The following is an interview with Rein Taagepera, professor emeritus of the University of Tartu, in Estonia, and the University of California, Irvine.
***
MOTYL: Professor Taagepera, you were the first social scientist to have studied the rise and fall of empires in a rigorous social-scientific manner. So let’s start with a big-picture question. Why do empires decay?
TAAGEPERA: Empires rarely stand still. They initially outrun their internal flaws through external expansion. Once they stop growing, these flaws accumulate. Expansion is self-reinforcing, and so is decay. To change course, one must give up on past glory and start anew.
MOTYL: How do empires react to decay?
TAAGEPERA: It is psychologically easier to give up on overseas holdings than on territorially contiguous ones, however disparate these may be ethnically. While losing vigor, Poland-Lithuania and Austria-Hungary largely maintained their territory, until their final collapse. In contrast, the Ottoman Empire began to lose ground slowly already in the 1700s.
When one compares Russia with these three, the Ottoman trajectory appears most similar. Both Russia and Turkey held huge territories, some densely populated, some almost empty. Early area loss was fitful. It involved some of the most densely populated parts, with Turkey losing the Balkans and Egypt, and Russia losing the East European satellite states and the former Soviet republics. Prior to final collapse, Turkey was reduced to an ethnic core area, the Fertile Crescent, and the (pre-petroleum) wastelands of the Arabian Peninsula. At present, Russia consists of its ethnic core area, the Caucasus, and the wastelands of Siberia. Both Turkey and Russia fell far behind other world powers in economic development.
MOTYL: So are you predicting the Russia’s collapse?
TAAGEPERA: It would be risky to conclude that a Russian collapse is imminent. Under Kemal Ataturk, Turkey gave up on empire and focused on building a new nation state. This flip was easier for Turkey than it would be for Russia. Ataturk could shift from Islam to ethnic Turkish pride. Post-Soviet Russian leaders had no such alternative, because language-based nationalism was at the very core of the empire ever since Moscow’s “in-gathering of Russian lands.”
Charles de Gaulle may offer a more feasible script for Russia’s emancipation from its past. He understood that, in the present world, colonies are a burden. But he dealt with overseas colonies. France had a tough time letting go of Algeria, while contiguity makes it harder for Russia to forget about Ukraine, not to mention the Northern Caucasus and Tatarstan. Russia is still waiting for such a visionary leader.
MOTYL: Do you see Russia succeeding in its quest for imperial revival?
TAAGEPERA: History rarely shows empires that stumble but rise again. The Egyptian, Assyrian, and Hittite repeat-empires were new formations that emerged long after the breakdown of the empires that preceded them. The French colonial empire comes closest to a second-breath empire. Kicked out of Canada and India, France built up a new empire in Africa. Today’s Russia lacks such an option. Trying to recoup its habitual sphere of domination only wastes resources that should go into starting anew.
MOTYL: While Russia’s imperial collapse may not be imminent, it does seem inevitable. What should the West do about it?
TAAGEPERA: As with the Ottoman Empire, no external power wishes Russia to collapse: The result would be too messy and unpredictable. Yet what Putin sees as his “near abroad” is slipping away thanks to the attractiveness of Western prosperity and the unattractiveness of the Russian model. Putin sees this as a dastardly Western plot: Given his imperial mindset, he cannot imagine Ukraine as having a mind of its own. One can understand Russia’s frustration. Putin genuinely feels on the defensive. Yet, by clumsily trying to strike back, Russia is creating a defensive circle around itself.
Aggression must be contained, even when launched by understandably frustrated people. When facing a decaying rather than an expanding empire, however, one can afford a more elastic response. The decaying empire has limited capability. Containment needs little active use of force. It’s enough for the West to refuse to recognize conquests and to reinforce its defenses elsewhere, while waiting for the empire either to reform or to crumble.
Russia is a socioeconomically decaying society, still mired in nostalgia, but still capable of plenty of mischief. It is up to Russia to free itself from the chains of imperial history. This will take time—generations—unless speeded up by some de Gaulle. Meanwhile, the tension has to be managed.
MOTYL: And if it’s not managed?
TAAGEPERA: International systems may become unstable when an emerging power demands a larger slice of the pie or when an existing empire undergoes decay. When both scenarios take place simultaneously, the system gets doubly unstable. The alliance of an ascending Germany with a decaying Austria led to World War I, because it encouraged Austria to attack Serbia, while Russia’s response to Austria drew in Germany. The tail wagged the dog. The present marriage of convenience between an ascending China with a decaying Russia carries similar risks. It seems far-fetched to imagine that, in trying to win leverage against the West, Russia could draw in China, but Austria’s drawing in Germany also looked far-fetched in the spring of 1914.
