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National Identity, Domestic Structures, and Trade Policies of the Ex-Soviet Republics: a Focused Comparison of Latvia and Belarus
*
School of International Relations
University of Southern California
International Studies Association
Minneapolis, Minnesota
March 17-21, 1998.
Support from the USC Graduate School, the USC School of International Relations made possible the research for this paper. The author is grateful to Laurie Brand, Eileen M. Crumm, Mohammed Hafez, Jeff Knopf and John S. Odell for their critical comments and suggestions on earlier drafts. None of these individuals is liable for all errors and deficiencies.
Abstract
After 1991 some of the former Soviet republics directed their international trade primarily to Russia and other former members of the Soviet state, while others shifted their trade policies sharply away from this pattern and toward new partners. A central reason for the difference in trade policy orientations, not sufficiently appreciated by available literature, is substantial variations in the strength of the new republics' national identities. A focused comparison of Latvia and Belarus suggests the significance of this national identity explanation relative to likely rivals, such as market competitiveness and security concerns. Thus this study adds support to the Weberian insight that cultural, idea-based influences should be treated as significant in their own right and not merely as residuals subordinated to interest-based thinking.
1. Introduction.
With the demise of the Soviet empire, Russia and fourteen other former Soviet republics have found themselves facing crucial tasks of becoming viable international actors. Lacking the experience of national independence, the former republics were to define their place in the world anew, to establish necessary economic and security links through coherent foreign policies. This paper explores the trade policies that were chosen by the former republics in response to the 1991 Soviet collapse. It asks why some of the republics decided to organize their trade around old trading partners, Russia and other republics, while others put all their energy into finding new commercial partners and restructuring their trade away from what used to be the Soviet empire.
In the post-imperial context, conventional explanations, such as those from market and power considerations, can only be partially successful in explaining variation in states' trade policies. Latvia and Belarus are similar in these two important respects and yet their trade policies have diverged sharply. Another explanatory variable – strength of national identity -- makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the NIS' economic policy behavior. In the post-imperial state, a strong national identity increases the power of nationalist-oriented groups--their ability to influence the foreign policy decision-making process. By focusing on the former Soviet republics in a post Cold War world, this paper seeks to demonstrate how states' economic behavior is motivated in part by their concerns about nation building and b sovereignty, and making Belarusan the country's single official language (See Andreev 1997).
The reorientation of trade towards new commercial partners may also require establishing necessary domestic institutions for the purpose of removing incompatibility of economic systems and conducting market-oriented foreign trade activities. The ex-Soviet republics inherited from the Soviet Union a highly centralized, immobile economy with little market incentives for development. Two crucial conditions are usually identified as of particular significance -- macroeconomic stabilization and lifting trading quotas and restrictions. Macroeconomic stabilization establishes domestic preconditions for market activities and usually identified as inseparable from foreign trade transformation (Slay, 1991:8; Michalopoulos & Tarr, 1995:22). Lifting up quotas and restrictions is essentially the continuation of the same process, as it reduces the state interference and encourages free exchange of goods and services. Being limited by space, the paper does not consider this part of the story in any greater details.
After introducing the dependent variable in the next section, I introduce the main hypothesis of this paper, an explanation from variations in strength the national identity and cultural perceptions of external threats (Section 3). Section 4 considers criteria for case selection. Section 5 traces the processes through which Latvia and Belarus adopted their different trade policies, and Section 6 considers possible objections to the argument made in this paper. It suggests that none of them is sufficient to explain the observed variation in the newly independent states' commercial policies. Finally, the conclusion summarizes the analysis and highlights its theoretical and policy implications.
2. Trade policy variation of the ex-Soviet republics.
After the break-up of the Soviet Union, Russia and fourteen other newly independent states (NIS) emerged to become international actors. Before independence, the NIS were national republics and been forced to trade primarily with one another, rather than with countries outside of the Soviet borders. The share of inter-republican trade comprised up to 85-90 percent of the republics' total trade (Bradshaw 1993:29). Accordingly, a commonly held expectation was that the former republics would do their best to keep this pattern alive (See for example Slay 1991:2). With the passing of the time, however, this expectation proved to be mistaken. In spite of the NIS' long term trading experiences as part of the Soviet empire, they adopted three different types of policies.
The question of variation in the trade strategies of the fourteen NIS has not received much attention in the scholarly literature. Economists have been either preoccupied with other foreign trade issues (See WB 1995; Michalopoulos and Tarr 1996), or dissolved this question in a more general question of economic viability of the NIS (Wyzan 1995). Foreign policy experts, while generally more sensitive to this problem, have failed to analyze it in a systematic way. To date, the best that has been done are small-n comparative studies of some of the NIS' foreign policies mentioning the relevance of the issue of trade restructuring but with no focus on it (See for example Kulinich 1995:113-140, 157-174).
3. Theoretical framework.
3.1. National identity.
This paper proposes to develop a national identity explanation for the former Soviet republics' trade policies. Following recent studies of ideational phenomena in world politics, we refer to identity as a varying construction of nation- and statehood (Katzenstein 1996:6). The national identity perspective captures the special nature of post-imperial states well. The NIS are emerging out of an empire and going through the process of state-building. This process is the most challenging and fundamental, because it involves the very redefinition of society, including its national borders, national memory, and cultural perceptions of the outside world (Bunce, 1995). Some scholars argue that it was in fact this process which tore apart the Soviet Union (Barner-Barry and Hody, 1995:85).
