Thinking the Russian-Ukrainian conflict in terms of the energy issue

In 1992, the American intellectual Francis Fukuyama published a landmark book: The End of History and the Last Man (1). The author’s thesis, famous since then, predicted the death of communism, the triumph of liberal democracy, and thus the end of conflicts, wars, and great tensions on an international scale; in short: the end of history, the entry into an era of lasting peace, and ” the final point of the ideological evolution of humanity” . Reality has already offered us several denials of this thesis, and this since September 11, 2001. Since then, history has continued to persist and surprise us until we reach the threshold of a virtual and umpteenth “world war”. A “third world conflict” confirming even more this ” military hybridization ” of which the political scientist Jean-Michel Valantin speaks, based on ” the intertwining of industry, war, and the transformation of geology and biodiversity into resources “(2). In short, a war in which energy and the environment become vital issues; even worse, actors in their own right, so that we keep on making enter more “nature in history, as suggested by Hannah Arendt (3) – thus anticipating the concept of the “Anthropocene”(4). A hybridization of “nature” and “culture” that States, public and private actors, and large world systems do not cease to make grow and endure putting in tension the geopolitical order.

The being, the event and the energy

According to the philosopher Alexis Cartonnet, the world of international relations (IR) involves the interaction of competing systems of states, transnational networks of actors, and regional groupings governed by community mechanisms such as the law or the market (5). These three categories would be like three worlds in their own right – three political ontologies -, fighting for the monopoly of legitimate existence within IR theory. These competing ontologies can only be organized on three scales: theinter, theinfra, and the“supra-state“. From then on, the State is and remains ” the real invariant of the three possible worlds “(6) which belongs to these three worlds in a concomitant and virtual way. However, what makes it possible to clearly distinguish in which world (ontology) the State appears, gives itself to be seen, at this or that moment, is an event. The event is what makes visible the ontological status (the world) of the present situation, it actualizes the mode of being of the state, its place and its relations at a given moment: inter, infra or supra-state. In the context of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, much more than just the warlike annexation, what is really an event is the energy issue itself. Through this crisis, we have been reminded of the energy emergency and its inescapability in the functioning of the world economy and international relations. This event, through the energy issue, has also revealed to us, in this situation, the importance of the inter-state and supra-state scales.

The geopolitical challenge of energy

Today, the importance of energy appears to us as a striking reminder. The latter, willy-nilly, shapes and has always shaped geopolitics and the great international orders of history: coal in the 19th century with Great Britain, oil and natural gas in the 20th century with the United States, and today, ” many expect China to become the world’s renewable energy superpower in the 21st century “(7) – unless the European Union (EU) becomes one before the Middle Kingdom. Thus, as Jean-Marie Chevalier summarizes: ” In the space of a century, access to energy sources has thus become a strategic issue for the functioning of the economy and, consequently, a major element in national policies, international relations and the conduct of wars. (…) On the battlefields, the States – producers, exporters or importers of energy -, the public and private companies that intervene directly or indirectly in the sector – are confronting each other. ” (8). In this sense, energy must be understood as a lever of power for States. Power that can be defined as ” a set of physical, human and economic resources offering the sovereign State, which has triumphed over all “private” powers, a range of instruments at its discretion – military, industrial, of course, but also technological, financial, economic and ideological – offering a platform for the projection of this power beyond its borders. “(9)

This energetic power thus ensures, in a relative way, a ” capacity to do, to make do, to prevent from doing and to refuse to do “(10). Following the last two world wars, states came to realize the importance of having access to such resources, since they are in a way “security providers”, as political scientist Emmanuel Meneut suggests. This is known as a ” functional disjunction “A country with energy resources is a security provider, it contributes to the proper functioning of mechanized armies and is at the same time relatively protected, since in theory, a customer cannot directly attack his supplier – energy therefore has considerable strategic value. Finally, let us remember that etymologically, the signifier of “ energy ” derives from the Greek ” ἐνέργεια/enérgeia“, which means: ” force in action “, in short, it is the power to transform, resist, move and cause to move – the proper of power and might. It is therefore not surprising that the great powers of the contemporary world compete in this race for energy resources (11) and that they use them as instruments of political pressure, as is the case today in this conflict.

