The article is devoted to activity of orthodox priests in Russian embassies and missions. All Russian embassies in Europe had churches and family chapels with the personnel. They submitted to ambassadors or heads of Russian missions, were accountable to the Russian Foreign Ministry that paid them salary. Most of the Holy Synod also controlled them. During the reign of Nicholas I the priests were appointed to those eastern countries with whom Russia wanted to open up diplomatic relations. The greatest number of cleric was in the Ottoman Empire and Greece. Churches and church services in these countries had to be examples for orthodox communities for the Balkan Slavic population where orthodox church services are usually non-canonical. Special attention should be paid to the Russian Orthodox Ecclesiastical Mission in China that also served as a diplomatic mission there. During the second quarter several Orthodox Ecclesiastical Mission were established in China and remained there for a long time, while Russia still had no diplomatic relations with China. The article is based on documents from the Archive of foreign policy of Russian Empire that have never been engaged in scientific researches. The theme of clerics’ membership in Russian embassies has never been studied before (except for few works concerning Russian clergy in the Holy Land). The large scale of materials that shows an important role of embassy clerics make it possible to significantly broaden the study of the activity of the Russian representational offices.

The subject of the study is the perception of political ideologies, movements and parties development problems by the Catholic Church, during the period of the First and Second World War. The object of the study is the Catholic political doctrine during the pontificate of Benedict XV, Pius XI and Pius XII. The author pays special attention to the key encyclical – Quadragesimo Anno, published in the 40th year after Rerum Novarum, as well as the influence that the Church has had on the formation of the post-war political system of European countries. Such methods as dialectical, logical, comparative, systemic, and a number of others are widely used in the article. The main conclusion of the author is that during the world wars the Church did not concentrate political doctrine only around foreign policy issues, being in search of a political platform capable of ensuring the implementation of its principles within the political process. Obviously, neither liberalism, nor communism could be such. Moreover, it was precisely because of the emergence of the communist threat that the Catholic Church perceived a number of authoritarian regimes in the early years of their existence as subjects that could be oriented toward a less hostile direction of development. As a result, Pius XII, choosing between existing political ideologies, did not stake on any of them, preferring the choice of a political regime - democracy.

This article analyzes the history of the development of the phenomenon of citizenship in Western Europe, from Antiquity to the Modernity. The analysis uses the binary opposition method, which is the basis for including individuals in or out of citizenship. The citizenship of Ancient Greece was of an elitist nature, sharply distinguishing citizens from the rest of the population. The basis for inclusion / exclusion was the binary oppositions “civilized – barbarians”, “free – dependent “, “possessing land ownership – not possessing such”, “adults – minors”, as a result only a small part of the population had the rights of citizens. In the Athenian democracy, for the first time in history, the basic essential characteristics of the concept of “citizen” was laid: equality, participation and liberty. The citizenship of Ancient Rome, which received the status of a limited circle of people, during the conquest of new territories included ever wider sections of population. As a result, Roman citizenship was unified, that led to the formation of the legal status of “subject of the Roman Empire,” for which no longer required property and which did not involve political participation. In the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period, for which characteristic subjection and vassalage was a type of relationship between the supreme power and the population, the phenomenon of citizenship existed only in cities. After the revolutions of the Mid Modern Period  the achievement of which was the liberation of all categories of the population and the proclamation of equality, the ideas of citizenship began to be embodied within national states. If, at the initial stage, all women and men who did not possess sufficient property were still excluded from political participation, by the end of the Mid Modern Period  all men had received a full range of civil rights. During the Modern Period women were granted the right to political participation, therefore, all adult indigenous peoples finally enter into citizenship within national states. Therefore, the list of oppositions began to include only the following: “native inhabitants of the country – foreigners” and “adults – minors”. At the same time, social rights were given special development, which enabled citizens did not worry about their survival and security. Currently, researchers note the following problems in the development of the phenomenon of citizenship: the actual remaining inequality with the declared equality of all citizens, “citizenship without participation,” when a citizen is a passive consumer of social services provided by the state. The processes of globalization led to mass migration, and it became obvious that the citizenship of the West European country is a huge privilege. The arriving population is again structured within the framework of binary oppositions: “resident - stranger”, “an European - a non-European”, “white - black (black, yellow-skinned)”, “educated - uneducated”, “ChristianMuslim” and so on. The question of inclusion / exclusion in the citizenship of Western European countries today is not fundamentally resolved. The analysis of the phenomenon of citizenship made it possible to draw a conclusion about two cycles of the development of the phenomenon of citizenship. The first cycle - Antiquity, the second cycle - the Medieval Ages and the New Time. For each of them there are some characteristic vectors of development: liberation from dependence (slavish, feudal); Inclusion of ever wider layers of the population in citizenship (the evolution of the phenomenon from elitist to mass); reduction and complete rejection of property requirements for inclusion in citizenship; reduction of active participation of citizens in government; alienation of a citizen from the state, formalization of relations between a citizen and the state. It is possible that the Modern period is the beginning of the third cycle, which will continue its development in accordance with the aforementioned vectors.