Building on insights from sociology and social psychology, identity theorists argue that identity is a product of actor interaction with external environment. The external environment should not be assumed constant as it is done in the concept of anarchy as pursued by neorealist and neoliberal approaches in international studies (see Wendt 1992, 1996). Instead, the international structure can be viewed as varying along many lines which should produce a variation in actors' identities. This suggests some fundamental implications for the study of human behavior. In particular, the variation in actors' identities or self-images implies that actor preferences are not given, waiting to be discovered or approximated. They are contextual and socially constructed, and their variation should be a subject of empirical investigation. 1
In theorizing political identities, two scholars seem to be of particular relevance. Max Weber has underscored the socio-cultural nature of rationality by introducing the notion of substantive rationality as different from formal rationality (Weber 1978:85). He spent a significant part of his scholastic career arguing that interests, particularly economic interests, are contextual, and that economic systems and economic policies emerge out of and are based upon firm social ground (i.e., religion, culture, values). George Mead in his turn emphasized the interactive aspect of relationships between the Self and its environment and specified the role of external environment in actor socialization by developing the distinction between the significant Other and the generalized Other (Mead 1974). The significant Other initiates the process of actor socialization and transfers a socially relevant knowledge and its meaning to the Self, thereby imbuing him with the decisive influence. The generalized Other is the Self's wider social environment with regard to which she must make an identification after assuming some general qualities from the significant Other. Finding a way to be accepted in the immediate social environment is a simple necessity for social survival or security. The acceptance or rejection of the qualities from the generalized Other will, therefore, depend on who was (were) the significant Other(s) in the initial steps of the Self's socialization.
With some modification, these insights may be applied to the identity of post-imperial states. 2 If a nation's identity is built by adopting some features of the international environment (the generalized Other) and rejecting others, then in order to identify the pattern of behavior we ought to learn about a nation's significant Other. Generally speaking the post-imperial states find themselves influenced by at least two significant Others. One influence is that of the former hegemon, a representative of imperial social organization. On the other side, the post-imperial states face the influence of an international system that is not associated with the former empire and organized along non-imperial authority principles. The system that is alternative to the old imperial order is most likely to be a system of sovereign states. 3
Therefore the post-imperial states are likely to be subjected to the influences of two significant Others, each representing different systems of authority relationships and associated with an empire and the world of sovereign states, respectively. The choice the post-imperial states are to be making is a choice between these two significant Others, a choice of identifying with only one of these at the expense of another. 4 These significant Others are then likely to exert fundamentally different influences on the process of identification among post-imperial states. More specifically, by accepting the qualities from one significant Other, a nation will be likely to perceive another significant Other as threatening to its very survival. A nation's identity, then, is something that can determine perception of threats on a national level. 5
Building on the above-formulated concepts, one can imagine at least two different groups of post-imperial states. One group may not be entirely alien to the world of sovereign states, as the states of the group had been exposed to the influence of the sovereignty norm before they had been incorporated into the empire. This allowed them to develop a sense of national (non-imperial) identity which became imprinted in these states' national memories and led to a perception of the metropole as threatening to their security. Conversely, those parts of the international system based on respect for the sovereignty norm were perceived by these states as neutral or potentially friendly. The states in the second group - due to various historical reasons - were not exposed to the influence of the sovereignty norm and had been incorporated into the empire without a well-developed sense of their political identity. Inability to identify themselves with the world of sovereign states (weak national identity) led them to perceive the metropole as neutral or potentially friendly, and other parts of the external environment as threatening to their security.
The variation of national identities among the post-imperial states then can be described in terms of strength of people's general identification with the nation as a non-imperial entity. National identity may be stronger, weaker, or it may not exist at all depending on whether people en masse have gone though the actual psychological process of making a general identification with the nation (Bloom 1990:52). A strong national identity challenges the institutional legacies of the former empire, and thereby broadens a state's options in choosing an optimal strategy of international adjustment. The former Soviet republics, therefore, will vary in their economic policies depending on their ability to challenge the inherited Soviet institutions for the purpose of assuming control over their policies, or in other words, depending on the strength of their national identities. 6 Those with a stronger sense of their identity are likely to be mobilized faster and be more supportive to policy makers' efforts of protecting national independence. A strong national identity therefore is likely to be employed by policy-makers as a lever in pursuing more independent policy. One can expect that the stronger a country's national identity, the more likely the country will perceive trade with the former hegemon as threatening to its security and the more likely that its policy will run counter to the old trading pattern, other things being equal.
The simple matrix below hypothesizes four levels of trade policy deviation from maintaining the old trading pattern that may be expected in NIS based on the interaction of identity and economic motivations. The incentive to pursue a policy of trade reorientation will depend on two factors: the strength of the society's national identity, and assessments of its commercial viability. 7 The stronger the national identity and the higher the perceived threat from the former hegemon, the greater the need for policy deviation from maintaining the old trading pattern. Similarly, the more cost-efficient the trade deviation, the greater the impetus to achieve it for development purposes. When the political and economic conditions differ in their strength, either security or economic motivations may prevail (square 2 and 3 compared). Finally, when a society's identity and the threat perception are low as well as its commercial viability, the government is very unlikely to adopt a policy of trade restructuring (square 4).
| Figure 1. Expected deviation of the post imperial states' trade policies from the former empire. | ||
| Strength of national identity | strong identity | weak identity |
| cost-efficient | 1. High deviation | 2. Medium deviation |
| Economic competitiveness | ||
| cost-inefficient | 3. Medium deviation | 4. Low deviation |
3.2. Domestic structures
The hypothesis of this paper is that national identity influences policy-makers' decision about pursuing more or less aggressive policy of restructuring foreign trade away from the former empire. This influence however is not direct; the causal link between national identity and policy outcomes is mediated by an important intervening variable – domestic structures and coalition-building processes. Adding consideration of domestic structures in addition to the national identity will help us to understand the process of transforming the energy of national identity into certain commercial policies.
