Post-war World Order Research Articles

“To the crematorium”: postwar U.S. tourism to West German concentration camps and beyond

AbstractFor a long time since the end of the Second World War, the memory of concentration camps influenced U.S. public views on Germany. When in the late 1940s Americans could travel to West Germany again, a new tourist industry brought West Germany, and with-it Germany’s recent past, closer to the U.S. American public. This article investigates the renewed travel interest of Americans in West Germany with a special focus on former concentration camp sites. It demonstrates the importance of tourism in creating new cultural ties, the ways in which U.S. tourism to the camps established a memory of the Second World War, and how these narratives influenced German-American relations. In newspaper articles, visitors to West Germany shared their experiences, attitudes, and challenges upon visiting the former concentration camp sites and through those interactions made sense of the war and their own position in the postwar world order.

Baltic and Polish Politicians in Exile and Their Vision of Post-War Peace Agreements in Eastern Europe, 1940–1945

The article examines two key topics: what vision the leading Baltic politicians in exile had of the post-war world order, and what vision Polish politicians in exile had of the post-war world order, specifically in terms of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and East Prussia. The main focus is on the Memel/Klaipėda question. The Vilnius question is also addressed to the extent that it is related to the Memel/Klaipėda question. This question is important for understanding the relations between Baltic and Polish émigré politicians during World War II. The article’s limited scope did not leave space for negotiations between the Soviet government and the Polish government-in-exile or between the Soviet government and the Lithuanian and Polish communists on the issue of East Prussia and Klaipėda. The article tries to avoid fundamental generalizations, and does not attempt to provide conclusive answers to many of the questions and problems that have arisen.

“Françafrique” Systemic Crisis

Recent global geopolitical shifts have deformed the postwar world order. These tectonic shifts mark the beginning of the end of French dominance in West and Central Africa, changing dramatically the layout of international relations in the region that has always been considered France’s zone of interests. There is a rapid degradation and disintegration of the French military-political system known as “Françafrique”, the essence of which lies in the latent ties between the corrupt elites of the Fifth Republic and certain African countries that are dependent on their former metropole both economically and politically. The purpose of this article is to examine the collapse of this system as a whole and its constituent parts in order to come closer to understanding how the destruction of its individual fragments causes the crisis of interconnected structural elements of the entire system. Within the framework of a short article, it is only possible to outline a general approach to considering the problematic situation, based on the theoretical and methodological approach, which implies a systemic analysis of the object, i.e., the phenomenon of “Françafrique”. Recently, a number of works have appeared devoted to various aspects of this problem (the change of elites in African states, the disappointment in the effectiveness of the former metropole’s Africa policy, the reduction of the French military presence in the Sahel and Central Africa, the failure of the military operation Barkhane, the collapse of the Fifth Republic-inspired military-political blocs of African countries). The novelty and relevance of this work lie in demonstrating the need to study these trends in their integrity and interrelationship. This approach requires a comprehensive study of the causes, course, results, and consequences of the collapse of the military-political system of “Françafrique” as part of a future large-scale study of this phenomenon.

Refusal to Negotiate: Britain’s Position and Impact on the World War in 1940

In 1940, amidst World War II, the United Kingdom, under Prime Minister Winston Churchill, decisively refused to negotiate with the Axis Powers. This article explores the strategic implications of this refusal, arguing that it prevented the legitimization of Germany’s aggressive policies and altered the war’s course. By analyzing the Versailles peace system’s failures, Churchill’s leadership, and the geopolitical shifts resulting from the United Kingdom’s stance, the article highlights how this decision shaped the postwar world order, influencing Europe’s geopolitical landscape and setting the stage for an Allied victory

Keep the Peace at Home to Shape the Peace Abroad: A Study of Elite Influence on Winston Churchill and British Foreign Policy at the Yalta Conference, 1945

