This publication analyzes the historical and geopolitical context of the formation and development of the concept of the “Russian threat” – a public narrative about the territorial ambitions of the Russian Empire that became widespread in Northeast Asia in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Using the example of the concept’s origins and transformation in Korea (first in the Joseon Dynasty, later in the Republic of Korea), the authors demonstrate how external actors (primarily Qing China), acting as agents of securitization, sought to convince the Korean government of the reality of the “Russian threat.” They analyze the reaction of Korean political elites to this narrative and explain its evolution through its transformation into an anti-communist narrative and its gradual decline in the first quarter of the 21^st century.

Nuclear weapons play a key role in ensuring both the national security of individual states and the stability of the international security system as a whole. At the same time, the topic of nuclear weapons is not limited solely to practical aspects; it has become an integral part of discussions at the academic, governmental, and international levels. In political science and international relations, issues related to nuclear weapons generate heated debates and a variety of viewpoints. The discourse on nuclear weapons is part of international security studies, which have undergone a significant evolution since the end of the Cold War: basic ideas about the nature of reality (ontology), approaches to cognition and analysis (epistemology), and general theoretical concepts have changed. Nuclear discourse within political science and international relations has remained a relatively conservative segment, less susceptible to new theoretical trends. The situation began to change in the first decade of the 21st century, when the transformation of nuclear discourse began. Approaches to discussing and analyzing nuclear issues began to be revised, taking on new contours in the context of contemporary challenges and changes in world politics. This study presents the evolution of nuclear discourse in political science. Nuclear discourse is presented in the form of three large groups: traditional studies of strategic arms control; works devoted to the nuclear non- proliferation regime and disarmament; and critical studies. The formation of nuclear discourse is influenced by the transforming world order, technological changes, key events of the last two decades, and formalization within scientific publications, scientific journals, and leading institutions. Nuclear discourse has emerged as an independent analytical field, providing a broad scope for scientific discussion.

The image of Russia in Finland has been in a continuous transformation since the perestroika period in the Soviet Union. Positive perceptions peaked in the years leading up to and following the collapse of the Soviet Union. A reversal began during the First Chechen War, and negative trends have gradually intensified until the present. Since the second half of 2022, the image of Russia as a direct adversary has become dominant. Its most distinct and psychologically significant component among the general population is the notion that Russia is continuously conducting subversive activities on Finnish territory, particularly in the adjacent Gulf of Finland. Although this is publicly disputed by certain segments of the Finnish security apparatus, the significance of such denials in shaping public opinion should be assessed as less considerable. The emerging image of Russia as an adversary contains no elements indicating increased interest on the part of Finland or Finnish society in territories located beyond Russia’s borders. At the same time, interest in Russia itself and its history has not diminished due to the increase in negative assessments. This article aims to present changes in Finnish perceptions of Russia without a comprehensive analysis of the significance of the internal and external political and ideological factors underlying their formation. It does not address the adequacy, fallacy, or moral evaluation of these narratives, nor the influence of Finland’s overall national and economic development on the dynamics of these trends.

India‘s foreign policy is rooted in millennia-old traditions and the philosophy of Indian civilization, as well as the foreign policy consensus and continuity that have developed since the proclamation of its independence in 1947. Currently, it is characterized by a purely pragmatic nature, a multivector approach (multi-alignment), and strategic autonomy, the formation and implementation of which, in the increasingly complex configuration of international relations, many states in the Global South are striving to achieve. For a significant number of them, India remains a benchmark for pursuing an independent economic and diplomatic course. Ensuring favorable external conditions for stable domestic development remains a crucial objective for the state‘s foreign policy: under the leadership of Narendra Modi, India has set the ambitious goal of becoming a developed economy by the centenary of its independence in 2047. A distinctive feature of India-Russia relations today is their self-sufficient nature. The significance of the specially privileged strategic partnership between the countries is not linked to the influence of third parties. At the same time, the need for a more nuanced understanding of relations with a number of key players in India – not so much at the level of official policy, but in expert and public debate – is becoming crucial for an effective Russian-Indian partnership. Drawing on documents, monographs, analytical articles, and media publications, the author seeks to understand how India views itself and its role in the world; what images have formed in its expert and public spaces around the United States, China, Pakistan, Britain, Russia, and Israel; whether the images of these states are being transformed among Indian experts in the current context; and how they influence India‘s foreign policy. The article concludes: while India‘s official position is always cautious and measured, its expert community is dominated by more diverse and sometimes categorical assessments, which leave their mark on the worldview of India’s politicians and officials.