This paper basically emphasizes two main elements of domestic structures:
The structure of society regarding its polarization, the strength of social organization, and the degree to which social pressure can be mobilized: How heterogeneous is the society in terms of ideological and/or class cleavages? How well developed are social coalitions and organizations in their ability to express grievances and raise demands? The nature of the coalition-building processes in the policy networks linking state and society. Is the policy-relevant coalition building restricted to the political elites and more or less exclude societal actors or societal actors have a wide access to the policy network? Which societal actors control the policy network? 8
Earlier, we hypothesized that post-imperial states vary in their economic policies depending on the strength of their national identity. After introducing domestic structures to the analysis, the process of causality becomes more clear. Strong national identity means that the large share of population has gone though the process of making a general identification with the nation as different from merely being a part of an empire. With the decline of empire, this sense of national difference and national selfness gives additional stimulus to a rapid development of nationalist-oriented social movements pursuing goals of nation-building. Depending on circumstances, nationalist movements may appeal to the population linguistic and religious instincts or historical feelings. Nationalists get involved in a political process of competing with empire-savers for mobilizing social support. If such support turns out to be sufficient, nationalists replace the old pro-imperial elite as a result of a coup or elections and set the agenda of economic decision making. If not, the decision making remains under the control of empire-savers. Table I summarizes the above described causal process and relations of national identity, domestic structures, and trade policy outcomes.
4. Research design.
In order to introduce the national identity perspective to IPE scholars and provide preliminary empirical support, this study uses an approximation to Mill's method of difference with two matched case studies. Case studies allow us to see the process through which national identity conceptions function (or do not function) in politics and policy making on trade issues, and to check for spurious relationships (George 1982:15). At the same time, if cases are selected carefully for theoretical reasons, such that they are similar with respect to plausible alternative causes of the main dependent variable, at least those alternatives can be ruled out as threats to the identity interpretation.
Two of the most important rival interpretations are relative security threats and international market conditions. As far as the NIS' economic competitiveness is concerned, the fourteen republics varied in the degree to which they would probably have benefited from abandoning the Soviet trading system and conducting their trade at world prices. According to calculations by Watson (1994:405), all except Russia and Turkmenistan had enjoyed subsidies under the Soviet system, so that all others were expected to suffer terms-of-trade losses from shifting the same trade to world prices -- but in widely varying degrees.
For this paper, we will select Belarus and Latvia, which are adjacent in the center of this spectrum, as roughly equivalent in economic respect and therefore as a reasonable set of cases for comparative examination.
As for the relative security threats, all the NIS other than Russia naturally faced a huge disparity in capabilities in Russia itself, but the weaker republics did not differ dramatically in this respect. In terms of conventional weapons, none of the fourteen would stand any chance were it to resist possible Russia's attack, As far as indirect threats go, with Russia proclaiming the strategy of 'reintegrating the Near Abroad' in 1993, the NIS did face the danger of being pulled back in Russian 'sphere of influence' by means of economic or political coercion (Porter & Saivetz 1994; Drezner 1996), but their reactions to Russian efforts were far from being homogeneous. These considerations make Latvia and Belarus roughly the same in terms of selecting for our study with the intent to control for power influence on their trade policies.
Latvia and Belarus amply illustrate the likely range of potential variation in strength of national identity. In fact, they can be viewed as the extreme cases on national identity. One reasonable proxy for this variable is the number of years of experience as an independent state the nation has had. Belarus, at one extreme, had had no such experience at all prior to 1991, and Latvia had possessed all the attributes of nationhood during 1921-1940. Therefore, with national identities that vary and economic and power variables controlled for, Belarus and Latvia would roughly fit cells 3 and 4 in the Figure 1 and may be considered a suitable pair of cases for tracing the effect of national identities. The fact that those two are extreme cases makes suites our purposes well -- if we are to investigate the value of the national identity explanation, than Latvia and Belarus is the most reasonable point of departure, because if the argument cannot be defended here, the hypothesis probably is not worthy of further research including coverage of more countries. If, however, the argument holds, it opens itself to further research in IPE.
5. The impact of national identity in Latvia and Belarus.
5.1. National identities and domestic structures of Latvia and Belarus.
National identity.
The most important and indisputable fact about Latvia's historical background is that this country had an experience of independent statehood which was quite significant as compared with most other former Soviet republics. By 1922, after the fall of the Russian empire, the independent government of Latvia managed to win full control of the country, despite armed resistance from the Bolsheviks and local Germans. Until 1939, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia enjoyed all the advantages of their independence. All the attributes of statehood, including international recognition, a constitution, an electoral system, the state's official tongue, and an independent foreign policy were established.
In August 1940, however, Latvia's, as well as Lithuania's and Estonia's, period of independence was terminated following the signing of the Nazi-Soviet pact in August 1939, whose secret protocols defined respective spheres of influence, with the Baltics falling within Moscow's area. Fifty years of colonial status led to dramatic changes in Latvia's domestic economy and composition of trade. Together with other nations, Latvia was subjected to policies of Russification and Sovietization and remote from the decision-making process at the center (Prazauskas 1994:160; Muiznieks 1997).
Yet the sense of a Latvian national identity was by no means eliminated. In fact, it was in many ways strengthened. Latvian nationalists used every possible opportunity to challenge the Soviet regime. They collaborated with the invading Germans during the Second World War, and they used a period of the regime's decentralization following Stalin's death in 1953 for mobilizing national sentiments. Naturally, being driven by anti-Soviet and anti-Russian feelings, Latvian nationalists were the front-runners of the republic's national rebirth following the start of Michael Gorbachev's policies of Glasnost and Perestroika.
Unlike Latvia and some other ex-Soviet republics, Belarus' people did not have their own state for almost their entire history and have long suffered from domination by neighboring powers. The country has always been a part of empire -- the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, then Poland, and after that, with the rise of Russian hegemony to the east in the late eighteenth century, Belarus became dependent on another expansionist neighbor (Clem 1990:109-110). In the twentieth century, its economic and cultural ties with Russia have been very close.
Secondly, not only did Belarus not have any experience of national independence, but its very boundaries and legitimate ethno-territory and the capital (Minsk) were established only in 1939, very late compared to Latvia. Only at that time when the Soviets expanded to the west and annexed the Baltic states they also annexed the western part of Belarus which had previously been ceded to inter-war Poland. Only then was the geographic denouement of Belarus as the BSSR (Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republic) completed.
The crucial difference between Belarus and the Baltics then is that it was incorporated into the Soviet empire without having a clear sense of being different. Not surprisingly, it has acquired an entirely different image of Russia and demonstrated a high degree of loyalty to the Old Brother. It has also been subjected to a high level of linguistic Russification.
Therefore Latvia and Belarus possess two distinctive types of national identity. Belarus is barely capable of separating itself from Russia whereas Latvia views itself as essentially a non-Russian state. The results of a fairly recent mass opinion poll conducted in Eastern European states indicate that Belarus simply does not perceive itself to be a European nation to the extent that Latvia does. One way to interpret the poll's results, consistent with the above-formulated theoretical framework, is to say that Belarus does not perceive Russia to be a threat to its cultural identity to the extent Latvia does.
Domestic structures.
Latvian society during the transition from communism can be described as mobilized around nationalists. The sense of national identity facilitated the establishment of nationalist movements in Latvia. Nationalist sentiments were not alien to members of the Latvian Communist Party, which in many ways facilitated the rebirth of nationalism. About one third of Latvian communists were simultaneously members of the Latvian Popular Front (LFT-Latvijas Tautas Fronte), the strongest pro-independent movement that at the end of 1988 claimed a membership of 250,000 people. Economically, the LFT advocated Latvia's "economic sovereignty" within the Soviet Union (Muizneiks 1997:385). Politically, the movement was struggling to attract the attention of the outside world to the drive of Latvia and the Baltics in general towards their independence. In October 1989, the Popular Front declared the goal of "complete independence", and in December of the same year the Popular Front and other nationalist movements achieve victory in the elections to the Latvian parliament.
Therefore, changes came primarily as a result of national elections through which the society, mobilized by nationalist movements, gained comparatively easy access to the decision-making process. The idea of national independence preoccupied the minds of Latvian politicians, and it was not surprising that after the nationalists won the 1990 elections, Latvia pursued even more aggressive policies towards assuming control over its domestic and foreign affairs. It terminated the "leading role" of the Communist Party. The 1940 annexation of Latvia by the Soviet Union was declared illegal by the Latvian parliament; the constitution of 1922 was reinstated, and so was the official name of the republic - the Republic of Latvia. Finally, Ivars Godmanis, one of the LTF leaders, was appointed Prime Minister, which put the nationalists in the control of the executive process as well.
As compared to Latvia, Belarus was a far less mobilized and politicized society. Due to the weakness of nationalists, Belarus was much less persistent in its independence drive. Under Gorbachev's rule, for example, it did not resist any version of the new Union treaty, and its independence came sort of unexpectedly in Belarus, without a prolonged freedom movement and the accompanying psychological change (Burant 1995:1135; Prazauskas 1994:155). The exposures of Soviet crimes and abuse of power, such as the discovery of a 500 mass graves at the Kuropaty Forest and the Chernobyl disaster (See more details in Marples 1993), did prompt the establishment of a Popular Front, whose philosophy of national independence was very much in line with Latvia's Popular Front. 9 Nonetheless, Belarus' Popular Front proved to be incapable of competing with empire-savers, or the old political elite. Its social support turned out to be narrow, and from the time of its emergence, the BNF faced fierce resistance from the ruling establishment. Unlike Latvia, nationalist movements in Belarus were never tolerated, let alone supported, by the Communist Party members and instead were taken as a threat to party control from the time of its appearance (Andreev 1997). The BNF, the main nationalist democratic opposition, lost the 1990 national elections, securing only about 10 percent of the 360 deputy seats, mostly in the capital city of Minsk (Markus 1995b:75). The parliament was dominated by conservative politicians whose mindset was formed during the Soviet era.
.2. Trade policy responses to the Soviet break-up.
Logically, a policy of restructuring trade flows assumes accomplishing two tasks, 1) minimizing economic ties with old commercial partners; and 2) finding potential new partners and signing trade agreements, both bilateral and multilateral, with them. 10 The most advanced form of trade policy restructuring should be gaining a membership in multilateral free trade arrangements with new commercial partners. A policy of trade restructuring is observable on each of those stages. The following section compares Latvia's and Belarus' trade policies from 1991to1996 along these two dimensions in greater detail.
The Russian pole.
By the time the CIS came into existence and replaced the Soviet Union in December 1991, Latvia was already on the fast track of distancing itself from Moscow. It was hardly surprising to anyone when Latvia and other Baltic states decided against joining the CIS, despite the invitations of the new Russian regime led by Boris Yeltsin. After nationalists had won the 1990 elections and became the predominant force in both parliament and government, this fear began to manifest itself in the policy of minimizing links with the CIS.
Politically, it became evident in the taking of control over Latvia's borders and replacing old Soviet passports with Latvian ones. In addition Latvia was the second of Baltic republics 11 to introduce a visa requirement for CIS' citizens (Misiunas, 1994:104). On the domestic scene, the fear of maintaining ties with the CIS and Russia resulted in a discriminatory citizenship policy towards those Russians that happened to reside in Latvia (See Barrington 1995:738-39; Krickus 1993:29-34; Girnius 1993).
Economically, Latvia's response to the formation of the CIS was a decision to deal with CIS' members on a strictly bilateral basis concluding bilateral Most Favored Nation (MFN) or barter agreements (EIU, Quarterly Economic Report, 1995, no.1:30). Bound by economic needs and a deep level of integration into the economy of the former USSR, Latvia could not simply turn its back to the ex-Soviet republics. But proposals of searching for solutions to economic problems on a cooperative basis 12 was not acceptable for Latvian policy makers either. The prevailing mood was that dealings with the former Soviet republics--members of the CIS -- should be treated as a temporary solution; that by no means could it be considered the best solution, but rather a necessary "evil" of Latvia's transition away from Russia's authoritarianism and socialism and towards Western freedom and capitalism (Misiunas 1994:103-104). Dealings with CIS' members on a bilateral basis seemed to be an acceptable compromise to Latvian politicians.