ABSTRACT As the end of World War II and a parliamentary election approached, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s wartime authority diminished. The erosion of influence at home could not have come at a worse time for Churchill abroad, who sought to rebuild a postwar world order at the February 1945 Yalta Conference to resurrect Britain’s global influence. Exploiting the erosion of Churchill’s unprecedented wartime powers, formal and fringe political elites pressured Churchill to align his postwar preferences at Yalta with prevailing elite views on major geopolitical issues. In doing so, these elites – which included senior government officials, newspaper editorialists, and members of Parliament – ultimately compelled Churchill to advocate for the United Nations and a free and democratic Poland at Yalta, despite his belief that both plans would undermine Britain’s postwar influence. In examining the critical role elite-leader relations played in shaping Cold War history, this paper seeks to improve the study of democratic foreign policy analysis by emphasizing Kenneth Waltz’s “first image” (the role of a leader’s motivations and intentions) and the role of non-government (or “fringe”) elites. Finally, it concludes that parliamentary democracies are more receptive to elite influence because elites have greater opportunities to drive policy debates and challenge political authority.

Ukrainian refugees of the period of the Russian-Ukrainian war in NATO countries: the geopolitical context of the military migration crisis

ABSTRACT The Russian-Ukrainian war is being waged on the territory of Ukraine, but it is of global importance. One of the aspects of the war is the mass migration of Ukrainians abroad. The causes and features of migration are explained in the global geopolitical context. In recent years, war refugees have become increasingly important in world migration flows. This testifies to the crisis of the world order that arose in the early 1990s. The uniqueness of the flow of refugees from Ukraine is its extraordinary size, speed of movement, gender and age imbalance, the predominance of urban residents with a high level of education. In the future, this prepares for Ukraine a demographic catastrophe and difficulties in the post-war reconstruction of the country. The author concludes that a solution to the Ukrainian military migration crisis can be found in the context of changes in the post-war world order.

US - China Competition for Global Leadership - An Alternative Perspective

This article investigates China’s prospects of assuming a global leadership role in a postAmerican world. It disputes the position of a growing group of American scholars who strongly defend America’s lead role in global politics and advance the argument that there is no alternative to US leadership of the current world order. On the contrary, this article argues that the sense of a relative decline in US power, exacerbated by China’s rise as a gigantic economic power in recent years, threatens to displace the US as the global leader. It concludes that Beijing may not, however, aim to redesign and reconstruct a new world order altogether, as its interests are best served within the framework of the existing post-war world order. In other words, China’s selfinterests would dictate it to lead the world while maintaining the basic structure of the USengineered post-war world order

SCIENTIFIC, POPULARISATION AND CIVIL ACTIVITY OF MYRON KORDUBA DURING THE GREAT WAR

The purpose of the article is to clarify the peculiarities of public activity and the scientific work of M. Korduba during the First World War. The methodological basis of the work is an interdisciplinary approach. Particular emphasis is placed on the structural and functional system analysis of historiographical facts and the method of critical analysis of documentary material. The scientific novelty of the article consists in an attempt to comprehensively reconstruct the intellectual biography of M. Korduba during the Great War. Conclusion. In the end, it was noted that the reconstruction of M. Korduba's life and activities during the First World War portrays him as one of the leading representatives of the Ukrainian intelligentsia of the modern era of national revival. Not being a professional politician by his chosen lifestyle, the scientist lively responded to the numerous needs of the Ukrainian public deprived of its own statehood. During the Great War, he directed his energy to the most important areas of national progress: he carried out cultural and educational work among prisoners of war, wrote popular scientific texts necessary for the self-education of the general public, defended Ukrainian interests with a journalistic pen when discussing the model of the post-war world order, etc. But M. Korduba's range of public talents was most fully demonstrated by the events of the establishment of national statehood in the western Ukrainian lands after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It was his composure in difficult situations, responsible initiative and public courage that largely made it possible to declare a short-term, but important for the national self-awareness of the people of Bukovyna, political independence. The events of that time crystallized the sobornist convictions of Korduba-politician, as evidenced by the scholar's intellectual biography of the interwar period, in which once again scientific creativity and public service were inextricably intertwined.

