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Accepted Paper:
Geopolitics as an Ethnographer’s Preoccupation
Bilge Firat
(University of Texas at El Paso)
Drawing on from ethnographic fieldwork on the makings of energy and infrastructure geopolitics as an everyday occupation conducted during the onset of the Ukraine War, this paper argues for the oft-neglected role of culture in geopolitics to bolster future anthropological engagements with it.
Paper long abstract:
Critical geopolitics scholars have long pointed at how geopolitics exhibit therapeutic and prophetic functions for those who are on the receiving end of the message. In the wake of the Soviet system’s downfall, there has been a noticeable resurgence in the global interest in geopolitics to anticipate and shape future global dynamics. This increasing interest in geopolitics is in part because of the active participation of new players in their respective areas of influence but also due to the so-called democratization of knowledge and expertise in relation to the anticipation and management of an increasingly uncertain future. In order to achieve this, actors who consider themselves experts in geopolitics commercialize, privatize, and widely distribute their geopolitical visions and initiatives. Building upon a previous exploration of geopolitics as an ethnographic subject and focus (Firat 2022; https://doi.org/10.1111/gec3.12649), this paper advocates for the exploration of the cultures of geopolitical expertise as a research agenda, aiming to strengthen the occasional engagement of anthropologists with geopolitics. In order to substantiate my thesis, the paper will use the findings of my research on the joint makings of geopolitics, infrastructure, and expertise pertaining to fossil gas in the post-Soviet era. This research was conducted during the Russo-Ukrainian War in 2022, which coincided with gas supply disruptions.