Illiberal Leviathans: Modeling the Sino-Russian Dynamic

Abstract

Sino-Russian relations are both crucial to the future of world politics and tragically misunderstood. Borrowing from neorealist, neoliberal, and constructivist theories of international relations, this thesis presents a mutlicausal model for understanding the Sino-Russian security relationship. Analyzing Sino-Russian interactions in Central Asia, the Russian Far East, and on the subject of international interventions, we empirically evaluate our model’s predictive power. Finally, we discuss the case studies’ implications for international relations theory, concluding that national identities matter most for understanding the Sino-Russian relationship, and that their strategic partnership will probably remain a fixture of the 21st century’s geopolitical landscape.