December 2, 2023 • 25 mins
Power Perception and Conflict Prevention in the Black Sea Region: A Conversation with Neli Kirilova
In this episode of 'Conflict Tipping Podcast', host Laura May speaks with Neli Kirilova, a researcher focused on power perception and conflict prevention in the Black Sea Region. Kirilova discusses why the Black Sea region is a nexus for conflict, largely due to cultural, religious, and linguistic diversity. She also delves into how foreign policy strategies can signal triggers for potential conflicts and effectively prevent escalation. The conversation then turns to discussing the importance of psychology and therapy in leadership.
Contents:
- The Black Sea region and conflict
- Influence and the six elements of power
- Conflict prevention by formula
- Applying conflict prevention
- Refocusing on the constructive
- What's next for Neli?
Neli's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neli-kirilova
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Laura May (00:11):
Hello and welcome to the Conflict Tipping Podcast from Mediate.com,
the podcast that explores socialconflict and what we can do about it.
I'm your host, Laura May, andtoday I have with me Neli Kirilova.
Neli has been conducting research at theEuropean Security and Defense College, and
recently submitted her PhD dissertationon power perception and conflict
(00:32):
prevention in the Black Sea Region.
She is interested in conflictprevention, security, and defense.
So welcome Neli.
Neli Kirilova (00:40):
Hi.
Laura.
Nice to meet you.
Laura May (00:42):
Yeah, it's great to have you here with me today,
but let's dive straight on in.
Because I wanna know about the regionsthat you are interested in and why
you interested in those regions.
Let's start there.
Neli Kirilova (00:55):
Well, I started uh, exploring the Black Sea
Region about 10 years ago.
When there was no war and therewere no conflicts at that time.
Still Crimea was not invaded as well.
And I come from Bulgaria and theuniversities in Bulgaria, it was highly
popular that uh, Black Sea Region isa place of high intensity of conflict
(01:18):
as well as the Western Balkans.
And the students were encouraged tostudy any of these two regions and
to try to identify how to preventpotential conflicts in the future.
So this is the bias that I come from.
Laura May (01:33):
And just for those who are less geographically inclined, when
we talk about the Black Sea Region,what does that actually incorporate?
Neli Kirilova (01:41):
Well, if we look back in the history of the Black Sea
region, we have Russia and Turkeyconstantly competing for influence.
And trying to control more ofthe countries, territories and
the people around the Black Sea.
And this has been lasting for centuriesin the past, and most probably it'll
(02:03):
continue in the future as well.
Of course, we have other players in theregion such as very long ago, the Mongol
Empire was reaching this territory.
Also, the Byzantine Empire, whichis inherited by Greece nowadays.
And maybe in the future there will beother players as well, like Iran . So
we need to, to know the past, butwe also need to look who are the
(02:26):
strong actors at the moment so thatwe could prevent their attempts to
control, and their potential conflicts.
Laura May (02:37):
And why do you think the Black Sea Region is such a nexus for
conflict, as you've just described.
Neli Kirilova (02:43):
Oh, because too many civilizations are
meeting at this territory.
We have the Slavic civilization wehave the Orthodox religion as well.
We have the Muslim religion, andalso we have the Turkic languages.
We have these are the big playersand we have the small players with
small languages and cultures likeGeorgia with different language.
(03:03):
And we have Armenian, Azerbaijan,,different languages and culture, and
we have Bulgaria and Romania, whichare also different from each other.
Basically, all the countries whichsurround the Black Sea are too
diverse, in territory, in languages,in religion, in uh, ambitions, in GDP.
(03:25):
And when we have such a lack of homogenityaround a place it's highly likely that
they will be in conflict in the futurebecause it's very difficult for them to,
to agree on whatever they try to agree.
For example, there is a Black Seaeconomic Cooperation Organization,
which was trying to organize atransport link between the countries.
(03:50):
And even such a simple issuelike organizing the highway and
making the transport easy was verydifficult for these countries.
Because they perceive things differentlyand because they are always expecting
that, the other one is maybe trying toharm them, or maybe not wishing them well.
And for this reason there isno common language, no common
(04:14):
understanding between these countries.
And we need to find a way to communicate.
Like in the EU, we also have a lot ofdifferent countries, civilisations,
and languages, but still thecountries are able to cooperate.
Around the Black Sea not so much,because the level of trust is much lower.
Laura May (04:33):
And so then turning to your PhD, while we're talking about conflict, I
understand that in this you contribute toacademic knowledge of conflict prevention.
As well as improving the role of the EU asa conflict prevention actor in the region.
So first things, how did do this research?
It was case study based, right?
Neli Kirilova (04:55):
I started with a case study and my basic idea was that
the lack of common understandingis the reason for conflict.
But later I narrowed it downand I constructed a whole new
theory, which new theory can beapplied to other regions as well.
My basic presumption is that theconflict can uh, happen as a result
(05:18):
of competition between regionalactors, strong regional actors.
