PostgradAsia 2020/21 Issue and Training a New Generation of International Regional Studies Specialists at HSE University

  The COVID-19 pandemic is radically changing the market for international education, including the International Regional Studies (IRS) as an area of research and training. The market for higher education has become more competitive and simultaneously attractive for long-term investment. As early as in the first months of the pandemic, it became clear that only a serious profession rather than a superficial occupation aimed at making quick, mostly here-and-now, profit is well worth the effort. Concerning the International Regional Studies, it must expand the instruments of resolving practically-oriented tasks, which should be premised upon fundamental knowledge and competences. 
  The subject, aim and tasks of the International Regional Studies as a field of expertise have been clearly specified at the School of International Regional Studies (SIRS), HSE University. Contrary to the understanding of Russian and foreign colleagues, the SIRS takes the view that the International Regional Studies should focus on the priorities of Russia’s government agencies and corporate sector, which gives the SIRS a competitive advantage. More than that, the SIRS draws a clear line between the International Regional Studies and related disciplines – International Relations, Political Studies and Linguistic and Cultural Studies.
  Synergized with Moscow’s strategic vision, the IRS should be used as Russia’s powerful instrument to promote its goods and services at foreign markets. The IRS should advance the Russian interests abroad, strengthen Russia’s positions in different countries and regions, secure its support in the partner states, attract foreign investment and advanced technologies to encourage Russia’s own development.  
  In line with this vision, the International Regional Studies should train specialists with competences in the political, economic and cultural marketing. This is the vital prerequisite for winning an intense competition for foreign markets, which has traditionally been the top priority of the IRS educational programmes in the US and the European countries.  
  In the academic and the applied research fields, the IRS should focus on the potential of global markets, as well as on specific features of markets spanning across various countries and regions. The fundamental aim is to produce recommendations for the government and the corporate sector on the right niches for Russia’s economic and political activity. 
  The International Regional Studies as an academic field explores the economic, political and cultural potential, as well as concomitant risks, of various countries and regions, with the aim is to promote national interests.  
  The IRS proficiency is premised upon competences in linguistics, culture, geography, socio-economic and political institutions of target countries and regions. At its core, this is the political and economic marketing aimed at promoting the brand of the Russian Federation abroad. 
  A remarkable event in the community of IRS specialists, as well as of those tracing the evolution of international education, was the publication of the catalog PostgradAsia Issue 2020/21. The catalog came out in July 2021 and presented a pool of programmes of post-graduate education. As the issue was published in Malaysia, its target audience are mostly from Southeast Asia. Significantly, HSE University and the portfolio of the SIRS Professor Evgeny Kanaev were presented on pages 90-91 and 79 respectively. Other Russian universities and professors were not mentioned. 
  For the School of International Regional Studies, this is an outstanding record of achievement. Nevertheless, the SIRS’ activity has proved that this reward from the professional community is the logical result of its purposeful and pioneering work rather than a casual occurrence.  
  Established in 2018, School of International Regional Studies includes specialists with distinguished academic record who are also involved in cutting-edge policy advice (professors Sergei Luzyanin, Vladimir Malyavin, Evgeny Kanaev, Sergei Lunev), top subject practitioners (Andrei Baklanov is the brightest example) and qualified methodologists (Yulia Seliverstova, Fedor Dolgachev, Anna Antonova, Olga Romanova, Sergei Bodnar). Within the SIRS, six sections offering a 360-degree perspective on different regions, as well as on Linguistic and Cultural Studies, are in successful operation. The international conference “East and West at the Stage of New Transformations” is organized annually. The IRS specialists from more than fifteen countries attend the conference; its results are published in collective monographs. Nearly every day, miscellaneous on-line events – seminars, master-classes etc. – take place. In 2020/21 academic year, the SIRS organized 57 events, in which the total number of 2933 specialists from 27 countries participated.   
  PostgradAsia 2020/21 Issue offers bright prospects for multi-dimensional cooperation with a cumulative positive effect for many parties. 
  For the School of International Regional Studies, a likely outcome is a further enhance of its image in the international professional community, with new promising partners and an influx of students as appreciable side effects. In its turn, the School has many opportunities to offer its new partners – no matter teachers, experts or students – the most attractive terms of cooperation. Apart from the afore-mentioned annual conference, the SIRS carries out international student projects in cooperation with universities of Japan, Iran, Pakistan, the Czech Republic and Belgium (supervised by Vera Vishnyakova, Evgeny Kanaev, Elmira Imamkulieva, Irina Strelnikova and other professors). The results are published in high-ranking academic journals. 
