Estonian ‘Balticness’ as a social construct: meanings and contextual specifics
This paper explores the Estonian vision of Baltic identity. Estonia’s authorities have repeatedly articulated their scepticism towards the concept of a stand-alone ‘Baltic region’ and the inclusion of Estonia in it, preferring to position their state as a Nordic country. Yet, in numerous ...
France’s strategy in the Baltic region: military and political aspects
This article examines the current military-political strategy of France in the Baltic region. This area has not traditionally been among the main priorities of French diplomacy. However, under President Emmanuel Macron, France pays closer attention to the Baltic Sea due to the growing tension between Russia and the West. According ...
Approaches to the Definition of the Baltic Sea Region
The Baltic Sea region is one of the most developed and well-formed regions of international cooperation. It is a place for promoting collaboration between businesses, non-profits, public authorities, and municipalities of the countries located on the Baltic ...
The economy of Russian Baltic regions: development level and dynamics, structure and international trade partners
The article explores the challenges encountered during the formation of the Baltic macro-region comprising Russia and eight EU countries (Germany, Poland, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) in the context of the ongoing geopolitical and geo-economic changes. The article aims to assess the dynamics, level,...
The Visegrad Group and the Baltic Assembly: coalitions within the EU as seen through Russian foreign policy
Today Russia has difficulty doing business-as-usual with EU states. It seems that the countries of the Visegrad Group (V4) and the Baltic Assembly/Baltic Council of Ministers (BA/BСM) have contributed substantially to this state of affairs. Overall, the tensions between Russia and the EU are building up – another tendency that did not arise on the Russian initiative. This article ...
The spread of the COVID-19 infection in Russia’s Baltic macro-region: internal differences
This article explores the spread of the Covid-19 infection in Russia’s Baltic macro-region. The monthly excess mortality rate in the Baltic region is analysed along with regional and municipal Covid-19 response acts to identify regional features affecting the spread of the disease. The spatial characteristics of Russia’s ...
The main environmental problems of the Baltic Sea and the ways to solve them
The Baltic Sea is a unique ecological system, an integral part of the global ecological system, which is in urgent need of protection from destructive anthropogenic impact stemming from the production and consumption of nuclear energy and artificial radionuclides,...
Territorial structure of inbound and domestic tourism in the Baltic States
... changes since they became independent and joined the EU. These changes have affected the geography of tourist flows and destinations of interest. This study aims to define the geographical and economic peculiarities of the development of tourism in the Baltic States and to identify the central, peripheral and semi-peripheral regions. Elements of the centre-periphery structure were identified through cluster analysis covering the period 2009—2019. Eleven indicators were used to determine the level ...
EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region: Challenges and Perspectives of International Cooperation
This article describes the main characteristics of international cooperation in the Baltic Sea Region (BSR) within the framework of the EU macroregional strategy. The analysis of the key directions, structure, and the Strategy implementation mechanisms demonstrates its experimental and innovative nature. At the same time, the authors ...
Major infrastructure projects and the foreign policy of the Baltic states in 2010—2014
... regional economy and new economic geography and their interpretation of the interconnection between political and economic factors. The article aims to demonstrate the inconsistency between political and economic objectives of the development of the Baltics. The study contributes to a broader set of research into the issues of post-Soviet economic and political development. The Baltic States follow their own political and economic ways. The study proves the hypothesis of low efficiency of large infrastructure ...
Russia and the European Union in the Baltic region: a treacherous path to partnership
This article examines policies of Moscow and Brussels in the Baltics since the launch of the European Union’s Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region in June 2009. An increase in the efficiency of Russia’s policy in the region requires not only the development of bilateral relations with the region’s countries ...
Electric energy cooperation in the Baltic Sea region and the role of Russia in it
This article examines cooperation in the electric energy sector in the Baltic region. The author explores the existing undersea HVDC power exchange projects. It is emphasised that cooperation in the electric energy sector is concentrated largely in the EU member states despite earlier plans to establish the Baltic energy ...
Societal security in the Baltic Sea Region: the Russian perspective
This study discusses whether the concept of societal security is embedded in the Russian formal and informal discourses as well as in the Russian strategic documents on national security and the Baltic Sea region. Particularly, the paper describes four paradigms of international relations (neorealism, neoliberalism, globalism and postpositivism) and theoretical approaches to the concept of societal security formulated in them. On a practical ...
Efficiency analysis of seaports in Russia’s Baltic basin: performance evaluation
This research presents a comprehensive analysis of the performance efficiency of Russia’s Baltic seaports, taking into account various economic indicators and addressing investment planning and management issues. Special attention is given to the sustainable development goals and objectives of the seaports, considering their significance in ...