Like Russia and Turkey, which I havein mind for the Black Sea region and
also the West, which appeared afterthe Cold War ended . But it could
be used from different perspectives,like other researchers could look
for other reasons for conflict.
I just look for the competition forinfluence between strong regional actors.
Laura May (05:39):
Okay.
And so when you talk about influence thenand fighting for influence, influence
over whom, what does this actually mean?
Neli Kirilova (05:47):
Influence over territory and people mostly.
Because when a strong regional actorcontrols the territorial people
beyond its border, it could win.
It could earn from, for example, thenatural reaches in the land, like, energy,
(06:07):
petrol, oil, gold, or other minerals.
And it could win from people doingthings which are in favor of the
strong regional actor, and this iswhy a regional actor like empire is
trying to grow because it tries tohave more land and to have more people.
(06:29):
As simple as that.
Laura May (06:31):
It's, it's so funny when you started talking about
expanding borders and findingnatural riches and gold and minerals.
All I could think about was actuallythe sort of late nineties game Age
of Empires where you would go out andfind these little patches of gold and
spread across the, I guess, the globe.
So apparently there was thehistorical basis to that.
And so the way you are using thisword influence is the way sometimes
(06:54):
people use the word power, right?
So how did power come up in your research?
How do you conceptualise power?
Neli Kirilova (07:03):
Power is very interesting concept and it
can mean very diverse things.
So I identified two huge branches of powerin international relations, and I used
both of them to conceptualize the idea.
The first one is the statusof an IR actor, so this
(07:23):
means what is the territory?
What is the population?
How big is the actor ininternational relations?
And what is the capacity to influence?
What is the military capacity?
What is the economiccapacity of this actor?
So this is the power as a status ofactor in international relations.
And usually it's like small power,middle power, regional power, big
(07:48):
power, great power, global power.
These are the typical definitionsand if we want to use the model of
comparing the competition between uh,power actors, we need just to pick two
actors who have the same power status,two middle powers or two big powers.
This was the first branch of power, andthe second branch of power is the external
(08:13):
influence, like attempt to exerciseexternal influence in another territory.
And as such, we have hard power,soft power, smart power, sharp
power in international relations.
These are typical and they overlapto some extent with the concept of
security of the Copenhagen School.
(08:34):
So, um.
I divide power into six categories,which I call elements of power.
And they're based on thesetwo major classifications.
And the first element of powerfor me is the military security.
The second is economy investment.
The third one is energy climate.
(08:56):
And these three fall within hard power.
Then the fourth element ofpower is the diplomacy politics.
The fifth is governance society, andthese two fall within soft power.
And then the sixth element of poweris information access and exchange,
which goes into sharp power.
Laura May (09:17):
Okay, and so just to have some concrete examples then.
So if we talked about influence via theinternet, and so having state-based
bodies to affect propaganda ordiscourses in a different country,
which element of power would that be?
Neli Kirilova (09:34):
Oh, this is the information access because it it's
very difficult to measure informationnowadays because we have so much, and
it's exchanged it in so many ways.
It's not only through the internet,but also through the people.
A couple of years ago when the internetwas not so much used, was very easy to,
Laura May (09:55):
so 2021.
We weren't using the internet then.
Well, maybe a few decades ago
Neli Kirilova (10:03):
We're still young, but this sounded like we
are already elderly professors.
Okay.
Some years ago, or decades ago, whenthere was not so much use of internet
it was possible to exchange informationthrough people, but it was very easy
because mostly the, the attempt tocatch information flows was through
(10:29):
official documents or things like that.
But uh, students actuallymeet and exchange all kind of
information easily for free.
Without any limit on this.
And I always thought why governmentsdon't don't pay attention to this.
Young people just share all theinformation without any any limit.
(10:51):
And all kinds of exchange programslike Erasmus, Erasmus Mundos, and other
others are just very easy way to shareinformation and to exchange information.
This information could beused for different purposes.
If people aim to useit for good, very good.
If not, then we shouldbe careful about that.
(11:12):
So on your question aboutpropaganda, yeah, it's on the
information sharing and access,the sixth element of power of mine.
But we cannot measure it completely.
We just could measure the intentionsof an international relations actor to
use information as a tool of influence.
And if we look the last strategiesof the European Union, it's
(11:36):
visible that it's trying to paymore attention to the information
sharing and access, and especiallyit's trying to combat propaganda.
But if we look at the foreign policystrategies of Russia, Turkey, or other
more authoritarian style democracies.
Laura May (11:53):
I love that.
Authoritarian style democracies.
Like,
Neli Kirilova (11:57):
officially they're democracies, but you know how
not everybody's going to say whatthey want to say and people are
reshaping the information in a waythat it would sound acceptable to
the authorities, but still they'reexpressing what they want to express.
So if you remember, there wasa book of George Orwell called
(12:19):
uh, 1984, and there everythingwas replaced with something else.
Every word basically,
Laura May (12:27):
Okay.
So yeah, that idea of war is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength in 1984.
Neli Kirilova (12:34):
Now in 2023,
still
Laura May (12:37):
Okay.
