Valdai Club

France’s growing activity on NATO’s eastern flank represents a long-term shift in its foreign policy and reflects a particular emphasis on relations with Poland, even though the project being advanced by Paris faces a number of fundamental limitations, argues Aleksei Chikhachev

Over the past decades, the Sahara-Sahel Region has been building its security architecture by primarily focusing and relying on pro-Western frameworks and approaches. This was largely attributable to the fact that even having put the decolonisation behind it, this part of the African continent remained under France’s tutelage and within its sphere of influence.

Paris’s resolutely pro-Ukrainian position is largely dictated by the evolution of its own foreign policy and a desire to halt its decline as a great power, writes Alexey Chikhachev, Associate Professor of the Department of European Studies at the Faculty of International Relations at St. Petersburg State University and leading expert at the Centre for Strategic Studies at the Institute of Foreign Economic Relations at the Higher School of Economics.

By restoring their old alliance, Paris and London are solving tactical problems, but are not very concerned about the longer term, writes Alexey Chikhachev, Associate Professor of the Department of European Studies, Faculty of International Relations, St. Petersburg State University, and leading expert at the Centre for Strategic Studies, Institute of Foreign Economic Relations, Higher School of Economics.

Having signed a “grand” treaty with Poland in Nancy, France is continuing to establish special ties with other individual EU member states while at the same time expecting to rely on Brussels in a long-term confrontation with Russia, writes Alexey Chikhachev, Associate Professor of the Department of European Studies at the Faculty of International Relations at St. Petersburg State University and leading expert at the Centre for Strategic Studies at the Institute of Foreign Economic Relations at the National Research University Higher School of Economics.

The recent televised address by the French president prioritized form over content, reflecting Paris’s current interest in artificially inflating its own importance, writes Alexey Chikhachev. The author is a participant in the Valdai – New Generation project.

France's African strategy has not yet overcome neocolonial inertia, it is based on an inadequate assessment of its own capabilities, which works to the advantage of the global majority, writes Alexey Chikhachev, Senior Lecturer at the Department of European Studies in the Faculty of International Relations at St. Petersburg State University, Leading Expert at the Center for Strategic Studies, Institute for Global Military Economics and Strategy, HSE University. The author is a participant of the Valdai – New Generation project.  

The appointment of a prime minister hasprovided short-term relief for the French political system, but will not lead it out of the impasse in which it has found itself at the behest of President Emmanuel Macron, believes Alexey Chikhachev, senior lecturer at the Department of European Studies, Faculty of International Relations, St. Petersburg State University.

The conflict in Ukraine has accelerated the shift in the centre of gravity within the European Union towards “Mitteleuropa” — Germany and its eastern neighbours, where France’s positions, unlike those of Germany, have never been particularly strong. As a result, the tandem now fully retains its significance for only one participant — Paris, which sees in “special” ties with Berlin an important confirmation of its sovereign status, writes Valdai Club expert Alexei Chikhachev.

The preservation of the status quo in France has caused understandable relief in the European establishment, as well as among most of the media: the staunch Europeanist Macron looks to them like a clearly more advantageous figure than Marine Le Pen, who has proposed reformatting the EU into a union of nation states while weakening common institutions, writes Valdai Club expert Alexei Chikhachev.