Russia’s Vaccine Diplomacy in Central Europe: Between a Political Campaign and a Business Project

Russia’s Vaccine Diplomacy in Central Europe: Between a Political Campaign and a Business Project

biopolitics

COVID-19

Hungary

Russia

Slovakia

Sputnik

vaccines

Drawing on the concept of vaccine diplomacy, the article analyses Russia’se!orts to promote its Sputnik V vaccine and the repercussions this had intwo Central European EU member states which authorized the use of theRussian vaccine. The authors argue that for Russia, Sputnik V promotionwas significant both as a business project and as a political enterprise, as itwas supposed to enhance Russia’s international status and help it inovercoming its post-Crimea isolation from the West. The results weremixed, however, as Russia’s international credibility had been underminedby its previous policies. Thus, in Hungary the vaccine managed to gainsome traction thanks to a government that preferred importing non-EUcertified vaccines as part of its larger policy of fostering closer ties with theauthoritarian great powers in Eurasia. In Slovakia, the vaccine deal withRussia caused a political crisis but eventually resulted in a very poorperformance of Sputnik V as compared to EU-certified vaccines.

Kazharski, Aliaksei

Makarychev, Andrey

Czech Journal of International Relations; Vol. 56 No. 4 (2021); 131-146

2788-2993

2788-2985

Institute of International Relations Prague

2021-12-01

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0

application/pdf

eng

info:eu-repo/semantics/article

info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion