This report was written with the intention which tried to clarify the realities of the oligarchies (the financial cliques)in Russia.
The Russian economic oligarchy research has just started in Japan. Even in Russia, so far it seems to be insufficient. A real research is the future task.
It can be said that economic oligarchy exactly symbolizes the Yeltsin age by the phenomenon which appears by the process of conversion to capitalism in Russia during about past ten years.
The Russian oligarchies skillfully accumulated the capital in the first stage of Russian capitalism with economic confusion and incompleteness of the law. That is, the monopoly (oligopoly) of wealth in Russia of the present age was achieved by small number of oligarchies. The numbers of the groups were from 7 to 10 only.
Privatization of government-owned properties was the splendid chance for the oligarchies. They approached the senior officials of the Yeltsin regime and build a special intimate relation with a Yeltsin family (“semiya” in Russian) to win by the public bidding for privatization. It was adhesion with the regime, by which the oligarchies have increased the property. On of the model is Berezovsky's case. The tycoon was often called even the safe keeper of the “semiya”.
First of all, I look back to the time when small number of Russian financial capitalists gained power and enumerate the groups concretely. In addition, I point out their shady relationships with the regime while introducing the examples of their action behind the scene of the process of the war between banks and privatization of the government-run oil companies.
Secondly, I verify when Russian words “oligarxhy” or “oligarxhiya” came to appear to the mass communication in Russia.
Thirdly, I enumerate names of the oligarchies' groups and each representative's names, and classify them into some categories according to some current reports. Moreover, I elucidate the reason why they became rich after the Soviet Union was dismantled.
Finally, I somewhat refer the movement of the old and new oligarchies in the Putin's regime.

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化粧料用油相成分として有用な, 月見草油, ククイナッツオイル等の高度不飽和油を, 安定に化粧料に配合することを目的として, 抗酸化力を有する植物抽出物を抗酸化成分に選定し, O/Wエマルジョン中で有効な, 抗酸化剤及び抗酸化システムの探索を行なった。リノール酸メチルを含むO/Wエマルジョンを評価系とした本報告において, 著者らは, O/Wエマルジョン系での植物抽出物系抗酸化剤の抗酸化力とそれらの分配挙動が密接な関係にあることを明らかにして, 更に, 親油性のポリグリセリン脂肪酸エステルが, O/Wエマルジョン中で, 抗酸化剤を, 効率良く, O/W界面に配向させることを見いだし, 結果として, 植物抽出物のO/Wエマルジョン中での抗酸化力を増大させることを確認した。

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Climate change has been recognised as an important policy issue that affects nature and socio-economic systems of all continents and oceans over the last few decades. In order to achieve the ambitious goal of ‘keeping a global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels’ by the Paris Agreement agreed at COP 21 in 2015, formulation and implementation of climate change policies, especially mitigation ones to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have been recently advanced all over the world.

Russia, as one of the largest energy-resource rich countries and GHG emitters, has been also in the process of modernisation towards a low-carbon society, especially after the occurrence of global financial crisis in 2008-2009. Under this circumstance, the formulation and implementation of climate change policies have recently begun in earnest in Russia through its signature on and ratification of the Paris Agreement effective in 2016. These policies in Russia, however, often end in failure.

In this context, this present paper firstly clarifies the current situation of climate change and its causes such as GHG and air pollutants emissions in Russia, followed by the critical consideration of previous studies on this global thematic issue. By revisiting the formulation and implementation process of Russian climate change policies with a special focus on its multi-stakeholders, this paper tries to explain why these policies are not materialised in Russia, that is, factors influencing on its policy failure.

Throughout a series of analysis, it becomes clear in this paper that Russian environmental administration has been weakened whilst the government spending with environmental purposes on a downward trend in Russia after starting market transition in the 1990s. This paper also derives that institutional arrangements in the governmental committees enable Russian oil and gas companies to do lobbying for reflecting their interests on relevant policies. Besides, it becomes unveiled that residents and civil society organisations (CSOs), as one of representative protesters demanding policy reforms through social movements, have an insignificant influence on climate change policies in the case of Russia.

This paper then concludes that these factors are crucial propositions given to Russian climate change policies to materialise its transition towards a low-carbon society as well as big challenges to be overcome for its future sustainable growth.