Belarus' trade position was similar to Latvia's, with both republics being heavily dependent on interrepublican trade (See for example Watson 1994:383; Bradshaw 1993:29). However, as compared to Latvia, Belarus was ill prepared psychologically for conducting independent foreign policies and has chosen a path of normalizing and strengthening relations with Russia without investing too much effort into seeking out new trading partners. Its trade with Russia has increased in importance since independence. As Russia began erecting trade barriers with the former Soviet republics, Belarus sought to preserve its economic links even at the cost of sovereignty.
It took a while, however, before Belarus' policy of economic integration with Russia led to its readiness to reintegrate with Russia politically. Belarus' first post-Soviet leader was the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet Stanislau Shushkevich, whose personal political stance was that of centrism, or moderate nationalism. While in favor of participating in various multilateral economic agreements with Russia as a member, he did support the idea of Belarus' national independence and nation-building and insisted on Russia's treatment of Belarus as a sovereign political entity.
In March 1992, Belarus made the first effort to secure economic cooperation on the territory of the former USSR by signing an agreement on principles of customs policy with other CIS' members (except Turkmenistan) pledging not to impose tariffs or taxes on bilateral trade. Belarus and other participants agreed to "try to secure the free movement of goods across signatories' boundaries and a common customs policy with third countries" (Barner-Barry & Hody 1995:286). In 1993, however, Belarus' attempts to establish close economic cooperation with Russia and other post-Soviet states faced the temptation to push economic cooperation all the way to political unification, with Russia as a power-holder. This temptation found its supporters on both sides.
On the domestic scene, the conservative, empire-saving forces began to concentrate around Belarus' Prime Minister Vyacheslau Kebich who was stronger oriented toward Russia than was Shushkevich and willing to accept economic union with Russia on terms that infringed on Belarus' sovereignty. In March, Kebich proposed an economic "confederation" with Russia, having noted that Belarus "cannot exist without close cooperation with [Russia, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan]" and that "it is not Russia that needs Belarus ... it is we who need Russia" (Dawisha & Perrott 1994:183). Shushkevich's responded to the idea of a confederation with Russia in the following way:
The road to a confederation, if one is possible at all, is rather long and time is needed before other republics are ready to accept the idea. For the time being, it's Kazakhstan and Russia which call for a confederation. They may have reasons for closer union but the idea of such a union is unacceptable to Belarus because it runs against the Belarusian contitution, which says we are seeking a neutral status (As cited in Szporluk 1994:138).
However, given the support of the largest parliamentary faction, the conservative "Belarus" and the government under his control, Kebich was increasingly capable of seizing initiative over Shushkevich and of conducting his own trade and monetary policies toward Russia. In September 1993, as a result of this policy, Belarus' and Russia's prime ministers signed an accord on monetary union within the CIS framework. As a result of the in January 1994, Shushkevich was ousted, with 209 voting against him and 36 for him, and replaced by one of Kebich's cronies, Mechyslau Hryb (Markus 1995a:47).
With removal of Shushkevich, one of the few reform-minded individuals to hold a prominent government position, Belarus' efforts to reintegrate with Russia had been considerably increased. In 1994, Belarus' parliament readily ratified the CIS charter, including the part on collective security (Burant 1995:1135), and in April a Belarus-Russia agreement on monetary and customs union was concluded. The agreement came under fire from Belarusian nationalists for contravening the country's constitution and betraying its national sovereignty, but it was signed under the terms that were recently objected to by Shushkevich and nationalists. 13 In their turn, empire-savers also brought cultural arguments into the debate about Belarus' sovereignty. The question of Belarus' integration with Russia, Kebich and his supporters argued, was "not just a question of economic circumstances. We are linked by the closest spiritual bonds; we have a common history and similar cultures" (See Kebich's remarks as cited in Burant 1995:1136). Ironically, it was Russian, not Belarus' opposition that prevented implementation of the accord and of further new attempts to reintegrate with Russia.(See Vek, 15-21 April 1994; Markus 1995a:49).
The policy of reintegration with Russia became possible primarily because of the considerable social support that was given to it. Unlike Latvia, nationalists in Belarus had a little chance to resist the influence of empire-savers in parliament and outside of it. The old elite firmly controlled power in the country and public support for empire was high. Perhaps the best example is the Belarus June-July 1994 presidential elections where Russophone Alyaksandr Lukashenka was elected the country's first president with 80 percent of votes and the two major candidates were running on a platform of economic reintegration with Russia and competed in their pro-Russian rethorics rather than supporting Belarus' national independence (Nezavisimaya gazeta, 21 March 1996; Burant 1995:1135). Just as Latvia's society was considerably homogeneous in terms of sharing nationalist feelings, Belarus was united by its citizens' unwillingness to risk economic relations with the former hegemon for the sake of illusory goals of achieving national sovereignty.
The Western pole.
Among other Baltic states, Latvia was one of the most active promoters of its independence and of establishing economic and political ties outside the Soviet Union. In this sense, the creation of independent foreign policies in Baltic republics actually began before they gained independence in August 1991 (Vares 1995:157). Latvia's efforts to participate in alternative international trade arrangements were advanced in two directions. First and foremost, Latvia advanced its efforts of trade cooperation with Western European countries. Secondly, it expressed an interest in cooperating with those of the former Soviet republics that were resisting joining the CIS, most notably with other Baltic states.
In their wish to become Europeans, the Baltic authorities undertook measures toward rapprochement with Western European countries. After winning wide international recognition of its independence and becoming a member of the United Nations, the IMF and the World Bank, Latvia launched a series of bilateral free trade agreements (excluding agriculture) - all with European countries. During 1992, such agreements were signed with Sweden (March), Norway (June), Finland (November), and Switzerland (December) (See "Annex" in IMF, 1994).