The end of August 1917 was marked by a dramatic event, which influenced a lot the future of the Russian state. It is the case of the so-called «Kornilov revolt» – undertaken by the Supreme Commander-in-Chief General L.G. Kornilov, who attempted to send troops to Petrograd in order to establish military order in the capital. Kornilov’s action was unsuccessful. Together with his closest associate she was arrested and sent to a small Belarusian town of Old Bykhov, located near Mogilev, where the headquarters was located. The generals L.G. Kornilov, A.I. Denikin, A.S. Lukomsky, S.L. Markov and other prominent figures of the White movement were soon placed in a converted women’s gymnasium in a prison. There they were about a month and a half, and then, shortly after the October events of 1918, they left it going to the Don. “The Kornilov revolt” has been devoted to a lot of books and scientific articles, but very few have been written about the stay of military commanders were held in the prison of the Belarusian town. More details about him were written, perhaps, only by A.I. Denikin in the work «Essays of the Russian Troubles». The absence of numerous sources about the «Bykhov period» of Kornilov and his associates can be explained by three reasons. First, Kornilov and his associates were in isolation in Bykhov and could not communicate with their recent political military environment. Journalists also did not have access to them, so articles in the newspapers about what happened to the Bykhovites appeared quite infrequently. Secondly, Kornilov’s stay in Bykhov turned out to be extremely short. Finally, those who could leave interesting memories, for example, the same Kornilov or Markov, died in less than a year on the fronts of the Civil War. Having decided partly to fill the gap in the historiography of the “Bykhov period”, the author visited the town of Bykhov, which is now located in the Mogilev region in Belarus, and tried to find evidence of the presence of participants in Kornilov’s actions in August 1918. He visited the building of the former women’s gymnasium, which now houses the Bykhov forestry. Then he saw the room in which Kornilov lived. Its layout has not changed much. In the same building, the forestry staff created a small museum exposition. Near the main entrance there is a memorial plaque informing about the stay of Kornilov in Bykhov. During the preparation of the article, author also held some conversations with the director of the historical museum of this city, as well as with L.A. Kornilov - Chapron du Lorre – grandson of the famous general, who lives now in Brussel. He told a lot of interesting things about the events which happened in late August 1917.

The topicality of the article is determined by many contemporary ethnic conflicts in different parts and regions of the world, including the conflict in Ukraine. The article’s study base is formed by modern Russian, Byelorussian and Polish, researches and historical sources. One of the main features of the emerging ethnic conflict in the Polish-Byelorussian borderland in the first half of the XX century, which had significantly influenced its development was the rivalry between two different cultural centers “west-oriented” Warsaw and Moscow as part of a greater “Russian World”. The article confronts two ideologically motivated policies towards Western Byelorussian lands: assimilation and integration. Both of them according to their background (nation-oriented assimilation and concentrated on the pattern of social and economical ties and relations – integration) somehow neglected very specific local identity. Specific character of the process was emphasized by lasting for many decades Byelorussian nation shaping, which ran under several different regimes: Russian Empire, II Polish Republic and Soviet state. As a result, such an ambiguity led to the development of a stronger local identity immune to the stronger oppression in the concerned period. The Tensions between Polish and Byelorussian regional communities escalated during the period 1939–1941, when integration processes in Western Byelorussia were taking place. In some aspects of interaction e.g. in the area of administration they even resulted in outright confrontation. The main reason for was caused by the fact that by the majority of the Polish population their national statehood was regarded, despite all the disadvantages of its realization during the II Polish Republic, as a significant value. Local polish community could not understand the reluctance of ethnic minorities to defend the old regime, that would discriminate them. Soviet authorities acted as a buffer, taking responsibility for the negative manifestations of the new ethnic policies and transformation processes.

