About

The “Clashing Visions: Russian Foreign Policy in the Age of Xi and Trump” conference brings together scholars, specialists, and graduate students in the subfields of area studies, comparative politics, international relations, economics and related disciplines to examine the changing dynamics of Russian’s foreign policy within the framework of an assertive China and the Trump administration’s uncertain foreign policy trajectory.

The conference’s overarching goal is to enhance the academic community’s understanding of a broad range of contemporary issues pertaining to Russia’s relationships with United States, Europe, China, and the post-Soviet space. The conference’s panels will place the changing dynamics of these relationships within the broader context of trends in the shifting international order. Such a broad goal can only be achieved with a comparative approach. This approach needs to consider varying institutional arrangements and constraints that exist within different states and regions,  and must take into account cultural and normative differences.

Conference Themes

The “Clashing Visions” conference will analyze Russia’s place in the shifting international order from both the transnational and domestic levels of analysis. The conference will juxtapose Russia’s regional integration projects, like the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) against Western institutions like the European Union (EU) and NATO; and the Chinese-led One Belt One Road.

It will also examine the shared internal challenges that these regional institutions seek to confront, like transnational crime, terrorism and migration, and analyze how state and non-state actors have sharpened divergences in national visions over time. By exploring distinctions and points of synergy between Russian, Chinese and Western visions of the international order, this conference will act as a forum for cross-cultural dialogue and further the University Consortium’s mission of strengthening transatlantic cooperation.

Engagement with the University Consortium 

This conference is partially funded by the University Consortium, a Carnegie Endowment affiliated organization, which seeks to foster Russia-West cooperation and encourage dialogue between six U.S., Russian and European academic institutions. In accordance with the University Consortium’s mission, our conference will highlight major topics relating to transatlantic security, the sources of the current conflict between the Russian and Western conceptions of the international order, and explore avenues for the future mitigation of these tensions. In addition to advancing the overarching themes of the consortium through presentations by academics, this conference will engage University Consortium fellows to participate via a Webinar on the May 5 afternoon.

Funding and sponsorship

The conference is funded by the  St. Antony’s College Antonian Fund, Russian & Eastern European Studies at the University of Oxford, and the Carnegie Corporation of New York under the auspices of the University Consortium.