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- Convenor:
-
Julien Thorez
(CNRS (French national center for scientific research))
Send message to Convenor
- Chair:
-
Mirzokhid Rakhimov
(Contemporary history center)
- Discussant:
-
Adrien Fauve
(IFEAC)
- Formats:
- Panel
- Theme:
- Geography
- Location:
- Room 104
- Sessions:
- Saturday 25 June, -
Time zone: Asia/Tashkent
Short Abstract:
This session deals with the vision of the world of young people, especially students, from a low geopolitics perspective. By analyzing mental representations and geographical imaginaries, the presentations will particularly address the place of nation-states, as well as the place of macro-regions.
Long Abstract:
This panel proposal focuses on geographical and geopolitical representations of the Youth in Central Asian countries and abroad. It brings together colleagues from various disciplines – geography (Camille Dabestani, Clarisse Didelon-Loiseau, Nurzhanat Shakirova, Mürat Güvenç), history (Mirzokhid Rakhimov), sociology (Almagul Mussina, Muzaffar Olimov), political science (Adrien Fauve) - and from different countries (France, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Uzbekistan), in order to compare their respective theorical and methodological approaches but also is order to compare their empirical field-based results
This session will deal with the vision of the world of young people, especially students, from a low geopolitics perspective. This perspective analyses how the “man in the street” positions himself in regards to the geopolitical issues his country is facing. By analyzing mental representations and geographical imaginaries, the presentations will particularly address the place of nation-states, as well as the place of macro regions in the context of globalization, in young people's perception of the world. In other words, we will explore the question of identities and spaces of belonging, a topic which remains crucial in the post-Soviet world characterized by a nation building process but also by regionalization processes. Therefore, it is relevant to investigate to which regional spaces do students from Kazakhstan, Turkey and Russia or young people from Tajikistan feel they belong to? Central Asia? Eurasia? Turkic world? Islamic world? In addition, several papers will raise the question of how Central Asia is perceived, both from inside and outside of the region, mainly from Russia, China and Tukey.
Through a comparative approach, we aim at highlighting the national and regional specific features governing the geographical and geopolitical perceptions of youth in each country. To what extent are world perceptions of the “Nazarbayev generation” different from world visions of the “Rakhmon generation”, the “Putin’s one” or the “Erdogan’s one”?
All the proposed papers are based on exploratory empirical approaches and large scale surveys implemented among students and young people. Those surveys are inscribed in quantitative (questionnaires) or qualitive (focus groups) perspectives but most of them mobilize an important cartographic apparatus.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Saturday 25 June, 2022, -Paper short abstract:
This paper analyses the representations of Central Asia of Russian, Turkish and Chinese students. Using a mental maps method at world scale, it shows the spatial structure of the macro region and provides information on frames of reference used for regionalization, raising geopolitical issues.
Paper long abstract:
Central Asia refers to different entities, depending on the period and approach. The uncertainties about its geographical definition make the region particularly interesting to analyze from a geopolitical point of view. Social representations have a central place in geopolitical analysis, particularly in "low geopolitics" approaches which describe the representations of the "man in the street". Within this category we have chosen to interview a particular but legitimate population: undergraduate students. Furthermore, it is interesting to approach the issue of Central Asia from the point of view of the riparian countries with geopolitical stakes in the region: China, Russia and Turkey.
In order to analyze the representation of Central Asia of students from these countries, we use a methodology based on mental representations of world regions which introduce an element of interpretation of the world space: by tracing world regions, respondent brings together what is similar and separates what is different according to them. The analysis of the names given provides information on the frames of reference used for regionalisation. This survey was conducted in 2009-2010. The questionnaire included a world map on which students had to draw and name regions of the world. In Russia the survey was done in Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Stavropol and Khabarovsk; 827 questionnaires were collected. The survey in China has been done in 5 cities: Beijing, Guangzhou, Nanjing, Shanghai and Wuhan and 1198 questionnaires can be used. In Turkey 734 questionnaires from students in Istanbul, Izmir and Erzurum have been gathered.