Neli Kirilova (12:38):
some some countries use these slogans.
Laura May (12:41):
yeah, yeah.
So democracy or authoritarianismis democracy in this case.
Neli Kirilova (12:45):
yeah.
yeah.
Laura May (12:46):
Interesting.
Okay, cool.
Neli Kirilova (12:47):
But, well, if we speak about power, we have the two concepts
like power as status-ifier actors,and power as areas of competition.
And if we put these concepts togetherin a very simple formula, like I
think in mathematical formulas forinternational relations, but it sounds
logical and I think we could use it to,to prevent the conflict, but the very
Laura May (13:13):
that that really escalated.
I love that.
You're like, so we'll justput this power calculation in.
We'll do some math and bam, wehave the solution to conflict.
I need to know this, thismagical mathematical formula.
Neli Kirilova (13:24):
But but there is a small thing that we need to pay
attention to, and it is time becauseif we do not use a particular time,
the formula doesn't work at all.
And if we use the time correctly, thenit's very easy to apply the formula
and to basically prevent conflict.
Laura May (13:42):
So wait, so tap?
if we're talking about time, thenso is it, we say, all right, we
plug in data from 2020 to 2023.
Do we plug in data from a month?
Do we plug in data for a century?
Like when we talk about sort oflimiting all this, by time, what
kind of time periods can we use?
Neli Kirilova (14:00):
So we need to select a region where we are going to apply the
theory, and I selected the Black SeaRegion, but it could be any region.
Just we need to to select a time period inwhich there are no crisis at this place.
I selected between 2016 and 2021,which is only five years of time
(14:22):
without crisis, but it could bebigger or smaller time period.
And this time without crisis,we need to pick the potential
regional competitors in the region.
In the Black Sea region, these wereat that time, Russia, Turkey, and
the European Union as the West.
For other region it would be other actors.
(14:43):
And then we need to select theirforeign and security policy
strategies in action during that time.
And in these documents, we can insertthe six elements of power, like I
created the categories which containwords of each of the six elements of
power, and then I check the strategiesto see how many words they use for
(15:06):
each of the six elements of power.
And then based on this content analysis,a simple pie chart can be done, and
we could see the percentage share foreach of the six elements of power.
And then we know this actorwill be reactive on this
element of power at this time.
As we have this information, wecould just negotiate, like we're
(15:30):
big international organization.
It could be European Union, UN,or any other big actor who is
trying to prevent the conflict.
We go, we negotiate with this strongregional actors actually and we make
sure that they don't get triggeredby anyone else in the region on this
very, very specific element, which theyperceive as very important at that time.
Laura May (15:55):
Okay, so I'm gonna use a really terrible analogy
for this, so roll with me.
So say it's us.
It's, it's you and me.
And we've been writing a diary, okay.
And we're talking about allof our hopes and dreams and
our worries and whatever else.
And then a researcher comes in and theygo, all right, well, I'm gonna see how
(16:16):
much they talk about this particular idea.
So say it's self-esteem related issue.
They'll have a dictionary of self-esteemrelated words, and they'll go
through our diaries, very rude them.
Uh, and they'll say like, oh, I think thisperson has a problem with self-esteem.
And then they say, all right, well,to prevent conflict between Laura and
Neli, I need to make sure they don'tattack each other's self-esteem, because
that will, result in a, a huge blowup and their friendship will be over.
(16:39):
And so using that analogy, if you'llforgive me for, for reframing your PhD
like that, that's basically what you did.
Except instead of with diaries,you chose, all right, here's these
policies that people have writtenand published from these countries.
They've got this many words that I'vesaid are about information, so all
right, information is really big thingfor them, or they've got this many words
(17:00):
about military, so ooh, they're gonna bereally upset if people have some kind of
military intervention or what have you.
And that, as I understand it,is what you've done, right?
Neli Kirilova (17:09):
Yes, but imagine that in your diary.
You have the self esteem as one ofthe very, very important things.
You put a lot of weight on it, andin my diary I put the sunlight or
something completely not relatedto whatever, something else.
And if you try to restrictmy access to sunlight.
(17:30):
I would be very reactive
And if I try to stick yourself-esteem, you'll be very
reactive and there will be conflict.
But you should know, which is myconflict trigger, and I should know
which is your conflict trigger.
Because otherwise, if youthink that self-esteem is
important to me and it is not.
It doesn't work.
And if you don't um, understandthat sunlight is very important
(17:52):
to me, again, it'll not work.
So we need to just understand whatis the basic value of the other
one and to prevent their reaction..
Laura May (18:02):
Great.
And so how do we actually apply this then?
Neli Kirilova (18:06):
So first of all, we need to recognize then the phase of prevention
of a conflict is very important.
Because nowadays the focus is on crisismanagement after it already escalated
and maybe trying to make peace afterwardsand to make the countries agree to
communicate again in a normal way.
(18:27):
And what we need to do is to prevent thisescalation of the conflict early enough.
How does it work?
