees summarized this approach in the following way: ‘we can voice our concerns but it will not bring results; this may have been a Soviet approach but it became our contemporary culture’ [R14]. Another interviewee distinguished between two strategies of ‘getting on with it’: Given this context, we adopt two strategies. One is to do research for money, writing reports for ministries – but with no illusion that they actually matter.

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Another is to do research to be part of the international research community, to publish internationally – there are clear incentives for publishing internationally. [R23] Some scholars present reaching out to international audiences not as accommodation but as an act of resistance. They consider it as a way of re-gaining agency through carving out an individual space of academic freedom. It may require certain amount of courage; one of my interviewees presented publishing abroad as akin to an act of treason: ‘If you publish abroad, you belong to a group of people from the West with a Russian surname, you are considered part of the fifth column; but also nobody here [in Russia] will read this’ [R25]. On the other hand, some scholars consider publishing in English to be safer for both themselves and (if interviews are used as a research method) their interview participants.33 Those who publish internationally may also be financially rewarded by the management of their universities, who see it as a way of improving a university’s position in the league tables. Accommodation is accompanied by, or at times interwoven with, different forms of resistance to state practices. These are practised fairly broadly, although – as emphasized by one of my interviewees – resistance does not characterize or come from the profession or academe at large, but rather from individuals and specific professional groups [R7]. In addition, direct and indirect dependence on the state does not necessarily and inadvertently lead to acquiescence. This is the case for both institutions and individuals. As Alexandr Etkind noted, commenting on the protests taking place in Moscow in 2011–12, many of those who took to the streets were financially dependent on the Russian state as employees of state-owned newspapers, universities and corporations (Etkind 2017). Discussing the issue of academic freedom at international conferences is a way of drawing attention to the problem.34 Participation in international events may, however, be limited by mundane obstacles such as visas. In just one academic year (2018/19), I was a direct witness to three such cases, which suggests that, overall, the scale of the problem is significant. All three cases concerned major IR conferences. A scholar holding a Russian passport experienced problems securing a visa to Canada to take part in an International Studies Association-sponsored workshop. Another Russian passport holder was unable to attend the Association’s conference in San Francisco in 2018. Yet another was unable to attend a British International Studies Association, BISA conference in Bath because it was impossible for them to apply for two visas simultaneously (they were in the process of applying for an Australian visa). Despite these obstacles, as Margarita Zavadskaya explains with respect to political science, scholars have managed to make considerable advancements in their disciplines.

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The examples of the European University of St. Petersburg and Moscow HSE clearly demonstrate that it is possible to be published in prominent foreign journals without needing to edit down to every last word. Despite the authoritarian consolidation seen in the country, political scientists have made important breakthroughs, considerably strengthening their methodological framework and leaving the ghetto of descriptive studies. What is more, the top political science departments in Russia have supplied talented graduate students to leading universities around the world. (Zavadskaya 2019) Among efforts to counter the falsification of research and plagiarism, two bottom-up initiatives are particularly noteworthy: Dissernet and the Council on the Ethics of Scientific Publications affiliated with the Association of Scientific Editors and Publishers. The origins of Dissernet go back to 2013, when a group of researchers and journalists established a now widely known network with the goal of raising awareness of and exposing fraud in the awarding of academic titles.35 Dissernet also aims to monitor plagiarism and the standards of scientific journals published in Russia. In particular, it draws attention to cases of incorrect editorial policy, for instance when a journal accepts ready-made reviews together with an article.36 The 2016 saw the establishment of the Council on the Ethics of Scientific Publications (Sovet po etike nauchnykh publikatsii). Its objective is to improve the quality of scientific publications in Russia. It offers support to editors, publishers and authors with regard to issues related to scientific publishing.37 In addition, in December 2018, RAS created two bodies to improve standards in Russian science and limit various types of academic malpractice: the Commission for Countering the Falsification of Scientific Research (Komissiya po protivodeistviyu falsifikatsii nauchnykh issledovanii) and the Commission to Combat Pseudoscience (Komissiya po bor’be s lzhenaukoi). Their task is to reinvigorate efforts of a body that existed since 1998 under the name the Commission Against Pseudoscience and the Falsification of Scientific Research. It is too early to assess the effectiveness of these institutional solutions but their very existence suggests greater recognition of the problem with the quality of academic practice and outputs.38 Professional groups (such as the Free Historical Society) and open-access publishing outlets dedicated to discussing academic affairs (such as Troitsky Variant – Nauka) are other instances of how some scholars have organized to resist unnecessary bureaucratic pressures and expose academic malpractice. The Free Historical Society, established in February 2014, recognizes that ‘the wave of incorrect and obscurantist publications generating and consolidating historical and social ideas that contradict modern scientific knowledge’ was particularly acute in Russia and did not encounter necessary resistance.39 Troitsky Variant defines its aim as the ‘struggle against the degradation of the Russian science’.40 Some developments may be interpreted as resistance through research and teaching in specific areas. In early 2019, the Information Technologies,

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Mechanics and Optics (ITMO) University and the European University launched a joint Master’s programme, titled Science and Technology in Society. Its aim is to train specialists in the social studies of science and technology.41 According to Dmitry Malkov, who heads the Center for Scientific Communication of the ITMO University, the analysis of science and technology helps to ‘identify the causes of conflicts between participants in scientific and technological development, [and] discrepancies in public and political discussion around acute scientific topics such as GMO, vaccination or cybersecurity’.42 So far, the stated goals of the programme focus on hard rather than social sciences but launching this degree scheme by two institutions that had experienced pressure from the state can be interpreted as a strategy of resistance. Institutional resistance can be illustrated with the example of Shaninka, which decided to continue its teaching activities making use of cooperation with Russian and foreign-based HE institutions: We continue to work, and all our students will receive diplomas. British – because Manchester doesn’t give a damn about Rosobrnadzor (Manchesteru naplevat’ na Rosobrnadzor). And Russian – because we have partners who are ready to help. We will do what we have been doing all these years – read, write and teach.43 Admittedly, at the other end of the spectrum of responses is opportunism. The discussion of this practice, however, is much more difficult, given the treacherous challenge of adjudicating between accommodation and opportunism. As is clear from multiple examples of scholars and artists working in the Soviet Union,44 rarely it is possible to assess their motivation and, in particular, to evaluate whether this motivation stems from fear (which would be an instance of coercion) or advantage-seeking (opportunism).

Conclusions This chapter explored the repercussions of the sociopolitical context for scholars’ epistemic practices. I paid particular attention to the co-production of knowledge and the co-construction of knowledge gaps as taking place between the state and academia. I illustrated how the co-production of knowledge may take a direct form, for instance when state institutions obtain or enforce scholarly validation of specific political narratives and concepts. More often, the state uses its financial and supervisory leverage over academia in order to make certain research topics more prominent, promote specific interpretations of international political or eclipse research directions. Overall uncertainty and blurred ‘red lines’, the crossing of which may lead to dismissal or reprimand, requires scholars to compromise and elicits self-censorship. One of the conclusions most salient from the perspective of this book’s overall aim is that the failure to attend to the specificities of context in which IR knowledge is produced prevents us from accounting for the problem of missing

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knowledge. In other words, context may influence what is not there, rather than stimulate the production of specific ideas or claims. It is difficult to account for knowledge gaps if analytical attention is placed primarily on IR theories emerging from different regions of the globe, as has been habitually practised in scholarship to date. Only through a detailed study of context and scholarly responses to this context are we able to reconstruct gaps and omittances in knowledge. This in turn broadens our understanding of the social construction of science. Russian scholars have a number of difficult battles to fight simultaneously. The sociopolitical context exacerbates divisions in the academic community, prompting scholars to group according to political preferences or allegiances rather than academic arguments, the results or interpretation of research. In addition to state interference and a shortage of research funds, scholars in Russia have to confront declining academic standards – a process reinforced by the fraudulent awarding of academic titles, unfair practices in conducting and publishing research, and the multiplication of low-quality journals. On top of this, the state does not fulfil the role of a guardian of academic standards. On the contrary, it prioritises the consolidation of political regime over academic honesty. The proliferation of these opaque practices led scholars to doubt what academic credentials and scientific knowledge actually are. So far, this has not been a productive doubt, or a constructive dialogue on a problem that can only have tentative answers. Rather, it is a doubt that arises out of despair. It has also shaped scholars’ attitudes towards the policy world and limited their readiness to communicate and share their research results with policymakers. The following chapter looks at this problem in more detail. By imposing indirect obstacles to research, the state shapes knowledge production practices and epistemic cultures. In particular, the state implicitly contributes to the widening of divisions between academic communities, obstructs international research collaboration and contributes to the diminishing status of academic knowledge. Against this complex picture, one decidedly positive aspect is the emergence and strengthening of bottom-up initiatives aimed at improving academic standards. Scholars’ joint action has tended to bring better results than the mechanisms of ‘quality control’ designed by bureaucrats.

Notes 1 Conversation held with students in October 2017. 2 The press conference of the Russian Minister of Science and Higher Education, Mikhail Kotyukov: www.edu.ru/news/education/obshchiy-priem-v-vuzy-v-2018godu-sostavil-bolee-1/. 3 See the communication by the Moscow State University whose staff member was invited to join the Council: http://audit.msu.ru/obyavleniya/scientific-council/. 4 The Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ website: www.mid.ru/foreign_policy/news/-/asset_ publisher/cKNonkJE02Bw/content/id/2313196. 5 Among examples of official documents and speeches that refer to the multipolar or polycentric world order are: Russia’s foreign policy concepts (Rossiiskaya Federatsiya 2016, 2013) and Russia’s national security strategy (Rossiiskaya Federatsiya 2015).

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6 For instance, The Russian World: Culture, Philosophy, History and Language, paper delivered at the International Students’ Academic Conference, Astrakhan, 23 May 2014; The Russian World as a Factor of Social Identification of Russian Youth, PhD dissertation, Russian State Social University, Moscow, 2012. 7 The Council on Foreign and Defense Policy. 8 See also Anton Barbashin’s critical engagement with Karaganov’s text: www.ridl.io/ en/one-of-russia-s-top-foreign-policy-analysts-turns-inwards-with-warnings-ofrevolution/ 9 For instance, Rossiiskaya Federatsiya 2015. 10 Public post shared on Facebook by a junior scholar in social sciences and humanities, September 2017. 11 I was asked not to disclose the name of the university. 12 This case has also been reported by Novaya Gazeta: https://novayagazeta.ru/news/ 2019/06/14/152506-issledovavshaya-aktivistov-navalnogo-sotrudnitsa-vshe-rasskazalaob-uvolnenii-iz-za-davleniya-prorektora-kasamara-eto-otritsaet. 13 This case was widely discussed on social media by Russia-based scholars and has been reported in some detail here: www.sociologists.spb.ru/news/1246-oficzialnoezayavlenie-pravleniya-spas-o-zaprete-karin-kleman-vezda-na-territoriyu-rf?fbclid=IwAR2fxZA8Fz9aAwoCiAnUQF9ACsVTOTWiba0cLBwT2EskxvBU-UdCf7I NDyU. 14 Boris Vishnevsky, Ekho Moskvy v Peterburge [Echo of Moscow in St Petersburg] Radio Station, 2 September 2019; video recording of the interview: www.youtube. com/watch?v=tiC7qItcvgQ. 15 For concrete figures concerning teaching loads and salaries, see (Baev 2019). 16 This term is applied to describe those supporting the idea of a strong domestic leadership (meaning a strong leader rather than strong institutions) and hawkish foreign policy with particular emphasis on presenting Russia as a great power. 17 I borrow the phrase from (Denisova-Schmidt 2016, 111). 18 The decree is available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/15236, last accessed 17 August 2017. 19 Quoted in Tatiana Pichugina, Publikujsja ili umri? Kak uchenyh zastavljajut gnat’sja za rejtingami [Publish or die? How scientists are forced to chase ratings], RIA Novosti, 6 February 2018, https://ria.ru/science/20180206/1514033974.html. 20 Information derived from the Association’s webpage: http://aevis.ru/. 21 Noteworthy, a recent analysis of published research outputs suggests that the Russian scholarship on the EU-Russia relations, at least in the Justice and Home Affairs Sector, is not in dialogue with academic knowledge on the subject produced in the West (Dekalchuk and Khokhlova 2019). 22 More detailed information about the Department can be found at: https://english. mgimo.ru/schools-departments/european-studies-institute/department-for-integrationstudies. 23 The Institute’s website: https://mgimo.ru/study/faculty/esi/. 24 The British equivalent would be a committee on academic malpractice, rather than one on research ethics. 25 The idea for the textbook, supported by president Vladimir Putin and the United Russia political party (Haukkala 2017), has since been abandoned. 26 Medinsky’s reply is available at: https://awas1952.livejournal.com/469702.html? thread=43291334. 27 The text is available at the following Dissernet’s webpage: http://wiki.dissernet.org/ tools/vsyakosyak/MedinskyVR_ZoLUS.pdf. 28 The July 1 Club includes leading Russian scientists, among whom are several members of the Presidium of RAS.