A question of method: the two social spaces of energy

At the inter-, intra- and supra-state level, any issue related to the energy sphere is marked by ambiguity, or rather ambivalence. These questions are inescapably inscribed in two social spaces, which are also, for the actors, two mental spaces (12) with sometimes radically divergent functions, interests and objectives: the economic field and the political field – national and international. The case of the current Russian-Ukrainian crisis vis-à-vis Europe is an exemplary illustration of this. Faced with the scale of the event, the EU has decided to take firm measures – not to say radical and certainly ambitious as the stakes are high – against Russia through economic and diplomatic sanctions. Among other things, the complete cessation of Russian oil and gas imports by 2030, and the reduction of 1/3 of these imports within a year.

For some specialists, these measures appear to be unrealistic and are essentially a symbolic threat. However, as symbolic as these future directives may (possibly) be, it is no less true that in the field of international relations, the symbol counts; and the latter has certain effects, virtual or actual. Also, what these decisions show, much more than just the political-economic power grab in a war context, is a strategic and diplomatic will to make thinkable and desirable – if only in the form of a project, a vision, even a fantasy – the conditions of reality, of possibilities and of legitimacy (13) of a possible ” energy sovereignty “(14) of the EU. However, this desire, which tries to be embodied in an effective will, is inevitably confronted with a principle of reality, rigid and complex, specific to international relations and the world economy. In this case, and to give just a few examples: a mesh of diplomatic relations that sometimes contradicts certain trade agreements; interdependence between nations that is again complex and sometimes counter-intuitive; the EU’s difficulties in having a truly common policy; unequal energy dependencies between European nations, etc. These are therefore the issues that we will try to address in the rest of this paper in order to shed light on certain points and to account for the singularity and theoretical interest of this Russian-Ukrainian conflict in the field of energy issues.

Available resources

In Europe, the major oil and gas resource developers are Norway (NG: 120 bcm (17) and oil: 618.10^6 barrels produced in 2020), the UK (NG: 42 bcm and oil: 330.10^6 barrels produced in 2020) and the Netherlands (NG: 21 bcm produced in 2020). The other European countries produce almost nothing.

This unequal dependence among European nations adds complexity to the situation.

The paradoxes of sovereignty

In the context of the energy perspective, dependence can be revealed by exceptional measures, such as, for example, for a producer state to stop exporting its production, or to increase its prices in an arbitrary and immediate manner. One would have expected similar measures from Russia, which is considered a priori superior and dominant in this economic relationship with the EU; however, in fact, and to everyone’s surprise, it was the latter that initiated the cessation of trade. In this sense, the EU’s decision to abruptly halt Russian hydrocarbon imports is part of this state of exception which, as surprising and inconsiderate as it may be, reaffirms a sovereignty which, according to its detractors, was struggling to emerge. Thus, contrary to what some critical observers, such as Jacques Sapir (18) or Charles Gave (19), assert, the main interest of these so-called “economic” sanctions does not lie so much in the penalization and the immediate objective of weakening Russia per se, as in the possibility, in the long term, of being able to put an end to this energy dependence on the Soviet giant; as Nicolas Mazzucchi and Annabelle Livet rightly write: ” Sovereignty induces the capacity of impulse that “forces” others to follow the one who positions himself as the decision-maker “(20), such would have been the ambition of the EU. However, it is quite true that this political will is an extremely risky gamble – perhaps even madness – and that, if it does indeed update the EU’s political sovereignty, it also weakens it with regard to the question of its immediate “energy security” understood as “energy security”. the ability of a player (…) to ensure uninterrupted energy supplies at a sustainable price “(21). The soaring prices of fuel and many commodity-based products are evidence of this fragility.

