RUSSIA AND THE COUNCIL OF EUROPE: THE CRISIS OF RELATIONS IN THE CONTEXT OF INVERTION IN DEMOCRATIC DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

The article is about the crisis in relations between the Russian Federation (RF) and the Council of Europe (COE) in the context of inversion in democratic development of Russia. While preparing the given paper a set of methodological instruments of the transitological approach was used, in particular, democratization «wave theory», the approach towards understanding transformation processes in Eastern Europe as a non-linear process, models of «transition with an open final».

In the ХХІ century the Council of Europe faced daunting challenges resulted both from crisis situations in the EU member-states and from inversion of democratic transit in post-Soviet countries, particularly, in Russia. Apparently, the COE failed to realize any of its basic functions in Eastern European countries: regulatory, prognostic, worldview and axiological. Under these circumstances, the functional weakness of some COE bodies and institutions became especially notable, complicating, along with lobbyism and corruption of representatives of post-soviet states, the organization’s operational capacity. Overcoming the institutional crisis and strengthening the role of the COE on the continent suggests both further reforms of the organization and reintegration of the normative dimension and the value-based approach into foreign policy of European states.