ENERGY MULTINATIONALS, FOREIGN POLICY, AND FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT: A NETWORK ANALYSIS OF POST-SOVIET RUSSIA

Date of Award

2019

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Hicks, Barbara

Area of Concentration

International and Area Studies and Russian Language and Literature

Abstract

This is a study of energy multinationals, foreign policy, foreign direct investment, and their intersection in post-Soviet Russia. Why would a Russian energy MNC, a theoretically rational actor with potentially strong links to top policy makers and formal agents of foreign policy, purposely increase its risk and threaten to decrease its value for shareholders by making inefficient decisions in its foreign direct investment strategy or other corporate behavior? Could those investments be directed by the Russian foreign policy establishment? What explains apparently irrational outcomes in foreign policy and corporate strategy on the parts of the state and energy multinationals? Stakeholders from end consumers and energy traders to international investors and non-Russian energy multinationals stand to make gains or incur losses based on their ability to evaluate risk accurately and to identify potential investment opportunities that may not be apparent. Utilizing a network analysis of informal governance structures, this study concludes that foreign policy and corporate investment strategy influence each other, and that outcomes that may appear irrational are often functions of domestic politics and the pulling-and-hauling of interconnected individuals in public administration and private enterprise.

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