Photo: Ekaterina Kuzmina/RBC

If we talk about an empire as a community of peoples, then such a scheme is quite possible. But today the coexistence of states requires polycentrism, which Russia is clearly not ready for in relation to its neighbors.

In a new series of articles for RBC, Dean of the Faculty of Economics at Moscow State University Alexander Auzan discusses the most common myths about the Russian and global economy and finds out what is true in these myths and what is not.

History is dominated by two forms of existence of states. One is a nation state, the second is an empire, when different ethnic groups live within one state. And such empires can be quite friendly to their members, as was the case, for example, in the Roman Empire. All elites of the captured countries received the rights of free citizens of the city of Rome. Not the entire population, but the elite.

And it is interesting that recently conflicts in the post-Soviet space have occurred precisely with those of our neighbors who historically occupied a special position in the Russian Empire, and representatives of the elites of these countries were closely intertwined. Russian aristocrats married Georgian princesses, and you will find Ukrainian surnames among the royal favorites of different times, as well as among current members of the government and the Kremlin administration.

Of course, Russia was, remains and will remain the largest state in the region. Even in a recession, we are still many times larger than neighboring economies and have a strong influence on them. At the same time, we do not have very strong economic ties with our neighbors. They are much stronger with the European Union, China and the United States, because these countries are the centers of the world economy. There are reasons to talk about imperial influence, if by this we mean something similar to the laws of gravity in astronomy, when a large body exerts a strong attraction. There are also gravitational models in economics. With this view, Russian devaluation is a guarantee of the collapse of currencies in neighboring small states after some time.

Does this mean that the Russian or Soviet empire can be restored in one form or another? If we are talking about a community of peoples, then an integration scheme is quite possible.

What is so wonderful about the European Union? With numerous disadvantages and the highest bureaucratization, the European Union was formed by those states that fought with each other for several hundred years: Germany, France, Britain, and then the wars turned into other forms of geopolitical competition. And as a result, a community arose, which from a historical point of view can be called an empire as a community of peoples, but it is structured polycentrically.

Can some kind of similar unity be restored in our space? Maybe, but it requires polycentrism. Because the Russian-centric unification can hardly be restored - otherwise the forces of gravity will act. We are already more focused on China and Europe than on Kazakhstan and Belarus, not to mention Tajikistan and Azerbaijan. The formation of certain communities where the influence of the Russian economy as the main one is possible, but only if a system of checks and balances arises. Until recently, one of the centers in this system could have been Ukraine. Now such a picture seems unlikely.

Myths about Russia: is it possible to revive the empire?