Artificial Intelligence: a catalyst for entrepreneurship education in the Baltics
... of AI technologies across economic and other domains of life. The authors aim to define the concept of ‘entrepreneurial potential’ and elucidate the contribution of AI in augmenting the entrepreneurial potential among university students in the Baltic States. To achieve this goal, the authors employ a range of methods, including comparative analysis, analogy, generalization, classification, and structural-functional analysis, among others. These methodologies are integrated within an interdisciplinary ...
Modern Hanseatic Trends in the Baltic Region
A critical analysis of Hanseatic traditions may produce consequential methodological material for the study of the 21st century Baltic regionalisation. Current trends in the development of the Baltic region, whose academic analysis is impossible without considering earlier cases of successful interactions between the peoples of the Baltic Sea region, necessitate political, economic,...
Geography of international clusters in the Baltic region
International cluster is a relatively new form of spatial organisation of economy in the globalisation conditions, which has become a frequent phenomenon in European countries, including those of the Baltic region. It requires a comprehensive study of both regional economics and economic geography. This article aims to identify structured international clusters in the Baltic region and map the corresponding regions. The results obtained will make ...
Forecasting Actions of Baltic elites: A Scenario Approach
This paper provides an overview of different approaches to forecasting the future of the three Baltic States. The author’s theoretical approach to studying Baltic elites is used to forecast changes in the action models of the Baltic elites. The article stresses the scarcity of internal political processes in the Baltics. However, a significant ...
Variability of climatic characteristics оver the South-East Baltic coastal waters in the early XXI century
The study is focused on features of hydrometeorological conditions in the southeastern Baltic Sea and their trends assessment for 2005—2019 (climatic half period). The authors used the data from field observations of atmospheric pressure, wind direction and speed, and air temperature from the automatic hydrometeorological station located ...
The position of international community on the restoration of independence of the Baltic States
The separation of the Baltics from the Soviet Uni on was a difficult process accompanied by both political and economic conflicts. The third party in the negotiation process was represented by Germany and the USA. This article sets out to identify the role of the USA and Germany ...
From the idea to the strategy of Baltic Europe
This article focuses on the historic prerequisites and forms of international cooperation in the Baltic region (“Baltic cooperation”). According to the author, Baltic Europe is being formed as a single administrative, economic, cultural and infrastructural area, which could become a new economic and cultural center of Europe. Special emphasis ...
The role of transborder cooperation in the increase of innovative potential of the Baltic region
The article aims at analyzing the role of cross-border cooperation in the development of innovation potential of the Baltic Sea Region. The author analyzes the projects in the framework of the Neighborhood Programs implemented in 2000—2006 and related to the development of innovation potential in the Baltic Sea Region, particularly in the South-East Baltic. The author ...
The Role of Political Elites in the Development of Politics of Memory in the Baltic States
The article focuses on multiple cases of the politicization of history by the Baltic political elites. Three states of development of politics of memory in the Baltic States are identified. Problems of political exploitation of the past are scrutinized in the context of political life and international relations. It is concluded ...
Geopolitical and Geo-economic Changes in the Baltic Sea Region at the Turn of the XX—XXI centuries
The article describes the process and results of the geopolitical and geoeconomic changes in the Baltic Sea region at the turn of the XX and XXI centuries. The authors assess the political, economic and military potential of individual countries and groups of countries. Ranking the selected countries and grouping them according to the similarity ...
On crisis trends in the legitimacy of the political regimes of the Baltic States
This article considers the legitimacy of political regimes in the Baltic States by analysing three major parameters: confidence in political institutions, level of corruption, and the development of their party systems. The author identifies the major crisis trends in the legitimacy of the political regimes of Lithuania,...
Economic and Geographical Structure of the Baltic Sea region
The Baltic Sea region is one of the most developed transnational regions. It comprises the coastal areas of Russia, Germany, and Poland and the entire territories of Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. New spatial forms of international ...
The Baltic economic model: some results of the 1990—2015 transformations
During the last 25 years, the economy of the Baltic States has been developing in the conditions of sovereignty, both de facto and de jure. This period has been sufficient to identify regular patterns in the national economic models. Studies into the nature of the economic development of the Baltic ...
International research cooperation in the Baltic region: a scientometric analysis
This article examines the processes of international research cooperation in the Baltic Sea region. It focuses on research works published in the leading periodicals in 1993—2012. The empirical material is collected from the world’s largest abstract and citation database, SciVerse Scopus, which makes it possible to evaluate macroindicators ...
