Research Information System
80th Annual Midwest Political Science Association Conference, Illinois, United States Of America, 13 - 16 April 2023, pp.1-26, (Full Text)
In this paper, geoeconomics, considering the usage of economic means as part of a
carrot-and-stick strategy in the pursuit of national objectives in foreign policy, is examined in
the context of the US response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Although the geoeconomic
approach had lost its impact in the late 1990s in academic circles, new international
developments following 2010 inspired a new wave of studies. These factors, such as dramatic
progress in military technologies, the impact of public opinion, and the level of integration have
increased both material and moral (spiritual) costs of war, especially among Great Powers. At
this point, geoeconomics enters the scene and transforms the use of economic means into a
functional strategy in pursuing states' own foreign policy agendas. In our case, by focusing on
incentives of inclusionist geoeconomic strategy, the US firstly has transformed Russia and tried
to made it one of the harmonies actors of the international system. After Moscow had turned its
face to the irredentist policies, the US, by operationalizing the punitive dimension of its
exclusionist geoeconomic strategy, restricted the some ties of Russia within the international
system. The assumption of this article is based on the inevitability of geoeconomic strategies
Geoeconomic strategies attract some criticism because of alleged insufficiency to persuade an
actor to do something or to discourage it from doing something. But they are still indespensible
due to the structure of international relations, despite their disputed functionality. Neither
Moscow’s energy geoeconomics has dissuaded Europe from joining the sanctions againts
Russia, nor those sanctions implemented by the US and Western countries have achieved to
dissuade Russia from the occupation in Ukraine. Both Russia and the US-Europe, however, can
not give up using geoeconomic strategies since the costs of a possible direct military
confrontation between the parties (both sides) are far beyond what these countries could bear.
Therefore, these countries need to rely on geoeconomic tools rather than hard power
instruments to keep the cost of the competition and struggle affordable.