The label “political prisoner” is one of the most contested signifiers in contemporary Georgian politics. Since the change of government in 2012, opposition parties, loyal TV channels and a range of Western politicians have repeatedly framed high-profile convicts – such as Mikheil Saakashvili, Vano Merabishvili, Gigi Ugulava, Nikanor (Nika) Melia, and Nika Gvaramia – as political prisoners and have called for their release. By contrast, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has adopted a more restrictive approach, using Articles 5, 6, and 18 of the European Convention on Human Rights rather than the political vocabulary used by domestic and international actors. Building on definitional debates around the term “political prisoner” in international law and political science, the article asks: how political are Georgia’s “political prisoners” when assessed through the lens of the Strasbourg jurisprudence and related legal standards? The analysis proceeds in three steps. First, it reconstructs the conceptual field of the term “political prisoner” through Resolution 1900 (2012) of the Council of Europe, the narrower notion of “prisoner of conscience,” and recent attempts to reserve the term for victims of politically biased trials. Second, it examines media and political narratives produced by Georgian opposition channels and Western actors, including European Parliament resolutions, campaigns around Mikheil Saakashvili’s release, and US sanctions against Georgian judges. Third, it juxtaposes these narratives with the ECHR’s handling of five cases (Mikheil Saakashvili, Vano Merabishvili, Gigi Ugulava, Nikanor Melia, and Nika Gvaramia), using Article 18 case-law and the Court’s Guide on Article 18 as benchmarks. The article argues that Georgian “political prisoner” discourse is systematically broader than the legal standards applied by Strasbourg and UN bodies. While some patterns of selective justice and abuse of pre-trial detention are acknowledged (most notably in Merabishvili v. Georgia), subsequent judgments reveal a high evidentiary threshold for improper motives and a strong emphasis on procedural correctness. The resulting gap between narrative and legal assessment does not simply reflect misuse of the term “political prisoner,” it shows how different actors strategically mobilise competing normative frameworks to contest the boundary between legitimate accountability and politicized repression.

This article employs rhetoric in the US Congress, as well as th e divergence between Freedom House1, Inc (Freedom House, FH* – деятельность организации признана нежелательной на территории Российской Федерации) and Polity evaluations of Russia’s regime type, to quantitatively estimate the US government’s attitude towards Russia over time. Congressional rhetoric is hand-coded on the basis of strict criteria. The FH*–Polity approach is based on preexisting findings that FH* evaluations are distorted by US government attitudes; this article similarly finds that FH’s* evaluations of Russia are quite arbitrary, including in that FH’s* claims of Russian election falsification are contradicted by years of polling data. The Congressionalrhetoric and FH*–Polity approaches yield very similar results, indicating a slightly negative US attitude towards Russia through most of the 1990s, a sharp decline to hostility from mid-1998 through 1999, a steady continued worsening of the now strongly-negative attitude until 2014, and then a final collapse to maximum animosity that is completed in 2016. Such findings contradict the prevailing view of a later US turn against Russia, and they have significant implications for understanding when and why US-Russian conflict became inevitable.

The article focuses on the Western mainstream media (WMM) discourse on Russia-Africa relations and how Russo-Western information confrontation affects the diplomatic dialogue between Russia and African states. Historically, the Soviet Union fostered a friendly relationship with the continent, characterized by solidarity and mutual respect. The collapse of the Soviet Union, the WMM discourse on Russian-African dialogue, and Russia’s change of interest largely diminished the volume of contacts, until recently, as Moscow is beginning to rebuild its relationship with Africa. However, the WMM narratives about Russia have contributed negatively to shaping its perception in Africa, thereby affecting Russia-Africa relations. Despite the negative stereotype about Russia in the WMM, the authors argue that these narratives have little to no effect on the Russia-Africa diplomatic dialogue at the current stage due to the Soviet Union’s legacy of establishing ties with African countries, and taking into account that the Russian Federation continues to engage with Africa in various fields. Additionally, since the escalation of the crisis in Ukraine, media reporting has even made Russia popular in Africa due to its one-sided coverage, leading dissenting audiences to view the news coverage as propaganda or an agenda to suit Western interests. The authors, however, conclude that the diplomatic relations between Russia and Africa are not solely shaped by geopolitical interests but might also be influenced by Western media due to their widespread narratives. As a result, efforts from both Russia and Africa may contribute to counteracting negative media effects and revitalise positive relationship.

