Iurii Agafonov, a Research Fellow at the Yerevan Center for International Education (YCIE), has published an online paper on The Russia Program website of George Washington University. The article, titled “Sources and Trends in Russian Foreign Policy Discourse: A Quantitative Text Analysis of Key Concepts”, employs quantitative text analysis and examines how key concepts are used in political and intellectual discourse on foreign policy in Russia. The concepts analyzed are “Ukraine”, “Russian world”, and “multipolar world”.

The goal of the article is to look at how the rhetoric on Russian foreign policy that originates from different groups, (Member of Parliament, president, and foreign policy intellectuals) correlates in time and content.

The article concludes that the rhetoric tends to synchronize around key events almost always in the frequency of usage of key terms and sometimes in content as well.

Some concepts are initiated by specific groups — there might be synchronization in time but not in content. Some initiate, others pick up.

Officials may not be overly concerned with the content but may use concepts as rhetorical devices. Conversely, they may introduce a symbolically charged concept, which intellectuals then refine and fit into existing theoretical concepts, albeit not always with great enthusiasm.

This is true for intellectuals as well. They may introduce the concept which then is picked up and reinterpreted by officials.

Certain events prompt the usage of a key term, leading to synchronization in time, but different groups strive to imbue the term with different meanings based on their initial perceptions and current political objectives.

Read the full article here!