The subject of the research is the institutional barriers in trade cooperation between China and Russia and the logic of their reproduction in modern political and economic conditions. The focus is not on individual technical or administrative restrictions per se, but on their systemic interrelation with differences in market access rules, settlement mechanisms, regulatory standards, and state approaches to economic coordination. Special attention is paid to how the institutional environment affects transaction costs, the stability of contractual relationships, trade structure, and the horizons of bilateral cooperation. The study also examines why institutional barriers do not automatically disappear as trade volume increases, but, on the contrary, are often reinforced as the areas of interaction between the two countries expand. The article employs a theoretical-analytical approach based on new institutional economics and political economy, as well as elements of comparative analysis of the institutional logics of China and Russia. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the fact that institutional barriers in Sino-Russian trade are viewed not as a set of disparate obstacles, but as an integrated system of constraints shaped at the intersection of rules, political risks, and structural features of bilateral exchange. The work proposes a three-level typology that includes barriers arising from differences in rules, barriers due to political risks, and barriers resulting from structural imbalances. The main conclusion is that the resilience of these barriers is determined not only by technical inconsistencies in regulatory regimes but also by the differences in the political and economic priorities of the two countries. It is shown that the expansion of trade does not in itself eliminate institutional constraints if it is not accompanied by coordination of procedures, stabilization of settlement mechanisms, and a gradual reduction in the dependence of bilateral cooperation on a narrow range of traditional sectors.
Yuzhe Zhao (Thu,) studied this question.