Geopolitics of explaining Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the challenge of small states

In this essay, I discuss some of the dominant ways of reasoning Russia's invasion of Ukraine.First, I examine the duality of the contemporary geopolitical condition, and the ways in which the invasion is understood to challenge the global liberalist project premised on economic competition rather than territorial contestation.Second, I briefly scrutinize the realist mode of explaining and understanding the Russian invasion and its problematic tenets from the perspective of small states.I argue that the liberalist and realist framings of world politics are, at their heart, reasonably similar.Both share and articulate a belief that there is a coherent geopolitical global order, and that it is the duty of powerful states to maintain and enforce that order.