Tertium datur: Multi-attribute reference points and integration choices between the European Union and Eurasian Economic Union
| Author | Sergiu Buscaneanu |
| DOI | 10.1177/1369148120974012 |
| Published date | 01 November 2021 |
| Date | 01 November 2021 |
| Subject Matter | Original Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1369148120974012
The British Journal of Politics and
International Relations
2021, Vol. 23(4) 627 –644
© The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/1369148120974012
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Tertium datur: Multi-
attribute reference points and
integration choices between
the European Union and
Eurasian Economic Union
Sergiu Buscaneanu
Abstract
The article imports insights from prospect theory into the study of integration choices of ruling
elites from Eastern Partnership countries. It introduces the notion of multi-attribute reference
points and provides an example of identifying their coordinates, against which ruling elites from
Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine are expected to consider distinct
integration choices: the European Union or Eurasian Economic Union. The research finds that
ruling elites from Eastern Partnership countries with the lowest levels of affluence, with medium
to high intensity conflicts with Russia and with lower, but still non-trivial costs of domestic
transformation have tended to be risk-seeking and opted for the European Union as an integration
choice. However, ruling elites from Eastern Partnership countries with low and medium levels of
affluence, with no conflict with Russia and with medium to high costs of domestic transformation
have tended to be risk-averse and selected the Eurasian Economic Union as an integration option.
Keywords
Eastern Partnership, EU, Eurasian Economic Union, multi-attribute reference points, prospect
theory, risk
Introduction
After fully completing negotiations over the content of the Association Agreement (AA)
with the European Union (EU), Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan took many observers
by surprise when he announced in September 2013 that Armenia was suspending the
association process to the EU and opting instead for integration into the Eurasian
Economic Union (EAEU). Ukraine experienced a double U-turn in a period of several
months. After negotiating 4 years, from 2007 to 2011, and preparing for two more years
European & International Studies, King’s College London, London, UK
Corresponding author:
Sergiu Buscaneanu, European & International Studies, King’s College London, Virginia Woolf Building, Room
4.12, 22 Kingsway, London WC2B 6NR, UK.
Email: sergiu.buscaneanu@kcl.ac.uk
974012BPI0010.1177/1369148120974012The British Journal of Politics and International RelationsBuscaneanu
research-article2020
Original Article
628 The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 23(4)
for the signature of AA with the EU, Viktor Yanukovych announced in November 2013
the suspension of association process. The new post-Maidan administration under Petro
Poroshenko reversed the decision of Yanukovych’s entourage and signed the AA with the
EU in the first-half of 2014.
Ruling elites from Georgia and Moldova have opted for the EU as an integration pro-
ject, whereas Belarus is a founding member of the EAEU from the onset. For the time
being, Azeri elites have selected the third alternative of staying away from both regional
integration projects.
The existing scholarship tends generally to adopt outside-in and inside-out perspec-
tives in explaining the choice between the EU and EAEU as regional integration projects.
Mearsheimer (2014), Sakwa (2016) and, to some extent, Charap and Colton (2017) take
the outside-in perspective and argue in line with the realist tradition that strategic compe-
tition between major external players, such as the United States, EU and Russia, has
forced the ruling elites from Eastern Partnership (EaP) countries to make a choice between
the EU and EAEU. Wilson (2014), Dragneva and Wolczuk (2015) and Kuzio (2017),
without neglecting the role of external actors, take an inside-out approach and frame the
regional integration choice of Ukraine with reference to peculiar domestic conditions,
such as re-election concerns of incumbent elites, socio-economic structures and their
embeddedness in a broader interdependence framework, and national identity.
This article builds on the inside-out perspective concerned with Ukraine, but it opts for
regional coverage and embraces a different theoretical approach. Since choices between
the EU and EAEU are instances of decision-making under conditions of risk, it imports
insights from prospect theory for the study of these integration choices in the EaP region.
Importantly, the article does so in the tradition of the philosopher of science, Karl Popper
(1963), known in the literature as ‘naïve falsificationism’, which implies theory testing
against empirical evidence. The alternative approach of testing prospect theory against
evidence and competing theories approximates what Imre Lakatos (1970) calls ‘sophisti-
cated falsificationism’ and can be the subsequent superior logical step of theory testing.
The current article starts from the premise that the debate between Popper and Lakatos on
falsifiability should not be viewed in zero-sum terms, but as distinct, yet legitimate, stages
of theory testing. Popperian testing might serve as the first stage of theory falsification,
whereas subsequent Lakatosian testing can start from the already known relationship
between prospect theory and evidence, and evaluate this relationship in a more complex
ontological framework. This article bears the signs of Popperian testing of prospect the-
ory and does not imply that alternative theories, such as (neo)realism and constructivism,
are inferior.
In addition, the article employs the ontological repertoire of prospect theory for two
idiosyncratic and related reasons. First, it brings into sharper focus the reference point as
a crucial concept in prospect theory and, second, it introduces a related multi-attribute
reference point (MARP) concept for the study of integration choices in the EaP region.
The question this article interrogates is the following: To what extent can the coordinates
of MARPs anticipate risk propensities and integration choices of ruling elites from EaP
countries?
The location of MARP is examined for all EaP countries and for the years 2013 and
2014. In 2013, the leadership of Armenia and Ukraine suspended permanently or tempo-
rarily the association process with the EU and in 2014, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine
signed AA with the EU, while Armenia and Belarus have signed the treaty establishing
the EAEU.
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