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29 The letter, as published by Kommersant daily on 28 October 2016, is available at: www.kommersant.ru/doc/3127495. 30 News report: Medinsky ne otpravil dissertatsiyu na proverku v MGU nesmotriya na obeshhaniye (Medinsky failed to provide his dissertation to MGU), https://snob.ru/ selected/entry/118812. 31 News reports on the case were published at: www.kommersant.ru/doc/3347564; www.bbc.com/russian/news-41472388; www.bbc.com/russian/features-41689537; and https://ria.ru/20171027/1507728865.html. 32 The author goes on to compare the situation of research in Russia to that in Great Britain, which, in his view, is similar. 33 [R40] and a discussion held at The Anxious Society (Trevozhnoye obshchsestvo) conference, the EUSP, St Petersburg, December 2017. 34 For instance, Academic Freedoms and ‘Bureaucratisation’: The Case of Russian Higher Education, paper delivered by Evgeny Roshchin, a Russia-based scholar, at the Annual Finnish Political Science Association conference, Turku, 9 March 2018. 35 The description of Dissernet’s aims and policies: www.dissernet.org/about/. 36 The details of Dissernet’s approach towards journals: http://biblio.dissernet.org/aboutb. 37 The aims of the Council can be found on its website: https://rasep.ru/sovet-po-etike/ polozhenie-o-sovete-po-etike. 38 In late 2019, the Commission for Countering the Falsification of Scientific Research proposed to retract more than 2,500 articles due to instances of plagiarism. The communication of the Commission can be found on its website: https://kpfran.ru/2020/01/ 06/soobshhenie-komissii-o-rezultatah-slushanij-1-oktyabrya-2019-g/. 39 The aims of the Free Historical Society can be found on its website: https://volistob. ru/about. 40 The details can be found on the journal’s website: https://trv-science.ru/about/. 41 https://eu.spb.ru/news/19834-pervaya-sovmestnaya-programma-itmo-i-euspb. 42 Joint communication of ITMO and EUSP: https://eu.spb.ru/news/19834-pervayasovmestnaya-programma-itmo-i-euspb. 43 A public social media post of Viktor Vakhshtayn, Dean of the Sociology Faculty: https://vk.com/id1452598?w=wall1452598_3929. 44 I would count among these for instance Dmitri Shostakovich, a composer, whose dilemmas have been immortalised in a literary account The noise of time by Julian Barnes.

References 2018. “Akademicheskiy plagiat – eto ne krazha, a podlog (Academic Plagiarism Is Not a Theft, But a Forgery).” Troitskiy variant – nauka 264, 9 October: 3–5. Abramov, Roman, Ivan Gruzdev, and Evgeny Terent’ev. 2017. “Rabocheye vremya i rolevyye napryazheniya sotrudnikov sovremennogo rossiyskogo universiteta (Working Time and Role-related Stress of the Employees of the Modern Russian University).” Voprosy Obrozovaniya 1: 88–111. Acharya, Amitav, and Barry Buzan. 2009. Non-Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and beyond Asia. London and New York: Routledge. Acharya, Amitav, and Barry Buzan. 2017. “Why Is There No Non-western International Relations Theory? Ten Years On.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 17 (3): 341–370. Averre, Derek. 2007. “‘Sovereign Democracy’ and Russia’s Relations with the European Union.” Demokratizatsiya 15 (2).

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Baev, Pavel K. 2019. “Anniversary of Death of Russian Opposition Leader Boris Nemtsov Reverberates Four Years Later.” Eurasia Daily Monitor 16 (29). Belokurova, Elena. 2017. “A Russian Perspective on Global Governance.” In Governance from Regional Perspectives: A Critical View, edited by Anna Triandafyllidou, 141–160. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bordyugov, Gennadiy, and Alan Kasayev, eds. 2014. Russkij mir i Rossija: formirovanje novogo tipa otnashenii 1986–2000 gg (The Russian World and Russia: The Creation of a New Type of Relations). Edited by Gennadiy Bordyugov and Alan Kasayev. Vol. 6. St. Petersburg: Associatya isledovatelej rossiykogo obschestva. Buyanov, Valery Stepanovich. 2015. Rossiya v globaliziruyushshemsiya mire (Russia in a Globalizing World). Moskva: Kniga i biznes. Chugrov, Sergei V. 2016. “Sushchestvuyet li nezapadnaya politologiya? (“Politicheskaya teoriya” T. Inoguti) (Is There a Non-Western Political Science? “Political Theory” of T. Inoguti).” Polis. Politicheskiye issledovaniya 4: 182–191. Dekalchuk, Anna A., and Aleksandra Khokhlova. 2019. “Russian and Western Scholarly Perspectives on EU – Russia Relations in Justice and Home Affairs: How ‘Indigenous’ Is the Russian Scholarship?” Journal of Contemporary European Studies 27 (2): 171–183. Denisova-Schmidt, Elena. 2016. “Academic Dishonesty or Corrupt Values: The Case of Russia.” In Corruption in Public Administration: An Ethnographic Approach, edited by Davide Torsello. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. Ershov, Vitaly F. 2017. Russkii mir i severokavkazskoye zarubezhye v XX – nachale XXI veka (The Russian World and North Caucasus Abroad in the 20th – Beginning of the 21st Century). Moskva: Infra-M. Etkind, Alexander. 2017. “Introduction: Genres and Genders of Protest in Russia’s Petrostate.” In Cultural Forms of Protest in Russia, edited by Birgit Beumers, Alexander Etkind, Olga Gurova and Sanna Turoma. London and New York: Routledge. Fenenko, Alexei. 2016. “Pochemu v Amerike ne lubiyat publikovat’ rossiiskikh avtorov (Why They Do Not Like to Publish Russian Authors in America).” Mezhdunarodnyye protsessy 14 (1): 172–180. Frickel, Scott. 2014. “Not Here and Everywhere. The Non-Production of Scientific Knowledge.” In Routledge Handbook of Science, Technology, and Society, edited by Daniel Lee Kleinman and Kelly Moore. London and New York: Routledge. Gel’man, Vladimir. 2014. “Sanktsii ili khaltura (Sanctions or Trash?).” Troitskiy variant 23 September. Golunov, Serghei. 2014. The Elephant in the Room: Corruption and Cheating in Russian Universities. Vol. 132. New York: Columbia University Press. Grove, Jack. 2020. “Retractions Mark ‘Significant Moment’ for Russian Science.” Times Higher Education, 13 January. https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/retractionsmark-significant-moment-russian-science#survey-answer. Haukkala, Hiski. 2017. “Negative Mutual Interdependence? The Clashing Perceptions of EU-Russia Economic Relations.” In EU-Russia Relations in Crisis: Understanding Diverging Perceptions, edited by Tom Casier and Joan DeBardeleben. London and New York: Routledge. Ivakhnik, Aleksandr. 2016. “V zaschitu professionalnogo dostoinstva (In Defense of Professional Dignity).” Politcom.ru, 31 October. Karaganov, Sergei. 2019. “Vspominaya revollyutsii (Remembering Revolutions).” Rossiiskaya Gazeta. https://rg.ru/2019/08/21/karaganov-budet-grustno-esli-my-vnov-nachnemrevoliucionnoe-samoedstvo.html.

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Kelly, Gregory J., and Peter Licona. 2018. “Epistemic Practices and Science Education.” In History, Philosophy and Science Teaching: New Perspectives, edited by Michael R. Matthews, 139–166. Cham: Springer. Kortunov, Andrey. 2017. “A New Model of International Cooperation in the Social Sciences and the Humanities.” 21 April. Kosachev, Konstantin. 2017. “Pravila umerli, da zdravstvuyut pravila? (Rules Are Dead, Long Live the Rules?)” Izvestiya, 15 marta. https://iz.ru/news/670458. Kristensen, Peter Marcus. 2015. “How Can Emerging Powers Speak? On Theorists, Native Informants and Quasi-officials in International Relations Discourse.” Third World Quarterly 36 (4): 637–653. Kuleshova, Anna. 2019. “Bol’shaya chast’ nauchnykh statey – eto krasivo upakovannyy musor (Most Scientific Articles Are Beautifully Packed Rubbish).” Realnoye Vremya. https://realnoevremya.ru/articles/144796-sociolog-anna-kuleshova-o-plagiate-vnauke. Laruelle, Marlene. 2015. The ‘Russian World’. Russia’s Soft Power and Geopolitical Imagination. Washington, DC: Center for Global Interests. Lebedeva, Marina M. 2004. “International Relations Studies in the USSR/Russia: Is There a Russian National School of IR Studies?” Global Society 18 (3): 263–278. Lebedeva, Marina M. 2018. Russian Studies of International Relations: From the Soviet Past to the Post-Cold-War Present. Stuttgart: Ibidem Press. Ledeneva, Alena V. 2013. Can Russia Modernise?: Sistema, Power Networks and Informal Governance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Makarychev, Andrey, and Viatcheslav Morozov. 2013. “Is ‘Non-Western Theory’ Possible? The Idea of Multipolarity and the Trap of Epistemological Relativism in Russian IR.” International Studies Review 15 (3): 328–350. Manoylo, A.V. 2017. “Gibridizatsiya mirovoi politiki (The Hybridization of World Politics).” In Gibridizatsiya mirovoi i vneshnei politiki v svete sotsiologii mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii (The Hybridization of World Politics and Foreign Policy From the Perspective of the Sociology of International Relations), edited by Pavel Tsygankov, 44–96. Moskva: Goriyachaya liniya – telefon. Medinsky, Vladimir. 2017. “Interesnaya istoriya (An Interesting Story).” Rossiiskaya Gazeta, 4 July. https://rg.ru/2017/07/04/vladimir-medinskij-vpervye-otvechaetkritikam-svoej-dissertacii.html Omarova, Z.M. 2011. Rossiya i “Russkii mir” blizhnego zarubezhya. Uchebnoye posobiye (Russia and the “Russian World” of Near Abroad. A Textbook). Moskva: Vostok-Zapad. Ottinger, Gwen. 2013. Refining Expertise: How Responsible Engineers Subvert Environmental Justice Challenges. New York: NYU Press. Pogosyan, Arsenii, and Alexandr Kolesnikov. 2014. “Rossiyskim uchenym otkazyvayut v publikatsiyakh i grantakh za granitsey (Russian Scientists Denied Publications and Grants Abroad).” Izvestiya, 12 September. http://iz.ru/news/576607. Putin, Vladimir. 2013. Meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club. Putin, Vladimir. 2014. Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly. Putin, Vladimir. 2016. Vladimir Putin’s Annual News Conference. Putin, Vladimir. 2017. Meeting of Council for Civil Society and Human Rights. Putin, Vladimir. 2019. Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly. Romanova, Tatiana. 2015. “Issledovaniya Otnosheniy Rossii i Evrosoyuza v Nashey Strane i Zarubezhom (1992–2015 gg.) (Studies on Russia-EU Relations in Our State and Abroad).” Sovremennaya Evropa 5 (65): 100–114.

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Rossiiskaya, Federatsiya. 2013. “Kontseptsiya vneshnei politiki Rossiyskoi Federatsii (12 fevraliya 2013) (The Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation, 12 February 2013).” Moskva. Rossiiskaya, Federatsiya. 2015. Ukaz Prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii ot 31 dekabriya 2015 g. N 683 “O strategii natsionalnoi bezopasnosti Rossiiskoi Federatsii. (The Decree of the President of the Russian Federation, 31 December 2015, On the National Security Strategy of the Russian Federation).” Moskva. Rossiiskaya, Federatsiya. 2016. “Kontseptsiya vneshnei politiki Rossiyskoi Federatsii (utverzhdena Prezidentom Rossiyskoi Federatsii V.V.Putinym 30 noyabrya 2016 g.) (The Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation).” Moskva. Ruvinskii, Vladimir. 2017. “Feyk s maslom (Fake Butter).” Kommersant-Dengi, 4 February www.kommersant.ru/doc/3200685. SAR. 2018. “Free to Think. Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project.” Scholars at Risk. https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/resources/free-to-think2018/ Skalamera, Morena. 2018. “Explaining the 2014 Sino – Russian Gas Breakthrough: The Primacy of Domestic Politics.” Europe-Asia Studies 70 (1): 90–107. Sokolov, Mikhail. 2012. “Izuchayem lokal’nyye akademicheskiye soobshchestva (Studying Local Academic Communities).” Sotsiologicheskiye Issledovaniya 6: 76– 82. Sokolov, Mikhail. 2018. “The Sources of Academic Localism and Globalism in Russian Sociology: The Choice of Professional Ideologies and Occupational Niches Among Social Scientists.” Current Sociology 67 (6): 818–837. Titarenko, Larissa, and Elena Zdravomyslova. 2017. Sociology in Russia: A Brief History. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Tsygankov, Andrei P. 2013. Mezhdunarodnyye otnosheniya: traditsii russkoi politicheskoi mysli (International Relations: The Traditions of Russian Political Thought). Moskva: Alfa-M. Tsygankov, Andrei P. 2014. “Rossiiskaya teoriya mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: kakoi yei byt’? (Russian Theory of International Relations: What It Should Be Like?)” Sravnitel’naya politika 2 (15): 65–83. Tsygankov, Andrei P. 2018. Russkaya mezhdunarodnaya teoriya. Tri traditsii (Russian International Theory. Three Traditions). Vtoroye izdaniye, pererabotannoye i dopolnennoye ed. Moskva: Rusajns. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov. 2005. “Globalnyi mir i budushchee rossiiskoi teorii mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii (vmesto zaklyucheniya) (The Global World and the Future of the Russian Theory of International Relations).” In Rossiiskaya nauka mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: novyye napravleniya (Russian Science of International Relations: New Directions), edited by Andrei P. Tsygankov and Pavel A. Tsygankov, 382–406. Moskva: PER SE. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov. 2006. Sotsiologiya mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii. Analiz rossiiskikh i zapadnykh teorii (The Sociology of International Relations. The Analysis of Russian and Western Theories). Moskva: Aspekt Press. Tsygankov, Pavel A. 2002. “Predisloviye k russkomu izdaniyu. Teoriya mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: sostoyaniye, problemy, uroki. (Preface to the Russian Edition. The Theory of International Relations: The Current State, Problems, Lessons)” In Teoriya mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii na rubezhe stoletii (International Relations Theory Today), edited by Ken Booth and Steve Smith, 5–12. Moskva: Gardariki.

