The dynamics of regional economic integration remain under-discussed in academic circles. The European Union’s trajectory – from customs union to common market to monetary union – exemplifies Bela Balassa’s well-known stages. The launch of the Economic and Monetary Union 25 years ago with the single European currency marked a significant advance. Yet the 2005 constitutional crisis revealed the limitations of pursuing Balassa’s full economic union, or a total economic integration that presupposes the unification of monetary, fiscal, social and countercyclical policies. Consequently, traditional stage-based models of integration are increasingly inadequate for explaining 21st-century dynamics. Scholars need new ideas and approaches that would help them to grasp the nature of regional economic integration in the first half of the 21st century. This article proposes a hypothesis of long cycles in regional economic integration. This framework rests on two key assumptions. First, regional integration is a collective instrument of globalization, not an insulated, endogenously induced process aimed at getting welfare gains and expanding national markets. Its pace depends on the interplay of internal and external driving forces, whose interrelation and juxtaposition may accelerate or slow down progress. Second, economic integration unfolds cyclically, characterized by long waves of growth and stagnation, rather than a steady, linear advancement. I identify three such cycles in the European context: the first (1951–1984), the second (1985–2019) and the third (2019–present). Each cycle exhibits distinct goals, agendas and programs. With goals almost achieved and programs close to implementation, the additional institutional and operational burden puts more pressure on integration dynamics. If coupled with adverse external impact, it may suppress integration activity and induce stagnation with certain elements of disintegration. Another upward trend may gain momentum with the initiation of a new cycle, driven by a comprehensive upgrade of the integration project based on novel ideology, revised goals and fresh resources.

Under what conditions can the sanctions potential inherent in EU–Russia economic interdependence be regarded as exhausted? This article examines the exemptions and derogations contained in Council Regulation (EU) No 833/2014 of 31 July 2014 and develops a five-part typology: humanitarian and diplomatic derogations, grandfathering provisions for winding down pre-existing transactions, relief available to natural persons, and exemptions motivated by economic-security considerations. For the last of these categories, the study analyses Eurostat trade data for 2021–2023, calculates growth rates for Russian exports to the European Union, and applies the Herfindahl–Hirschman Index to measure the geographical concentration of those exports within the Union. The findings identify empirically observable limits to the weaponisation of economic interdependence in EU–Russia relations. The article conceptualises these constraints as a bottleneck effect: sanctions policy-making stalls not because restrictive measures are intrinsically ineffective or legally impossible, but because selected areas of exchange remain governed more by market than by political logic. Three manifestations of the effect are identified: first, where other EU policy priorities outweigh the objective of weakening Russia; second, where humanitarian considerations preclude outright sanctions and thereby shift coercive pressure towards tariff instruments; and third, where major member states seek to preserve entrenched trade and economic ties with Russia that were consolidated over decades of interdependence and are difficult to dismantle under prevailing market conditions.

Long regarded as an outstanding model for restoring lasting peace in Europe and underpinning the continent’s prosperity, the European integration project increasingly faces existential risks. The withdrawal of states from the European Union and the Council of Europe has unsettled the established architecture of pan-European cooperation and calls for closer examination of the political and legal models governing withdrawal from European regional organizations. Drawing on a wide range of international and domestic legal rules, case law, negotiating materials, official statements, media sources and scholarly literature, this article analyses Brexit as a complex process by which a state disengages from a highly organised supranational union. It examines, first, the international-law dimension: denunciation of constituent treaties and the negotiation of new agreements designed to secure an orderly or “soft” withdrawal, transforming intra-union relations while severing some links and retaining others. Second, it considers how withdrawal and its consequences are implemented in domestic law. The gradual recasting of elements of the EU legal order embedded in UK law requires thousands of legislative measures and an even broader reconsideration of EU-derived legal positions in national case law. Against the background of geopolitical shifts and profound political and economic difficulties within the EU, the Brexit experience should be viewed comparatively as a sophisticated, though not exclusive, legal model for withdrawal from a regional integration project. Despite major differences between the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from the EU and Russia’s withdrawal from the Council of Europe, the two processes display certain parallels in their treatment un-der international and domestic law and in their implications for further disintegration across Europe.

