Neoclassical realism and neo-revisionist foreign policy: Russian interventions in Georgia and Ukraine

Since the Russian Federation began to pursue an active foreign policy in the late 2000s, Moscow has been once again the focus of international politics. Even though Vladimir Putin followed Gorbachev and Yeltsin's status quo policy in his early years, Russian foreign policy has transformed into neo-revisionism. The study distinguishes Russian neo-revisionism from revisionism and reformism by explaining the causes. Russian neo-revisionism is analyzed in the framework of neoclassical realism. The hypotheses of the study argue that states shape their foreign policy behaviors according to their positions in the international system, while also claiming that the uncertain nature of the international strategic environment will make it more likely that intermediate factors such as strategic culture and threat perception will play a role in the foreign policy making process. The study, which uses the case study method, one of the qualitative research methods, tested its hypotheses with the Russia-Georgia War in 2008, the military intervention in the Ukrainian territory of Crimea and the limited intervention in the Donbas region in 2014.