Russia 's Annexation Of The Crimean Region Of Ukraine

As stated earlier, Russia’s economy is largely based on oil. Further, throughout Russia’s existence, its political institutions have strongly remained stable do to their performance legitimacy. Therefore, the rise of oil and therefore competitive authoritarianism are not mutually exclusive. Since Putin’s election, economic growth has averaged 6.7%, however, much of this growth is directly due to rising oil prices since 1998 that have topped over 100 dollars a barrel. Rising oil prices has allowed Russia to eradicate foreign debt, establish massive reserves of hard currency, and create budget surpluses. This has in turn allowed Putin to accumulate massive amounts of wealth as well as improving his performance legitimacy. Arguably, this is a false performance legitimacy. To many in Russia, this is the best the economy has ever been, and it has allowed for Putin to easily consolidate power. Yet, with oil on the decline, Russia has effectively created an economy that can not last into the near future, and only time will tell how far they will end up

The foreign policies of Russia also compliments in many ways its domestic policies, both in the apparent want for dominance and security in the focal point on sovereignty. These aims lead to an importance on bringing back Russia’s international status and removing positions of power that Western states have had in Russia

The conflict and subsequent invasion of the Ukraine by Russia came as a surprise to many people in the world, including to the United States intelligence community. This surprise move by the Russian government caused many members of Congress to point the blame at the intelligence community for failing to accurately predict this move, thus limiting the United States and NATOs ability to respond in a timely manner. But was there really an intelligence failure or was this action something that was

But first, what is the definition and scope of the economic sanctions that US is threatening to put on Russia? From NewRepublic.com (2014), these sanctions would:

As economic hegemony and political and military superpower following WWII, the United States attempted to impose its will on many countries through the use of economic sanctions. There are many motivation prompting the use of sanction. First, it can be a proportional response to a challenge where the interests at stake are judged to be less than vital. Second, sanctions are a form of expression, to communicate official displeasure with a certain behavior or action . American reluctance to use military force is another motivation, especially in those instances where U.S. interests are not deemed sufficiently important to justify casualties and high financial costs. Third, the growth of congressional power helps explain the prevalence of economic

The quick collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 appalled everyone in the West, but that is because no one outside the Soviet Union knew what was going on. The Soviet government’s lies of economic success and superiority over the Western capitalist states had controlled the citizens of Russia to believe that the USSR’s Communist regime was growing for half a decade. It wasn’t until Mikhail Gorbachev that mocked previous leaders like Stalin and Brezhnev for being responsible for not improving the Soviet economy. Gorbachev’s reforms to modernize the USSR created more freedom and openness for Russians, but sprawled uprisings and revolutions in the Central Asia and the Baltic states. The inability to keep up with the United States economically in the 1970s and 1980s along with the later reforms to improve the Soviet economy in Gorbachev’s term led to the downfall of the USSR.

The collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991 marked the beginning of Russia’s transition from a communist system to a market-based economy and democratic political system. Russia, despite being a nation rich with natural resources such as oil, fell into a state of economic instability and continued to weaken throughout the 1990s. The situation escalated until the point of financial collapse on August 17, 1998, resulting in a 90-day suspension on payment to foreign creditors, a default on domestic debt, the devaluation of the ruble and as a consequence, an increase in all debts denominated in foreign currencies. The primary causes of Post-Communist Russia’s economic crisis of the 1990s can be identified as the corporate elite’s influence on parliamentary economic agenda, foreign influence and pressure, the government’s ineffective integration into the global market and its presentation to the international community, as well as the government’s inadequate macroeconomic preparation and management. These causes significantly weakened the power of the state and the government’s ability to effectively instigate economic reform; leading to a large drop in investor confidence and consequently, a devaluation of the ruble, which resulted in the August 1998 economic crisis.

All of the goods that we receive from Russia are very important and beneficial to us. Some people use iron and steel in their everyday lives, so if we do not continue helping Russia, we may not continue to get these goods that contribute so strongly to our economy. The importance of these goods that we receive is another incentive to continue helping Russia and their economy expand and grow. The total imports from Russia totaled $27 billion in 2013, while the total exports to Russia totaled only $11.2 billion ("President Obama 's Signature Paves Way for Permanent Normal Trade Relations with Russia and Moldova"). Even though the US did have a $15.8 billion deficit in 2013, as the Russian economy continues to grow, more Russians will be able to buy the imported goods and more companies will use the imported goods since they use more advanced equipment and technology (Cohen, "President Obama 's Signature Paves Way for Permanent Normal Trade Relations with Russia and Moldova").