International clearing system as alternative monetary order

The purpose of this paper is to reconstruct the debate on the international clearing mechanism from the pioneering proposals of the nineteenth century to the years of high theory, at the beginning of the 1940s, when several plans were defined to establish international clearing mechanisms, and the well-known John Maynard Keynes’s International Clearing Union Plan was joined by other projects proposed by Paul Einzig and two German-born economists, Ernst Friedrich Schumacher and Hubert Ladenburg. As is well known, the Keynes plan was conceived as a response to the Nazi plan to establish a multilateral clearing system for regulating trade relations in the economic space of the countries occupied by the Third Reich. However, Keynes did not elaborate a plan radically opposed to the Nazi proposal, but shared its essential core. While being opposite sides of the conflict, both Nazi Germany and the British government proposed the same monetary order, based on multilateral clearing system, for the post-war world. The project of a new international monetary order based on the multilateral clearing system was not unanimously shared among the Allies: the United States moved on different lines confirming the centrality of gold in the post-war world order. Economic interests imposed the restoration of gold-exchange standard, based on the dollar supremacy and the Bretton Woods agreement, confirming the political success of Harry Dexter White’s proposal, was a turning point in a spontaneous path towards a new international order based on clearing agreements. Keynes proposed an economically realistic solution, based on the experience of clearing agreements resulting from the collapse of the gold exchange standard, but his plan was politically unrealistic in the face of the interests of the United States superpower. Keynes did not accept a compromise, but was simply defeated.

Svalbard in the Strategy of the Great Powers During the Second World War (1939– 1945)

The article deals with the place of Svalbard in the strategy of opposing coalitions during the Second World War in the various stages of the war. Since 1939 until the Tehran Conference, the main strategy of the Anti-Hitler Coalition had been the British strategy of “tightening the ring”. Therefore, the Arctic in the frame of this strategy was considered to be an important segment of the “ring”, and Svalbard — as the ice shore of the “channel” through which the route of the northern convoys ran, and the main battles of the war at sea took place. With the adoption of the new coalition strategy of “direct action” in 1943, the role of Svalbard changed accordingly. In the global warfare strategy, this role became auxiliary. At the same time, as the war was nearing its end, the archipelago obtained a special significance in the national defense doctrines of the circumpolar states as well as in the post-war world order, in particular, in the Soviet doctrine of “creating a belt of friendly states” and in the Norwegian strategy of “building bridges”. In accordance with the changes in the main coalition strategy and national doctrines of the Arctic states, the article examines military operations in the archipelago as well as the policy of these states towards Svalbard at the end of war. In this regard, it is noted that during those military operations not only the liberation of the Norwegian territory was accomplished but also a direct military cooperation between Norway and the USSR. On the basis of the recently declassified documents, the author examines the role of Svalbard in the constructing of the post-war Europe, in particular, in solving the so called “Polish question”, in abandoning operation “Unthinkable”, and in establishing a zone of “limited forms and purposes for military activity” in Northern Norway bordering the USSR.

‘South Asia’: Construction and Deconstruction of Spaces and Institutions. Part II

The term ‘South Asia’ in its present meaning was coined in the late 1940s following a reinterpretation of previous approaches to the study of the (ancient) Orient, which had proved to be ill-suited under the conditions of the Second World War. The concept was created by an American Indologist W. Norman Brown (1892–1975) who defined almost the entire territory of British India as such and founded the Department of South Asia Regional Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. The consequence of this innovation was the institutionalization – along with traditional Sanskrit – of the modern socio-political spectrum of disciplines essential for the comprehensive understanding of the region where the languages studied are spoken. As the new idea spread beyond the borders of the United States, and changes continued in the geopolitical structure of the decolonized space, ‘South Asia’ as a concept in the educational strategy and post–war world order began to be replaced by ‘South Asia’ as a construct composed of new states and further reinforced by the formation of many new institutions, first of all SAARC. However, unlike Southeast Asia, the construction of which was also facilitated by external actors during the Second World War, ‘South Asia’ has failed to become a distinct region with its own identity, and its nomenclature is maintained for functional convenience while the search for its unifying factors in various spheres keeps going. The example of the latter is the idea of ‘Southasia’ (in one word), coined in Nepal and currently promoted from Sri Lanka.

К истории публикации брошюры Н. И. Кареева «Южные славяне и Италия на Адриатике». 1916 г.

