Janusz Bugajski is a Senior Fellow at the Jamestown Foundation, an expert on Russia, Central and Eastern Europe, and transatlantic relations.
Janusz has lectured at leading universities and scientific institutes, written countless articles for American and European media, and parliaments around the world seek his expert opinion.
Interviews, Videos
25.04.2025
Failed State. Interview with Janusz Bugajski and Stefan Bandera on UMN
Interview with Janusz Bugajski and Stefan Bandera on Ukrainian Media Network about Janusz Bugajski’s book “Failed State. A Guide to Russia’s Rupture”.
Analysis
12.04.2025
Bugajski for The Geopost: The United States can profit from a dissolving Russia
President Donald Trump has claimed that the United States would benefit greatly from acquiring Greenland and Canada. However, a much more significant strategic prize would be to establish American protectorates over the vast Arctic and Pacific territories that will emerge from Russian occupation…
Analysis
04.04.2025
Poland Prepares for Direct War with Russia
Poland has been reinvigorating its military preparations for a potential war with Russia since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022. Warsaw is bolstering its defenses in anticipation of the growing likelihood of direct armed conflict with its perennial historical rival, given the uncertainties surrounding U.S. President Donald Trump’s attempts to broker peace between Moscow and Kyiv, as well as the prospect of Russia consolidating its territorial gains in Ukraine…
Opinion
02.04.2025
Janusz Bugajski’s Washington View: Trump May Provoke War in The Balkans
President Donald Trump’s transactional approach to foreign policy appears tough on the surface, but it contains a hollow center that can provoke wars in vulnerable regions, particularly in the Western Balkans…
Opinion
20.03.2025
Janusz Bugajski’s Washington View: Trump’s Trans-Atlantic Divorce
While attempting to stop the war in Ukraine, President Donald J. Trump must simultaneously focus on reducing Communist China’s global expansion. Africa has become a crucial theater for Beijing’s growing influence. Anti-Western and especially anti-French sentiment fueled by misguided policies has handed China a decisive advantage…
Analysis
19.02.2025
Poland Caught in the Middle of Diplomatic Maneuvers Affecting European Defense and Security
Poland has recently been caught in the middle of intense diplomatic maneuvers affecting European defense and security. As the largest front-line state facing Russia, Poland is navigating to maintain the unity of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) while engaging in discussions over a European defense structure without the United States…
Selected Articles
Longreads
09.04.2025
Mapping Russia’s Devolution
The rupture of the Russian Federation will be the third phase of imperial collapse following the unravelling of the Soviet bloc and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. It will a…
Longreads
25.04.2025
Ukraine and Poland Spearhead Promethean Liberation
Two mythical interpretations of the ancient Greek god Prometheus apply to Russia’s future: fire and creation.1 As the Titan “God of Fire,” Prometheus, or the “Forethinker,” defied the Olympian gods — …
Longreads
29.03.2024
Central Asia gains prominence in European Union strategy
Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the importance of Central Asia to the EU has become increasingly clear. Now represents an opportune moment for Brussels to strengthe…
Failed State: A Guide to Russia’s Rupture by Janusz Bugajski
Bugajski considers the factors contributing to a possible Russian state collapse, among them lack of economic growth, stark socioeconomic inequalities, distrust of government institutions, regional and ethnic revivals, and most recently, the impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Washington DC: Jamestown Foundation, 2022 (translated into Ukrainian, Russian, Polish, Montenegrin).
Free Nations, New States: The End Stage of Russian Colonialism
This is an anthology of insights, experience, and effective prescriptions by leading experts from the regions of Russia and abroad who reveal a glimpse of the coming realities in Russia that Vladimir Putin does not want you to know.
Edited by Janusz Bugajski
Pivotal Poland: Europe’s Rising Power
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine precipitated a tectonic shift in European security dynamics, ending a relatively peaceful post–Cold War phase and moving the epicenter of European security eastward, to Poland. Janusz Bugajski explores the nature and context of Warsaw’s determined efforts to shape NATO’s eastern policy and to build a strong, modern military able to resist Russian aggression.
Washington DC: Jamestown Foundation, 2025
Eurasian Disunion: Russia’s Vulnerable Flanks (with Margarita Assenova)
Eurasian Disunion: Russia’s Vulnerable Flanks examines the impact of Moscow’s neo-imperial project on the security of several regions bordering the Russian Federation, analyses the geopolitical aspects of Kremlin ambitions, and makes recommendations for the future role of NATO, the EU, and the United States in the Wider Europe.
Washington DC: Jamestown Foundation, 2016
Conflict Zones: North Caucasus and Western Balkans Compared
Janusz Bugajski enhances our understanding of the causes and consequences of the current conflicts in the North Caucasus and extrapolates likely scenarios in the region’s development. He compares and contrasts conditions in the North Caucasus with the former Yugoslav federation in the Western Balkans.
Washington DC: Jamestown Foundation, 2014
Return of the Balkans: Challenges to European Integration and U.S. Disengagement
This monograph focuses on the escalating security challenges facing the Western Balkans, assesses the shortcomings and deficiencies of current international engagement, considers future prospects for U.S. military involvement, and offers recommendations for curtailing conflict and promoting the region’s international institutional integration.
Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, 2013
Georgian Lessons: Conflicting Russian and Western Interests in the Wider Europe
Russia’s invasion, occupation, and partition of Georgia in August 2008 initially sent shock waves throughout Europe and NATO. This volume places the conflict in the context of Russia’s broader objectives, its internal weaknesses, the limitations of EU and NATO policies, and America s security priorities.
CSIS Press, 2010
Dismantling the West: Russia’s Atlantic Agenda
Janusz Bugajski explores how the Russian authorities have systematically sought to undermine Western interests through sustained diplomatic campaigns, increasing control over energy supplies, escalating political subversion, and the recent military campaign in the Caucasus.
