Foundations of Geopolitics

The Foundations of Geopolitics: The Geopolitical Future of Russia is a geopolitical book by Aleksandr Dugin. It has had a large effect with the Russian military, police and the people decide how the Russia deals with other countries.[1] It has been used as a textbook in the Academy of the General Staff of the Russian military.[1][2] The book was published in 1997. It was well liked in Russia. Because of the book powerful Russian politicians have taken an interest in Dugin.[3] He was a Russian Eurasianist, fascist,[4] and nationalist. [5] Dugin has formed a close relationship with Russia's Academy of the General Staff.[6]

The Foundations of Geopolitics: The Geopolitical Future of Russia
AuthorAleksandr Dugin
Original titleОсновы геополитики (геополитическое будущее России) / Osnovy geopolitiki: geopoliticheskoe budushchee Rossii
CountryRussia
LanguageRussian
PublisherArktogeja
ISBN978-5-8592-8019-3

Dugin has said that General Nikolai Klokotov of the Academy of the General Staff helped him write the book. [7] Klokotov says this is not true.[2]Colonel General Leonid Ivashov helped write the book.[8]

Use

Klokotov said that the book would "serve as a mighty ideological foundation for preparing a new military command".[9] Dugin has said that the book has been used as a textbook in many Russian schools.[1] Former speaker of the Russian State Duma, Gennadiy Seleznyov has "urged that Dugin's geopolitical doctrine be made a compulsory part of the school curriculum".[9]

Content

In Foundations of Geopolitics, Dugin says that the United States should not have any effect on Eurasia. He wants Russia to rebuild its power through annexations and alliances.[2]

The book says that "the battle for the world rule of Russians" has not ended. It also say that Russia is still "the staging area of a new anti-bourgeois, anti-American revolution". The Eurasian Empire will be built "on the fundamental principle of the common enemy: the rejection of Atlanticism, strategic control of the USA, and the refusal to allow liberal values to dominate us."[9] Military operations are not a large part of his plan. The textbook says subversion, destabilization, and disinformation should be used. They should also use Russia's gas, oil and other natural resources to pressure other countries.[9]

Reception and impact

Historian Timothy D. Snyder wrote in The New York Review of Books that Foundations of Geopolitics is influenced by the work of Carl Schmitt. Scmitt was a supporter of a conservative international group whose work influenced the Nazis. He also said that Dugin's was important in getting people to talk about the iideas of Eurasianism and National Bolshevism.[10]

In 2017, news.com.au said that the book "reads like a to-do list for Putin's behaviour on the world stage".[11]

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 Dunlop, John B. (2004-07-30). "Russia's New—and Frightening—"Ism"". Hoover Institution. Retrieved 2017-10-12.
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 "The Unlikely Origins of Russia's Manifest Destiny". Foreign Policy. Archived from the original on 2016-07-27. Retrieved 2017-10-23.
  3. Liverant, Yigal (Winter 2009). "The Prophet of the New Russian Empire". Azure. Jerusalem: Shalem Center (35). ISSN 0793-6664. Retrieved 2015-04-06.
  4. "Classification of Dugin as a fascist is justified, regardless of the fact that today the MGU professor frequently speaks not as a primitive ethnocentrist or biological racist. (...) By «fascist» we understand the «generic» meaning of the concept, used in comparatory research of contemporary right-wing extremism by such well-known historians-comparativists as Alexandr Galkin (Moscow), Walter Laqueur (Washington), Stanley Payne (Madison), Wolfgang Wippermann (Berlin) or Roger Griffin (Oxford)", Андреас Умланд (22 June 2012). ""Евразийские" проекты Путина и Дугина – сходства и различия" [Putin and Dugin's "Eurasian" projects − similarities and differences]. Geopolitika (Lithuania). Retrieved 31 August 2015.
  5. Koposov, Nikolay (October 13, 2017). Memory Laws, Memory Wars. Cambridge University Press. p. 211. ISBN 9781108419727.
  6. Lavelle, Peter (2003). Uncovering Russia (excerpt: A civil society without civility). Norasco Publishing Ltd. pp. 379–380. ISBN 0972970800.
  7. Firth, Charles (March 4, 2017). "1990s Manifesto outlining Russia's plans is starting to come true". news.com.au. http://www.news.com.au/world/europe/1990s-manifesto-outlining-russias-plans-is-starting-to-come-true/news-story/343a27c71077b87668f1aa783d03032c. Retrieved 12 October 2017. 
  8. Mankoff, Jeffrey (October 17, 2011). Russian Foreign Policy: The Return of Great Power Politics. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 69–70. ISBN 9781442208261.
  9. 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 Dunlop, John (January 31, 2004). "Aleksandr Dugin's Foundations of Geopolitics" (PDF). Demokratizatsiya: The Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization. Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (George Washington University). 12 (1): 41. ISSN 1074-6846. OCLC 222569720. Archived (PDF) from the original on 7 June 2016. Retrieved 5 March 2022.
  10. Snyder, Timothy (20 March 2014). "Fascism, Russia, and Ukraine". The New York Review of Books. Archived from the original on 2016-01-27. Retrieved 5 September 2014.
  11. "This is what Russian heavyweights wanted in the '90s". NewsComAu. http://www.news.com.au/world/europe/1990s-manifesto-outlining-russias-plans-is-starting-to-come-true/news-story/343a27c71077b87668f1aa783d03032c. Retrieved 2017-10-23. 

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