So we are a biginternational organization.
Let's imagine tomorrow weare either the European Union
or the UN or another big one.
We pick regions which have highpotential of conflicts in the world.
(18:48):
We select time period when they arenot in a conflict, and we pick the
regional competitors who are most likelyto try to influence the territories
and people around so that we knowwho are the actors we are going to
explore after we have the actors.
We make sure that they're ina similar power status, like
(19:12):
regional powers or competitors.
And then we use the six elements of powerto explore their foreign policy strategies
and to find out who is reactive on what.
And then we, as a big internationalorganization, make sure that we
negotiate with these regional competitorsthat their high values will not be
(19:35):
touched, will not be endangered,and they do not need to initiate a
regional security crisis to protecttheir high value elements of power.
And instead, we try to cooperate with themand to give them more of what they need.
So that they would be more likelyto, to negotiate and to keep
(19:56):
the peace stable in the region.
It's very important.
We can negotiate because in thestrategies we see that, okay this
country is reactive on this issue,and would probably trigger a conflict.
We do not want a conflict, but wewould like to cooperate on other
issues which are not so problematic.
So we need to find theissues, which are they good at?
(20:17):
And they're not potentially goingto trigger a conflict and we need
to make them do more of the good.
I think of course I'mvery optimistic, but,
Laura May (20:28):
Yeah, really optimistic,
Neli Kirilova (20:30):
but we have to do it somehow.
Laura May (20:31):
Oh my goodness.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Maybe I'm too cynical.
Neli Kirilova (20:36):
But actually in this Black Sea region there are
other things which are really cool.
For example the culture is very rich,so if we succeed somehow to focus on
culture instead of military, again,everybody would have more influence
on everyone, because sharing cultureis this, sharing what we are good at.
(20:58):
Attending cultural events or rebuildingcultural monuments or even food . Bio eco
food, which is a very hot topic in theWestern world, world could come from Black
Sea region, for example, because it'seasy to produce and it's uh, high quality.
What else?
The nature is very beautiful.
There're amazingly beautiful sceneriesin the mountains, the sea, and
(21:24):
it's very accessible, easy to reachit short distances, it's amazing.
But we need to refocus.
We need to change the attentionfrom the military to how, how
to, enjoy what we already have.
Because now the narrative only goes tothe war and only goes to who is stronger,
(21:45):
who is doing what best, and it's not good.
And
the world nowadays doesn't havepsychology tests, but it's uh, much
needed because if we have people whoare egocentric, egoistic, and not
thinking about the others, but takinga high level leadership position, for
sure they'll make other people suffer.
(22:07):
We need to solve thisproblem in, in any place.
I'm not sure that it's a hot topicnow, but it should be because all
Stalin, Hitler, Napoleon, all ofthem had some issues with self-esteem
and this led to villain behavior.
Laura May (22:25):
And it's yeah, it's crazy that, a them problem should
become a rest of the world problem.
So yeah, therapy for all.
Therapy for all.
I'm very into this.
Neli Kirilova (22:35):
Yeah, we start to completely different things,
but we ended up here, so.
Laura May (22:40):
Yeah, exactly.
We came to an agreement.
We'll just send everyone totherapy, everything will be great.
Neli Kirilova (22:46):
Yeah, but those who want to be in leadership positions for sure.
'cause otherwise
Laura May (22:51):
Yeah, I absolutely agree actually, and I mean I do
some work, and this is not withlike national leaders, but with
business leaders along these lines.
Where we do actually talkabout feelings and stuff.
And you know, sometimes people do goon to seek therapy so they can become
better leaders within businesses.
And if you've got sort of top levelbusiness leaders doing this kind of work,
(23:13):
why would we have people who are tryingto run countries not doing the same stuff?
Neli Kirilova (23:18):
Yeah, exactly.
Exactly.
Especially if the country's very big.
You need uh very good uh internalstrength of the person who is
going to lead this country.
Laura May (23:31):
Okay, Neli, and so now that we've established therapy
is the future for everyone.
What is next for you?
Neli Kirilova (23:39):
Actually I'm pretty much impressed by academic positions
and academic perspectives, but also bydiplomatic positions and perspectives.
And I'm wondering what is the connectionbetween diplomacy and academia, because
they should always be hand in hand.
If you cut the connection betweenthe two, they'll be less efficient.
(24:04):
So I'm thinking about establishingbridges between this in the long term.
Of course, I know there are advisoryroles of the diplomatic bodies in the
institutions and practitioners visituniversities and academic conferences.
But uh, my future I thinkwill be in this two parts.
Laura May (24:27):
Fantastic.
And for those who are interestedin learning more about your
work, where can they find you?
Neli Kirilova (24:35):
It's best to look at my profile in LinkedIn.
Because there I post everythingthat I do, all the podcasts.
All the publications.
Now I'm publishing a few articles.
I have some of them already in print, andsome of them are coming soon, particularly
those are related to the foreign policyanalysis of Russia, Turkey, and the EU.
