The Valdai Discussion Club is a Moscow-based think tank and discussion forum. It was established in 2004 and is named after Lake Valdayskoye, which is located close to Veliky Novgorod, where the club's first meeting took place. In 2014, the management of the club was transferred to the Valdai Club Foundation, established in 2011 by the Council for Foreign and Defense Policy, the Russian International Affairs Council, Moscow State Institute of International Relations, and the Higher School of Economics.

Overview The 2004 Valdai conference was attended by Russian president Vladimir Putin. Among many other Russian Government officials attending Valdai meetings are Dmitry Medvedev, former Prime Minister and former president; Sergey Ivanov, former Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office; Sergey Lavrov, Minister of Foreign Affairs; Sergey Shoygu, former Minister of Defence.

The club also operates regional programmes – Asian, Mid-Eastern and Euro-Atlantic Dialogues. It holds a special session at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum and the Eastern Economic Forum. Stanislav Zas, Secretary-General of the Collective Security Treaty Organization spoke at Valdai in February 2022.

Daniel W. Drezner, professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, described Valdai as "a swanky high-level conference put on by the Russian elite" and "the highest-profile Russian equivalent to Davos (minus the corporate presence)". Drezner also wrote that the chief value to attendees is the ability to determine the official line of the Russian government, although attendance also risks "greater legitimacy on a government that has been accused of some less-than-legitimate activities as of late." Nikolay Petrov of the Carnegie Moscow Center identified Valdai as "a project used as blatant propaganda by the Kremlin" while Russian sociologist Lilia Shevtsova criticized the Valdai conferences in an article entitled "Putin's Useful Idiots." Marcel H. Van Herpen wrote that Valdai was a soft power effort by the Kremlin in service of Russian foreign policy goals, with Russian leadership using the conference in a bid to gain goodwill among Western intellectuals, create networking opportunities between Russian and Western elites, and "create a testing ground for the Kremlin's foreign policy initiatives." Angus Roxburgh wrote that RIA Novosti was important to the establishment of Valdai during Putin's second term, and that the conference plays a key role in the Russian government's effort to burnish Putin's image and influence outsiders. Nikolay Petrov also wrote that the club has increasingly become a "propaganda tool." British journalist Angus Roxburgh described it as part of the Russian propaganda effort.

According to the Institute for the Study of War, in 2023, one of Valdai's contributors, Konstantin Zatulin, stated that Russia had failed to achieve any of its major goals during the Russo-Ukrainian War. These he listed as "denazification, demilitarization, the neutrality of Ukraine, and the protection of the inhabitants of the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics". He said that these goals "have ceased to hold actual meaning" and suggested that Russian forces should have been more aggressive in efforts to push Ukrainian forces back from the borders of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.

The Valdai Discussion Club Foundation has been sanctioned in connection with Russia's aggression against Ukraine, by Ukraine and by Canada.

In John Mearsheimer's 2023 book How States Think, the preface acknowledges him receiving a small financial support from Valdai in conjunction with Best Book award for his 2019 book The Great Delusion.Mearsheimer, J. J., & Rosato, S. (2023). How states think: the rationality of foreign policy. Yale University Press.

Annual meetings Title Place Date NotesRussia at the Turn of the Century: Hopes and RealityVeliky NovgorodSeptember 2–5, 2004Russia as a Political Kaleidoscopecruise ship Alexander Radishchev (traveled from Moscow to Tver and back)September 2–5, 2005Global Energy in the 21st Century: Russia's Role and PositionMoscow and Khanty-MansiyskSeptember 4–9, 2006Russia at the crossroads - choice and identityMoscow and KazanSeptember 10–14, 2007Russia's Role in the Global Geopolitical Revolution of the Early 21st CenturyMoscow, Rostov-on-Don and GroznySeptember 9–14, 2008Russia – West: Back to the FutureYakutsk and MoscowSeptember 7–15, 2009Russia: History and Future DevelopmentSt. Petersburg, Karelia, SochiSeptember 1–7, 2010The 2011–2012 Elections and the Future of Russia: Development Scenarios for the Next 5–8 YearsKaluga and MoscowNovember 6–12, 2011The Future Is Being Made Today: Scenarios for Russia's Economic DevelopmentSt. Petersburg and MoscowOctober 20–26, 2012Russia's Diversity for the Modern WorldNovgorod OblastSeptember 16–19, 2013The World Order: New Rules or a Game Without RulesSochiOctober 22–24, 2014Societies Between War and Peace: Overcoming the Logic of Conflict in Tomorrow's WorldSochiOctober 19–22, 2015The Future in Progress: Shaping the World of TomorrowSochiOctober 24–27, 2016Creative Destruction: Will a New World Order Emerge from the Current Conflicts?SochiOctober 16–19, 2017Russia: Agenda for the 21st CenturySochiOctober 15–18, 2018Former president of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai attended the plenary sessionThe Dawn of the East and the World Political OrderSochiSeptember 30 – October 3, 2019Presidents of the Philippines Rodrigo Duterte, Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and King Abdullah II of Jordan attended the plenary session The Lessons of the Pandemic and the New Agenda: How to Turn the World Crisis Into an Opportunity for the WorldMoscowOctober 20–22, 2020Global Shake-Up in the 21st Century: The Individual, Values, and the StateSochiOctober 18–21, 2021A Post-Hegemonic World: Justice and Security for EveryoneMoscowOctober 24–27, 2022 Fair Multipolarity: How to Ensure Security and Development for Everyone Sochi October 2–5, 2023 Lasting Peace on What Basis? Common Security and Equal Opportunities for Development in the 21st Century Sochi November 7, 2024 The Polycentric World: Instructions for Use Sochi October 2, 2025

See also 2014 Valdai speech of Vladimir Putin Yaroslavl Global Policy Forum

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