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Eastern partnership and the Eurasian Union: bringing ‘the political’ back in the eastern region

ABSTRACT Drawing on the post-structuralist traditions and especially Jenny Edkins’ [1999. Poststructuralism and international relations: Bringing the political back in. London: Lynne Rienner] interpretation of ‘politics’ and ‘the political’, this article sets to conceptually rethink the geo-strategic dynamics of the EU–Russia relations in the context of the eastern region. It argues that while the EU’s and the Russia-led Eurasian (EEU) projects may be appealing in their own right, their visions for the ‘shared’ eastern neighbourhood remain self-centred and exclusionary. The root of the problem, as this paper contends, is that the EU and the EEU struggle to imagine a new social order, which would give a relational value to the Other as pari passu, and assume cooperation as an interplay of differing normalities rather than subjection to one’s norms and authority. Presently, the EU and Russia find themselves locked in parallel rather than complementary relations with the ‘shared’ region, each attempting to institutionalise their respective political orders, and not by way of contestation – ‘the political’ – but rather by a depoliticised means of technocracy or compulsion. This, if anything, is likely to destabilise the region further, if ‘the political’ is not back on the agenda.