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Tsygankov, Pavel A. 2017. “Vvedeniye (Introduction).” In Gibridizatsiya mirovoi i vneshnei politiki v svete sotsiologii mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii (The Hybridization of World Politics and Foreign Policy From the Perspective of the Sociology of International Relations), edited by Pavel Tsygankov, 12–43. Moskva: Goriyachaya liniya – telefon. Tyulin, Ivan G. 2005. “Institutsionalnoye izmereniye rossiiskoi nauki MO (The Institutional Dimension of the Russian Science of International Relations).” In Rossiiskaya nauka mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: novyye napravleniya (Russian Science of International Relations: New Directions), edited by Andrei P. Tsygankov and Pavel A. Tsygankov, 49–67. Moskva: PER SE. Zavadskaya, Margarita. 2019. “Academic Unfreedom.” Riddle, 11 July. Zenkovsky, Vladimir. 2003. A History of Russian Philosophy. Vol. 1. London and New York: Routledge.

5

The uses of knowledge

In 2019, Dmitri Trenin, head of a well-regarded think tank in Moscow, called on his fellow citizens to engage in a public debate about Russia’s foreign policy (Trenin 2019). A seasoned observer of the Kremlin’s international activities, Trenin opined that Moscow had reached a wall in its relations with the external world and that it was high time to begin a nationwide debate on how to move forward. Indeed, in the 2019 presidential address, Vladimir Putin passed over such important international matters as Ukraine and mentioned Syria only with respect to Russian officer corps training (Putin 2019). Trenin suggested that the ‘professional community’ in the first instance should take it upon itself and aid this state of affairs. An important key question to be asked with regard to Trenin’s call is about the extent to which scholars studying international politics may be willing to share their research with the wider public and offer advice to the government. For a lay observer who enters a bookshop or newspaper kiosk in Moscow, discussions of foreign policy seem to be ubiquitous; they scream from book and magazine covers. However, a more detailed look reveals their largely uncritical character and many a time their outright advocacy for the state’s foreign policy moves. This lack of critical voices prompted observers to characterize international relations experts in Russia as the ‘guardians of the regime’. But the picture is more complex; many scholars withhold from participating in the debate about foreign policy, and those who are willing to share their expertise prefer to tread carefully, as too much criticism may close many doors. This chapter makes use of the third element of the exploratory framework and addresses the question of scholars’ willingness to share research with the public and state institutions. I situate this problem within the wider context of how expertise is used and abused by state institutions in a complex process of knowledge and ignorance co-creation.

The institutional framework for cooperation The literature on Russia’s foreign policy-making generally considers the influence of non-state actors, including academia, to be an exception rather than a rule (Trenin and Lo 2005; Mankoff 2011; Lo 2015; Petrov and Gel’man 2019). As one author puts it:

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Russian authorities ignore the possibilities of dialogue with Western politicalsecurity experts in such forums as the Munich Security Conference as they deem these experts completely irrelevant. Such a stance results from transposing onto the West Russia’s own workings, where experts are not asked about foreign policy. The only thing expected from them is to justify the foreign policy course adopted at the very top. (Gabuev 2018) English-language studies suggest that academic impact on foreign policy may, to some extent, be effectuated through teaching.1 The only two areas in which the literature acknowledges that scholars may play a more direct role are ideational inspiration and policy rationalization (Lo 2015, 5–7). High-profile foreign policy experts (mezhdunarodniki) – including, but not limited to, academics – are often presented as following the official line, or as the ‘guardians’ (okhraniteli) of the regime, whose motivation may vary from genuine persuasion to opportunism (Shevtsova 2017).2 The view that International Relations scholarship in Russia may be ‘policy-based evidence-making’ is quite common.3 At the other end of the spectrum are those openly voicing their concerns about the lack of proper public debate and limited role of scholars in the process of foreign policy decision-making (Okunev 2019). Contemporary legal ramifications of the foreign policymaking process are not particularly conducive to the participation of non-state actors.4 Article 86 of the Russian Constitution makes the president, rather than the government or prime minister, responsible for Russia’s foreign and security policy. By extension, the presidential administration is at least as important as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) in foreign policy-planning and implementation. Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, summed up the foreign policy decision-making process in the following way: ‘To be honest, our President defines foreign policy in the same way as it was determined by the Emperor in the Russian Empire’.5 This centralization notwithstanding, a relatively rich institutional setting for knowledge exchange between the expert community and the government has emerged over the last three decades. The opening of the political system after the dissolution of the Soviet Union made it possible to establish a number of IR research and teaching centres beyond the capital. The 1990s were characterized by the mushrooming of think tanks, private analytical centres, consultancies and so-called polit-tekhnologs, which blurred the boundaries between research, advocacy and propaganda.6 Some of the Soviet institutions attempted to adapt to new realities. For instance, the Academy of Social Sciences became the Academy of State Service (Laruelle 2009, 14). The Russian Institute for Strategic Studies, RISI, was created in 1992 on the basis of a Soviet intelligence research institute. Its new task was to provide state administration with expertise on international politics (Graef 2019). The early 2000s were a period of increased demand and supply of expertise. Economic recovery freed up resources, while the pool of experts – including those with international education diplomas – grew. A new generation of

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young scholars was willing to engage with the policymaking process (Laruelle 2009, 9–10). In 2002, a new journal, Russia in global politics (Rossiya v globalnoi politike), was establish with the view to providing a forum for Russian expert commentary on foreign policy and international politics.7 One of my interviewees pointed to this journal as the major platform for dialogue between research and policy practice (tsentral’naya ploshchadka dialoga) [R3]. Another opined that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reads it [R25]. Some of my interviewees were, however, more critical: ‘if you publish there, you are considered an insider but you have no influence over policy’ [R6]; ‘Rossiya v globalnoi politike adapts its claims to the political situation’ [R20]. Another new initiative – the Valdai Club – was inaugurated in 2004 with the mission of connecting policymakers with Russian and foreign experts. Vladimir Putin’s participation in Valdai’s annual sessions raised its profile considerably. Towards the end of Putin’s second term, the number of think tanks underpinned by conservative and/or nationalist ideology surged. Some of them, for instance the Russian Club, were actively discussing foreign policy issues. It is difficult to assess the actual links and impact these discussions had on the Russian government. Some suggest that they have been little more than a visible element of the internal competition within the regime (Laruelle 2009, 11–12). The period of the ‘tandem’ – that is, Dmitry Medvedev’s presidency and Vladimir Putin’s premiership during 2008–2012 – opened more space for scholars to partake in the debate about domestic and international politics (Efremenko 2017). In early 2008, Dmitry Medvedev promoted the creation of the Institute of Modern Development, INSOR. Headed by Igor Yurgens, this think tank emerged as a ‘liberal’ voice in the public debate (Wilson 2010), contributing to and supporting Medvedev’s domestic modernization agenda and his ideas concerning European security. The year 2010 saw the establishment of the Russian International Affairs Council, RIAC (Rossiiskii Sovet po Mezhdunarodnym Delam). RIAC defines its mission in terms of linking ‘the state, scholarly community, business, and civil society in an effort to find foreign policy solutions to complex conflict issues’8 and according to interviewees it did develop a policy of cooperating with a broad pool of experts, including academics [R30]. Two factors stimulated greater openness. First, the existence of two centres of power resulted in a system that was more pluralistic and open to external advice. Thus, Medvedev’s presidency to some extent institutionalized competition between different factions inside the ruling elite. Second, greater financial capabilities allowed for the sponsoring of diverse academic initiatives. One example is the Northern Dimension Institute, a university network established in 2009 with the aim of informing policies in the Baltic region. The idea for the Institute originated in the academic realm, but it required foreign policy practitioners’ support to be implemented as a multilateral research network [R9].9 The framework of the Open Government programme, inaugurated by thenpresident Dmitry Medvedev in early 2012, allowed for the creation of the Expert Council (Ekspertnyi sovet pri pravitelstve) affiliated with the government and Public Councils (Obshchestvennye sovety) linked to specific ministries.

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These reforms laid the institutional foundation for knowledge exchange involving scholars, non-academic experts and state officials. While the Expert Council provides advice on areas such as economic and social policy, foreign and security policy are outside its remit,10 and no Public Council is linked to the MFA.11 The Charter of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs allows this executive body to ‘establish academic and expert advisory bodies’12 but the MFA has used this opportunity only to a limited extent. The Council for International Law, established in 2009 and composed of international legal scholars, is formally affiliated with the MFA, but according to publicly available data it last convened in 2011.13 A Scientific Council (Nauchnyi Sovet) at the MFA meets on an annual basis. In addition, once a year, the Minister of Foreign Affairs meets with representatives of Russia’s not-for-profit organizations. At one such meeting in 2018, Sergei Lavrov described the aims of this practice as the ‘exchange of views on issues of mutual interest for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and our non-profit organizations’.14 A Public Council affiliated with the Ministry of Defence exists since 2006 but information available publicly about its aims, functioning or concrete achievements is scarce. The Ministry’s website provides only vague and general formulations about its workings: ‘One of the main tasks of the Public Council is to attract citizens (privlecheniye grazhdan) and public associations to the formation and implementation of state defence policy, to put forward and support civic initiatives aimed at protecting constitutional rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of citizens in the framework of civilian control over the activities of the Ministry of Defence.15 The conservative turn in domestic and international policy agendas that has been in place since Vladimir Putin’s return to presidency in 2012 found reflection in the think tank environment. INSOR, associated with the former president Medvedev, lost its influence, its voice mostly disappearing from the public sphere. The Izborsky Club, established in 2012, came to prominence uniting conservative thinkers under the common aim of influencing state policies (Laruelle 2016a).16 Apart from new organizational solutions, some institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) – which provided expertise for the Kremlin during the Soviet period – maintained their links with the policymaking world after the fall of the Soviet Union. For instance, through the officially established positions of liaison officers, the Institute of Europe at RAS cooperates with the MFA and provides policy briefings on the ministry’s request [R31]. Universities, in turn, used to have a relatively weak position as centres for knowledge and expertise production, as their role focused primarily on teaching. This situation has been changing recently, as universities have begun to set up their own centres oriented towards the provision of expertise. For instance, in 2009, Moscow State Institute of International Relations, MGIMO established the Institute of International Research (Institut mezhdunarodnych issledovanii), with the aim of providing expert analysis upon MFA’s request.17 One of my interviewees also directed me to a special webpage, titled MGIMO experts say

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(govoriyat eksperty MGIMO), where scholars working at MGIMO share their views on international politics. Among universities that have placed greater emphasis on expertise provision is St Petersburg State University, which in 2012 established the Centre for Expertise (Tsentr ekspertiz). Its head, Vladimir Semenov, presents expertise provision as one of the statutory activities of the University, and considers the development of this area an important task for the institution. According to information available on the Centre’s website, different entities – including central and local administration, the judiciary, small and medium enterprises as well as individual citizens – can approach the university with a specific question requiring expert knowledge.18 While foreign policy issues do not figure among the expert analyses published on the Centre’s website, it is notable that a substantial part of expert analyses was requested by the Centre for Countering Extremism of the St Petersburg branch of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, MVD (Tsentr po Protivodeistviyu Ekstremizmu Glavnogo Upravleniya Ministerstva Vnutrennikh Del po gorodu Sankt-Peterburgu i Leningradskoi oblasti). MVD requested, for instance, that a specific YouTube video be analyzed as to whether it contained signs of inciting hatred against, or insulting the dignity of, an individual or a group of people on the grounds of their race, ethnicity or language.19 Other requests concern materials published on social media, particularly Vkontakte (a Russian equivalent of Facebook). For instance, a request to analyze whether a non-public post contained ‘denial of facts established by the International Military Tribunal for the trial and punishment of war criminals . . . as well as the spread of knowingly false information about the activities of the USSR during the Second World War’.20 Another MVD request asked whether an opinion expressed by a Russian film director, published on a niche news website, contained calls for or justification of violating Russia’s territorial integrity.21 The type and scope of these requests shows that a large part of the Centre’s activity has been subordinated to the online contentpolicing agenda of the MVD. It is highly likely that similar requests will multiply, together with even tighter legislation concerning the freedom of speech. On the other hand, this type of expert activity gives scholars a chance to limit the potentially vast interpretation of what might be considered extremism or ‘historically false information’. This opportunity is not always used. Boris Grozovski, an economist, writes for The Insider, an independent news and investigative journalism portal, that there are cases where scholars abuse their expert credentials. Grozovski provides several examples of expertise delivered by scholars: a philologist at the Yaroslavl Pedagogical University confirmed that songs posted on a rap group website comprised propaganda in the form of a ‘false concept of freedom (do what you want)’; a philologist at another regional university compared criticism of the United Russia ruling party to a campaign against the Russian statehood. Not all investigations that make use of this type of expertise end in convictions. But, for instance, expertise provided by an academic from the Crimean Federal University contributed to sentencing nine Crimean Tatar activists for extremism. Questions posed to academic experts, writes Grozovski, are formulated in such a way that

