Nation-building in the Post-Soviet Borderlands: The Politics of National Identities

This book examines how national and ethnic identities are being reforged in the post-Soviet borderland states. The first chapter provides a conceptual and theoretical context for examining national identities, drawing in particular upon post-colonial theory. The rest of the book is divided into three parts. In Part I, the authors examine how national histories of the borderland states are being rewritten especially in relation to new nationalising historiographies, around myths of origin, homeland, and descent. Part II explores the ethnopolitics of group boundary construction and how such a politics has led to nationalising policies of both exclusion and inclusion. Part III examines the relationship between nation-building and language, especially with regard to how competing conceptions of national identity have informed the thinking of both political decision-takers and nationalising intellectuals, and the consequences for ethnic minorities. Such perspectives on nation-building are illustrated with substantive studies drawn from the Baltic states, Ukraine, and Belarus, Transcaucasia, and Central Asia.

Graham Smith is a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College and Director of the Post-Soviet States Research Programme. He is Lecturer in Geography at the University of Cambridge Vivien Law is a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College and a member of the Post-Soviet States Research Programme. She is a Lecturer in Modern and Medieval Languages at the University of Cambridge Andrew Wilson is a Lecturer in Ukrainian Studies in the School of Slavonic and East European Studies at the University of London. He is also a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College and a member of the Post-Soviet States Research Programme Annette Bohr is a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College and a member of the Post-Soviet States Research Programme Edward Allworth is Professor of Turko-Soviet Languages and a former Director of Soviet Nationalities at Columbia University