The Interests of Russia and the Caspian Successor States of the Soviet Union Uwe Stehr It is not difficult to determine both the economic and the political interests of the states situated at the Caspian Sea. Their economic interest is to earn money. All of them are aware of the fact that they cannot acquire and exploit the oil and gas resources alone, but have to share and that they therefore depend on cooperation with their neighbors. They also know that the time has not yet come to earn a lot of money and that they have to wait some six to eight years before this situation will change. It is of particular relevance for the future development of this region to observe how these states use the six to eight years to find solutions to their regional instabilities and how they prepare their legal systems and their infrastructures for the expected big business. The political interests of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan are to stabilize and to strengthen the national independence they achieved seven years ago. They implement this policy by inviting as many investors from different countries as possible, thereby diversifying their dependencies on foreign capital. Another interest of today’s ruling elite is to stabilize their dominant position in their societies with the help of gas and oil. The more money they can distribute or make available to competing clans, the fewer the challenges they face for their own power. Here again the ruling elite will have to make provisions for the years from 1998 to 2005. To determine the Russian interests in the region is more complicated. At first glance, Russia wants to pursue two objectives, apart from earning money: Russia wants to provide political stability at its southern flank and it wants to be acknowledged as a leading power in this post-Soviet era. Russia’s leverages to implement these objectives are security offers, and offers for conflict resolution on the one side, Lukoil and pipelines on the other side. In the Caspian region as well as in the West, there is a lot of speculation about decisions concerning the future routes of big pipelines. The facts of today are that there is certainty only about the northern route to Novorossiysk through 48