Does Europe have the means of its pretensions? Between great ambitions and reality

A desire for emancipation that does not date from yesterday

If one refers exclusively to the media treatment of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, one would be tempted to believe that this crisis is unprecedented – and it certainly is in many respects – but, in fact, it is part of a history that is already well anchored in the memory of international relations, and particularly in the ambiguous relationship between the European Union and Russia. Indeed, since the 2000s, there have been countless disputes and even conflicts between Europe and the country of the former USSR. The ” gas wars ” embody this reality. The first tensions involved Russia and its neighbors Belarus (2004) and Ukraine (2006), over the inflation of gas prices imposed by the giant Gazprom. Belarusians and Ukrainians refused such an increase and the gas company decided to cut off their gas supply (22). However, Ukraine was already at that time the first country of transit and export of Russian gas for the old continent. Numerous agreements and talks are reached to calm tensions, but only temporarily. Since in 2013, new frictions arose: Ukraine ”threatens” Russia to enter the EU and Nato; Russia reactivates its energy pressure to prevent such accessions. This situation leads to the Euromaidan protests, until the annexation of Crimea by Moscow and, in 2014, the war in Donbass. Even then, Europe had tried to find alternatives to Russian energy dependence, notably via the Baltic in the north, with the Nord Stream gas pipeline, Turkey and the Caucasus (23). In this game of attempts to disengage Europe from Russian energy hegemony, the United States is not an innocent player. And for good reason, now the leading producer of oil and liquefied natural gas, they were virulent opponents of the Nord Stream II project, sanctioning European companies collaborating with Gazprom – among others: EDF-Engie, Uniper, OMV, etc. Even today, they are the ones who pushed through the embargo on hydrocarbons against Russia (on March 8); on the one hand, to weaken the latter, and above all, on the other hand, one might think, to make Europe more subservient to it (24).

The mysteries of the energy war

“Politics is the continuation of war by other means”(25). This is what Michel Foucault explained in 1976 in his lectures at the Collège de France, turning Clausewitz’s famous formula on its head: “War is the continuation of politics by other means. Never has a sentence been as fair as this one today. The sanctions measures taken by the EU are part of this kind of continuation of the war through political “diplomacy”.

And for good reason: it is indeed quite true that the measures to stop Russian hydrocarbon exports will prove extremely difficult for Europe, given the degree of dependence of the old continent on the Soviet giant, as we have seen. However, what few commentators emphasize is that a dependence is never totally unilateral – any power finds other counter-powers along the way, as Foucault summarized (26) -; in this case, it is true that Europe is heavily dependent on Russian energy, but as Francis Perrin points out, the Russian energy economy is just as dependent, if not more so, at nearly 60%: “The Russian economy is not only dependent on Russian energy, it is also dependent on the Russian economy. Historically,” describes the political scientist, ” Gazprom has designed a gas export strategy focused primarily on Europe, including the European Union . This is evidenced by the various pipeline export routes linking Russia to the old continent: Brotherhood, Yamal-Europe, Nord Stream I, Nord Stream II, Blue Stream, Turk Stream, etc. Gas can only be exported in two physical forms: gaseous via pipelines, or liquid (LNG) by cargo and by sea, requiring heavy infrastructure, LNG terminals, allowing the regasification of the product; in fact, Russia has essentially relied on the land routes of gas routes.

