Analysis

This listing contains all the analytical materials posted on the Russia Matters website. These include: RM Exclusives, commissioned by Russia Matters exclusively for this website; Recommended Reads, deemed particularly noteworthy by our editorial team; Partner Posts, originally published by our partners elsewhere; and Future Policy Leaders, pieces by promising young scholars and policy thinkers. Content can be filtered by genre and subject-specific criteria and is updated often. Gradually we will be adding older Recommended Reads and Partner Posts dating back as far as 2011.
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5 Years Since Russia’s Intervention in Ukraine: Has Putin’s Gamble Paid Off?

Simon Saradzhyan March 14, 2019 RM Exclusives
The author analyzes the costs and benefits for Russia, finding that the intervention advanced one vital national interest and damaged several others. The costs have been manageable so far, but may eventually become prohibitive.
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Russian Sanctions: Why ‘Isolation Is Impossible'

Henry Foy November 12, 2018 Recommended Reads
Countries throughout Asia, the Middle East and even Europe continue to do business with Russia despite U.S. efforts to isolate Moscow.
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US Sanctions Against Russia: What You Need to Know

Cyrus Newlin and Jeffrey Mankoff October 31, 2018 Recommended Reads
While Washington clearly intends to continue using sanctions as a primary means of confronting Russia, it is less apparent what the various sanctions imposed since 2012 have done to change Russian behavior.
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Skepticism About US Intentions and Other Enduring Consequences of Russia’s 1993 Crisis

Paul Saunders October 04, 2018 RM Exclusives
Twenty-five years ago this week, a confrontation between President Boris Yeltsin and Russia’s parliament became one of the most consequential events in Russia’s post-Soviet history.
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New Sanctions Won’t Hurt Russia

Andrey Movchan September 26, 2018 Recommended Reads
Moscow's foreign currency reserves are at an all-time high, and the falling value of the ruble has actually been a boon for Russia's state budget.
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The Rise of Authoritarian Capitalism

Kevin Rudd September 16, 2018 Recommended Reads
As democratic capitalism begins to show signs of sickness, on offer are other modes of governance, including Russian nationalism and China's model of authoritarian capitalism.
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Russian Power Under Putin: Up and Down and Flatline

Andrew Kuchins August 22, 2018 RM Exclusives
While Moscow’s military power has grown considerably, Putin has not created the conditions crucial for sustained economic growth and the development of new commercial technologies.
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How to Interfere in a Foreign Election

Stephen Kinzer August 19, 2018 Recommended Reads
Despite Yeltsin's unpopularity, Washington saw him as easy to control, and so, U.S. resources were thrown behind a Russian presidential candidate.
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Hacking Power Grids: New Tactic of War or Wave of the Future?

Nadiya Kostyuk November 03, 2017 RM Exclusives
Recent research suggests that cyberattacks have not yet become a force multiplier to conventional military tools in wartime, but this may very well change in coming years as countries invest in such capabilities.
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The US Sanctions Bill Is a Win for Russia

Angela Stent July 28, 2017 Recommended Reads
The EU may rethink its own sanctions regime if the U.S. sanctions bill moves forward. This, of course, would be good news for the Kremlin.
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To Punish Putin, Economic Sanctions Are Unlikely to Do the Trick

Eduardo Porter July 25, 2017 Recommended Reads
Ambitious sanctions aimed at powerful countries with autocratic governments have a poor track record of success.
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Why Forecasts of a Chinese Takeover of the Russian Far East Are Just Dramatic Myth

Alexander Gabuev and Maria Repnikova July 14, 2017 Recommended Reads
Reports of mounting tensions between Moscow and Beijing are not rooted in ground realities but on faulty assumptions about China-Russia relations.
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