The article publishes correspondence concerning publication of a pamphlet by the famous Russian historian, Nikolai Ivanovich Kareev (1850–1931) “Southern Slavs and Italy on the Adriatic.” It was to be published in the series “World War and Slavic Questions.” The compilers intended the series to increase the knowledge in the Russian society about the “Slavic question” and its prospects after the war. In particular, they supported the idea of uniting the Czechs and Slovaks into a Czechoslovak state and expanding the borders of Serbia, both at the expense of Austro-Hungarian territories. Kareev held to a similar point of view in his brochure, based primarily on historical facts. Written in the summer of 1916, this work reflected his views on the course of the war and the future post-war world order. In the question of the fate of Austrian Istria and Dalmatia, Kareev actually supported the Serbian side, seeing no reason for Italy to acquire these lands after the victory over the Central Powers. At the stage of censoring, the essay encountered some obstacles. According to the existing procedure, the Petrograd Committee for Press Affairs (which also dealt with military censorship) sent essays on foreign policy topics to the Press and Information Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for review. In August 1916, Kareev’s manuscript was received there. After reviewing it, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Anatoly Neratov advised to postpone the publication of the brochure, as it raised difficult questions and might have caused discontent of Italian allies of Russia. The manuscript was “stuck” in the censorship committee for two months, and Kareev tried to solve the problem by contacting the head of the Second Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, baron Boris Nolde, who, in his turn, advised him to write a personal letter to Neratov. In his letter, Kareev assured Neratov that there was nothing “offensive” in the brochure; it was written in “objectively scientific” language; the facts had been published and discussed not only in England and France, but also in Italy. Kareev also asked Neratov for a personal meeting to convey his arguments. It is possible that the meeting actually took place, because a week later the director of the Press and Information Department, Alexander Lysakovsky, informed the chairman of the Petrograd Press Committee, Nikolai Levitsky, that the Foreign Ministry no longer had any complaints against Kareev’s brochure and it could be published. The published documents show the mechanism of censoring essays on foreign policy topics in Russia during the First World War. In addition, N.I. Kareev’s letter is now introduced into scientific use, supplementing his extensive epistolary legacy.

Сущность и причины войн в социал-демократической мысли XX−XXI веков

This article deals with the problem of war and peace in the works of representatives of the social democratic thought of the 20th and 21st centuries. The focus is on the works of Marxists (K. Kautsky, A. Bebel, R. Luxemburg, F. Mehring, G.V. Plekhanov) and neo-Marxist I. Wallerstein, as well as their opponents: realists (C. von Clausewitz, R. Aron, and others) and supporter of liberal idealism W. Wilson, as well as on some studies of contemporary authors. Much attention is paid to defining the essence of wars, their causes, ways to achieve peace, and ideas about the ideal world order. Further, the evolution of social democratic theory on the issue of war and peace in the 20th century is traced. The views of Marxist theorists are compared with those of representatives of other areas of the science of international relations. It is concluded that socialist theory, which is based on the understanding of the essence of war laid down in the works of the founders of Marxism and has much in common with the realist school, has evolved towards liberalism in matters of peace and post-war world order. At the same time, it made a significant contribution to the theory of international relations and not only became the basis for neo-Marxism, but also enriched political realism and liberalism as well as modern science in general with some conclusions. Works of researchers of the 21st century develop and summarize the most important conclusions on war and peace made by representatives of Marxism and other schools of the theory of international relations, which indicates the aspiration of the world scientific community to solve this global problem through joint efforts.

Institutions of War and Peace

The author conducts a comparative analysis of international institutions that emerged as a result of two world wars in the twentieth century — the League of Nations and the United Nations, and shows their fundamental diff erence. The author rightly believes that the League of Nations was unable to prevent the Second World War due to the imperfection of its Charter and the lack of universal principles embodied in it. These shortcomings, according to the author, were due to the instability of the Versailles-Washington system, which failed to overcome the contradictions that later led to a new world war. Unlike the League of Nations, the United Nations, established after the Second World War, was able to take into account the systemic shortcomings that were originally embedded in the statutory principles of the former organization. The author focuses on the "veto" rule, which is the fundamental principle of the UN Charter, and shows its fundamental diff erence from the principle of "liberum veto" of the Statute of the League of Nations, which allowed any dissenting state to block a decision regarding the defi nition of a threat to peace and condone aggressor countries to freely exercise their expansionist plans. The author takes into account that the UN is an organization of the “nuclear age”, since the Yalta system determined the status of permanent members of the Security Council as victors in World War II and leading nuclear powers in the UN Charter. The author argues that complex international confl ict situations can only be resolved through the joint eff orts of the world community. With the help of various international mechanisms, regional confl icts must be resolved by political and diplomatic methods, and they must not be allowed to develop into a global confl ict, since a new world confl ict in the context of globalization can only be at the nuclear level. The UN Charter lays down the principles for resolving international regional problems and their settlement by political means. The author comes to the conclusion, that the United Nations is a stable international institution to prevent a new world war and maintain international security. Unlike the League of Nations, which failed to prevent the Second World War, the UN is an institution for actually preventing world crises and building a new post-war world order, which has been ensuring the sustainable development of mankind without global wars for more than 75 years.

