NATO vs. the CSTO: security threat perceptions and responses to secessionist conflicts in Eurasia

Abstract

ABSTRACT While there is a growing body of research on the role of international organisations (IOs) in regional security governance, relatively little attention has been paid to IO responses to the secessionist conflicts in Nagorno-Karabakh (NK), in Abkhazia/South Ossetia in Georgia as well as in Crimea/Eastern Ukraine. This article explores the differences between NATO’s and the CSTO’s responses to the three conflicts. Our findings demonstrate that NATO neglected the conflict in NK which stands in sharp contrast to its active responses to the outbreak of war in Georgia (2008) and Crimea/Eastern Ukraine (2014). The CSTO, however, has largely avoided any engagement in all three cases. Three factors were of crucial importance to explain this variation: the level of regional security institutionalisation, both IOs’ geostrategic threat perceptions as well as both IOs’ mutual perception, hence, their IO-IO (non)relationship.