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there is little doubt as to the type of an answer the officials are expecting to obtain. In Grozovski’s view, such institutions as the State Regional Pedagogical Institute, depend on the state and if scholars dared to provide ‘wrong’ answers regularly, they would risk their own professional career and the future of their institution: ‘The arsenal of measures is endless – from layoffs to funding cuts’ (Grozovski 2019). Grozovski assesses expertise provision to be a lucrative undertaking that brings more income than teaching. Depending on its complexity and length, it may be priced between 8,000 and 89,000 RUB (100 and 1,100 GBP, respectively). Grozovski refers to a case when in 2018, the Ministry of Territorial Security of the Perm Territory announced a tender for ‘psychological and linguistic research and examination to identify statements of extremist and terrorist nature’, in which the hourly pay was four to five times higher than the rates at regional universities (Grozovski 2019). Another example of a lucrative tender is the one put forward by the State Duma in October 2019. The Duma asked for an expert analysis of how parliaments outside of Russia respond to ‘interference in the internal affairs of a state’ and was prepared to pay 3.7 million RUB (45,000 GBP).22 Thanks to studies published by Russia-based scholars, we know more about the role of various types of expertise in domestic politics (Sungurov, Raspopov, and Belyaev 2012a, b; Sungurov 2015; Malinova 2017; Sungurov 2017). These analyses show that experts face a number of obstacles. Working for domestic government structures, they have some flexibility in their policy-oriented advice, but there is also an implicit mutual understanding of the limits of their autonomy (Sungurov 2017, 11). Experts may be expected to deliver according to the ‘paid-for result’ model (model’ oplachennogo rezul’tata), which means their role is reduced to confirming and legitimizing a predetermined course of action rather than advising on it (Sungurov 2015). Even the existence of a legal requirement to involve independent expertise does not prove sufficient, as government structures strive to maintain control over what experts deliver (Sungurov 2017, 12). When it comes to the evaluation of a specific policy, ‘under current Russian conditions, this evaluation, as a rule, is under control’ (Sungurov 2017, 12). Experts occupying high-level positions at universities and the Academy of Sciences (statusnyye eksperty) are additionally restricted in expressing their views because of wariness that excessive criticism of the authorities might harm the institutions and their employees. Experts working within governmental structures (vnutri vlastnykh struktur), in turn, tend to prioritize the bureaucratic rule of subordination over the delivery of critical analysis (Sungurov 2017, 12–13).23 With respect to civic groups, such as socially oriented NGOs, their expertise is harnessed by the government but their participation in the process is controlled (Owen and Bindman 2017). Dmitry Dubrovskiy, a historian and lecturer at the HSE, adds that the shift towards conservatism increased the status of experts with clear conservative leanings, who previously had had no significant influence or role in the decisionmaking processes. Dubrovskiy provides several examples, among them one

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concerns an ‘expert’ who, as ‘doctor of psychology, associate member of the Russian Academy of Education, and chief researcher of the laboratory of psychological anthropology and professional pedagogical development at the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute for the Study of Childhood and Family’, undertook a ‘psychological and linguistic’ analysis of a popular Russian TV show Comedy Woman, concluding that the recordings of the show ‘constitute an act of psychological sabotage aimed at the destruction of traditional Russian values’. Dubrovskiy provides another example of Vladimir Rukinov, a professor, who supported the prosecution in the so called ‘foreign agent’ cases in St Petersburg but is also known to be the former employee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Regional Foundation for Supporting Employees and Veterans of the FSB and Military Counterintelligence. Dubrovskiy concludes in the following way: Thus the conservative turn in Russian politics has been carried out with the aid of a specially selected pool of experts from all walks academia; from linguistics to history. . . . The state is once again trying to incorporate the social sciences and humanities into its ideologically committed repressive apparatus. In achieving that task, it now has friends on the inside. (Dubrovskiy 2019) Vladimir Putin’s third presidential term reinforced the contrast between a relatively rich institutional structure for knowledge exchange on the one hand and officials’ growing uneasiness with expert input on the other. The fourth term continues that trend, especially with the scrapping of the ministerial post supervising the Open Government initiative.24 While scholars supporting – genuinely or for pragmatic reasons – the conservative turn may see an increase in demand for their contribution, other scholars will feel discouraged from active participation in the public debate and from expert engagement with the foreign policymaking process, regardless of the existing formal structures for cooperation.

Interfering with the communication of research The process of communicating research to the broader public is often mediated by institutions loyal to the state. Both printed and TV media may interfere with what is being said and how. As political scientist Ekaterina Schulmann explains, on the basis of her personal experience with First Channel (Pervyi kanal) state television, scholars may find themselves participating in portions of a programme in which they are asked not to comment but to sit silently. Their very presence, however, lends credibility to what is being discussed. Even when actively participating, their voice may be muted while the host largely dictates the discussion.25 These observations were confirmed by a scholar of history at a public talk hosted by the EUSP,26 as well as by two of my interviewees, who described similar experiences and added that these prompted them to withdraw completely from participation in programmes run by state media [R12;

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R20]. One respondent opined that no self-respecting IR expert would be willing to participate in a televised debate because these events are meant as a show and have little in common with genuine expert discussion [R40]. Another of my interviewees put it in the following way: I was invited for interviews by the Russian television, but I realized I was the source of legitimization. However, I also admit that it was always tempting for me to appear on TV. This is how the system works; they turn people into puppets. But, once you are turned into a public intellectual, you don’t do critical thinking. [R20] Another example is the printed press, which, either purposefully and with a view to reinforce a certain narrative and furnish it with academic legitimacy, or due to poor journalistic standards, may deliver skewed information about academic events. For instance, in an article dedicated to an international academic conference organized at Moscow State University, the Izvestiya daily wrote – two weeks in advance of the event, and without referring to a source – that the conference would analyze the repercussions of tsar Nikolay II’s abdication. In the concluding resolution of the conference, Izvestiya reported: ‘[it] has been planned to underline the negative effects of this historical fact on the state’s development and conclude that the time of revolutions has passed’. Izvestiya’s report emphasized that academics from Russia, China, the UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, Finland, Poland and Belarus (in that order) were due to participate and to provide ‘scientific assessments’ (dadut nauchnye ocenki) (Ladilova 2017). It is difficult to believe that Izvestiya could have access to a post-conference report two weeks in advance of it actually taking place, especially that the event foresaw international participation. A tactic combining malevolent media activity with direct personal assault against scholars is exemplified in the case of Anna Alimpeva, a lecturer in sociology at Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University, who was the unwitting heroine of a story aired on state television channel Russia 24 in October 2017. The channel accused lecturers at the university of criticizing the current government, ‘propagating homosexual orientation’ and suggesting that the Kaliningrad region should leave the Russian Federation.27 These accusations were made on the basis of an anonymous note delivered by a person who identified themselves as a student of the Baltic University. The material Russia 24 aired included highly selective quotations from Alimpeva’s published work and out-ofcontext clips of her video-recorded conference presentations. One can also identify incidents when various media outlets misrepresent foreign researchers’ work and undermine their competence. As well as the rare cases in which the local popular media present researchers as hostile spies,28 misrepresentation may take place in outlets seemingly addressed at policy professionals. For instance, a website run by the Center for Political Analysis published information about an upcoming talk by Brian Taylor due to take

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place at the EUSP. Taylor is the author of an acclaimed book, titled State Building in Putin’s Russia: Policing and Coercion After Communism (Cambridge University Press 2011). Information about the conference published on the Centre’s website was accompanied by a critique of Western scholars who undermine Putin’s state-building project and the Russian system of governance.29 Eleanor Knott, a lecturer at the London School of Economics, described her experience in the following way: in December 2015, I published a piece in the Monkey Cage blog, where I argue that in Crimea there was a plurality of meanings of being Russian and a lack of support for a change away from the then status quo. In other words, I argue there was little support among those I interviewed for the kinds of reality that emerged in 2014 with Russia’s annexation of the peninsula. Within a day, the article was translated into Russian and posted on a Russian news website (InoSmi). Within a few weeks, the Russian Ministry of Defence’s TV station, Zvezda, created a 60-minute documentary with Russian commentators and politicians discussing and critiquing the research. The documentary used video clips from YouTube, sharing my face and details about my professional life, such as my educational background. This made me feel uncomfortable and visible in a way that I had neither anticipated nor consented to. I had lost control of the research material. It was a personal choice to publish work that was critical of the Russian government (but not critical of my participants). (Knott 2018) Such treatment of foreign researchers is not limited to established scholars and those publishing in well-regarded and influential outlets; it may also be linked to a specific theme. On social media, under the telling title ‘How the valiant police saved Krasnoyarsk from feminism’ (Pro to, kak doblestnaya politsiya spasla Krasnoyarsk ot feminizma), a scholar and activist re-posted a description of a Cambridge University student being penalized for abusing their tourist visa for delivering a presentation: We organized an open meeting yesterday titled Feminism in the modern world – who needs it and why? We hold such meetings on socially significant topics quite often. We were glad that, despite the summer season, quite a lot of people came. Our key guest was a Cambridge University student, who, after a year studying abroad in Russia, received a tourist visa to visit other parts of the country. This is a common practice – to make use of someone’s arrival to organize a small event – since our city is not spoiled by high-quality communication with foreigners (nash gorod ne ochen’ izbalovan kachestvennym obshcheniyem s inostrantsami), and obtaining funding for bringing in such guests is a very difficult task and poorly supported by our state. The plan was to listen to her presentation and open the floor to a wider conversation. About half an hour after we began, a small group of people came

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into the hall and started taking photos of the presentation. Then they approached the student, introduced themselves as police officers, presented their certificates and announced a 15-minute ‘technical’ break to clarify the issue. All this was done quite rudely. It would be logical in such a situation to approach the organizers, explain the situation and politely announce a break. But this was not how it was done. It looked as if they were confronting a malicious offender, but the only violation was related to the visa type. If your visa is for tourist purposes, you are not allowed do anything else – work, volunteer, hold any events, participate in projects, etc. Such rules do exist. Another thing is their interpretation. By the way, if you have an ordinary Schengen visa, for example, you can engage in all sorts of activities [in the EU] except earning money.30 This is by no means an exhaustive list of cases of state actors interfering with the communication of research – and nor are they all of equal significance – but viewing them together provides a better sense of how the Russian state has made itself present in various academic endeavours and with what result to the communication of research. Against this background, the next section considers scholarly perceptions of their engagement with the policymaking world.

How scholars view their impact on foreign policymaking Scholars employed at the Russian Academy of Sciences see engagement with the policy world – for instance, the preparation of policy briefs – as part of their obligations to their employer [R28; R32]. In contrast, university-based academics generally do not perceive their research in terms of policy relevance, although they too may be requested to provide research to government bodies [R17]. This difference in the identification of roles may be attributed to traditional, but changing, divisions of labour between universities, primarily responsible for teaching and the RAS, which is tasked with creating and disseminating knowledge. Many of my interviewees agreed on a number of issues regarding the link between scholarly knowledge and policymaking. They shared the view that the decision-making process is highly centralized and non-transparent and that key areas of foreign policymaking are handled by the presidential administration rather than by the MFA – and, on many occasions, by the president himself. However, scholars who have had the experience of interacting with consultative bodies (like the RIAC) and with foreign policy practitioners recognize that, despite limited room for criticism, there are some entry points for their expertise. They also agree that demand for and openness towards such expertise has not been constant but rather subject to change over time and according to topic. Some respondents described the end of the 1990s and beginning of the 2000s as the ‘golden age’, when it was possible to not only make suggestions but also see them implemented in policy practice or state legislation. References to this perceived influence have been recorded in academic writing; for instance, Yuri Borko describes how the government and the Central Bank commissioned a

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team of scholars, affiliated with MGIMO and the RAS, to prepare a report concerning the euro currency and Russia’s national interests (Borko and Butorina 2001). As emphasized by one of my interviewees, the recommendations of this report were translated into legal solutions [R28]. The early-2000s golden age of academic expertise is usually linked to the fast pace of European integration. The EU not only introduced a single currency but was also just about to significantly broaden its membership and discuss a constitutional treaty. It was increasingly difficult for bureaucrats in Russia to evaluate developments in the EU with respect to Russia’s politics and economy; knowledge inside Russian legislative and executive bodies on the workings of the EU was partial (Gretskiy, Treshchenkov, and Golubev 2014) [R28; R30]. These circumstances increased the demand for comprehensive and accessible academic expertise. Taking this context into account, authors working on the first textbook on European integration intended it to be for not only students but also civil servants. The textbook, prepared by scholars from the Institute of Europe of RAS and MGIMO (Borko and Butorina 2001), was promoted among bureaucrats and physically distributed to various ministries [R28]. In 2005, IR academics assessed the value of their contribution to the state’s development very highly. Andrei and Pavel Tsygankov wrote: Without purposeful efforts of the academic community of IR scholars, it will hardly be possible for Russia to become a fully fledged member of the world, nor will it be capable of profiting from globalization while avoiding its many traps. (Tsygankov and Tsygankov 2005, 382) However, even then Russia’s political system was starting to limit scholarly contribution to the policymaking process. Scholars provide the following explanations: Since the 2000s the regime has become more and more centralized, which also means it has become less interested in finding actual solutions to concrete problems. [R5] Since 2011, the government has perceived the academic knowledge as distant and irrelevant: ‘you academics have no idea how we really work’. The expectation is that academic advice would not be realistic. [R8] The ruling elite stereotype of the university is that information that may be useful to policy practitioners does not originate there. [R12] Respondents recognize that policy practitioners’ openness towards academic expertise largely depends on the particular subject at hand. Demand for experts’

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advice peaked during the process of establishing the Eurasian Economic Union due to the fact that its legal and institutional construction was, to a large extent, based on the EU model: ‘We all advised the government on the EEU – we were telling the government how the EU worked’ [R9]. Some scholars compare their positive experiences of knowledge-sharing with the situation that developed in the late 2000s, when centralization and the subordination of regional decision-making to Moscow resulted in fast-dwindling demand for expertise on the EU at the regional governance level [R19]. One interviewee commented positively on the openness of regional-level policymakers: Until 2009 it was okay to speak to regional officials. Many of the cooperation projects were independent of Moscow. . . . These were educational projects, there was no policy impact component. Our idea was not to influence politicians but to disseminate knowledge about the EU among students and professors. But there was some unintended impact on local politics – we ended up disseminating our research results there, too. Officials had the opportunity to read our results. We could communicate with the authorities, it was possible to discuss, there was a lot of reflection. Our projects generated reflection. Back then, minds and doors were open. Now, it would be impossible to do anything on the regional or local level. Back then, federal authorities were doing ‘big politics’ and we could bring some change locally. [R19] While there is no longer enough room of manoeuvre on the regional level to make use of expertise on the EU, some scholars now perceive greater openness on the part of regional authorities towards advice concerning the Arctic [R29]. The dominant view among respondents is that the government is more eager to use expertise with regards to the economy than to foreign policy. Some academics attribute this development to the government considering foreign policy an important propaganda resource; it is seemingly less precise than economics, and potential errors and misjudgements are either not immediately visible, can be concealed with appropriate rhetoric or can be presented as success stories [R27]. At the same time, one of the interviewees spoke about IR scholars as more closely aligned with the government than economists, and thus less likely to openly criticize foreign policy actions [R6]. This is probably because it is easier to interpret certain foreign policy events as successful; there are no obvious quantifiable criteria for measurement, such as gross domestic product or economic growth, so criteria can be created to suit the government’s purposes – for instance, equating greater military might and foreign military engagement with success. The existence of formal channels of knowledge diffusion does not immediately translate into impact. Respondents agree that one of the most prevalent problems characterizing the link between expertise and the state is the absence of feedback from policymakers: ‘Who will guarantee that it will be read by

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anyone?’ [R25]. Interviewees emphasized the lack of communication after delivering their input: Your work enters a black box; there will be no feedback. [R30] Once recommendations reach the government, no one knows what happens to them . . . we don’t know how this expertise is processed and used. [R21] There are institutions which collect information. Scholars do not know, however, what happens next. . . . You never know how information you gather will be used. [R25] We don’t know how much influence Valdai experts really have; both sides will say they have influence. The Kremlin will say, ‘yes, we use their expertise’; experts will say they use our expertise because they want to secure their position close to the centre of power. In reality, we cannot prove any influence. Think tanks usually justify what Russia already did. There were voices which tried to ask, ‘did you calculate all the costs of Crimea’s annexation?’, but these voices were silenced. [R20] Some scholars recognize a clear dividing line between the role of IR scholars in the Soviet Union and their role in contemporary Russia: In the Soviet Union, the assumption was that you have to know your enemy; this assumption gave priority to area studies and created the requirement to be policy-relevant. The Soviet past plays a role in the way institutional access to policymaking is shaped. MGIMO staff did research on the Party’s request. It was a whole industry in Soviet times; scholars prepared background material, but took no part in actual decision-making, and their advice was often ignored (as was the case with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan). During Soviet times, there was an institutionalized mode of communication between research and policy. Following the 1990s, the status and prominence of scholars was radically reduced; many experts were wiped off; the process started to rely on personal connections, and those with greater media recognition became prominent experts. [R6] According to some respondents, foreign policy practitioners perceive scholarly expertise as too distant from ‘real politics’ and too sterile to be translated into concrete policies [R29]. Practitioners feel strongly that their participation in diplomatic exchanges grants them a unique vantage point for understanding foreign

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affairs, while academic expertise seems to be of lesser value because it is produced by a community that is removed from daily diplomacy practices. However, as one of my interviewees noticed, ‘scholars who could provide quality expertise do not know the language of communication with the authorities; they are not trained in formulating policy recommendations’ [R19]. In addition, a perception fairly widespread among respondents is that, in matters of foreign policy, the government relies primarily on information provided by the intelligence services. It is believed that bureaucrats dealing with foreign affairs have a preference for ‘first-hand’ knowledge, which either they themselves possess (due to their professional engagement in diplomacy) or they can obtain via intelligence networks [R30]. Bureaucrats involved in policymaking and implementation share the belief that intelligence provides a true and accurate picture of events; it is the source of reliable information, and is transmitted almost in real time. Lack of access to these sources of information automatically diminishes the value of academic expertise, in the eyes of policy practitioners. More importantly, however, it shows that policy practitioners may not be drawing a clear distinction between information, analysis and policy planning. In the eyes of respondents, trusted individuals have privileged access to policy practitioners and are regarded as more influential than institutions formally tasked with expert advice. As one respondent put it: As an individual you will not have any impact on the government if you do not have personal ties and if you cannot influence their thinking directly. . . . Those who work with presidential administration to prepare, for instance, large economic or political fora, are not recruited in an open competition; this is by invitation only. [R25] Scholars I interviewed perceive that expertise has become personalized, with particular individuals having better reputations than entire institutions [R7]. Collaboration with institutions relies on personal connections rather than institutionalized forms of expertise exchange; it is people-based, not institutions-based [R8]. One interviewee sought the roots of this personalization in the early 1990s, when institutional patterns of communication between scholars and the Communist Party broke down and politicians started relying on personal connections [R6]. Another interviewee, an early-career scholar, confirmed the relevance of personal ties, speaking of outlets such as the Valdai Club or the Russian Council on International Affairs: ‘These outlets are a bit closed; professors have connections to them; this is a way for them to disseminate research to government agencies’ [R14].

Impact: the spectrum of opinions In addition to aspects of policy impact that scholars agree on, there are certain issues on which the views of respondents diverged, oscillating between highly

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No foreign policy process, hence no impact No impact, only justification of policy Unwilling to have impact Impact possible under certain conditions

Figure 5.1 The spectrum of views concerning the impact of scholarly expertise on foreign policy

sceptical and cautiously optimistic. These views can be classified into four groups and are illustrated in Figure 5.1. Each of these views is discussed in turn in the following sections. No foreign policy process, hence no impact The most sceptical view – expressed by respondents who admitted they had never had contact with policy practitioners – is that no policymaking process takes place in Russia, so there can be no possibility for scholarly contributions of any kind [R27]. These scholars see foreign policymaking as limited to state officials and openly excluding societal actors, such as think tanks, experts and academics. This sceptical view rests on the assumption that, if there is only one decision maker, we should discount processes usually involved in the elaboration of specific policies, including agenda-setting and the discussion of key goals and their achievement [R8; R27; R33]. When speaking of such forums as the Valdai Club or the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, one of my interviewees put it bluntly: ‘these institutions try to sense the atmosphere, but their work is like “steam into the whistle” – it is simulation of policy advice because there is no policymaking in Russia’ [R27]. One of my interviewees recalled a poll, organized by the Russian Association for Political Studies, on the subject of impact on policy; the largest group of respondents considered the political class to be insufficiently enlightened to understand that they need this type of expertise [R13]. No impact, only justification of policy Some respondents opined that academics are often required to step in to fill in policy slogans with content, rather than being invited to participate in the process of policy formulation. This, according to one respondent, was the case with Dmitry Medvedev’s security doctrine (proposed in 2008) and the European Security Treaty (presented in 2009) [R32]. One of my interviewees put it in the

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following way: ‘If your research is used by policymakers, it is mainly for justification’ [R26]. On the other hand, some experts may have a role in adding new terms to the overall vocabulary, but without much influence on the substance of actual policies that would follow. One respondent described this activity as ‘throwing in new terminology’ (vbrasyvat’ novyye terminy) [R32]. Academics recognize that having a role in the creation of discourse is not equal to actual foreign policymaking, although some observed that it may indirectly contribute to identity building, especially if these terms aim to position Russia on the world stage in a specific way. This sceptical attitude towards impact has been closely linked to academic assessments of the role of think tanks specializing in foreign policy. Most of my interviewees agreed that the landscape is heterogeneous. Many respondents were, however, sceptical about the influence of think tanks on the policymaking process, and were inclined to describe their task as the justification and legitimization of policy choices and decisions made by the political centre without any external input. As one respondent put it: ‘They [think tanks] are like clubs for people who pretend to be policy-related’ [R27]. One of my interviewees opined that there are no real think tanks and that what they do is propaganda: ‘they clarify positions which a minister cannot openly present with enough detail’ [R1]. Another interviewee reiterated this point by arguing that think tanks follow rather than create narratives themselves [R4]. Researchers also argue that it is important to recognise the diversity and differentiate between the types of think tanks. Those with state sponsoring and political contacts dominate the scene (Barbashin and Graef 2019). Many respondents emphasized that think tank experts primarily play a role in maintaining the status quo, adapting their claims to the political situation and following the official discourse: ‘Experts sniff for demand from the Kremlin, what is it that they want . . . think tanks usually justify what Russia already did’ [R20]; ‘Expertise that exists close to the power centre supports the status quo’ [R22]. Some identified ideology as playing a more important role than expertise for think tanks specializing in international politics – as in the case of the Russian Institute of Strategic Studies,31 which provided the backdrop for the Novorossiya concept32 [R5]. These assessments confirm the findings of a recent report on Russian think tanks (Pallin and Oxenstierna 2017), which concluded that, while the community of think tanks is diverse, a significant number convey official narratives promoted by the Russian state. Unwilling to have impact Another group of respondents considers impact possible but consciously withdraws from participation. Scholars provided at least two reasons for this approach. Some perceive the claim to academic authority to hinge upon their successful presentation as objective and apolitical [R17];33 they see any engagement with policymaking as dangerously undermining their objectivity, and are not interested in providing expertise on the grounds that thinking in terms of policy impact would

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harm or contaminate science [R17; R24; R26]. For others, impact and policy advice is simply not considered worthy of academic engagement; these scholars prefer to invest their efforts in either teaching or scholarly production. Some aim for international academic recognition rather than for policy impact: Due to the fact that Soviet social sciences lagged behind (otstavaniye sotsialnykh nauk), it is now appreciated when people get recognition in the West. This is why we constantly think what type of research will be interesting for other scholars and not for policymakers. [R24] There are also those who see providing policy advice as primarily directed at self-promotion. As one interviewee put it: ‘If experts or academics work with politicians, this means they themselves want to become politicians, deputies or work for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ [R1]. An important reason for avoiding engagement with the policymaking process is its lack of transparency. One interviewee described a case he was familiar with where a non-academic, with no particular knowledge of a region or its languages, was commissioned to write an expert report on this region’s politics. The respondent described it as an instance of corruption, benefiting the commissioning civil servant, the intermediary and the provider of ‘expert analysis’ [R33]. Another of my interviewees separated academic research from commenting on current affairs: I do not aim at policy relevance, and particularly policy relevance in Russia. My research is hard to relate to policy; I want to produce academic outputs. I don’t discard the need to be policy relevant; I publish op-eds, I commented on Hillary Clinton electoral programme. [R21] Finally, a few scholars decline participation on the grounds that the political system currently in place is not one they would like to assist with their data or knowledge; they withdraw because they are critical of the undemocratic outlook of contemporary politics in Russia [R8; R35]. Impact possible under certain conditions The less sceptical attitude recognizes that IR scholars usually share the ambition to have some leverage in the realm of foreign policy. In this group, the willingness to have impact goes hand in hand with the realization of obstacles. Some scholars are caught between their desire to contribute and their awareness of the limited room for their expertise. One respondent put it in the following way: It is not that criticizing current state policies has become impossible. It is just that such a critical voice is effectively muted, it does not exist. If it

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tries to reappear, it gets criticized as unpatriotic. This is why there is little desire to offer alternatives . . . do not rock the boat (ne raskachivat’ lodku); . . . do not meddle with identity questions (ne vmeshivat’sya v voprosy identichnosti). . . . Rather than criticize, the academic sphere is expected to adjust (podstroivat’ ne kritikovat’). [R3] The state’s growing intolerance towards criticism of foreign policy narrows the avenues for scholarly engagement and limits their potential input: Political scientists and IR scholars want to be in line with the government position on EU – Russia relations, the official line being, ‘the West is in decline’. Even those who are critical of the government will publicly express the government line. Following the official line is more important than genuine expertise grounded in data analysis. [R4] However, a group of respondents that does not feel paralyzed by these difficult circumstances maintains that, although policymaking is highly centralized, there are ways to participate and meaningfully contribute to this process. This group agrees that participation is possible only under certain conditions: You need to find the appropriate level in order to bring some added value. It needs to be bigger than the day-to-day operationalization of foreign policy, where you cannot compete with bureaucrats and intelligence. Neither can it be too general; your advice needs to be possible to operationalize. [R30] Other elements to consider in order to create impact include identifying the most appropriate topic and assessing potential demand. One interviewee distinguished clearly between following the official line and fitting into the official agenda, suggesting that, while the former is not desirable, the latter is key [R39]. Timing is considered crucial when planning to contribute, as illustrated by the following interview excerpts: Timing is crucial; you must also know what kind of knowledge is in demand. [R25] With the action in Syria in 2017, all decision-makers thought it was the culmination and Russia’s success. But it turned out that there is no endgame in sight; we have no exit strategy. It is then when bureaucrats became more open to outside ideas. [R30]

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Academic knowledge matters only when it is timely and when specific ideas fit the hot agenda. [R39] Respondents considered that a window of opportunity may also open in advance of a high-level state visit or summit, as well as when a new government is elected in a country deemed important to Russia’s foreign policy. The format of the contribution is key: ‘The higher you go, the shorter your brief should be. This is an art in its own right – to be short but substantive’ [R30]. It is also crucial to identify the right entry point: This is not always the highest level, because top-level decision-makers may simply delegate the issue to someone else and you lose track of it. The thing may as well disappear from the agenda altogether. You have to find the right recipients. [R30] In addition, demand for expert knowledge may arise when the state administration is faced with an entirely new, unexpected and complex situation, or when scenarios it had planned fail. Recent instances include the euro crisis and the migration crisis in the EU [R28]. Respondents who want to have an impact are willing to pragmatically use tactics that have proven effective in drawing practitioners’ attention. For instance, when proposing a new idea, it is considered important to refer to a statement by president Putin on a given matter. As one interviewee confessed: ‘To do this successfully I needed to make a reference to what Vladimir Putin had said’ [R9]. Such strategic quoting is seen as necessary to persuade lowerand mid-level bureaucrats not to dismiss ideas straight away [R9]. At the same time, scholars recognize that their role is difficult because, in their view, foreign policy practitioners have a simplified view of academic expertise: ‘Foreign policy practitioners regard International Relations as a new discipline that is excessively influenced by Western ideas’ [R19; R29]. Another group of scholars views expertise delivery in economic terms. Expertise they provide needs to ‘sell’, which also means it needs to respond to specific demand. They act as ‘entrepreneurial subjects’, to borrow Natalie Koch’s phrase (Koch 2016). For them, gaining entry into the policymaking process and the provision of expertise to the state is necessary to keep their institutions afloat, in budgetary terms, especially if the institution in question has no permanent line of financing: Every year I need to find clients for my expertise. I never do what is interesting for us, but what is interesting for the government. These sometimes overlap. The MFA has its own centre of analysis and we need to offer something unique. This is tightly linked to my budget. [R39]