Forced Migration and Refugee Resettlement in the Long 1940s: An Introduction to Its Connected and Global History

AbstractWhen considering the wave of forced migrations during the Second World War in Europe and Asia, and the international and institutional responses thereof, we can speak about the 1940s as witnessing the birth of a global refugee resettlement regime. Organisations including the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), the International Refugee Organization (IRO), and eventually the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) placed refugee resettlement at the heart of constructing the postwar world order. This volume adopts a global optic to investigate the formation of this international resettlement regime in Europe and Asia, while also studying refugee camps and movements, agency of refugees and migrants, decision factors for resettlement, and the intellectual production of people on the move. A historicisation of the global resettlement regime of the long 1940s may well carry important political and ethical lessons for us today, if only to remind us of the connected fates of our common humanity, and the responsibilities we therefore bear towards our fellow human beings.

A world safe for Catholicism: interwar international law and Neo-Scholastic universalism

ABSTRACT This article recounts how Neo-Scholastic international lawyers navigated the complex political landscape of the 1920s and 30s, combining universalism, nationalism and religious belief. Participating in the contemporary re-engagement of Catholics with modern politics, they re-imagined the international legal order in Catholic terms. They argued that a universal morality, overruling the extremes of state sovereignty, was the only solid basis for just and stable global legal relations. While the contribution of Catholics to the establishment of the post-war world order and the rise of human rights is widely acknowledged, the interwar genealogy of these developments is not. Reading these thinkers’ universalist legal tenets in conjunction with their political trajectories provides a relevant frame to understand the moral charge characterizing international law in the early years of the Cold War.

Philippine Independence in U.S. History

In 1946, the United States freed its largest colony, the Philippines. This article examines the decision-making behind that and argues that the road to freedom was not straight. The 1934 law scheduling independence was motivated mainly by protectionism, racism, and a sense that the Philippines was a military liability. Moreover, it contained many loopholes. Between its passage and the scheduled date for independence, Washington’s original reasons for freeing the Philippines had nearly all vanished, and high-ranking colonial officials sought to derail the independence process. Nevertheless, the Philippines was freed, because Washington regarded this act as central to its attempts to legitimize the postwar world order. Putting Philippine independence in the proper chronological context connects it to the history of decolonization and U.S. global hegemony.

От биполярного мира к многополярности. Эволюция лидерства

The article touches upon the problem of “leadership” in international relations of the second half of the 20th century. Based on the analysis of well-known historical material, taking into account the positions of domestic and foreign politicians, the author seeks to trace the evolution of leadership during the transition from the “bipolar” system of the post-war world order to the modern “multipolarity”. The whole motley and unstable picture of the world order, often referred to as the Versailles-Washington system, which arose on the ruins of former European empires, was destroyed and destroyed in the conflagration of the Second World War. What came to replace it in many ways only accidentally took the form of a “bipolar” world. A status of peace that lasted from 1945 to 1989 rather, it was rather unique for international relations and was the result not so much of the all-out strengthening of overseas democracy, but of the hypertrophied growth of the role and influence of the Soviet Union, which bore most of the hardships and losses that fell on the countries of the European continent. The supertension undertaken by the Soviet people during the Great Patriotic War allowed the Soviet country not only to make a decisive contribution to the defeat of Hitlerite Nazism, but also to expand its influence far beyond even the tsarist empire. A new factor that radically changed the entire post-war system of international relations was the emergence of a third center of power that broke away from the Soviet bloc and eventually turned into a new “superpower” - the PRC. The idea is substantiated that both retention and loss of leadership positions are directly related to success in interstate competition and rivalry. The late Soviet leadership, like the leadership of the Russian Federation, refused, first of all, from the role of an alternative center of the world to the West. Recognized its failure, as such, and defeat in competition with free market economies.

