If Russia does not develop and produce technological innovation, it will not be able to keep pace with the outside world.
Akio Kawato is a former Japanese diplomat and blogger. Over the course of his career, he has served in the former Soviet Union and Russia, West Germany, Sweden, the United States, and Uzbekistan.
During his time serving in the USSR and Russia, he had the opportunity to witness many of the region’s key developments, from the inauguration of Gorbachev and the fall of the Soviet Union to the transfer of power from Yeltsin to Putin. He left the diplomatic service in 2004 to serve as chief economist at the Development Bank of Japan until 2006.
Kawato has also published extensively, including an epic novel entitled Land of Legend...Land of Dream (available on Amazon Kindle), which depicts Russian society during and after the Perestroika. The Russian version was published by Vagrius, under the name Akira Kumano. He currently writes primarily on his blog Japan and World Trends, which publishes in Japanese, English, Russian, and Chinese.
He received a master’s degree in Soviet studies from Harvard University.
If Russia does not develop and produce technological innovation, it will not be able to keep pace with the outside world.
While dreadful news continues to pour out of Ukraine and the Middle East, East Asia appears to have found an equilibrium—at least for the time being.
Many are talking about Russia’s pivot eastward, but is it working? Eurasia Outlook posed the question to some leading experts in the field in order to gather some thoughts about the policy’s effectiveness.
Pax Sinica has come. Countries in China’s orbit will be given security guarantees and trade preferences as long as they remain allegiant. Thus, the pivot to Asia will only drive Russia to unnecessary dependence on China.
Facing Western sanctions, some Russian pundits are rushing to find an easy way out through increased cooperation with Asia. However, nothing can replace the West for Russia.
East Asia is coming back to a phase in which economic considerations dominate. In this milieu Russia may lose her place in East Asia, because it will be deprived of an opportunity to play China against the West.
The United States seems intent to force Russia into capitulation over Ukraine, a situation caused by a poor understanding of economics on the part of Putin’s advisers. While low intensity battle will likely linger on, Russia remains in a more maneuverable position to offer a deal to the United States.
Japan’s new guidelines for overseas operation by the country’s Self-Defense Forces are not aimed at Russia. On the contrary, Japan’s pro-active policy serves the maintenance of balance of power in North-East Asia, which in its turn fits the interest of Russia.
Russia must know that an exclusive alliance with China will incur its own cost.
If the Kremlin allies with China too closely, it will not only estrange Russia from most of Asian countries, but also may provoke China’s appetite to gobble the newly-born child of Russia, the Eurasian Union.