In addition to signing bilateral treaties, Latvia expanded its efforts to deal with international economic organizations, most importantly with the European Union (at that time known as European Community (EC). In May 1992 Latvia and other Baltic states signed several trade and cooperation agreements with the European Community, obtained of most-favored-nation (MFN) trading status and signed a political declaration with the EC, declaring their shared ideals and pledging foreign policy coordination. In June 1993, Latvia and other Baltic states applied to become EC associate members and in October of 1995, Latvia became the first of the Baltic countries to officially apply for full membership to the EU. Whereas Latvia's full membership in the organization is not likely before 2005, given the Union's own preoccupation with internal problems (EIU. Quarterly Economic Report, 1995, no.3:25), Latvia's trade regime, 14 and the Union's intention to admit the Baltics as a group rather than on an individual basis (Monitor. E-Mail Bulletin, April 11 1995).
In addition to its interest in joining the EU, Latvia advanced its efforts to establish closer relations with another European organization, the European Free Trade Association (EFTA). EFTA unites all the European countries outside the EU, most of which have established bilateral trade ties with Latvia as yearly as during 1992. In November 1995, Latvia became a member of EFTA, thereby making another crucial step towards its Westernization.
The second direction of Latvia's efforts of restructuring its trade away from Russia and the CIS was its policy towards other Baltic states (Lithuania and Estonia). Latvia's cooperation with other Baltic states began even before the disintegration of the USSR, with the signing of the Agreement on Economic Cooperation with Lithuania and Estonia in April 1990, and with the adoption of the Declaration on Unity and Cooperation and establishment of a Council of the Baltic States to assist in the full restoration of independence (Vares, 1995:158). After the demise of the Soviet Union, inter-Baltic relations continued to proceed smoothly, despite the appearance of some disagreements (EIU. Quarterly Economic Report, 1995, no.1:30). They announced their intention to set up a customs union as early as September 1991. The union, it was announced, would establish a common external tariff at approximately EC levels and allow free movements of goods, services and people within it (Schroeder 1992:561). In September 1993, the three states reached a free-trade agreement, excluding agriculture, and in June 1996, this agreement was supplemented with a long-sought treaty on free agricultural trade and plans for establishing common Baltic transportation and communication systems (Monitor E-Mail Bulletin, June 16, 1996).
Unlike Latvia, and even though they were in comparable trade situations, Belarus did not pursue any visible foreign economic activities either during Gorbachev's Perestroyka, or after Soviet disintegration. At least two alternatives to unilateral dependence on Russia were identified, but were never pursued by Belarus' leaders. The radical alternative was put forward by the Belarusian Popular Front (BNF) as early as 1989 and may be termed the European alternative. The idea was to create a Baltic-Black Sea political-economic association uniting Belarus, the three Baltic states, Ukraine, and Moldova. The association was supposed to help its members to resist economic pressures from Moscow as well as gain gradual access to Western European markets (Paznyak 1994:147; Andreev 1997).
More moderate alternative was favored by Shushkevich, according to which Belarus would not separate itself from the CIS and Russia, but would instead take full advantage of economic cooperation within the CIS under the following conditions: 1) such cooperation must be pursued for the purpose of strengthening, not weakening Belarus' sovereignty; and 2) Belarus should not limit itself to the CIS, searching for other trading partners as well.
None of these ideas was given serious consideration by Belarus' policy makers. Belarus did conclude a series of bilateral trade agreements (mainly granting MFN status) with European and Third World countries, 15 and in January 1995, after years of hesitations, it even initialized a partnership and cooperation agreement with the EU. However, it never looked at those relations as a priority over economic confederation with Russia, nor did Belarus' leaders considered going any farther than bilateral relationships (Burant 1995, 1134). To summarize, Belarus did not take advantage of existing foreign economic strategic options, having fallen behind Latvia and other former republics. "The focus on Russia," as one observer put it, "has led the country to neglect its relations with other countries, and Belarus is now widely perceived as a nonentity on the international scene" (Marcus 1995c:62).
6. Possible objections.
The research design section has addressed two of the most important rivals to the present argument -- terms-of-trade losses from shifting the same trade to world prices, and relative security threats. This section responds to some additional possible objections.
6.1. International economic opportunity for trade reorientation.
It may be argued that, economically, Latvia benefited more than Belarus from cooperation with Western countries and that the West was simply more interested in providing various economic assistance to Latvian transition from communism. Since the international community had never recognized Baltic incorporation into the USSR, and since the Scandinavian countries were eager to help independent an Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia to consolidate their economic independence, Latvia faced an international economic opportunity structure that was much more advantageous than that which faced Belarus.
This objection confuses economic and cultural aspects of the Western support given to Latvia. It misses the fact that the creation of independent foreign trade policy in Latvia actually began before it gained independence in August 1991, before it became a member of the United Nations, the IMF, and the World Bank, and before it began receiving financial assistance from European states. Latvian nationalists had won the elections and became the predominant force in both parliament and government in March 1990. They certainly had hopes for Western economic aid in the not so distant future, but their decision to minimize Latvia's links with Russia could not have been affected by the non-existent help from the West. However the decision was affected by the hopes for such help, and this is not inconsistent with our argument. Those hopes reflected Latvia's sense of identity as a country culturally close to the West.
6.2. Geographic location and transportation cost.
It can also be asserted that Latvia is located on the Baltic Sea and has significant access to Scandinavian markets, while Belarus is a landlocked country bordering Russia and Ukraine. This assertion expects Belarus to trade primarily with Russia and Ukraine, and Latvia with Scandinavian countries. Yet a look at the map tells us that Belarus is as close to potential European partners as Latvia is to Russia. It is not clear why Belarus chose to enter into preferential trade agreements with Russia while Latvia limited its trade ties with the former hegemon on a strictly bilateral basis. Nor is it clear why Latvia did its best to sign multilateral free trade treaties with European states (notably those with countries others than Scandinavian), while Belarus emphasized the bilateral basis of its cooperation with EU. Even if one allows that Latvia's trade transaction costs are somewhat lower due to access to the Baltic Sea as compared with those of Belarus, this difference still does not seem sufficiently significant to account for the wide disparity in the two countries' commercial policies.
