In a time when the enlargement of NATO seems to have exhausted its political capital, there is a rising intellectual trend in Europe that talks about a geopolitical compromise: the Finlandization of the former Soviet space. But why now this resurrection of a Cold War concept? And what does it mean in practice? Is it applicable to the post Soviet space? In its latest edition, the November/December issue, FP Romania has published a comprehensive dossier under the title "New Yalta" reuniting the perspectives of three international experts on the Finlandization topic: Hans Mouritzen (The Danish Institute for International Studies), Tuomas Forsberg (University of Helsinki) and Igor Torbakov (Finnish Institute of International Affairs in Helsinki).

See all contributions in the New Yalta dossier, including the interview of Igor Torbakov on The limits of a geopolitical metaphor: the Finlandization.

- FP Romania: How would you define Finlandization and what Finlandization historically meant in the case of Finland? It seems that this geopolitical dependence did not prevent it from developing and modernizing itself.

- Finlandization, or adaptive acquiescence as it is termed theoretically, is a foreign policy orientation that may result from narrow action space. It means that the state concedes certain values to a great power in order to be able to preserve more basic (core) values. It is typically accompanied by (flexible) neutrality in great power conflicts and a dovish ‘détente for any price’ view. It occurs rarely for the simple reason that it is so difficult to practice: if too much is conceded, the great power’s expectations for the future are raised, and the smaller state will risk sliding down the slippery slope of concessions (the great power will say, for instance, ‘now that you have declared your warm friendship, you should also show this in practical d