As regional integration deepens, international energy cooperation increasingly depends on legal frameworks capable of supporting cross-border production arrangements. This article examines the legal and economic conditions for cross-border tolling—the processing of one party's raw materials by a contractor in another jurisdiction—in the oil and natural gas sectors within the Greater Eurasian Partnership. It seeks to identify Russia's most promising partners and to assess whether the existing regulatory framework is adequate for such projects. The study combines doctrinal analysis of international and domestic legal instruments with economic analysis of law to classify prospective partners according to their level of economic integration. It also draws on the monist–dualist debate to explain why tolling arrangements sit uneasily between international and domestic regulation. Four partners emerge as the most promising: Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan and China. Within the Eurasian Economic Union, a relevant framework is already developing for cooperation with Belarus and Kazakhstan, including rules on the processing of customer-supplied materials and indirect taxation. By contrast, the international legal basis for cooperation with Azerbaijan remains limited, while the Russian–Chinese framework is still at an early stage and is substantially less developed than EAEU law. A comparative analysis of domestic contract law further reveals significant differences in the treatment of works contracts, pricing, personal performance, allocation of risk, defects in customer-supplied materials, rights of retention and security interests, and unused materials. The article argues that a stand-alone multilateral convention on cross-border tolling is presently unlikely. A more realistic course is to build on existing legislative practice and patterns of implementation by adding specific provisions to EAEU law and developing model rules or guidelines for the drafting and performance of cross-border tolling agreements.

The Eurasian Patent Organization (EAPO) has made the development of a Eurasian dispute-resolution system a strategic priority through 2028, while litigation involving Eurasian patents - particularly before Russia's Intellectual Property Court - has begun to expose structural tensions in the existing regime. This article examines the legal architecture governing disputes over the validity and infringement of Eurasian patents and assesses options for its further development. It draws on the Eurasian Patent Convention (EAPC), the Patent Regulations, national legislation and judicial practice, using doctrinal, comparative and historical legal methods. The analysis shows that the regime is multilevel: substantive rules are largely unified at the Eurasian level, whereas procedure, remedies and institutional review remain national. This division creates a risk of divergent interpretation, especially because the EAPC Contracting States lack formal mechanisms for ensuring consistent application and most reported disputes are concentrated in Russia. Recent decisions of the Russian Intellectual Property Court illustrate both the friction between Eurasian and domestic patent law and the harmonising potential of judicial dialogue. The article proposes stronger transjurisdictional cooperation, including structured exchanges among judges and patent-office examiners and a shared database of national decisions. A supranational Eurasian patent court remains premature given the limited and uneven caseload, although it may become viable if the regional system expands beyond inventions and industrial designs to trade-marks and utility models. As an interim alternative, the article advocates a quasi-judicial expert body empowered to issue advisory opinions on the interpretation and application of Eurasian patent law.

The idea that the principles of international law enshrined in the United Nations Charter may be supplemented or even displaced by a “rules-based order” has become prominent in contemporary legal and political discourse. The concept remains contested because its normative content, legal basis and procedures for modification are unclear. This article examines whether it can provide a legitimate means of addressing regulatory gaps in international space law. Drawing on foreign legal scholarship and policy materials, and using insights from law, philosophy, political science and economics, the study employs historical, doctrinal, comparative and systems analysis. It argues that the development of international space law requires broad agreement among established and emerging space actors on the renewal of the existing legal framework. Reform may proceed through new universal treaties and through soft-law instruments capable, if widely accepted, of contributing to generally applicable legal norms. Abandoning the existing treaty regime—especially the 1967 Outer Space Treaty—or replacing it with indeterminate standards reflecting the preferences of a limited group of states would undermine rather than strengthen the legal order in outer space. Domestic legislation, regional instruments and plurilateral arrangements cannot by themselves resolve the principal regulatory challenges, although internationally endorsed guidelines and standards may play an important transitional role. Legal responses to technological change, commercialisation, space debris, space traffic management and environmental risks must be developed on an inclusive and universal basis that takes equal account of the interests of all participants.