6.3. Military and economic vulnerabilities to Russia's pressures.
Another objection might be that Latvia was more vulnerable to Russia's military and economic pressures and, therefore, pursued the policy of trade restructuring motivated by its search for Western protection. Belarus, on the other hand, had much more powerful military arsenals and could be expected to feel safer trading with the former hegemon. The problem with this argument is that it assumes Belarus' independent military posture and security policy. It cannot explain why in reality Belarus made significant steps to weaken its military status relative to Russia while continuing its efforts to establish firm commercial ties with the former hegemon. For instance Belarus was the first to turn over its nuclear weapons to Russia; it allowed the presence of Russia's military bases on its territory; and eventually it entered into a military alliance with the former hegemon. As for economic vulnerabilities, both Belarus and Latvia are highly vulnerable to Russia's potential pressures. One obvious aspect of such vulnerability is their oil and gas dependence on Russia (Brown and Belkindas 1993; Kramer 1993; Markus 1995a). Yet despite being highly vulnerable to Russia's economical pressures the two countries differ sharply in their trade policies.
6.4. Perception of threat.
It may also be objected that this paper did not apply the perception of threat argument (Knorr 1976; Walt 1987) for explaining variation in Latvian and Belarusian policies. This explanation might claim that these states' policy makers felt differently about Russia's intentions, and that this accounted for variation in their trade policies. The perception of threat argument, however, is limited in considering individual policy makers and is normally applied to explain the policy differences across governments associated with particular individual leaders. It cannot tell us much about the continuity of policies which cut across governments and political leaders. The argument then is of little use in understanding the difference between Belarus' and Latvia's trade policies, each observed as conducted by various governments over the period of 1991-1996. If anything, it was perception of threat expressed by the nation as a whole that should account for the observed variation in trade policies. If conceptualized that way, threat perception argument is not inconsistent with our analytical framework.
6.5. Domestic institutional arrangements.
Another perspective might claim the relevance of considering domestic arrangements in understanding Latvia's and Belarus' policies (Katzenstein 1977; Hall 1986; Keohane and Milner 1996). This paper does not argue that domestic structures are unimportant -- they are merely insufficient for explaining the observed policy variation. As our analysis indicates, domestic structures are significant in understanding the influences of national identity, but it is national identity that comes first, thereby determining the shape of domestic structures and causing trade policy outcomes.
6.6. Primordial aspect of national identity.
Finally, one might argue that constructivist version of the national identity argument pursued in this paper is not necessary and that the differences in primordial features of the two countries, such as language and religion, might be sufficient to account for the outcomes. As with the previous objection, we did not intend to argue that those factors have no relevance. Rather, we argued that language and religious compositions of Latvian and Belarusian populations should be viewed as historical phenomena, and not something given or waiting to be discovered. Primordial factors might matter but not as taken out of their social and historical contexts. For instance, what do we make of the fact that Latvian population, as compared with that of Belarus', is much more heterogeneous in terms of proportion of ethnic Russians residing in the country? 16 A purely primordialist account might mistakenly assume that it is Latvia which should be more pro-Russian in its foreign policy orientation, and that it is Belarus which should redirect its trade away from Russia, not vice-versa. The linguistic data however will start making sense after we place them in the relevant socio-historical context. It is socio-historical factors, such as the degree of linguistic Russification and the extend of resistance to it (see the table 3), that will be of assistance in interpreting the role of primordial factors in the observed policy variation.
7. Conclusions.
The main purpose of this paper was to formulate a national identity hypothesis for studying foreign trade policy. The comparison of Latvia and Belarus suggests the significance of the national identity explanation relative to likely rivals. Immediately after the Soviet break-up, Latvia and Belarus pursued distinctive policies of restructuring their trade patterns, which can hardly be captured by conventional international political economy perspectives. According to the power perspective, Latvia and Belarus should have taken advantage of relative international calm and pursued equally aggressive policies of switching their trade away from Russia/CIS, which is not in accord with reality. The market perspective also does not adequately capture Latvia's and Belarus' policy variation. According to this perspective, they should have adopted similar trade policies, because they are similar in their size, natural resource endowment, economic structure, and geographic location, as is widely recognized by experts on the former Soviet economy (See for example Schroeder 1992:562, 564; Vavilov & Vjugin 1993:120,156; Brown & Belkindas 1993:175; Watson 1994:404-405). Finally, the state structures' perspective also does not fully account for the variation in Latvia's and Belarus' commercial policies. In both cases, it was national identity that determined the structure of state institutions, not vice versa.
Empirically, the comparison of the trade policies of Latvia and Belarus may not be particularly puzzling, as those two represent "extreme cases" in terms of degree of their national identity strength. However it does have important theoretical implications. In particular, it suggests the potential significance of cultural influences on economic policies in addition to other influences. As the comparison of Latvia and Belarus indicates, the case can be made for the fairly independent influence of culture on economic policy outcomes, thereby confirming the Weberian insight that cultural, idea-based influences should be treated as significant in their own right, and not merely as subsumed in interest-based phenomena (See Weber 1958:280). Culture, a sense of national difference and national subjectivity does make a difference, and the politics of the NIS serves as an instructive example. Here, the influences of culture and identities on economic policy making are much more direct, than in countries with an established sense of national identity that completed the process of state-building.
The study also has policy implications. By offering a more sophisticated understanding of the former Soviet republics' economic behavior, it warns against the still common simplified perception that all the NIS will soon become a part of the "free-market" world, especially those NIS that are strategically located and endowed with rich natural resources. This paper indicates that because national identity is involved, the question of "joining" the community of Western developed nations is actually much more complicated than one might think. At the same time, it warns against expectations that all the former Soviet republics will return to their traditional trading area sooner or later, that only the political ambitions of their leaders are currently driving them away from establishing some sort of customs union on the territory of the Soviet Union. Again, the issue is more complicated, and some of the NIS, while being relatively weak as economic entities, are still likely to pursue an aggressive policy of restructuring their trade pattern and thereby of "joining" the West. This paper suggests that this process is likely to happen to those NIS that possess a relatively strong sense of their nationhood and therefore perceive trade with the former hegemon as threatening to their national identity.