Potomac Books, 2009
America’s New European Allies
This book provides a set of recommendations to the United States, NATO allies, and EU institutions in promoting a more consequential Eastern Dimension. Above all, the U.S. administration needs to clearly make the argument that progress toward stable states and secure democracies in a widening Europe and an expanding trans-Atlantic community that encompasses the Black Sea zone is in America’s national interests and serves its strategic goals.
Nova Science Publishers, 2009
Expanding Eurasia: Russia’s European Ambitions
Moscow’s overarching ambition toward Europe is to expand the “Eurasian space” in which Russia is the dominant political player. The author explains that the most effective and realistic long-term Western strategy toward Russia needs to combine “practical engagement” with “strategic assertiveness”.
CSIS Press, 2008
The Eastern Dimension Of America’s New European Allies
This monograph provides a set of recommendations to the United States, NATO allies, and EU institutions in promoting a more consequential Eastern Dimension. Above all, the U.S. administration needs to clearly make the argument that progress toward stable states and secure democracies in a widening Europe and an expanding trans-Atlantic community that encompasses the Black Sea zone is in America’s national interests and serves its strategic goals.
U.S. Army War College, 2007
Atlantic Bridges: America’s New European Allies (with Ilona Teleki)
In the post-9/11 era of heightened security awareness, conflicting strategies for containing and combating security risks have strained relations between the United States and the European Union despite common goals.
Rowman & Littlefield, 2007
America’s New European Allies: Central-Eastern Europe and the Transatlantic Link
The “America’s New Allies” book series focuses on the relationship between the United States and Central-Eastern Europe (CEE) nations, particularly in the context of EU and NATO expansion.
CSIS Press, 2006
Cold Peace: Russia’s New Imperialism
In this first systematic analysis detailing Russia’s post-Cold War imperialism, Bugajski challenges the contemporary equivalent of Cold War appeasement, which views Russia as a benign and pragmatic power that seeks cooperation and integration with the West.
Praeger/Greenwood, 2004
(Translated into Romanian, Bulgarian, Lithuanian)
Back to the Front: Russian Interests in the New Eastern Europe
This paper examines Russian policy toward the former East European bloc by distinguishing four major sub-zones: Russia’s European Commonwealth, the Baltic region, the Central European states, and the Southeast European countries. The study is based on research conducted in most of the countries of Eastern Europe and in Russia.
Donald T. Treadgold Papers in Russian, East European, and Central Asian Studies, No.41, University of Washington, 2004
Political Parties of Eastern Europe: A Guide to Politics in the Post-Communist Era
This comprehensive one-volume guide to politics in Eastern Europe provides a wealth of information on the region. The author outlines the emergent political spectrum of parties and coalitions, which are described in the 20 country chapters that make up the heart of the book.
M. E. Sharpe, 2002
Toward an Understand of Russia: New European Perspectives (Edited)
If Russia veers toward instability or a more severe dictatorship under President Vladimir Putin, the threat to its neighbours could be severe. Such a scenario would also present serious challenges for European integration and derail the process of rapprochement with the United States. To understand Russia’s unsteady evolution, the Council on Foreign Relations organized an innovative international conference with analysts from the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe.
Janusz Bugajski (Editor), Marek Michalewski
Council on Foreign Relations Press, 2001
Nations in Turmoil: Conflict and Cooperation in Eastern Europe
Selected by Choice as an Outstanding Academic Book, this notable work has now been thoroughly updated and revised to investigate the sources, manifestations, and implications of interstate and interethnic instability in post-Communist eastern Europe. Janusz Bugajski illuminates long-suppressed historical antagonisms, traces the key contemporary conflicts, and considers evolving forms of regional cooperation and European integration. Pinpointing the new actors and factors shaping eastern European developments, the author considers likely scenarios of future unrest, particularly in light of the Yugoslav wars and persistent tensions throughout the Balkans.
Westview Press, 1993; 2nd edition, 1995
Sandinista Communism and Rural Nicaragua: (The Washington Papers)
In this groundbreaking study, Janusz Bugajski evaluates the impact of Sandinista political, economic, and social programs. The book focuses on the confrontations between the regime and Nicaragua’s rural population, particularly the Ladino peasantry and the Indian and black indigenous minorities of the Atlantic coast region.
By Janusz Bugajski
Praeger/CSIS, 1990
Fourth World Conflicts: Communism and Rural Societies
This study consists of a comprehensive examination of Communist policies toward rural populations and indigenous societies in a cross-section of developing Third World states. It explores the universal threads and national adaptations of Communist or Marxist-Leninist theory and praxis.
by Janusz Bugajski
Westview Press, 1991
Ethnic Politics in Eastern Europe: A Guide to Nationality Policies, Organizations, and Parties
This guide charts national histories and policies, relevant statistics and chronologies, and the identities, programmes, and activities of the full spectrum of ethnically-based parties and organizations in Central and Eastern Europe.
2nd Edition
M. E. Sharpe, 1994
East European Fault Lines: Dissent, Opposition, and Social Activism
This book provides a comparative analysis of oppositionist trends in the Soviet satellite states of contemporary Eastern Europe. It evaluates the extent and objectives of independent social activism in these countries, and explores both the causes and effects of public dissent.
By Janusz Bugajski
Westview Press, 1989
Czechoslovakia: Charter 77’s Decade of Dissent
This work by Janusz Bugajski should be considered mandatory reading for any student of Eastern Europe. The anatomy of the dissident movement of Czechoslovaki — its scope activities, affiliations at home and abroad — has been well documented and presented in a lucid manner.
By Janusz Bugajski
Praeger/CSIS, 1987