In this sense, it is extremely difficult to totally redirect of gas flows – unlike oil flows, for example -; there is therefore a “gas social rigidity “(28) embodied by the material and technical conditions of the energy activityThese are the limits to the imagination and will of the actors, beyond the official speeches and their announcement effects. This rigidity and reality principle can be illustrated by several elements:

First, as Jacques Sapir pointed out, despite the very real war, Russia would continue to sell its hydrocarbons to Europe, Ukraine and the United States. This “anomaly” corresponds to the fact that ” we cannot stop the flows immediately, so in the meantime, trade continues (…) We are in a situation reminiscent of what war was like in the Middle Ages or in the classical age. We are in a situation that is reminiscent of war in the Middle Ages or the Classical Age, that is to say, we are fighting but we continue to trade,”(29) the economist explained. Second example, concerning the recent decisions of Vladimir Putin to impose on European nations the payment of gas in rubles (30). Until recently, did the EU pay directly for its gas in rubles? The answer is no. And for good reason, as Francis Perrin explained: ” What does Gazprom finally do? He explains to his clients – his clients being European gas companies -: “Don’t worry, not much will change. You will continue to pay for Russian gas in euros, and you will put the euros in Gazprombank. Then we will convert these euros into rubles, and we will credit an account in rubles at Gazprombank. And we will say that you have paid in rubles. “(31) This staging sheds light on the extent to which, in matters of energy, the ambivalence of interests and social spaces discussed above is tenacious. Gazprom, a state-owned company closely linked to Moscow, is nonetheless first and foremost a The conatus of capital [being] to accumulate, potentially ad infinitum “, accompanied by a “politics of capital” which is not only a ” supplement of power deployed from a strictly economic base, [mais est aussi] the expression of what, in its very movement, capital has to do with the search for power, that all its economy concurs with it and is in a certain way dedicated to it “(32). Gazprom does not escape this law of being-for-capital, despite the context of war: to renounce the European market completely is equivalent to breaking with both the accumulation of capital and the will to preserve power, as the world’s leading gas producer and exporter.

Obviously, the situation is so complex that the course of events is constantly evolving in such a way as to make false what was true yesterday and true today what was false the day before yesterday; but the energy war is indeed played out in the singular folds of these multiple ambivalences.

The game of international interdependence: the Algerian example

Other examples of this type of geopolitical imbroglio can be mentioned:

For the sociologist Norbert Elias, what characterizes states is that they are ” defensive and offensive survival units “. Like tribes, clans or fiefdoms, states would be an extension of this “death struggle”, of this extension and monopolization of violence in order to stabilize power. If the state can be defined as a “unit of survival”, then what determines it is and remains the question of “survival”, of persistence in being. In this sense, it does not matter what partnerships, agreements or other arrangements may exist between States, as long as it is a question of survival, most often, “necessity is the law” – the hallmark of the realpolitik in short – and even more so when it comes to commercial and economic issues, i.e., elements directly related to the production and the reproduction of collective material life – that is, the way in which a society ensures its subsistence (its survival) and its existence (its lifestyle). In this virtual “eliminatory struggle” between “survival units”, the system of international relations constitutes a network of interdependence woven of multiple and reciprocal subjection, in which different social fields are in action in a concomitant way (for example, as we have said, the economic field, the political field, etc.)

To illustrate this principle of international interdependence, we could refer to the Algerian example – which today is the subject of much ink following the last visit of President Emmanuel Macron to Algerian soil. That Algeria is close to Russia is no mystery. There are in fact several commercial agreements for the exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbons (petro-gas) between Algeria (Sonatrach) and Russia (Gazprom; one of the most recent dating from 2 February 2022) (33), and even with China (Sinopec, 17 February 2022). Should we therefore establish on this basis that Algeria would be definitively linked body and soul to Russia or China? Certainly not.

These different partnerships do not prevent Sonatrach from trading with European countries (member of the EU) and from forming other commercial agreements, for example with Greece (the DEPA group, February 3, 2022, relating to the sale / purchase of LNG); Spain (34); or with Italy (ENI, April 12, 2022, “one of the most important customers” of Sonatrach) (35). In addition, Algeria also supplies France (and much of Europe) with LNG, mainly via the Transmed pipeline. France has been the main trading partner since 1962 (36). And as the geo-political scientist Francis Perrin explains: ” Algerians are cautious because Algeria has good relations with Russia. But the European market is the main gas market for Sonatrach. If demands were made, it would not be easy for this country to ignore them. ” (37). The Algerian trade policy alone illustrates the complexity and interdependence in act within the geopolitical world and economic globalization. And this example can be applied to several others: Iran or Saudi Arabia with the United States, Iran and China, Turkey, etc. In international relations, the enemies of my friends are not necessarily my enemies too.