Both theoretical and policy implications suggest the importance of further investigating the potential of national identity explanations in international studies. The hypothesis needs to be tested with new cases, possibly with the use of rigorous quantitative techniques. The conceptual universe of cases is potentially rich and includes, in addition to the former Soviet republics, eastern European countries - the former members of the Soviet block, and post-imperial states in general. Our knowledge about the post-imperial states and their economic and security policies, is still fairly limited, and this study is only a step towards contributing to their understanding.
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Notes:
* To avoid possible misunderstanding, one caveat is in order. This paper does not study actual trade flows and trade patterns. Instead, it focuses on state as a unit of analysis and asks the question about motivations underlying the state behavior, not the behavior of private economic actors. Back.
Note 1: The literature devoted to the analysis of social context of preferences formation and behavior is voluminous and can be traced back at least to Max Weber's works. Other most influential sources would include early sociological approaches (Berger 1963; Berger and Luckmann 1966) and most recent development of the "new institutionalism" in sociology, political science and economics (March and Olsen 1989; North 1990; Powell and DiMaggio 1991; Steinmo, Thelen, and Longstreth 1992; Koelble 1995). In international studies, those approaches has recently made a comeback in a form of studying the effects of cultural norms on actors identity and behavior (see especially Klotz 1995; Finnemore 1996; Katzenstein 1996; Cederman 1996). Back.
Note 2: On various application of identification theory to issues of national identity and international relations, see Todorov 1985; Der-Derian and Shapiro 1989; Bloom 1990; Campbell 1992; Neumann 1993; Dijkink 1996; Doty 1996; Tunander, Baev, and Einagel 1997. Back.
Note 3: Ever since the Peace of Westphalia, the system of international relations has been in the process of its progressive development towards the global ascendancy of state sovereignty and away from traditional imperial polities (see Seton-Watson 1977; Giddens 1985; Motyl 1992; Dawisha and Parrott 1997). Back.
Note 4: This is so because, for the former colonial states, the world of empires and the world of sovereign states are fundamentally conflictual -- perhaps even incompatible -- as long as an empire "denotes a dominant society's control of the effective sovereignty of two or more subordinate societies" (Parrott 1997:7). Conceptually, this conflict between the two systems of authority relationships was recognized by many scholars of empires, nationalism, and state-building (see for example, Seton-Watson 1977:Chaps.6-8; Doyle 1986; Strange 1996; Dawisha and Parrott 1997; Barkey and von Hagen 1997). Back.
Note 5: The literature on identities widely accepts the conclusion that there is an important relationship between identity and construction of the threat, because identity emerges as a consequence of taking into consideration a relevant "other." See for instance, Bloom 1990: 32-53; Connolly 1992; Campbell 1992; Neumann 1992; Katzenstein 1996, esp.19-26, 37-49, 403-413. Back.
Note 6: We are well aware of the limitations related with attempts to trace variation in national identity in terms of its strength. National identity is of course a variable full of qualitative substance. It is a variable that is fuzzy, complex and multi-dimensional. Yet, in our opinion, this is true of any ideational phenomena and should not preclude us from trying to emphasizing those dimensions that are of particular relevance in learning about causal connections. It is in the interests of being more socially scientific that we must not limit ourselves to discussing exclusively qualitative or exclusively quantitative dimensions of national identity. Back.
Note 7: To a certain degree, such assessments of commercial viability will be culturally based too. Those elements are adopted, with modification, from Snyder 1989 and Risse-Kappen 1991. Back.
Note 8: Experts' estimations of the NIS' economic viability and potential to integrate their economies into the world economy vary, but they are fairly consistent in terms of suggesting a similarity between Baltics and Belarus (See for example Schroeder, 1992; Erikson, 1992; Vavilov & Vjugin, 1993; Brown & Belkindas, 1993; Watson, 1994). Back.
Note 9: The Front's organizational committee was created in October 1988, and its goals were the national revival of the Belarusan people. Back.
Note 10: The reorientation of trade towards new commercial partners may also require establishing necessary domestic institutions for the purpose of removing incompatibility of economic systems and conducting market-oriented foreign trade activities. The ex-Soviet republics inherited from the Soviet Union a highly centralized, immobile economy with little market incentives for development. Two crucial conditions are usually identified as of particular significance -- macroeconomic stabilization and lifting trading quotas and restrictions. Macroeconomic stabilization establishes domestic preconditions for market activities and usually identified as inseparable from foreign trade transformation (Slay, 1991:8; Michalopoulos & Tarr, 1995:22). Lifting up quotas and restrictions is essentially the continuation of the same process, as it reduces the state interference and encourages free exchange of goods and services. Being limited by space, the paper does not consider this part of the story in any greater details. Back.
Note 11: The first was Estonia. Back.
Note 12: Many analysts suggested that the Baltics would benefit from participation in some kind of economic union among the former republics. One example of it was a proposal to create a "clearing arrangement or payment union" among them (See Schroeder 1992:561). Back.
Note 13: According to the agreement, Russian troops may use Belarusian military installations free of charge; the Russian Central Bank is to be the sole center for currency emission; Belarus is to cede control of its fiscal and monetary policy to Russia; and the country is to amend its legislation to bring it in line with Russia's (See Markus 1995c:64). Back.
Note 14: Latvia can only be admitted to the EU after it brings its tariff structure in line with EU standards, which is going to take a while because of domestic, particularly agricultural protectionist pressures. Back.
Note 15: During 1992-1993, such agreements were signed with Poland, the Czech Republic, the Slovak Republic, Romania, Finland, Austria, China, Viet Nam, Mongolia, the U.S., Kuwait, and Cuba. During the same time, similar agreements were initiated with India, Turkey, and Switzerland. Back.
Note 16: 33% as compared to 13.2% of Russians living in Belarus (Chinn and Kaiser 1996:95, 131). Back.
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