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Conclusions Contemporary thinking about the political relevance of knowledge, as explored in Chapter 1, has mostly been predicated on the liberal separation of knowledge and politics. Situating questions about knowledge-making in a liberal-democratic context allows to regard scholars as willing to produce politically relevant knowledge and able to share their thoughts unconditionally with the view to contribute to policy enhancement. In such a context academic research has been presented as one that protects civil-society actors, while science has been conceptualized as both keeping a distance from politics and remaining relevant to policy. Research results discussed in this chapter show that – to many academics in Russia – the policy relevance of their work is at best a secondary concern. Scholars generally share the view that the decision-making process is highly centralized and non-transparent. Some scholars are convinced that achieving impact is impossible, some declare unwillingness to interact with the policymaking world and others find providing expert advice difficult but possible under certain conditions. Those less sceptical recognize that there exists some room for their expertise and try to identify entry points. For this group, the key challenge is that foreign policy practitioners find it difficult to recognize ‘external’ sources of knowledge on international affairs. Bureaucrats, considering foreign affairs to be their bread and butter, are dismissive of expertise coming from outside of their own circle. Their preference is – in the view of some interviewees – for information delivered by intelligence services. A popular perception among Russian scholars is that policy practitioners value and trust particular individuals and rely on personal ties more than on formal links with academic institutions. The negative side is that those individuals have to constantly prove their trustworthiness and loyalty, which makes articulating criticism more difficult. Elsewhere, I discussed a range of factors negatively influencing scholars’ approach to the policy impact of their work (Kaczmarska 2019). What is crucial to emphasize here is that many of those factors are directly linked to the wider sociopolitical context. Taking into consideration the contours and content of contemporary public debate, this part showed that the non-existence of certain topics in the broader public discourse makes academics, who may want to research and publicly discuss them, look radical. Moreover, since institutions loyal to the state mediate the communication of research, critically inclined scholars will avoid using this route. Specific context stimulates reluctance on the part of some scholars to engage in ‘political activity’ that might potentially endanger their career. Other scholars do not want to be seen as assisting the state whose system of governance they do not support. The general lack of trust boosts scholars’ perception that their expertise may be ignored or manipulated. Despite the fact that Russian authorities expect universities to upgrade their position in international rankings, they do not seem eager to broaden their reliance on academic knowledge. On the contrary, many activities of the Russian

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state have pushed scholars towards greater caution rather than motivated them to share their knowledge. In such a context, providing advice in a form accessible to policy practitioners may be the least of scholarly concerns.

Notes 1 For instance, it has been argued that geopolitics teaching at universities in Russia provides knowledge that students may use in their future careers (Grenier and Hagmann 2016; Mäkinen 2017, 297). 2 The term mezhdunarodniki (literally, ‘an internationalist’) as denoting foreign policy and IR experts emerged in the early 1960s. Before then, it referred to party activists whose task was social outreach and explaining to the public the Communist Party line on international matters (Zimmerman 1969, 43–44). 3 It was expressed, for example, in the question and answer sessions at the British International Studies Association annual conference in Bath in 2018. 4 This chapter draws on material originally published in my article for Problems of Post-Communism, which I use here under a Creative Commons licence. 5 Interview of Sergei Lavrov for the RBK daily, 6 June 2019: www.mid.ru/web/guest/mer opriyatiya_s_uchastiem_ministra/-/asset_publisher/xK1BhB2bUjd3/content/id/3672964. 6 For an early analysis of this phenomenon, see Struyk (1999); for an overview, see Laruelle (2009, 14–18). 7 The journal’s webpage and archive can be found here: www.globalaffairs.ru. 8 The Institute’s webpage: http://russiancouncil.ru/en/about/. 9 The Institute’s webpage: www.northerndimension.info/contacts/northern-dimensioninstitute. 10 The official webpage of the Open Government framework: http://open.gov.ru/ expert_sovet/. 11 For a list of councils, see http://open.gov.ru/os/os/. 12 The Charter is available at the ministry’s website: https://www.mid.ru/activity/shots/ service/law_on_service/-/asset_publisher/s6NLVAIqZ3pG/content/id/381992. See also Okunev (2019). 13 The official webpage of the Council for International Law: www.mid.ru/activity/coordinating_and_advisory_body/international_law_council. 14 A speech by Sergei Lavrov is available at: www.mid.ru/web/guest/meropriyatiya_s_ uchastiem_ministra/-/asset_publisher/xK1BhB2bUjd3/content/id/3260122 (last accessed on 13 September 2018). 15 This particular Council was established following a presidential decree of 4 August 2006. Its aims are described at its official webpage: https://function.mil.ru/function/ public_board.htm (last accessed on 13 September 2018). 16 Marlene Laruelle’s work discusses the Izborsky Club main figures and how they are connected to the decision-making circles (Laruelle 2016a). 17 The IMI’s webpage can be found at https://mgimo.ru/about/structure/ucheb-nauch/ imi/. 18 The university’s webpage: https://spbu.ru/openuniversity/documents/ekspertnoezaklyuchenie-po-dogovoru-no-ce-3417-38. 19 The text of the expertise: https://spbu.ru/sites/default/files/01-122-1638.pdf. 20 The text of the expertise: https://spbu.ru/sites/default/files/01-122-2096.pdf. 21 The text of the expertise: https://spbu.ru/sites/default/files/01-122-2017.2.pdf. 22 The details of the tender: http://zakupki.gov.ru/epz/order/notice/printForm/view.html? printFormId=103744315. 23 Sungurov adds that expertise delivered by ‘independent’ experts is best divided into two: that delivered by ‘niche’ experts and that delivered by ‘universal’ experts

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29 30 31 32

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(Sungurov 2017). The former have knowledge and experience of a certain issue, which the state may require at the stage of devising a specific policy. The latter group is labelled ‘TV political analysts’ (telepolitologi) to denote their availability and harmlessness; they can be summoned to provide a commentary that would neither be underpinned by specific knowledge of the topic nor at risk of implicating or ridiculing decision makers (Sungurov 2017, 12). News report: http://tass.com/politics/1005075 (last accessed on 30 July 2018). Ekaterina Schulmann’s description of her own experience is available at: www. youtube.com/watch?v=7DhwLJ2dn0A. Is a scientific history of the great Patriotic War possible? Talk delivered on 12 March 2018. The Rossiya 24 material: www.youtube.com/watch?v=9N_qLBcdNYc&feature= youtu.be&t=2538. The issue was reported by (Ziberova 2017). In October 2017, three news outlets in Volgograd – MK in Volgograd, Volgogradskaya Pravda and Volga-Media – ran a story that presented Richard Arnold, a professor at Muskingum University, US, as a foreign spy working to undermine the World Football Championships 2018. One of these articles: http://volg.mk.ru/articles/2017/10/04/ operaciya-provokaciya-chm2018.html. Information about the conference: https://centerforpoliticsanalysis.ru/news/read/id/ amerikanskij-uchenyj-iz-sirakuz-rasskazhet-slushateljam-evropejskogo-universitetav-peterburge-chto-putin-ploho-upravljaet-rossiej. This is a translated and abbreviated version of a post shared publicly on Facebook in July 2019. The abbreviated version purposefully omits the name of the student and the organization hosting the meeting. English-language literature also uses the following name: the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies. Novorossiya in the contemporary discourse denotes Ukraine’s Donbas region, in which Russia stirred insurgency after the Maidan revolution in 2014. Under the Tsarist rule, it referred to regions north of the Black Sea conquered by Catherine the Great in late 18th century. For an in-depth analysis, see (Laruelle 2016b). The concept of ‘politicization’ has been used very often in recent Russian public discourse and interviews. My impression is that its meaning changes and it is highly context-dependent.

References Barbashin, Anton, and Alexander Graef. 2019. “Thinking Foreign Policy in Russia: Think Tanks and Grand Narratives.” The Atlantic Council. https://atlanticcouncil.org/indepth-research-reports/report/thinking-foreign-policy-in-russia-think-tanks-and-grandnarratives/. Borko, Yuri, and Olga V. Butorina, eds. 2001. Evropeyskii Soyuz na poroge XXI veka: vybor strategii razvitiya (The European Union on the threshold of the 21st century: the choice of development strategy). Moskva: Editorial URSS. Dubrovskiy, Dmitry. 2019. “Judge, Jury, and Professor: Russia’s Experts Are for Hire.” The Riddle, 25 March. Efremenko, Dmitry. 2017. “Ekspertno-analiticheskiye soobshchestva i rossiiskaya vneshniyaya politika. (Expert-analytical communities and Russian foreign policy” In Rol’ ekspertno-analiticheskikh soobshchestv v formirovanii obshchestvennoi povestki dniya v sovremennoi Rossii (The role of expert-analytical communities in setting the social agenda in contemporary Russia), edited by Olga Malinova, 32–49. Moskva: RAN INION.

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Gabuev, Alexandr. 2018. “Myunkhenskii nagovor: kak Zapadu i Rossii stanovitsya ne o chem govorit (Nothing to Discuss: Munich Conference Highlights Russia-West Stalemate)”. Carnegie Moscow. 7 March. http://carnegie.ru/commentary/75716. Graef, Alexander. 2019. “Russia’s RAND Corporation? The Up and Downs of the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies (RISI).” Russian Analytical Digest 234. Grenier, Félix, and Jonas Hagmann. 2016. “Sites of Knowledge (Re-) Production: Toward an Institutional Sociology of International Relations Scholarship.” International Studies Review 18 (2): 333–365. Gretskiy, Igor, Evgeny Treshchenkov, and Konstantin Golubev. 2014. “Russia’s Perceptions and Misperceptions of the EU Eastern Partnership.” Communist and PostCommunist Studies 47 (3): 375–383. Grozovski, Boris. 2019. “‘Prizyvy k bor’be s rabstvom ugrozhayut gosudarstvennomu stroyu’. Kak ustroyen rynok “ekspertov” na sluzhbe u SK (‘Calls to the Fight Against Slavery Threaten the State System’. How the Market for “Experts” Works in the Service of the Investigative Committee). The Insider, 14 May. Kaczmarska, Katarzyna. 2019. “Academic Community and Policymaking in Russia.” Problems of Post-Communism 66 (4): 240–252. Knott, Eleanor. 2018. “Beyond the Field: Ethics After Fieldwork in Politically Dynamic Contexts.” Perspectives on Politics. Koch, Natalie. 2016. “We Entrepreneurial Academics: Governing Globalized Higher Education in ‘Illiberal’ States.” Territory, Politics, Governance 4 (4): 438–452. Ladilova, Elena. 2017. “V MGU pereosmyslyat’ vliyaniye revolyutsii na politicheskuyu sistemu (Moscow State University will rethink the influence of revolutions on the political system).” Izvestia. https://iz.ru/news/670899. Laruelle, Marlene. 2009. “Inside and Around the Kremlin’s Black Box: The New Nationalist Think Tanks in Russia.” Institute for Security and Development Policy. http://isdp. eu/content/uploads/images/stories/isdp-main-pdf/2009_laruelle_inside-and-around-thekremlins-black-box.pdf. Laruelle, Marlene. 2016a. “The Izborsky Club, or the New Conservative Avant-Garde in Russia.” The Russian Review 75 (4): 626–644. Laruelle, Marlene. 2016b. “The Three Colors of Novorossiya, or the Russian Nationalist Mythmaking of the Ukrainian Crisis.” Post-Soviet Affairs 32 (1): 55–74. Lo, Bobo. 2015. Russia and the New World Disorder. London: Chatham House. Mäkinen, Sirke. 2017. “Professional Geopolitics as an Ideal: Roles of Geopolitics in Russia.” International Studies Perspectives 18 (3): 288–303. Malinova, Olga, ed. 2017. Rol’ ekspertno-analiticheskikh soobshchestv v formirovanii obshchestvennoi povestki dniya v sovremennoi Rossii (The role of expert-analytical communities in setting the social agenda in contemporary Russia). Moskva: RAN INION. Mankoff, Jeffrey. 2011. Russian Foreign Policy: The Return of Great Power Politics. 2nd ed. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. Okunev, Igor. 2019. “Foreign Policy Think Tanks in Russia: Trends and Obstacles.” Russian Analytical Digest 234. Owen, Catherine, and Eleanor Bindman. 2017. “Civic Participation in a Hybrid Regime: Limited Pluralism in Policymaking and Delivery in Contemporary Russia.” Government and Opposition: 1–23. Pallin, Carolina Vendil, and Susanne Oxenstierna. 2017. Russian Think-Tanks and Soft Power. Stockholm: FOI. Petrov, Kirill, and Vladimir Gel’man. 2019. “Do Elites Matter in Russian Foreign Policy? The Gap Between Self-Perception and Influence.” Post-Soviet Affairs: 1–11.