The discourse of “borders” and decolonisation in the context of Central Asia has been a path unexplored until this moment, therefore a “startup” approach is logical. This “border” is a phenomenon that continuously shapes and transforms itself, therefore giving new light to the understanding of history and culture of Central Asia.  This guiding principle influences the relationships that are built between close and distant neighbors on the planet. The other side opposite of this the notion is that of a modern state, that does not tolerate the lack of an identity; it requires one to cement a belonging to a certain geographical unit. The history of “modern and national” is articulated through the juxtaposition of “I” and “Other” (“outside of the border”). The interconnections of borders, states in Central Asia, and their orientalist platform do not lend themselves to an easy solution. The border does not hide or deny its artificiality, it has become ingrained as the norm. The innocent process of modern statebuilding is ensued by its «Westphalian» foundation. Naturally such interpretation of modern state raises more questions than answers. These questions are related to the uncertainty of the past of Central Asia, as well as the it’s bordering lands. The most fascinating characteristic of such uncertainty, is that it displays multi-locality (or otherwise, multi-community) rather than “multi-nationality. Inside Dushanbe, Samarkand, Tashkent, and Bukhara most of these communities are distinguished by their national diversity, which is a given. This “rhythm” continues to make the region more open not just to each other internally, but also globally. Therefore, in this context the remaining colonial heritage should be treated differently, without constant references to “borders”, without attempts to reproduce the sense of subordination of former colonization. In this regard, the proximity (geographical, cultural, “Soviet”) to Russia should help with understanding its own Eurasian of interconnectedness. A real equilateral dialogue, with the incorporation of the accumulated common academic heritage. i.e. sovereignty (in which all the inhabitants of the republics are believed) cannot be represented as a voluntary application of the universally declared right to self-determination. All five members of the Central Asian “club” march and convince each other, that the abstract universal form of international relations in no way makes our common «stan» Eurocentric. While Central Asian involvement in so-called “national” cultures is difficult to materialize with its variety of languages, traditions, styles. Hence the difficulty of a sense of «multinationality». This should rather be treated and seen “multi-locality” (or otherwise “multi-community”) in Dushanbe, Samarkand, Tashkent, Bukhara. National diversity of these communities are naturally inherent. This “rhythm” continues to make the region more open to each other and to the world, transforming it into a “field” located on beyond good, evil, right or wrong. The region is where the diversity meets.

The article analyzes the impact of 2016 amendments to the Constitution of the Kyrgyz Republic on maintaining and strengthening of political stability in the country, which was the official goal of the amendments. The author focuses on new elements in the sphere of division of powers between the head of state, the prime minister, and the legislative power. There are two aspects to the analysis: the normative and the empirical. The main analytical tool was the model of relationship between presidents and assemblies, devised by M. S. Shugart and J. M. Carey.The articlealso utilizes the neo-institutional approach, which can account for the influence of informal political norms and practices when evaluating various institutional patterns. In particular, it examines such peculiarities of the Kyrgyz society as ethnocultural dividedness and neopatrimonial political and cultural orientations. The author concludes that alterations made to the institutional framework of relationship between the president, the head of parliament, and the parliament, and to the growth of responsibility and discipline of deputies may have a positive effect on maintaining of political stability especially given the level of institutionalization of the party system rises.

