EU-Russia Civil Society Forum: Reasons and Factors of Its Establishment and Development
In the year 2021, the EU-Russia Civil Society Forum, an international platform of more than 180 NGOs from the EU and Russia, is celebrating 10 years since its establishment. During these times, it became an unique phenomenon both for the Russian civil society and among other international civil society platforms. The research question of this paper concerns the reasons and factors of its establishment and active further development. To answer this question, the situation and conditions of the Forum development are analyzed and their unique characteristics are formulated, and then the reasons and factors of these characteristics are explained through the political analysis of the corresponding factors of the EU and Russian policies as well as EU-Russian relations.