VIOLATION OF FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHTS AS A RESULT OF MILITARY AGGRESSION OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION AGAINST UKRAINE IN 2022 AND MECHANISMS OF BRINGING WAR CRIMINALS TO LEGAL RESPONSIBILITY

The publication covers the issues of violation of fundamental rights and freedoms in Ukraine as a result of military aggression of the Russian Federation which started on February 24, 2022, and also investigates mechanisms of bringing war criminals to legal responsibility. It is noted that wars are the coevals of humanity. This is evidenced, in particular, by the legends and myths of the peoples of the world, the inherent landscape of which is war. Some of the wars we know led to the self-determination of peoples and the formation of political nations, their exit from the colonial dependence of empires and the development of nation-states. Other wars asserted or strengthened authoritarian regimes, and became a prologue to the death of not only states and peoples, but also of entire civilizations. At the same time, at all war times there was a total negative impact on the individual and his fundamental rights, beginning with the right to life, liberty and dignity, and ending with the newest groups of human rights and freedoms – informational, environmental, gender, etc. In ancient times wars were declared not only to the hostile state or city-polis and their armed militia, but also to all inhabitants. From the Renaissance and to the 19th century the tendency to humanize wars becomes noticeable, when states begin to fight with states and not with the population. Under the influence of H. Grotius’s doctrine on the law of war, the laws and customs of war are developed in international law, implying humane treatment of prisoners of war, prohibition of murder, torture and attacks on honor and dignity of civilians, inadmissibility of destruction of civilian infrastructure, etc. The relevant international customs and rules of war were enshrined in the late 19th century – early 20th century in the Geneva Conventions and the Hague Conventions. The horrors of World Wars I and II forced to rethink the reliability of international humanitarian law and to strengthen it in the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Geneva Convention of 1949. However, the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and the massive and brutal violation by the aggressor state of international humanitarian law and fundamental human rights and freedoms demonstrated the formality of international conventional and institutional mechanisms to protect the postwar world order. The main violations of international laws and customs of war by the Russian army in the temporarily occupied territories and in the areas of military operations, which grossly violate the rights of Ukrainian civilians to life, honor and dignity, freedom of movement, etc., as well as the rights of Ukrainian military prisoners, are analyzed and systematized. It is emphasized that an important way to restore and strengthen international guarantees of fundamental human rights and freedoms during the war is to bring to justice all persons who committed war crimes in Ukraine during the Russian military aggression in Ukraine. Perspective institutional models of inevitable punishment for these crimes are substantiated. The importance of judicial experts in the mechanism of forming the evidence base, which will be used in international courts against war criminals, is emphasized.

ТЕОРЕТИЧЕСКИЕ АСПЕКТЫ РАЗВИТИЯ ВНУТРЕННИХ ГЕОЭКОНОМИЧЕСКИХ РЕГИОНОВ СТРАНЫ

This article studies the geo-economic paradigm of the development of the world and national economy, which should be considered as an economic interpretation of geopolitics, since we are talking about control over space, which, first of all, refers to geographical and economic space, inextricably linked with the concept of "territorial integrity". This led to the emergence of specific institutions - global and internal (often transboundary) geo-economic regions, which are interpreted as tools for implementing state economic policy in solving the problems of developing the national economy. The article discusses some theoretical aspects of the formation and development of internal geo-economic regions, in relation to modern Russia. Approaches to the interpretation of the concept of "geoeconomic region" in the context of the continuous transformation of the system of global economic interaction and the reformatting of the institutional model of the world geopolitical system are proposed. It is noted that the radical transformation of the post-war world order, expressed by the fall of the bipolar (balanced) principle of economic and political interaction and its replacement by a transnational economy, caused a response of national economic systems, expressed by regionalization. It is also argued that in the conditions of a radical transformation of the system of global economic interaction, the course of internal regionalization processes is changing, which is associated with a gradual modification of the functional role of regions in the world reproductive system. This made it possible to give a brief theoretical description of the existing internal geo-economic regions and study the prerequisites for their emergence and development. Based on the theoretical analysis of the processes of geoeconomic regionalization carried out in the study, a general classification of the internal geoeconomic regions of the country is proposed, which is based on a functional approach.