The article discusses the current state of relations between Russian and the West. The author presents long-term assessment of rising tensions between Russia and the West. The article identifies the NATO expansion as one of the most important factors that contributed to the current deterioration. The author argues that the NATO expansion was a political miscalculation of the Western countries. The author believes that the relations between Russia and the West can be improved through foreign policy linkage of two regions: Middle East and Eastern Europe. It is the place for significant political transformations (especially in the Middle East) and both sides are politically involved there. The first major recent shift in the global political landscape there is Russian-Syrian alliance that has changed the development of the civil war in the country as well as global counterterrorist efforts. The second major shift occurs in the Saudi Arabia where a more moderate leadership has come to power. The author proposes the diplomatic framework for improving relations 5+1 format that includes the USA, major European states and Russia. However, the main issue is not the format of negotiations, but its essence. Russia could use its current potential as a mediating power to fully restore the Syrian state and calm down the tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran. In return, the West can be more flexible in conflicts in the postSoviet space.

Muslim scholars from Egypt and British India formulated the principles of Islamic economy in the second half of the 1940s. At the turn of the 1970s-1980s a number of countries (Sudan, Iran and Pakistan) attempted to Islamize their financial systems. However, in none of the three, the experiment was successful. Afterwards, the Muslim world has not undertaken to build a financial system based on the principles of Islamic economics and finance any more. However, interest in the application of individual institutions of the Islamic economy has not faded away. The article examines how the principles of Islamic economic doctrine were applied in the formation of the “state” budget in the terrorist entity “Islamic State” (IS). The author analyses the principal differences between the theoretical constructions of the Islamic economy and their practical implementation in the territories controlled by the IS. In fact, the IS implements a completely different concept of Islamic economy and Islamic finance (fundamentalist) from the one that was applied in a number of Muslim countries (modernist). Considering the practice of application of Islamic economic principles by the IS, the author of the article develops the thesis expressed in his earlier publications that there is no single universal Islamic economic doctrine that could be applied with some modifications in any society and in any jurisdiction. Moreover, the various interpretations of the economic provisions of Shariah can come into serious contradiction with each other. This is indicated, in particular, in the case of the IS, where, with the help of law-permitting institutions, they try to legalize activities that are illegal from the point of view of Shariah. Another important feature of the financial policy in the IS is the insignificant interest in modern Islamic financial institutions: banks, insurance (takaful) companies, etc. The author explains this as follows. In their attempt to build a caliphate, the ideologists of the IS and their followers take a traditionalist approach in which there is no place for institutions unknown in the 7th-13th centuries. For traditionalists, such institutions as Islamic banks, etc., formed in the second half of the XX century, are often unauthorized innovations (bida’).

The article analyzes problems of solar energy rise in the Middle East and North Africa. The Arab World possesses huge resources of oil and natural gas and gained great significance as a world producer and exporter of energy. The MENA region home market is also a big consumer of oil and gas. The study stresses the fact, that industrial processing of mass amounts of crude inside the region has already created serious constraints in development of the area. The further steps to overwhelm the aggravations may be positive if secured through minimizing serious threats, concentrating around problems of climate warming and green gases. The perspectives of doing well in this vital sphere are closely connected with the implementation of various kinds of renewables represented in the Arab East in supply, given the fact that the most preferred of them is the sun energy as economically more commercial and so far more effective in its competition with the traditional fuels. Meanwhile the study confirms that the Arab World as a whole is not yet ready for frontal deployment of this method of electric power generation. The real obstacle for the major part of the Arab countries is the inequality of their economic potentials and lack of financial support for industrial use of the new type of energy. There are also social and economic limits doing alongside with the macroeconomic factors. Insufficient experience and lack of competence are followed by more serious factors seeing in bureaucratic hurdles, passivity of national capital, incorrect distribution of functions among administrative bodies, etc. The whole situation is abnormally stressed due to the absence of flexible cost-reflective energy policy and improper billing mechanisms still dominating the region and braking promotion of solar energy industry. The study comes to the conclusion that any delay with building-up of most favorable grounds for the energy market in the MENA region may provoke mal-practicing of the whole business and then the ambitious arab plan for the solar energy development may find itself effective only to a certain degree.