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This paper analyses state capitalism in Russia from the viewpoint of state capital and state functions. As far as the Russia's government size (number of public servants and financial expenditures of the public sector) equals to those in developed countries, it cannot be applied as a precise indicator to characterize state capitalism. On the other side, both the state capital as a market player and the state functions can be regarded as qualitative characteristics of the Russian capitalism. As for the state capital, both privatization and state intervention have coexisted, and have simultaneously functioned for "controlling the highlands (the mainstay of state)". Moreover, the 2008 global economic crisis authorized state intervention. In order to maintain global competitiveness, the government has established strategic enterprises and has implemented preferential measures. Even though the state sector in the economy has decreased, it has enhanced its intervention into the private sector of the economy. The state has a strong influence on the economy via holding shares and regulations. Particularly, state-owned enterprises have changed their enterprise type from state corporations and unitary enterprises to joint-stock companies. In addition, "the exchange system of interests (state capture and business capture)" has been established and the state capital has openly showed its new "internationalization" behavior. The state capital has close ties with the global financial flows and it has stipulated the emergence of Russia's multinationals that are deeply connected with tax havens. Despite the offshore problem, the state sector is deeply linked with the global network and, therefore, state capitalism cannot exist without linkages with the global market. With regards to authoritarian political regime, concentration of powers, and existence of oil and gas rents, Russia is none other than state capitalism. However, functions and quality (good governance) of the state capitalism are far behind other developed countries. The Russian state is inferior in terms of state functions and state quality; the state as a coordinator of interests by grabbing hands may not be regarded as a strong one. Thus, Russia (Putin's regime) cannot be referred as "a normal middle income democratic country". Finally, low quality and authoritarian regime are mutually complementary in Russia, and the legacy inherited from the past also aff ected institutionalization of low quality state and institutional complementarities. State capitalism has also balanced interests among players. Why has state capitalism spread into the emerging and transition economies? The state sector has become a tool to correct the distorted markets. The basis of the Russian state capitalism is its global linkages with global markets (WTO accession), low-quality state coordination of oligarchs' behavior, and premature financial markets. This state intervention is old style, but it is a new phenomenon from the viewpoint of global adaptation. Global trends are common among other transition economies. However, the Russian case is based on its own historical and social thought. Thus, being both "old" and "new," Russian state capitalism seems resilient.

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ベネズエラでは、ニコラス・マドゥロ（チャベス派）、フアン・グアイド（反チャベス派）のふたりが、自らが正統な大統領であると主張して対峙する状況になって約３年が経過した。国際社会も、マドゥロを支持する中国・ロシアなどの国々と、グアイドを支持する米国、EU、南米のリマグループなどに分かれている。米国の経済制裁や中国・ロシアによるマドゥロ支援、またノルウェーなど両者の対話を求める国々、国内の食料・医薬品不足や難民問題などで支援を拡大する国連の機関など、国際社会の関与は、内政にも影響を与える。本稿では、両勢力を支持する大国である米国および中国・ロシアが、ベネズエラに対してどのような政策対応をとってきたのかについて、それぞれの国や政権ごとの特徴に焦点を当てて考察する。

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If general political situation in Iraq is improved explicitly, there will be good possibility its oil production will be over 6 million B/D in 5 years time. But to materialize this, economically rational political decision by the future legitimate Iraqi government for huge scale introduction of IOC must overcome naive nationalism and vested interests of NOC technocrats that can be seen very often in other major oil producing countries. At present, despite hope of the White House and the interim government, IOC's are very reluctant to longterm investments in Iraq because of serious political instability and strong possibility of severe contractual conditions, which are very common in the Arabian Gulf area. Based on these situations, there will be certain business chances for Japanese oil industry, but in order to make these chances really meaningful profits, Japanese companies should consider various factors and alternatives cautiously.

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This paper explains how the EU has strengthened energy policy based on “solidarity” with the Russia-Ukraine gas disputes in 2006, 2009 and Ukraine Crisis. The European Commission succeeded in framing gas disputes as an urgent issue requiring an EU-level solution. As a result, energy solidarity has been one of the fundamental principles in the article 194 of the TFEU and the energy policy has been shared competence between the EU and Member States. European Energy Security Strategy made with Ukraine Crisis in 2014 proposes Energy Union that will pool resources, connect energy networks and unite negotiating power with one voice.

But there must be a long way to achieve intended objectives of Energy Union, because creating Energy Union is related to restructuring institutions that had supported stable energy relations between the EU and Russia for more than 40 years. Energy infrastructures (pipelines, storage utilities and so on) and the price formula (long-term contracts, destination clauses, take-or-pay clauses, gas prices linked to oil prices and so on) were the common institutions between two regions. The stable relations have deteriorated by institutional changes in the energy market. The EU promotes internal energy market integration through unbundling and mandatory third party access by the Third Energy Package and the Competition law. The EU’s new liberalised market model with diversification of energy suppliers and energy mix is no longer the one that Russia used to share with the EU. Internal energy market integration reinforced by the energy solidarity principle improves the EU negotiating power with energy suppliers. The EU is building a “wider regulated area” by “exporting” the EU energy regulations and directives to neighbouring countries and even to Russia. Russia is forced to abolish destination clauses, reduce prices and loosen take-or-pay clauses to keep its market share in Europe, although she, depending on the vertically integrated energy companies such as Gazprom, is reluctant to adapt to conditions changing in the European energy market.

Ukraine Crisis is often recognised as the issue of energy security, because Ukraine monopolised pipelines between the EU and Russia. Since 2006, the European Commission has been using Ukraine Crisis to enhance energy security policies of the EU and competence creep in the energy policy. Now Energy Union is officially one of the priorities of the new Commission.

But the EU will be confronted with difficulties in and out. First, creating Energy Union may be with creeping competence of the Commission in the energy policy and may cause dissatisfaction, even opposition to integration from Member States with different energy mix. Second, there are problems of external dimensions of Energy Union. It is difficult to ensure consistency between the energy policy and the external policy of Member States, because they are different both in energy mix and energy suppliers. And Energy Union must set a stable framework to enable the project finances to develop energy resources in Russia and so on, because most of Member States depend on imported energy from them. Energy Solidarity is crucial to overcome these difficulties.

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