(24:57):
And also the theoretical uh, perspectivesof power in the international relations.
So if you're interested on uh,reading about this, follow my LinkedIn
profile, you can find it there.
Laura May (25:09):
Awesome and I'll make sure to include a link as
well in the episode description.
Neli Kirilova (25:13):
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Laura.
Laura May (25:16):
Thank you so much for joining me today and for everyone else until next
time, this Laura May with the ConflictTipping podcast from Mediate.com.
Hello and welcome to the Conflict Tipping Podcast from Mediate.com,
the podcast that explores socialconflict and what we can do about it.
I'm your host, Laura May, andtoday I have with me Neli Kirilova.
Neli has been conducting research at theEuropean Security and Defense College, and
recently submitted her PhD dissertationon power perception and conflict
(00:32):
prevention in the Black Sea Region.
She is interested in conflictprevention, security, and defense.
So welcome Neli.
Neli Kirilova (00:40):
Hi.
Laura.
Nice to meet you.
Laura May (00:42):
Yeah, it's great to have you here with me today,
but let's dive straight on in.
Because I wanna know about the regionsthat you are interested in and why
you interested in those regions.
Let's start there.
Neli Kirilova (00:55):
Well, I started uh, exploring the Black Sea
Region about 10 years ago.
When there was no war and therewere no conflicts at that time.
Still Crimea was not invaded as well.
And I come from Bulgaria and theuniversities in Bulgaria, it was highly
popular that uh, Black Sea Region isa place of high intensity of conflict
(01:18):
as well as the Western Balkans.
And the students were encouraged tostudy any of these two regions and
to try to identify how to preventpotential conflicts in the future.
So this is the bias that I come from.
Laura May (01:33):
And just for those who are less geographically inclined, when
we talk about the Black Sea Region,what does that actually incorporate?
Neli Kirilova (01:41):
Well, if we look back in the history of the Black Sea
region, we have Russia and Turkeyconstantly competing for influence.
And trying to control more ofthe countries, territories and
the people around the Black Sea.
And this has been lasting for centuriesin the past, and most probably it'll
(02:03):
continue in the future as well.
Of course, we have other players in theregion such as very long ago, the Mongol
Empire was reaching this territory.
Also, the Byzantine Empire, whichis inherited by Greece nowadays.
And maybe in the future there will beother players as well, like Iran . So
we need to, to know the past, butwe also need to look who are the
(02:26):
strong actors at the moment so thatwe could prevent their attempts to
control, and their potential conflicts.
Laura May (02:37):
And why do you think the Black Sea Region is such a nexus for
conflict, as you've just described.
Neli Kirilova (02:43):
Oh, because too many civilizations are
meeting at this territory.
We have the Slavic civilization wehave the Orthodox religion as well.
We have the Muslim religion, andalso we have the Turkic languages.
We have these are the big playersand we have the small players with
small languages and cultures likeGeorgia with different language.
(03:03):
And we have Armenian, Azerbaijan,,different languages and culture, and
we have Bulgaria and Romania, whichare also different from each other.
Basically, all the countries whichsurround the Black Sea are too
diverse, in territory, in languages,in religion, in uh, ambitions, in GDP.
(03:25):
And when we have such a lack of homogenityaround a place it's highly likely that
they will be in conflict in the futurebecause it's very difficult for them to,
to agree on whatever they try to agree.
For example, there is a Black Seaeconomic Cooperation Organization,
which was trying to organize atransport link between the countries.
(03:50):
And even such a simple issuelike organizing the highway and
making the transport easy was verydifficult for these countries.
Because they perceive things differentlyand because they are always expecting
that, the other one is maybe trying toharm them, or maybe not wishing them well.
And for this reason there isno common language, no common
(04:14):
understanding between these countries.
And we need to find a way to communicate.
Like in the EU, we also have a lot ofdifferent countries, civilisations,
and languages, but still thecountries are able to cooperate.
Around the Black Sea not so much,because the level of trust is much lower.
Laura May (04:33):
And so then turning to your PhD, while we're talking about conflict, I
understand that in this you contribute toacademic knowledge of conflict prevention.
As well as improving the role of the EU asa conflict prevention actor in the region.
So first things, how did do this research?
It was case study based, right?
Neli Kirilova (04:55):
I started with a case study and my basic idea was that
the lack of common understandingis the reason for conflict.
But later I narrowed it downand I constructed a whole new
theory, which new theory can beapplied to other regions as well.
My basic presumption is that theconflict can uh, happen as a result
(05:18):
of competition between regionalactors, strong regional actors.
Like Russia and Turkey, which I havein mind for the Black Sea region and
also the West, which appeared afterthe Cold War ended . But it could
be used from different perspectives,like other researchers could look
for other reasons for conflict.
I just look for the competition forinfluence between strong regional actors.
Laura May (05:39):
Okay.
And so when you talk about influence thenand fighting for influence, influence
over whom, what does this actually mean?
Neli Kirilova (05:47):
Influence over territory and people mostly.