The article analyzes main trends in the work of the UN Security Council on the Syrian issues. The author notes that the interaction of the Security Council members fully reflected the modern development of international relations, related to its transformation towards polycentricism. This process is associated with a reduction in the ability of the US to use the UN Security Council to conduct its own narrow-conjuncture policy, with the growing influence of new centers of power, primarily Russia and China. Those actors are ready to uphold the principle of inadmissibility of using the UN Security Council to interfere in the internal affairs of states in order to change regimes. To counter this trend, Washington and its allies pursued a policy of pressure on Moscow, trying to force it to abandon an independent course toward Syria. At the same time, the thesis of the “paralysis” of the UN Security Council with reference to the conflict in Syria was actively used because of Russia’s position. Simultaneously, Russian initiatives in the UN Security Council aimed at de-escalating the situation and launching an inter-Syrian dialogue were rejected. Nevertheless, the consistent position of Russia and China forced the West to gradually realize the non-alternative search for common denominators on the Syrian issue as well as collective partnership efforts to find measures to end the conflict. As a result, it became possible to adopt a number of decisions of the UN Security Council concerning various aspects of the settlement of the crisis. The main principles of the settlement, negotiating formats for the participants in the conflict and external players were agreed upon. Thus, it was the interaction in Syria that gave the UN Security Council the opportunity to become the embodiment and guarantor of a multipolar world, a platform for harmonizing approaches on an equitable collective basis in a changing world.

Since 1990s the EU has been highly aspirational on its role in human rights promotion on a global scale, which has led to the EU’s proactive participation in international organizations. The Union identifies itself as ‘global human rights force’ but less and less acts in accordance with that identity at the UN HRC. At this intergovernmental body the EU acts as a smoothly coordinated block, which is contested by the other regional and political coalitions of states. The emerged multi-polar world system urges for a less normative analysis of EU human rights promotion. The article proposes and applies 4 measurable indicators to assess the EU actorness in human rights promotion: 1) explicitness of references to the UN or global fora in the EU primary law and secondary legislation related to human rights promotion; 2) degree of support/contestation for the EU objectives by other non-EU actors at the HRC; 3) degree of (in)cohesiveness of EU external representation at the HRC; 4) EU (in)consistency in formulating priorities and using instruments at the HRC. Multi-polar world system questions the EU high aspirations as ‘a global force’ in human rights promotion. The EU ability to use its instruments in human rights promotion is moderate even despite its enhanced burden sharing among the EU member states, a hybrid system of representation, a vast diplomatic and NGOs’ network. ‘Big’ states still play the leading role in this process. The internal disagreement among the EU member states weakens the EU human rights promotion. The UN HRC structural context limits the EU opportunity to promote human rights, therefore, the EU tries to be less loud and less visible.

Despite the acknowledgment of the global city concept and the importance of transnationalization processes in their formation, the debate regarding global city identification methods continues. The article stresses the need to change our approach in evaluating global cities by primarily looking at them as locales for foreign multinational corporations. By analyzing the location decisions of foreign TNCs included in the Forbes 2000 rankings two things become apparent: the “nodality” of US global cities and their hierarchical pattern. Moreover, the article recognizes the key role that Alpha global cities play by leading the country’s international business relations, examined through foreign TNCs. Using our methodology and data on foreign TNCs we defined five uneven groups of cities are defined in the study: city-hegemon New York, leading cities, heavyweight cities, middleweight cities and cities-outsider. The article defines some key factors that determine city’s attractiveness for foreign multinationals: its geo-economical power, functional specialization, location, historical and cultural ties, position on different sectoral markets. The study of US global cities as hubs for foreign transnational corporations seems to be especially useful for Russian cities, especially Moscow and St. Petersburgh, which aim to increase the attractiveness for foreign investment.

Book review: Alexander Zakharov, International competitive bidding in modern world economic relations. Moscow:MGIMO-University, 2017. 379 p.

Book Review: Geography of world economy: traditions, modernity, prospects (in Russian) / Ed. By V.A.Kolosov & N.A.Sluka. Collective monograph. Moscow-Smolensk: Oikumena, 2016. 400 p.

The book under review is a solid monograph, the result of the work of the famous geographers, whose core is staff and graduates of the World Economy Geography Department of the Geographic Faculty of the Moscow State University. The stages of formation and achievements of the national school of the world economy geographical research are revealed. Modern changes in the geography of material and non-material spheres are estimated. The changes in the place of countries and regions in the world economy and politics are considered. The international migration of the population at different territorial levels has been analyzed. It seems that the book under review the book is written on a high scientific level, good language and will be of great interest not only for geographers, but also for international economists and political scientists.