The ambivalence of economic warfare: an offensive or suicidal strategy?

” We are going to wage a total economic and financial war on Russia,” Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire presumptuously announced, before retracting his statement shortly after. But it was the right word: an “economic war”. An “economic war” that can be defined with Ali Laidi as ” the use of violence, coercion and unfair or illegal means to protect or gain market power, or to gain or maintain a dominant position that allows abusive control of a market “(38) – of course, this violence can just as easily be done through legal and conventional means, and exist in times of peace. In this case, it is a question of preserving European sovereignty or energy autonomy from its strong dependence on the Russian “enemy” – not to say, finally “creating” a real energy sovereignty -, while trying to sanction the latter. Therefore, since we are indeed talking about a conflict in which the energy variable seems to be at the heart of the conflict, it is quite relevant to ask, as the two authors of Le Monde diplomatique, Mathias Reymond and Pierre Rimbert, do, “Who is winning the energy war? For our authors, there is no doubt that the EU is and will be the big loser in its diplomatic gamble. Ultra-dependent on Russia, these decisions can only lead to violent inflation, of which the middle and working classes as well as industrialists and traders will suffer the consequences until an eventual recession of the European economy (40). In this perspective, the EU appears as a weak power. A weak power that had the audacity, the naivety and the imprudence toattack the Soviet giant. Now, as Clausewitz explained, in the context of a war, there is a superiority of defense over attack, insofar as the attack would aim at change, transformation, capture, involving movement and additional work – thus an expenditure of excess energy -, whereas defense would seek conservation, involving less effort and thus easier to maintain: ” Defense is the strongest form and aims at the negative goal; offense is the weakest form and aims at the positive goal “(41). The EU’s attack – with Washington’s blessing (42) – is ultimately aimed, consciously or not, at subverting the established energy market arrangement in which Russia has a predominant place. This subversion therefore requires upsetting the established order and the power relations structuring the international system. To this principle of superiority of conservation over acquisition, Clausewitz adds the factor of temporality: time would work against the attacker: ” the time that elapses is lost to the attacker, and any loss of time is a disadvantage and must weaken in some way the party that suffers it “. If one considers the EU as the attacker and Russia as the defender, the attack party seems to be in trouble in view of the strategic principles developed by the Prussian general.

However, the singularity of the case we are dealing with here is that the attack driven by the EU also forces Russia not to be satisfied with the preservation of the status quo – and thus with strict defense. On the contrary, by virtually or actually breaking trade agreements with its privileged market, Europe, the EU is forcing the Russians to redirect their hydrocarbon trade towards other clients, and to do so at a low cost – and therefore to make efforts as well and not to be able to hold on to its positions -, notably in Asia with China and India (43), implying a new form of commercial dependence on clients who, if they so wish, could negotiate with other suppliers. The reduction in Russian supply inevitably puts Asian demand in a strong position – and what is worse, in a Russian economy that is not very diversified and is mainly based on energy rents. This commercial vassalage is likely to increase further as time goes on and the stalemate in international relations continues to mirror the Ukrainian conflict, as neither China nor India looks favorably on this war if it were to upset their economic and diplomatic interests in any way. On the other hand, the EU is certainly in an extremely perilous situation at the moment, on the short average timecertainly; but nothing says that on the long timeIf we do not have the means to do this, a changeover cannot take place – notably through new diversified partnerships, new innovations, an acceleration of the energy transition, real European political solidarity, etc. – and that this diplomatic ostracism move will eventually