The Russian Economy was falling at a substantial rate, many economist saw the fall as a result of tough sanctions put on the country from many western civilizations due to Russia’s actions in the Ukraine. The global community as a whole cooperated with international leadership from the United States, and enforced these sanctions to try and strong arm Russia out of Ukraine without having to put troops on the ground. There has been a recent bump in the Russian Economy, The prices of oil which makes a large majority of the Russian Economy has been rising steadily as of recent, and the sanctions put on them from the EU will most likely expire in a couple of months which some see as an opening the Russian government could not resist taking.

Russia’s energy security depends largely on the global demand and international energy market price. Thus, Russian energy security is vulnerable to market forces and benefits from economic stability, particularly that of the European countries, with whom Russia conducts the majority of its energy trade. Let us see the history trend of Russia’s energy trade during the financial crisis.

SUMMARY: As of 26JUL17, major international players are warning the U.S. against imposing further sanctions on Russia, saying that doing so could further isolate America from the world community. EU President Jean-Claude Juncker issued a warning to the U.S. stating that the “bloc would act “within days” if it doesn’t get assurances that new sanctions wouldn’t significantly impact European interests. The economic bloc worries that American sanctions developed without their input could jeopardize the continent’s energy security.

There are several aspects of Russian society that can threaten businesses operating in this nation. Russian participation in the European Social Survey determined they are individuals characterized by a high degree of caution and more pronounced need to be protected by a strong state (Magun & Rudnev, 2010). The strong state applies to multiple facets of Russian society that leads to concerns about property rights and the protection of other assets. There is pervasive government intrusion into business that affects leaders of Russian companies. Economic advisors warned of a danger to economic growth comes from creation of state corporations with a difficulty facing business leaders being uncertainties from a powerful, hostile Russian government (McCarthy, Puffer, May, Ledgerwood, & Stewart, 2008). In certain areas the state hinders economic

“Economic sanction” is frequently used in discourse with the incorrect implication that it is a single course of economic action. In fact, the opposite is true. It actually refers to an entire class of nonviolent actions that are each unique and cannot be argued as whole. Part of the appeal is that sanctions can be a mere nuisance, such as a limit on luxury goods like Rolex watches or Cuban cigars, but on the other hand they have the potential to cripple entire economies or level entire sectors of commerce. To understand it is necessary to make distinctions between them in each individual case. Failure to do so can result in ill-informed, sweeping assertions that have the potential to be dangerous if left uncorrected. Common explanations argue that the most important factors to consider when trying to understand the nature of sanctions are the power dynamic between the sender and receiver and level of international support, but I argue that the most important thing to consider when trying to understand the nature of sanctions is the motivation behind them. Put differently, the behavior is that is being pressured to change. Depending on the behavior both sides may be very committed or only marginally committed to the sanction effort. Why does the goal have the strongest effect on the type that is used and why shouldn’t the argument for or against the “success” of sanctions continue? Using a few specific cases this

“Since 2005, U.S. policymakers have increasingly turned to sophisticated types of economic sanctions as a foreign policy tool of first resort. From the development of banking sanctions limiting Iran’s ability to secure financing from Western capital markets to new sanctions targeting Russia’s financial system and the development of its oil resources, U.S. policymakers have touted these innovative tools as extremely powerful while also being tailored and precise.” (Feaver & Lorber, 2015)

Kassim 3 financial sanctions. A boycott is the restriction of imports from the target country; embargoes are restrictions on exports to the target country; financial sanctions are restrictions on investment in the target country (Caruso “Should We Set” 23). Kaempfer and Lowenberg posit that economic sanctions can be proposed for the following three reasons: in response to a nation that threatens the wealth or security of the sender nation; to achieve moral or ideological goals; as a part of trade policy and commercial relations – i.e. in response to tariffs or quotas (Kaempfer 2). The question of whether or not sanctions are efficient is a difficult one to answer. A major contributing factor to this difficulty is the lack of a universal standard for gauging success. Analysts create the criteria by which to judge success, and these criteria are not accepted by