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Putin, Vladimir. 2019. Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly. Shevtsova, Lilia. 2017. “Okhraniteli (The Guardians).” Radio Svoboda. 27 August. https://www.svoboda.org/a/28662872.html. Struyk, Raymond J. 1999. “Reconstructive Critics: Think Tanks in Post-Soviet Bloc Democracies.” The Urban Institute. Sungurov, Aleksandr. 2015. Kak voznikayut politicheskiye innovatsii: “fabriki mysli” i drugiye instituty-mediatory (How political innovations emerge: “think-tanks” and other mediating institutions). Moskva: Rosspen. Sungurov, Aleksandr. 2017. “Rol’ i funktsii ekspertov v protsesse priniyatiya vlastnykh reshenii (The role and functions of experts in the process of decision-making).” Upravlencheskoye konsultirovaniye 6 (102): 8–15. Sungurov, Aleksandr, N. P. Raspopov, and A. Yu. Belyaev. 2012a. “Instituty-mediatory i ikh razvitiye v sovremennoi Rossii. I. Obshhestvennye palaty i konsul’tativnye sovety: federal’nyi i regional’nyi opyt (Mediating institutions and their development in contemporary Russia. I. Social chambers and consultative councils: federal and regional experience).” Polis. Politicheskiye issledovaniya 1: 165–178. Sungurov, Aleksandr, N. P. Raspopov, and A. Yu. Belyaev. 2012b. “Instituty-mediatory i ikh razvitiye v sovremennoi Rossii. II. Fabriki mysli i centry publichnoj politiki. (Mediating institutions and their development in contemporary Russia. II. Thinktanks and centres for public policy).” Polis. Politicheskiye issledovaniya 4: 99–116. Trenin, Dmitri. 2019. “It’s Time to Rethink Russia’s Foreign Policy Strategy.” Carnegie.ru. Trenin, Dmitri, and Bobo Lo. 2005. The Landscape of Russian Foreign Policy DecisionMaking. Moscow: Carnegie Endowment for international peace. Tsygankov, Andrei P., and Pavel A. Tsygankov. 2005. “Globalnyi mir i budushchee rossiiskoi teorii mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii (vmesto zaklyucheniya) (The global world and the future of the Russian theory of international relations).” In Rossiiskaya nauka mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: novyye napravleniya Rossiiskaya nauka mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii: novyye napravleniya (Russian science of international relations: new directions), edited by Andrei P. Tsygankov and Pavel A. Tsygankov, 382–406. Moskva: PER SE. Wilson, Jeanne L. 2010. “The Legacy of the Color Revolutions for Russian Politics and Foreign Policy.” Problems of Post-Communism 57 (2): 21–36. Ziberova, Tatyana. 2017. “‘Na obychnykh listakh v kletku’: podrobnosti skandala vokrug BFU im. I. Kanta (‘On Ordinary Paper’: Details of the Scandal Surrounding the IKBFU I. Kant).” Novyi Kaliningrad, 29 September. Zimmerman, William. 1969. Soviet Perspectives on International Relations, 1956–1967. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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Questions pertaining to knowledge production and use have attracted considerable attention in IR. As IR scholars have become more reflective about their own knowledge-making practices, the discipline has incrementally opened up to the idea that factors and values beyond the purely epistemic ones play a role in shaping the research process and its outcomes. Scholars in the Anglophone tradition have also become more interested in the divergent perspectives colleagues from around the globe offer on international politics. While acknowledging the many constructive aspects of these intellectual developments, this monograph has been motivated by a desire to fill in several important gaps in that area of research. In particular, I have argued for taking a more inquisitive stance towards the sociopolitical milieu of IR knowledge-making. IR knowledge claims – as products of social relations that change over time – are localized and should be studied with due consideration for the sociopolitical setting of their production. An inquisitive approach towards context and its effects on knowledge production practices, outputs and the uses of knowledge, widens the confines of contemporary thinking about knowledge-making and contributes to a more nuanced conceptualization of what IR knowledge is and what can be understood as its political relevance. It also allows for a better understanding of IR knowledges stemming from around the globe. Most literature on knowledge and expertise production in IR presupposes the context of a liberal-democratic state. As Chapter 1 elaborated on in more detail, it also tends to unproblematically rely on the ideal of a fairly autonomous university, detached from political processes within a given polity. Researchers who emphasize the need to study IR knowledge outside of the West, focus predominantly on the outcomes of knowledge-making – that is on selected IR theories – rather than the contexts and processes accompanying knowledge production and use. In contrast, the key aim of this book has been to show that the study of IR cannot be detached from factors that condition scholarly production, primarily the state-society relations and historic (dis)continuities in how the state, research and higher education teaching are organised. I also attempted to show how to go about studying this context and its effects. Accepting the challenges, I elaborated a framework facilitating a more structured exploration of the sociopolitical context, its constitutive elements and their implications for

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scholarly epistemic practices. It is hoped that this framework will serve as a step towards – rather than a definitive model for – exploring how context shapes and influences IR knowledge production. In the empirical part of this book, I delineated and analysed the elements of this context in Russia (Chapters 2–3) and elaborated on how the sociopolitical milieu affects knowledge production and its uses (Chapters 4–5). This does not mean that a specific context precludes IR discipline from developing. The intention of this book has in no way been to deny that formal study of international politics takes place in Russia. Nor have I claimed that IR in Russia is one thing. On the contrary, it is multifaceted and scholars respond in dissimilar ways to the sociopolitical context in which they work. With this qualification in mind, I demonstrated that neither the study of IR in a given local context nor the concerns of IR as a potentially global discipline should be limited to theoretical outputs. I argued that no knowledge about international politics can escape the peculiarities of its own place and that it is necessary to study the wider conditions of knowledge production and utilization, both to adequately read the product of scholarly labours and to critically approach the ideal of Global IR. After all, even calls for Global IR must come from somewhere. I have shown that the broader sociopolitical context not only influences how and what knowledge is made, and how it is validated, but also has a bearing on what is ignored and how knowledge is (or is not) transmitted to and utilized in the policy world. Even more fundamentally, context affects the understanding of what knowledge is as well as the conceptualization and assessment of its political relevance. The theorization of IR knowledge and of its political relevance cannot be limited to democracies for the simple reason that the production of knowledge about international politics takes place in diverse political systems. Global patterns of knowledge production are not static and we have already observed and cheered the growing role of countries and regions beyond the geographical realm of Western Europe and the US in the knowledge-making endeavour. Approaching this development with enthusiasm should not foreclose questions about the impact of different sociopolitical settings on the content and validation processes of that knowledge. In democracies, too, the idea of university autonomy is faced with challenges and pockets of illiberalism have infringed on such areas of research as gender studies (Ignatieff and Roch 2018). As Chapter 1 explained, for Pierre Bourdieu, relative autonomy meant that the constituent parts of the scientific field, such as scholars, scientific teams and laboratories, were relatively independent of pressure exerted on the field from the outside. Competitive struggle over scientific authority took place within that field. The Bourdieusian idea of a relatively autonomous scientific field should be approached as an ideal we strive for but hardly can it remain the underlying assumption on which to base our enquiry into knowledge-making and the political relevance of knowledge. Approaching it as an ideal rather than as default makes us more vigilant of processes contributing to this autonomy’s erosion. Since democracy is never complete, so the relationship between universities, academic communities and the wider context in which they are placed is

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dynamic rather than static. For that reason, challenges related to knowledgemaking and validation in Russia cannot be viewed as sui generis and/or as an anomaly but rather as part of the complex relationship between knowledge and society. The discussed case of Russia has demonstrated that the struggle over scientific authority often takes place not within the scientific field but on the poorly delineated border between this field and the state. Bourdieu rightly emphasized that relations and competition inside the academic realm are not limited to the pursuit of truth but include political fighting among scholars. Bourdieu nonetheless maintained that this infighting is in general detached from the state.1 To him, scientific authority was the capacity ‘to speak and act legitimately in scientific matters’ (Bourdieu 1999[1975], 31). The academic field’s autonomy in Bourdieu’s writing relies on ‘the professor in higher education . . . [being] cut off from the world of social dignitaries by a professional activity incompatible with political life, and animated by a specifically academic ideal’ (Bourdieu 1988, 37). Chapter 4 illustrated how, in practice, academic and political careers may intersect. It also showed that the power of state institutions may facilitate ideas – fervently questioned by the academic profession in terms of their content and construction – to not only pose as science but to meet the formal criteria of academic validity. Simply overlooking these processes when theorizing knowledge and discussing knowledge production does not make us better equipped to understand how these processes work and to stand up to them. It is a widespread view that crippled political freedom either precludes knowledge and/or corrupts knowledge-making. Undoubtedly, illiberal politics poses serious obstacles to research; but it is not capable of controlling it entirely. This makes an enquiry into specific aspects of illiberal politics that may be influencing knowledge production so important. Academic work is never and nowhere completely autonomous; it is limited by its material, social and intellectual environment. In what follows, I will recapitulate the observations stemming from my empirical work and link them to the debate about theorizations of IR knowledge and its political relevance. I will also offer a critique of contemporary thinking about global IR community.

The sociopolitical context and IR knowledge production While some researchers of knowledge-making accept that context has a bearing on knowledge, their inquiries rarely – if ever – extend beyond the realm of the democratic state. The presupposition of a democratic setting has been common not only in practice-oriented writing that deliberates ways in which to link knowledge and policy, but also in theoretical arguments about knowledge and its political relevance. Literature more attuned to the wider world, primarily the advocates of Global IR, has tended to pay too little attention to context and its impact on knowledge production practices. Overall, IR has placed overwhelming emphasis on theories produced around the globe and the problem of differing perspectives on the international, rather than on the sociopolitical

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contexts which affect them. But these are not solely different perspectives that influence how the international is approached, conceptualized and researched. In order to discuss the IR discipline and its developments around the globe, one needs to ask how specific sociopolitical contexts affect scholars and their knowledge claims. It is not enough to merely derive concepts and theories from other societies and cultures. Rather, in order to understand how these concepts and theories come about, what their intellectual roots are and what practices are involved in endowing them with scholarly authority, it is necessary to study the milieu of their making. Only then do we gain insight into why theories were conceptualized in certain ways, which further helps us grasp their meaning and significance and consider their potential endurance. Crucially, it also allows us to consider what is not there, what is not being discussed, researched and why. The Russian state’s supervision of academia has gone beyond ensuring the quality of higher education (HE) and in some cases translates into an outright confrontation with academic institutions, especially those not entirely dependent on state funding. The granting of excessive powers to bureaucratic structures ‘responsible’ for the HE sector may thereby lead to undermining high-achievers. Specific governmental decisions, such as the recommendation on contacts with foreigners, result in curbing academics’ ties with the external world and pose a direct challenge to developing international research collaborations and knowledge exchange. As the state’s influence is often dispersed, scholars may find themselves as targets of overzealous bureaucrats misinterpreting signals from the centre. Moreover, greater regulation and restrictions of the work of nongovernmental organizations, in particular the ‘law on foreign agents’ discussed in Chapter 2, create indirect obstacles to the pursuit of research, primarily through obstructing data collection. The foreign agent label increases the probability of individuals declining to participate in surveys and hinders cooperation between organizations. This study, illustrating the complex relationship between the state and academia, has shown that the state’s influence does not need to take the extreme form of an all-encompassing censorship and control. The motivation behind the state’s engagement with particular institutions or individual scholars can change suddenly. As the state’s actions are often dispersed and not necessarily coordinated, a similar issue may be regarded as crossing a red line by one institution and as ‘safe’ by another. The state’s involvement proceeds through means and ways that may not be instantly obvious. It becomes difficult to capture in, for instance, academic freedom reports that compile well-documented events of academic freedom violations. There are very few, if any, means at the disposal of academic freedom defendants that allow to account for self-censorship, self-policing or instances of soft repression (Kinzelbach and Spannagel 2018). Various pressures exercised by the Russian state on scholarly activity cannot be considered large-scale open censorship. However, the intellectual climate, which contours are shaped by the state with its quasi-monopoly on mass communication, puts indirect limitations on what kind of questions can be raised and

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which avenues are available for scholarly engagement with the wider society. The intellectual climate in Russia has been influenced by specific legal measures as well as by their misuse. The former includes a series of legislative acts that impinge on civil liberties, including the freedom of speech and of assembly. The latter comprise pressures on societal actors who challenge official narratives or criticize the conservative – patriarchal turn in Russian politics. In this context, certain topics never enter the public discourse, certain issues are considered too sensitive, while others continue to be actively promoted by the government. Research funding is another sphere in which the state’s activities influence scholarly practice, especially if the state remains the only or major source of funding and regards other donors – either private or from abroad – with suspicion. At the same time, scholars may take into consideration the state’s policies when deciding what kind of research may have better chances of receiving state sponsorship. This book situated these developments against the backdrop of historical change and continuity. In Chapter 3, I focused on the role of the Soviet past and historic discontinuity in knowledge production about international politics. I explored how the IR discipline evolved in the Soviet period taking into consideration the Soviet state’s changing approach to science and social science. Attitudes towards the latter were highly dependent on the political climate and specific configurations of power. This chapter paid particular attention to the role of the ideological framework of Marxism-Leninism that facilitated and legitimised a division between ‘proper’, Marxist-Leninist and ‘bourgeois’ science. While the break-up of the Soviet Union freed Russian academia from its ideological straightjacket and allowed it to develop wide-ranging international ties, the ensuing economic decline had a profoundly negative influence on state funding in social sciences and the humanities, weakening these disciplines both materially and in terms of status (Sokolov et al. 2015; Dubrovskiy 2017). During the 1990s, academia was largely stripped of its elite position. Its authority was tarnished as a result of its previous enforced intellectual entanglement with Soviet Marxism-Leninism (Kharkhordin 2015, [R7]),2 and the sudden divorce from Soviet state ideology caused a profound ideational void (Mäkinen 2014, 87; Sergounin 2009). A number of hasty reforms further undermined the status of academic expertise. Political science, for instance, emerged largely as a result of renaming the departments of scientific communism, rather than according to a plan of how to advance knowledge in that area (Golosov 2016). The contemporary system of HE and research still battles with the Soviet and transition heritage. No agreement has been reached on how to complete the process of reforms and political agendas appear strong enough to capture and undermine this process to the detriment of science.