  The projects focus on creating advanced practical-oriented competences with personalized support and mentoring. They include fundamental training premised upon advanced digital technologies, critical thinking and problem-solving cases. In April 2021, the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs launched the web-portal OrientaliaRossica – Russian Oriental Studies of the XXI Century – a professional digital venue for Russian and foreign scholars, experts and practitioners whose area of research and expertize includes Asia. This opens up possibilities to considerably increase publications on Asia’s critical domestic and international issues, as well as to initiate cutting-edge academic research and in-depth discussions. 
  As the target audience of PostgradeAsia are intent on postgraduate study, the Issue 2020/21 will naturally stimulate their interest to the relevant programmes offered by the SIRS. These programmes prioritize a synergy of linear competences (the regions of their specialization) and subject competences (the substantive activity undertaken in those regions). At present, the SIRS offers six post-graduate programmes. The SIRS is planning to expand the offer line, simultaneously upgrading educational instruments and technologies.  
  For HSE University, the implications will also be positive. The Issue presented a pool of HSE programmes ranging from “Economics, Politics and Business in Asia” to “Business Analytics and Big Data Systems”. Tellingly, the IRS specialist Evgeny Kanaev stands for the “hub”, while the “spokes” are the graduate programmes offered by HSE University. This exemplifies the real substance of the International Regional Studies as an academic discipline and as a profession: to provide a point of entry for many other directions, as well as to spark interest in these spheres from the partner states.   
  Importantly, HSE University occupies position 45 in QS 2021 ranking in the nomination “Politics”. As political processes are an important part of the International Regional Studies field of expertize, the afore-mentioned trajectory – from the IRS as a point of market entry to other fields of study – appear utterly reasonable.  
  A beneficial effect for the Russian Federation can also be expected. The intensification of contacts between the SIRS and HSE University and the target audience from Southeast Asia corresponds to the prospective plans of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), an important part of which is strengthening the people-to-people connectivity. Arguably, PostgradAsia 2020/21 Issue will hardly pass by unnoticed in both the ASEAN Secretariat and the ASEAN member states. This offers prospects for cooperation of all sorts, including between the government agencies of Russia and ASEAN, as well as between those of Russia and the ASEAN Secretariat, for training specialists for join projects. In the latter regard, it is symbolic that PostgradAsia 2020/21 came out simultaneously with the 25-year anniversary of ASEAN-Russia Full-Dialogue Partnership established in July 1996. 
  Logically, the ASEAN member states will also be among the beneficiaries.  Expanded ties with HSE University will allow those countries to get a true rather than a misleading and over-simplified picture of Russia. Regrettably, at present their awareness of Russia is built upon publications in the Western mass media that are often far from objective. In their turn, many young people from Southeast Asia who got their education in the Russian Federation take the view that Russia is a beautiful and fascinating country which offers plenty of opportunities for self-realization, while the Russians are nice, hospitable and kind-hearted people who are always ready to help and able to fully appreciate good relations. The expansion of university diplomacy is an important prerequisite for the Russia-ASEAN Strategic Partnership to live up to its name, in which the association is truly interested. 
  Stating its readiness to hold a close dialogue with Southeast Asia, the School of International Regional Studies is open to cooperation with the Russian and foreign partners whose area of research focuses on Southeast Asia. The more so since some of them have been developing relations with ASEAN and its member states for a long time. ASEAN Center in MGIMO University the MFA of Russia is the most representative example. Since its establishment in June 2010, the ASEAN Center has been involved in miscellaneous activities focusing on Southeast Asia and ASEAN. The ASEAN Center has organized many important events in Russia-ASEAN relations, including the Russia-ASEAN Youth Summits, as well as has prepared several books and research papers (the SIRS Professor Evgeny Kanaev participated in some of them). The ASEAN Center experts – the acting director Ekaterina Koldunova and the leading expert Victor Sumsky – are welcome guests at the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs of HSE University. The SIRS fosters close relations with the Center for Asia-Pacific Studies IMEMO RAS, the Center for Southeast Asia, Australia and Oceania Studies of the Institute of Oriental Studies RAS, the editorial boards of the academic journals “Southeast Asia: Actual Problems of Development”, “The Russian Journal of Vietnamese Studies”, “Russia and the Pacific”, “Far Eastern Affairs”, as well as with other think-tanks and expert venues. 
  In sum, PostgradeAsia 2020/21 Issue signifies a new interest in the ASEAN member states in cooperation with the School of International Regional Studies and HSE University. The response from the School and the University is premised upon their readiness to meet the highest expectations of their partners from Southeast Asia. 

Catalogue PostgradAsia 2020/2021 Issue

V.V. Vishnyakova

E.A. Kanaev