Because when a strong regional actorcontrols the territorial people
beyond its border, it could win.
It could earn from, for example, thenatural reaches in the land, like, energy,
(06:07):
petrol, oil, gold, or other minerals.
And it could win from people doingthings which are in favor of the
strong regional actor, and this iswhy a regional actor like empire is
trying to grow because it tries tohave more land and to have more people.
(06:29):
As simple as that.
Laura May (06:31):
It's, it's so funny when you started talking about
expanding borders and findingnatural riches and gold and minerals.
All I could think about was actuallythe sort of late nineties game Age
of Empires where you would go out andfind these little patches of gold and
spread across the, I guess, the globe.
So apparently there was thehistorical basis to that.
And so the way you are using thisword influence is the way sometimes
(06:54):
people use the word power, right?
So how did power come up in your research?
How do you conceptualise power?
Neli Kirilova (07:03):
Power is very interesting concept and it
can mean very diverse things.
So I identified two huge branches of powerin international relations, and I used
both of them to conceptualize the idea.
The first one is the statusof an IR actor, so this
(07:23):
means what is the territory?
What is the population?
How big is the actor ininternational relations?
And what is the capacity to influence?
What is the military capacity?
What is the economiccapacity of this actor?
So this is the power as a status ofactor in international relations.
And usually it's like small power,middle power, regional power, big
(07:48):
power, great power, global power.
These are the typical definitionsand if we want to use the model of
comparing the competition between uh,power actors, we need just to pick two
actors who have the same power status,two middle powers or two big powers.
This was the first branch of power, andthe second branch of power is the external
(08:13):
influence, like attempt to exerciseexternal influence in another territory.
And as such, we have hard power,soft power, smart power, sharp
power in international relations.
These are typical and they overlapto some extent with the concept of
security of the Copenhagen School.
(08:34):
So, um.
I divide power into six categories,which I call elements of power.
And they're based on thesetwo major classifications.
And the first element of powerfor me is the military security.
The second is economy investment.
The third one is energy climate.
(08:56):
And these three fall within hard power.
Then the fourth element ofpower is the diplomacy politics.
The fifth is governance society, andthese two fall within soft power.
And then the sixth element of poweris information access and exchange,
which goes into sharp power.
Laura May (09:17):
Okay, and so just to have some concrete examples then.
So if we talked about influence via theinternet, and so having state-based
bodies to affect propaganda ordiscourses in a different country,
which element of power would that be?
Neli Kirilova (09:34):
Oh, this is the information access because it it's
very difficult to measure informationnowadays because we have so much, and
it's exchanged it in so many ways.
It's not only through the internet,but also through the people.
A couple of years ago when the internetwas not so much used, was very easy to,
Laura May (09:55):
so 2021.
We weren't using the internet then.
Well, maybe a few decades ago
Neli Kirilova (10:03):
We're still young, but this sounded like we
are already elderly professors.
Okay.
Some years ago, or decades ago, whenthere was not so much use of internet
it was possible to exchange informationthrough people, but it was very easy
because mostly the, the attempt tocatch information flows was through
(10:29):
official documents or things like that.
But uh, students actuallymeet and exchange all kind of
information easily for free.
Without any limit on this.
And I always thought why governmentsdon't don't pay attention to this.
Young people just share all theinformation without any any limit.
(10:51):
And all kinds of exchange programslike Erasmus, Erasmus Mundos, and other
others are just very easy way to shareinformation and to exchange information.
This information could beused for different purposes.
If people aim to useit for good, very good.
If not, then we shouldbe careful about that.
(11:12):
So on your question aboutpropaganda, yeah, it's on the
information sharing and access,the sixth element of power of mine.
But we cannot measure it completely.
We just could measure the intentionsof an international relations actor to
use information as a tool of influence.
And if we look the last strategiesof the European Union, it's
(11:36):
visible that it's trying to paymore attention to the information
sharing and access, and especiallyit's trying to combat propaganda.
But if we look at the foreign policystrategies of Russia, Turkey, or other
more authoritarian style democracies.
Laura May (11:53):
I love that.
Authoritarian style democracies.
Like,
Neli Kirilova (11:57):
officially they're democracies, but you know how
not everybody's going to say whatthey want to say and people are
reshaping the information in a waythat it would sound acceptable to
the authorities, but still they'reexpressing what they want to express.
So if you remember, there wasa book of George Orwell called
(12:19):
uh, 1984, and there everythingwas replaced with something else.
Every word basically,
Laura May (12:27):
Okay.
So yeah, that idea of war is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength in 1984.
Neli Kirilova (12:34):
Now in 2023,
still
Laura May (12:37):
Okay.
Neli Kirilova (12:38):
some some countries use these slogans.
Laura May (12:41):
yeah, yeah.
So democracy or authoritarianismis democracy in this case.
Neli Kirilova (12:45):
yeah.
yeah.
Laura May (12:46):
Interesting.
Okay, cool.
Neli Kirilova (12:47):
But, well, if we speak about power, we have the two concepts
like power as status-ifier actors,and power as areas of competition.