The article examines the impact of technological capabilities in the Arctic on the perception of Norway and Finland as allies by the United States. Against a backdrop of intensifying international competition for leadership in the development of the Arctic, particularly in the fields of icebreaker technology and communications, Western nations are actively developing their Arctic capabilities. Small Nordic states – Norway and Finland – play a significant role in this process, positioning themselves as “Arctic superpowers” and using their long-standing experience of developing the North to occupy unique niches in NATO’s technological supply chains and strengthen relations with their primary security guarantor – the US Technological capabilities in the Arctic serve as symbolic capital for Norway and Finland and translate into a special allied status in the eyes of the leader of the military and political bloc – the United States. Against the backdrop of the escalating military and political security situation in the Euro-Arctic region in the 2020s, both states are developing technological cooperation with the US in the fields of space and satellite technologies (Norway) and icebreaker construction (Finland) within the framework of specialized formats. In addition to the military, political and economic benefits, institutionalized cooperation with the US is viewed by the Nordic states as a status symbol and only serves to enhance their standing as allies in the eyes of the US, making them indispensable partners for strengthening the West’s presence and influence in the Arctic. In turn, this enhanced status in the eyes of the key security guarantor reinforces the sense of security among the ruling elites of Norway and Finland and can be viewed as one of the instruments of their security policy and an element of strategic culture. The findings of the study confirm the high significance of the categories of symbolic capital and status for the strategic cultures of certain small Arctic states and their security policies.

This article analyzes the US representations of Iran across five administrations (1993–2024). Combining historical institutionalism with discursive institutionalism, the study traces how presidents and senior foreign-policy officials produced and reproduced two foundational myths – the “international community” and the “rogue states” – that represent Washington’s approach to Tehran. Based on detailed analysis of presidential statements and key policy discourse, the work argues that these myths produce a durable path-dependent framing: they simplify complex political interaction into a moralized binary (inside / outside; civilized / outcast) and thereby limit the range of politically plausible options. Although US administrations have oscillated between engagement and pressure, such stylistic and tactical differences remain confined by the underlying myths. Even administrations that pursued negotiations or rapprochement did so while implicitly sustaining the “rogue state” frame. The article therefore explains the puzzle of persistent hostility amid episodic détente: US rhetoric as well as policy towards Iran moves in circular patterns within mythic boundaries. In other words, although “dovishness” and “hawkishness” play an important role in US discourse towards Iran, both are still strictly limited by the “rogue state” framework. Such a state of affairs renders complete and lasting normalization between the two states impossible.

The escalation of Ukrainian conflict in February 2022 has radically changed the security parameters in the Baltic-Scandinavian macroregion. Russia is perceived as the main source of military and hybrid threats. The aim of the study is to show how media images of Russia as a security threat in the Baltic Scandinavian macroregion contribute to the securitization of the regional agenda and the transformation of international security practices after 2022, as well as to identify the consequences of systemic demonization of the “enemy” for the stability of the regional order. The concept of collective securitization as well as critical security studies and approaches to the analysis of media framing form the theoretical and methodological basis of the research. The empirical data include academic and expert publications as well as reports on the safety of the Baltic Sea by international organizations. The study shows that three interrelated images of Russia are fixed in the media discourse of the Baltic-Scandinavian macroregion after 2022: existential and unpredictable threat, source of “hybrid attacks” in the “gray zone”, universal culprit of any failures and crises. These images legitimize the expansion of emergency measures, including a sharp increase in defense budgets, the construction of defensive lines, restrictions on Russian media, and tougher policies towards Russian-speaking minorities. The conclusion to be drawn is that the formation of Russian image as an overarching threat as well as the exploitation of the cliche of the “Russian footprint” increase the short-term consolidation of states in the macroregion, but at the same time narrow the space for dialogue, create risks of escalation due to erroneous interpretation of events and undermine the long-term stability of the regional order. For the Russian Federation, such securitization means institutionalizing a hostile environment in the immediate vicinity of its borders and requires the development of strategies for targeted desecuritization of certain areas of cooperation while maintaining military stability.

The article dwells on the relations between Syria and the League of Arab States (LAS) in 2017–2024 through the lens of perception in international relations. It focuses on the discrepancy between the official discourse of Arab solidarity and the actual policies of LAS members towards Syria. The relevance of the study lies in the need to understand the significance of Syria’s reintegration into the pan-Arab space for regional stability. The article analyzes the restoring of Syria’s membership in the Arab League against the backdrop of transforming regional political dynamics. It also examines the prerequisites and chronology of the gradual normalization of relations in 2017–2023, including the role of Arab states, the political context and conditions for Syria’s restoration to the LAS, as well as the limitations and unresolved issues in the relations in 2023–2024. The study demonstrates that the gap between perception and reality in Syria-LAS relations is determined by a combination of factors: the domestic political dynamics of Arab states, geopolitical rivalries between regional powers, and pragmatic interests. The authors conclude that the Arab League’s symbolic policies often masked the lack of genuine consensus on the Syrian issue, while Syria’s reintegration was partial and the result of a short-term shift in the regional balance of power rather than a restoration of promoted narratives of Arab solidarity. The study covers the period up until the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024. It demonstrates that Syria’s reinstatement was largely symbolic: formal reintegration did not completely resolve tensions. The relations remained superficially restored, but lacked a solid foundation due to persistent disagreements on key issues.