Between Europe and Asia: Narrow Spaces for Strategic Hedging in New Europe

ABSTRACT Since the end of the Cold War, the former Soviet states of Europe, located at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, have been the site of a political game between the great powers, gradually developing a left-right strategy. This paper constructs the explanatory theory of hedging strategy and argues that post-socialist European countries, collectively referred to as ‘New Europe’, have navigated a middle way between balance and followup strategies called compound hedging. Starting at the regional scale, this paper discusses three issues, i.e., whether the new Europe has adopted a hedging strategy, why they adopt a hedging strategy, and the policy performance and effectiveness of hedging in the security and economic fields. Specifically, New Europe has implemented diversified fuzzy strategies amidst the transatlantic alliances and Eurasian powers, avoided security risks from Russia through cooperation with NATO, and balanced interest risks caused by European Union pressure through contacts with the United States, Russia, China and other countries. Although New Europe has realized certain practical strategic effects, it still faces difficulties (e.g., structural pressure changes, divergences between old and New Europe, and a lack of hedging capacities and motivations), and its policy space remains narrow and uncertain.