And if we put these concepts togetherin a very simple formula, like I
think in mathematical formulas forinternational relations, but it sounds
logical and I think we could use it to,to prevent the conflict, but the very
Laura May (13:13):
that that really escalated.
I love that.
You're like, so we'll justput this power calculation in.
We'll do some math and bam, wehave the solution to conflict.
I need to know this, thismagical mathematical formula.
Neli Kirilova (13:24):
But but there is a small thing that we need to pay
attention to, and it is time becauseif we do not use a particular time,
the formula doesn't work at all.
And if we use the time correctly, thenit's very easy to apply the formula
and to basically prevent conflict.
Laura May (13:42):
So wait, so tap?
if we're talking about time, thenso is it, we say, all right, we
plug in data from 2020 to 2023.
Do we plug in data from a month?
Do we plug in data for a century?
Like when we talk about sort oflimiting all this, by time, what
kind of time periods can we use?
Neli Kirilova (14:00):
So we need to select a region where we are going to apply the
theory, and I selected the Black SeaRegion, but it could be any region.
Just we need to to select a time period inwhich there are no crisis at this place.
I selected between 2016 and 2021,which is only five years of time
(14:22):
without crisis, but it could bebigger or smaller time period.
And this time without crisis,we need to pick the potential
regional competitors in the region.
In the Black Sea region, these wereat that time, Russia, Turkey, and
the European Union as the West.
For other region it would be other actors.
(14:43):
And then we need to select theirforeign and security policy
strategies in action during that time.
And in these documents, we can insertthe six elements of power, like I
created the categories which containwords of each of the six elements of
power, and then I check the strategiesto see how many words they use for
(15:06):
each of the six elements of power.
And then based on this content analysis,a simple pie chart can be done, and
we could see the percentage share foreach of the six elements of power.
And then we know this actorwill be reactive on this
element of power at this time.
As we have this information, wecould just negotiate, like we're
(15:30):
big international organization.
It could be European Union, UN,or any other big actor who is
trying to prevent the conflict.
We go, we negotiate with this strongregional actors actually and we make
sure that they don't get triggeredby anyone else in the region on this
very, very specific element, which theyperceive as very important at that time.
Laura May (15:55):
Okay, so I'm gonna use a really terrible analogy
for this, so roll with me.
So say it's us.
It's, it's you and me.
And we've been writing a diary, okay.
And we're talking about allof our hopes and dreams and
our worries and whatever else.
And then a researcher comes in and theygo, all right, well, I'm gonna see how
(16:16):
much they talk about this particular idea.
So say it's self-esteem related issue.
They'll have a dictionary of self-esteemrelated words, and they'll go
through our diaries, very rude them.
Uh, and they'll say like, oh, I think thisperson has a problem with self-esteem.
And then they say, all right, well,to prevent conflict between Laura and
Neli, I need to make sure they don'tattack each other's self-esteem, because
that will, result in a, a huge blowup and their friendship will be over.
(16:39):
And so using that analogy, if you'llforgive me for, for reframing your PhD
like that, that's basically what you did.
Except instead of with diaries,you chose, all right, here's these
policies that people have writtenand published from these countries.
They've got this many words that I'vesaid are about information, so all
right, information is really big thingfor them, or they've got this many words
(17:00):
about military, so ooh, they're gonna bereally upset if people have some kind of
military intervention or what have you.
And that, as I understand it,is what you've done, right?
Neli Kirilova (17:09):
Yes, but imagine that in your diary.
You have the self esteem as one ofthe very, very important things.
You put a lot of weight on it, andin my diary I put the sunlight or
something completely not relatedto whatever, something else.
And if you try to restrictmy access to sunlight.
(17:30):
I would be very reactive
And if I try to stick yourself-esteem, you'll be very
reactive and there will be conflict.
But you should know, which is myconflict trigger, and I should know
which is your conflict trigger.
Because otherwise, if youthink that self-esteem is
important to me and it is not.
It doesn't work.
And if you don't um, understandthat sunlight is very important
(17:52):
to me, again, it'll not work.
So we need to just understand whatis the basic value of the other
one and to prevent their reaction..
Laura May (18:02):
Great.
And so how do we actually apply this then?
Neli Kirilova (18:06):
So first of all, we need to recognize then the phase of prevention
of a conflict is very important.
Because nowadays the focus is on crisismanagement after it already escalated
and maybe trying to make peace afterwardsand to make the countries agree to
communicate again in a normal way.
(18:27):
And what we need to do is to prevent thisescalation of the conflict early enough.
How does it work?
So we are a biginternational organization.
Let's imagine tomorrow weare either the European Union
or the UN or another big one.
We pick regions which have highpotential of conflicts in the world.
(18:48):
We select time period when they arenot in a conflict, and we pick the
regional competitors who are most likelyto try to influence the territories
and people around so that we knowwho are the actors we are going to
explore after we have the actors.
We make sure that they're ina similar power status, like
(19:12):
regional powers or competitors.