Conceptualizing the political relevance of knowledge The sociopolitical context is fundamentally important to how we think about academic knowledge and conceptualize its political relevance. The co-production of

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knowledge is not limited to the moment of knowledge exchange between researchers and policymakers as suggested by the existing literature (Boswell and Smith 2017). Already at the stage of choosing questions and designing research, scholars may feel directly or indirectly pressured to select topics accepted by the state rather than those that might challenge existing policies or official narratives. It is therefore important to consider the relationship between scholars and policymakers not just in terms of knowledge-making but also the co-production of ignorance. Omitting or silencing certain topics and research agendas, is one of the noticeable implications of the sociopolitical context. The domination of conservative-patriotic narratives in the official discourse, coupled with limitations imposed on public debate in general, makes it riskier for scholars to pursue research in the realm of e.g. gender studies. Under contemporary conditions, it became more difficult to pose questions about power and power relations in the Russian state and study opposition movements and leaders. The evolution of attitudes towards the EU and European integration manifest in the formal organization of research and in academic outputs are without doubt linked to and inspired by political developments in Europe. However, shrinking interest in the EU studies and the disappearance of certain research strands connected with the EU cannot be ascribed solely to political developments inside the EU and should be seen against the background of material (limited funding) and ideational obstacles posed by the state. Critical scholarly assessments have in some instances mutated into attack and accusations. More sceptical attitudes exist side by side with emotionally charged expressions of contempt for the EU and European integration. Gap-bridgers and gap-minders, considering the policy relevance of IR knowledge, generally assume that it is up to individual scholars to choose whether to reach out to the policy world in order to help improve specific policies or maintain distance (Stokes, Peters, and Pierre 2017). As the Russian case shows, scholars have certain degree of agency but they are not entirely autonomous when it comes to distancing themselves from politics. Some scholars choose to withhold their expertise from the policy world or to provide contributions that are not overtly critical. This choice is always limited by its material consequences – deciding not to work with the state may close off important sources of institutional funding, career progression and even livelihood. Attempts on part of the state to separate academia from politics – for instance by defining what ‘political activity’ entails – make scholars approach the term political relevance with unease. The aim of enforcing an ‘apolitical’ character on research has been, at best, only partially realised. On the one hand, governmental policies, legal prescriptions and the intellectual context push scholars towards disengagement. At the same time, however, scholars find themselves at the very centre of politics. They become politically engaged and relevant not by providing or withholding advice on foreign policy, and not by how they theorise politics, but by how they cope with the state’s presence in academic research. Understanding how scholars accommodate, exploit or challenge state

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policies allows to build an account of their political agency. As Chapter 4 has shown, some opt for defending academic standards and decide to challenge the blurring of the boundary between the scientific field and the state; others modify their research agendas and adjust to maximise gains while minimizing losses. Some may combine a principled position with respect to certain issues, while making necessary concessions in other areas. This practice-focused approach to scholars’ agency has far-reaching implications for how we theorize the political relevance of knowledge. Existing literature shies away from looking at an individual scholar, their choices and epistemic practices in a given sociopolitical context. It assumes that keeping a distance from politics is necessary in order to remain relevant (Jahn 2017). A detailed enquiry into the actual contexts of scholarly practice undermines this definition of the political relevance of knowledge. It illustrates that the assumption of university autonomy and academia as separate from politics does not hold and that it is crucial to consider the dynamic relationship between the worlds of politics and knowledge. This takes us back to the book’s main argument – we cannot theorize knowledge and its political relevance without taking the sociopolitical context into serious consideration.

The global IR community A broader conclusion can be offered here, one that is important for deliberations about academic community and social science making. Reflections on the discipline of IR tend to be accompanied by the assertion that a global community of IR scholars exists, and that this community can – and should – work across scholarly differences and perspectives in an attempt to forge a dialogue. However, a more critical stance towards the actual possibility of constructing such a community is necessary. Leading IR journals have reproduced the idealised vision of the academic community. The European Journal of International Relations (EJIR) maintains it is building on its European origins while reflecting ‘the best of the global International Relations community’.3 In 2018, the EJIR’s editorial team referred to the global scholarly IR community profusely, articulating the journal’s aim in terms of dissipating ‘the destructive boundaries’ in theoretical and methodological approaches (Underhill 2018). Divisions stemming from political and economic pressures, including infringements on academic freedom have not been mentioned. While the idea of dialogical relations between producers of contending arguments is persuasive, I aimed to highlight that calls for a community and dialogue seem vacuous without paying due attention to vastly different contexts of knowledge-making. Closing our eyes to challenges emerging from these contexts, in addition to downplaying the vastly unequal global arrangements of knowledge production, means we only pay lip service to the notions of community and dialogue. Our contemporary idea of an IR community rests primarily on institutional density; for instance, growing genuinely international (usually described as

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non-Western) participation at annual International Studies Association conventions, more caucuses or working groups dedicated to specific regions as well as conventions organised in locations outside of the US and Europe, such as the International Studies Association first international conference held on the African continent – in Ghana in 2019 – and dedicated to ‘exploring the agency of Global South in international studies and practices’.4 These developments show that some broadening of perspective is taking place but much more work needs to be done than the proliferation and copying of existing institutions and structures from the professional ‘core’ to the rest of the globe. In particular, more research is needed into the definition and practice of academic freedom and its impact on IR knowledge-making around the globe. Without doubt, studying the sociopolitical context of academic knowledge production remains fraught with challenges. This book is but one step and an invitation to a broader conversation about methods that can be used in the sociological study of IR knowledge and the production of varied perspectives on world affairs.

Notes 1 Exceptions included the disciplines of law and medicine (Bourdieu 1988, 73–74). 2 See also a critique of the forms of intellectual production in Soviet humanities and social sciences (Kharkhordin 2015) and a discussion of academic freedom in Soviet times (Dubrovskiy 2017). 3 The journal’s official description: https://journals.sagepub.com/description/ejt. 4 The conference webpage: www.isanet.org/Conferences/ISA-Accra-2019.

References Acharya, Amitav. 2016. “Advancing Global IR: Challenges, Contentions, and Contributions.” International Studies Review 18 (1): 4–15. Boswell, Christina, and Katherine Smith. 2017. “Rethinking Policy ‘Impact’: Four Models of Research-policy Relations.” Palgrave Communications 3 (1): 44. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1988. Homo Academicus. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1999[1975]. “The Specificity of the Scientific Field and the Social Conditions of the Progress of Reason.” In The Science Studies Reader, edited by Mario Biagioli, 31–50. Hove, East Sussex, UK: Psychology Press. Dubrovskiy, Dmitry. 2017. “Escape From Freedom. The Russian Academic Community and the Problem of Academic Rights and Freedoms.” Interdisciplinary Political Studies 3 (1): 171–199. Golosov, Grigoriy. 2016. “Politologiya v Rossii: ne ochen’ radostnyy yubiley (Political Science in Russia: Not a Very Joyous Jubilee).” Troitskiy variant – nauka, 15 November. Ignatieff, Michael, and Stefan Roch, eds. 2018. Academic Freedom: The Global Challenge. Budapest: CEU Press. Jahn, Beate. 2017. “Theorizing the Political Relevance of International Relations Theory.” International Studies Quarterly 61 (1): 64–77. Kharkhordin, Oleg. 2015. “AHR Roundtable. From Priests to Pathfinders: The Fate of the Humanities and Social Sciences in Russia After World.” American Historical Review 120 (4): 1283–1298.

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Kinzelbach, Katrin, and Janika Spannagel. 2018. “Better Data Can Counteract Soft Repression.” Open Global Rights, 16 August. Mäkinen, Sirke. 2014. “Geopolitics Teaching and Worldviews: Making the Future Generation in Russia.” Geopolitics 19 (1): 86–108. Sergounin, Alexandr. 2009. “Russia. IR at a Crossroads.” In International Relations Scholarship around the World, edited by Arlene Tickner and Ole Wæver. London and New York: Routledge. Sokolov, Mikhail, Katerina Guba, Tatyana Zimenkova, Mariya Safonova, and Sofiya Chuykina. 2015. Kak stanoviyatsiya professorami: akademicheskiye kar’ery, rynki i vlast’ v pyati stranakh (How to Become a Professor: Academic Careers, Markets and Power in Five Countries). Moskva: Novoye Literaturnoye Obozreniye. Stokes, Gerry, B. Guy Peters, and Jon Pierre. 2017. “The Relevance of Political Science.” In Theory and Methods in Political Science, edited by Vivien Lowndes, David Marsh and Gerry Stoker, 321–331. Palgrave Macmillan. Underhill, Geoffrey. 2018. “European Journal of International Relations March Issue: From the Editors.” European Journal of International Relations 24 (1): 3–7.

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academic community 5, 49, 167, 224; Russian academic community 8, 93, 112, 147, 149, 164, 167, 172, 177, 187, 204 academic freedom 2, 12, 25, 28–29, 65, 86, 93, 157, 165, 184, 221, 224–225 Acharya, Amitav 27, 38, 42, 44 authoritarianism 3, 22, 35, 46, 66–67, 97, 114, 149, 162–163 Bilgin, Pinar 38, 40, 43, 51 Boswell, Christina 4, 26, 29 Bourdieu, Pierre 2, 4, 9, 16, 23, 32–35, 150, 219, 220 Bull, Hedley 38, 52 censorship 2, 74, 80, 83, 95, 112, 115, 125, 127, 221; self-censorship 3, 5, 12, 27, 115, 158, 161–163, 186, 221 conservatism 71, 199 Council on Foreign and Defense Policy (SVOP) 16, 146, 160, 208 Crimea 78, 81, 87, 94, 167, 198, 202, 206 Dissernet 182, 185, 189 Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) 175–176, 205 Eurocentrism 38; see also Western-centrism European Union (EU) 146, 223; EU studies 158, 172–174, 177, 223 European University at St Petersburg (EUSP) 1, 75, 85, 88, 89–93, 97, 103, 157, 165–166, 179, 200, 202 expertise 11, 24, 25, 36, 86, 145–147, 173, 183, 194–195, 197–199, 203–213, 218, 222–223 explanatory model 45, 47 exploratory framework 47–49, 97, 194

Federal Agency of Scientific Organisations (FANO) 76–77 Federal Security Service (FSB) 89–90, 96, 200 foreign agents 85, 87–89, 91, 102–103, 200 foreign policy 8–10, 15, 24, 27, 28, 45–47, 195, 223; Russia’s foreign policy 71, 80–81, 87, 94, 158–160, 164, 167–168, 173, 187, 194–198, 200, 203, 205–214; Soviet foreign policy 120, 128, 130, 138–139, 141 gender studies 64, 82, 90, 163, 219, 223 Global IR 7, 22, 41–44, 50, 219–220 Global South 7, 41, 225 higher education 28, 218, 220; in Russia 8, 14, 64, 69, 71, 77, 86, 92, 99, 146, 163, 221; in the Soviet Union 120 Higher School of Economics (HSE) 71, 75, 92, 100, 166, 173, 185, 199 Hoffmann, Stanley 128 human rights 84, 95 hybrid regime 3, 5, 15, 35, 66–67, 165 ideology 35, 47, 49, 51, 75, 91, 112, 116, 118, 120, 123, 125–126, 129–133, 139–140, 145, 147, 196, 209, 222 ignorance 4–5, 7, 26, 49, 158, 160, 194, 223 IR community 14, 41, 44, 50, 129, 158, 220, 224 Jahn, Beate 24, 29 knowledge: co-production of 5, 26, 49, 158–159, 186, 222–223; knowledgepolicy nexus 4, 24; policy relevance of 51, 203, 210, 213, 223; political relevance of 2–5, 14, 21–27, 29–30, 34, 46, 50, 98, 213, 218–220, 222–224

228 Index Latour, Bruno 33, 52 Levada Center 87 Mannheim, Karl 6–7, 12, 30–31, 36, 47–48, 50–51 Marxism 140–142 Marxism-Leninism 14, 46, 112, 116, 118, 123, 130–134, 138–139, 142, 145, 148–149, 222 Medinsky, Vladimir 180–183, 188 Medvedev, Dmitry 80–81, 92, 196–197, 208 Memorial 84, 87, 96, 104 Merton, Robert 31–33, 51–52 methodology 9, 12, 34–35, 122 Milyukov, Pavel 112, 114, 118–119 Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation (MFA) 80, 118, 121, 158, 163, 195, 197, 203, 212 Ministry of Science and Higher Education 68–70, 77, 86, 181–182 Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) 6, 72, 94, 118, 120–121, 173, 176, 197–198, 204, 206 Moscow State University (MGU) 11, 66, 68, 70, 72–75, 83, 101, 120–121, 126, 173, 182 objectivity 23, 142, 209 peer review 144, 146, 151, 177 plagiarism 14, 73–74, 147, 177–179, 185, 189 Putin, Vladimir 14, 67–68, 74, 76–77, 80–81, 84–86, 90, 93, 160, 172–173, 182, 194, 196–197, 200, 202, 212 reflexivity 9, 12, 23, 27, 44, 49–50

228 research: communication of 6, 14, 48–49, 200, 203, 213; research ethics 17, 147, 178–180, 185; research integrity 182 Rosobrnadzor 69, 89, 91, 93, 164, 166, 186 Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) 10, 75–77, 101, 149, 179, 181, 197, 203–204 Russian Fund for Basic Research (RFFI) 78, 79, 101 Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) 196, 203 Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA) 71, 73, 94 Science and Technology Studies (STS) 3, 21, 23–24, 33–36, 50, 158 Shaninka 73, 93, 157, 186 sociology 12, 13, 32, 64, 74–75, 89, 122, 125, 127, 140, 147–148, 167–168, 201; of (IR) knowledge 8, 21, 23, 36, 45, 47, 50, 122, 134; of science 9, 11, 21, 23, 30–33, 35, 46–47, 50 Soviet Union 13–14, 27, 32, 38, 52, 74, 81, 99, 112–149, 178, 176, 186, 195, 197, 206, 222 St Petersburg State University (SPbGU) 68–70, 72, 86, 93, 96, 173, 198 theory: IR theory 3, 38–39, 41–45, 141, 158, 170; of knowledge 51, 149 Vernadskii, Vladimir 112, 117 Wæver, Ole 5–6, 40, 45–47, 49 Waltz, Kenneth 38, 128 Western-centrism 14, 37–39, 52, 170 Yermolenko, Dmitri 112, 122, 132, 134–141, 143, 148