The Role of Soft Power Institutions in Russian-Ukrainian and US-Ukrainian Relations within the Period between 2007 and 2014

This research is aimed at the analysis of the role and influence of Russian and the U.S.’ soft power institutions in Ukraine within a period between 2007 and 2014. Soft power concept has always been considered to be one of the most perspective areas in the development of international relations. For this reason, it is claimed to be evidently preferential tool for national policy makers in the field of interstate cooperation because of the fact that it provides international actors with an opportunity not only to achieve but sustain the result obtained without usage of military and direct force resources. Globalization has a tremendous effect on the popularization of the notion of soft power – each significant political power should absorb main principles of soft influence and communication in order to reach the goals stated in the agenda (economic/financial attractiveness, political influence abroad). Soft power institutions (especially NGO due to their nominal independence and indirect incorporation within the official line of national public diplomacy) are perfectly applicable to be implemented abroad so as to organize viable and sustainable system of effective soft influence. The US and Russia differently used potential and opportunities of their soft power NGO due to the difference in their academic and practical knowledge and experience in the field of soft power implementation (the US is an expert and Russia as relatively young in the area). This paper conducts qualitative analysis of the grounding official foreign policy documents of two states and provides mixed one of corresponding NGOs. The goal of this work is to point the main impact of soft power institutions of two states in Ukraine and make comparative analysis of their activities in order to establish theoretical and practical basement for further developments of the strategic agenda.