And then we use the six elements of powerto explore their foreign policy strategies
and to find out who is reactive on what.
And then we, as a big internationalorganization, make sure that we
negotiate with these regional competitorsthat their high values will not be
(19:35):
touched, will not be endangered,and they do not need to initiate a
regional security crisis to protecttheir high value elements of power.
And instead, we try to cooperate with themand to give them more of what they need.
So that they would be more likelyto, to negotiate and to keep
(19:56):
the peace stable in the region.
It's very important.
We can negotiate because in thestrategies we see that, okay this
country is reactive on this issue,and would probably trigger a conflict.
We do not want a conflict, but wewould like to cooperate on other
issues which are not so problematic.
So we need to find theissues, which are they good at?
(20:17):
And they're not potentially goingto trigger a conflict and we need
to make them do more of the good.
I think of course I'mvery optimistic, but,
Laura May (20:28):
Yeah, really optimistic,
Neli Kirilova (20:30):
but we have to do it somehow.
Laura May (20:31):
Oh my goodness.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Maybe I'm too cynical.
Neli Kirilova (20:36):
But actually in this Black Sea region there are
other things which are really cool.
For example the culture is very rich,so if we succeed somehow to focus on
culture instead of military, again,everybody would have more influence
on everyone, because sharing cultureis this, sharing what we are good at.
(20:58):
Attending cultural events or rebuildingcultural monuments or even food . Bio eco
food, which is a very hot topic in theWestern world, world could come from Black
Sea region, for example, because it'seasy to produce and it's uh, high quality.
What else?
The nature is very beautiful.
There're amazingly beautiful sceneriesin the mountains, the sea, and
(21:24):
it's very accessible, easy to reachit short distances, it's amazing.
But we need to refocus.
We need to change the attentionfrom the military to how, how
to, enjoy what we already have.
Because now the narrative only goes tothe war and only goes to who is stronger,
(21:45):
who is doing what best, and it's not good.
And
the world nowadays doesn't havepsychology tests, but it's uh, much
needed because if we have people whoare egocentric, egoistic, and not
thinking about the others, but takinga high level leadership position, for
sure they'll make other people suffer.
(22:07):
We need to solve thisproblem in, in any place.
I'm not sure that it's a hot topicnow, but it should be because all
Stalin, Hitler, Napoleon, all ofthem had some issues with self-esteem
and this led to villain behavior.
Laura May (22:25):
And it's yeah, it's crazy that, a them problem should
become a rest of the world problem.
So yeah, therapy for all.
Therapy for all.
I'm very into this.
Neli Kirilova (22:35):
Yeah, we start to completely different things,
but we ended up here, so.
Laura May (22:40):
Yeah, exactly.
We came to an agreement.
We'll just send everyone totherapy, everything will be great.
Neli Kirilova (22:46):
Yeah, but those who want to be in leadership positions for sure.
'cause otherwise
Laura May (22:51):
Yeah, I absolutely agree actually, and I mean I do
some work, and this is not withlike national leaders, but with
business leaders along these lines.
Where we do actually talkabout feelings and stuff.
And you know, sometimes people do goon to seek therapy so they can become
better leaders within businesses.
And if you've got sort of top levelbusiness leaders doing this kind of work,
(23:13):
why would we have people who are tryingto run countries not doing the same stuff?
Neli Kirilova (23:18):
Yeah, exactly.
Exactly.
Especially if the country's very big.
You need uh very good uh internalstrength of the person who is
going to lead this country.
Laura May (23:31):
Okay, Neli, and so now that we've established therapy
is the future for everyone.
What is next for you?
Neli Kirilova (23:39):
Actually I'm pretty much impressed by academic positions
and academic perspectives, but also bydiplomatic positions and perspectives.
And I'm wondering what is the connectionbetween diplomacy and academia, because
they should always be hand in hand.
If you cut the connection betweenthe two, they'll be less efficient.
(24:04):
So I'm thinking about establishingbridges between this in the long term.
Of course, I know there are advisoryroles of the diplomatic bodies in the
institutions and practitioners visituniversities and academic conferences.
But uh, my future I thinkwill be in this two parts.
Laura May (24:27):
Fantastic.
And for those who are interestedin learning more about your
work, where can they find you?
Neli Kirilova (24:35):
It's best to look at my profile in LinkedIn.
Because there I post everythingthat I do, all the podcasts.
All the publications.
Now I'm publishing a few articles.
I have some of them already in print, andsome of them are coming soon, particularly
those are related to the foreign policyanalysis of Russia, Turkey, and the EU.
(24:57):
And also the theoretical uh, perspectivesof power in the international relations.
So if you're interested on uh,reading about this, follow my LinkedIn
profile, you can find it there.
Laura May (25:09):
Awesome and I'll make sure to include a link as
well in the episode description.
Neli Kirilova (25:13):
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Laura.
Laura May (25:16):
Thank you so much for joining me today and for everyone else until next
time, this Laura May with the ConflictTipping podcast from Mediate.com.
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