Modern trends in paradiplomacy: a case of Russian-Finnish regional cooperation
... regional interaction and defines the main trends in paradiplomacy. The author concludes that paradiplomacy intensifies globalisation and regionalisation processes. In the past years, the main paradiplomacy trends in cooperation between Russia and the Baltic Sea region states, particularly Finland, were as follows: (1) project activity gathering momentum; (2) diversification of paradiplomatic actors; (3) equal and symmetrical partnership between Russia and the European states.
Introduction
During ...
Population Ageing as a Sociodemographic Problem in the Baltic Region
Population ageing is a major problem of European development in the 21st century. Rapid population ageing in most developed countries will continue to drive the dependency ratio up. This research aims to forecast dependency ratio in the Baltic region until the end of the century. A more detailed population analysis and forecast is provided for the case of the Baltic States — Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. The authors use Bayesian probabilistic predictions based on data from the Population ...
Coalition Within a Coalition: The Baltics in the European Union
... political responsibility for decision-making to larger players. Such an asymmetric strategy makes it possible for small powers to advance their interests within alliances and save resources. The authors test this hypothesis on the behaviour of the Baltics in the European Union. It is demonstrated that Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia have created a stable small coalition within the EU and actively form ad hoc alliances with the leading states to push union-level decisions, as it was the case with ...
Russia and the Baltic States: Some Results and a Few Perspectives
Russia has a vested political interest in the Eastern Baltics; yet acting upon this interest is made either difficult or altogether impossible when it comes to the Baltic States. For 20 years, the Russian Federation has been actively promoting a model of mutually beneficial co-operation. The anti-Russian ...
The Development of International Tourism in Lithuania: a Comparative Analysis of Regional Aspects
... quality-price ratio of the services offered contribute to the growth of competitiveness on the international tourism market. Service standards applied in Lithuania at the international tourism market uphold and improve the image of Lithuania in the Baltic Sea region. The interregional cooperation between Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia in the field of international tourism development is based on the principle of public private partnership. It has been recently acknowledged that the three Baltic ...
The Baltic policy of Germany and current international relations
This article analyses the Baltic policy of united Germany from the 1990s until today. The authors set out to identify the significance of German-Baltic relations and the role of the Eastern policy in Russian-German relations. The method of dynamic comparison between the political ...
Innovations in the Baltic Sea Region and Network Cooperation between Russia and the EU
Transnational (involving countries) and cross-border (involving adjacent regions of different countries) cooperation and integration are rapidly developing in the Baltic Sea region. Russia lags behind the Nordic countries and Germany as far as innovative development is concerned; yet our national pace here is comparable to that of Poland and the three Baltic States. At the same time, the features of innovative ...
Strategic perspectives for the territorial development of the Baltic Sea Region
The article describes the motives, objectives and findings of preparing a perspective for territorial development of the Baltic Sea Region and discusses issues related to its implementation. Particular attention is paid to Northwest Russia and Kaliningrad region. Promoting innovation clusters, metropolitan networks and urban-rural partnerships, improving accessibility as ...
Competition and cooperation problems in the energy sector of the Baltic region
This article considers the problems of competition and cooperation in the field of energy in the Baltic region, first of all, those related to the export of Russian oil and oil products, the Nord Stream gas pipeline, and the construction of nuclear plants in Poland, the Kaliningrad region, Lithuania, and Belarus. The author shows that, though Russia ...
A functional description of the model for the protection of the environmental interests of the Russian Federation in the Baltic Sea region
... given added urgency when, within the same ecological unit, one country needs to develop and another to protect its environmental interests. The borders of the countries and regions, the economies of which affect the safety of Russia’s interests in the Baltic, do not coincide with the boundaries of the ecosystems. This calls for a study of the legal protection of Russia’s environmental interests in the Baltic Sea region. There is no legal mechanism for ensuring a balance between the interests of development ...
Security in the Baltic region as a Projection of Global Confrontation between Russia and the USA
This article considers the problem of security in the Baltic region, namely, that of Poland and the Baltics. The authors rely on the works of Karl Deutsch, Emanuel Adler, on Michael Barnett’s theory of security communities and Barry Buzan’s regional security complex theory, address Steven Mann’s ...
The prospects of nuclear power development in the eastern part of the Baltic Sea region as a factor of the formation of international relations system in the region
The current development of economic diplomacy in the world is determined by a combination of globalization and regionalization. In addition, it has an economic dimension. At the same time, the Baltic Sea region demonstrates large-scale politicisation of economic cooperation. The development of nuclear power in the eastern part of the Baltic Sea is indicative of the effectiveness of political and economic cooperation in the region. The author ...
The Baltic Sea Region and the Black Sea Area: Two Pieces of the Same Puzzle
The Baltic Sea region and the Black Sea area are overlapping regions that have their own political, historical and cultural peculiarities. They belong to the same geopolitical system, within which they are developing two regional cooperation subsystems strongly ...