Two types of analyses are carried out. On the one hand, we analyze the extension and denomination of the regions that include the countries studied. In other words, in which regions do Russian, Chinese and Turkish students project themselves at global scale and does this region include Central Asia? On the other hand, we analyze in which region countries from Central Asia are included. Despite variations between the samples from different countries, our analysis shows that Russians, Turks and Chinese students have mainly a nationalistic vision of the world. This leads to the identification of a space of uncertainty in Central Asia, which is explained by its location on the borders of other regional spaces including Europe, Asia and the Middle East. It is one of the least determined spaces in the representations of the world, one of the most obvious areas of multiple belonging, when viewed from outside.
Paper short abstract:
This presentation is a study of macroregional imaginaries of Turkish students in 2022 based on an online mapping survey conducted in three university cities. It focuses on students’ representations and practices of macroregions they feel they belong to.
Paper long abstract:
This proposal is a study of macroregional imaginaries of Turkish students in 2022 with approaches in political geography and geography of representations. The analysis is based on an online mapping survey conducted through students in three university cities. It focuses on students’ representations and practices of macroregions they feel they belong to. We seek to analyze imaginaries associated to a region of the world thanks to mental maps linked to a panel of questions that interrogate socio-demographic and geographic factors.
By focusing on their macroregion, we propose to ask two main questions: what regional spaces and what scales of representation are meaningful to define the part of the world they belong to? How the current geopolitical situation might influence the positioning of their country among the regional spaces at stake in Turkish representations?
A previous test phase of that survey conducted in 2021 in Isparta gives exploratory results that will be detailed with the next phase. It has shown that Turkish students represent their region of belonging mainly at the scale of their country: more than 90% of responses includes Turkey following its frontiers. Largest representations include Caucasus, Western parts of Iran, the Black Sea region or the Balkans in less than 30% of responses. Names given to those macroregion also reveal two main scales at stake: the state scale and the macroregional scale with four area mentioned (Asia, Europe, Eurasia, Middle East). Geographical images of an in-between position with those area appear as structuring (“bridge” or “middle”).
Paper short abstract:
Based on the survey materials examined attitudes of young people towards integration / isolation, integration projects EAEU, CSTO, SCO, One Belt One Road and prospects for integration within the Central Asian region
Paper long abstract:
The collected materials show that in 2020, the youth of Tajikistan felt relatively safe, both at the personal and at the country level, but believed that security would be best ensured within the framework of some kind of integration association. A year later, the sense of danger increased and this strengthened the orientation of the youth of Tajikistan towards joining any integration association, as well as establishing closer relations with neighboring countries.
As for the geopolitical ideas and preferences of the youth of Tajikistan, those geopolitical orientations of the Tajik youth reflect an ongoing process of formation of the country's identity.
Young people are oriented towards establishing closer relations with Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Iran, China, to a lesser extent - with Kyrgyzstan, i.e. with the countries of the former USSR and territorial neighbors. The youth believes that this can ensure the security of Tajikistan in relation to the Taliban Afghanistan. In general, the attitude towards Afghanistan has become much more complicated, as well as towards Ukraine, which is considered in the context of relations with the EU and the USA. When comparing the results of studies from different years, we found that the attitude towards China has undergone the greatest changes. Young people of all ages recognize the growing influence of China in Tajikistan. At the same time, the younger groups are oriented towards China to a lesser extent than the older ones. Overall, this empirical study contributes to the concept of interlinking of views about isolation / integration and security.
Paper short abstract:
The paper deals with the place of the State in the shaping of mental representation of the world of Kazakhstani students. It is based on the results of a survey conducted in 2018 and 2019 among 540 students interviewed in Astana, Karaganda and Almaty.
Paper long abstract:
Spatial representations are a powerful factors in territorialization. They allow to know and to understand space extent and limits but also to construct individual and collective belonging to territories. Representations are partly determined by individual knowledge and practices of space. But they also are collectively elaborated through the assimilation of discourses produced by actors, notably the State. It is then possible to show how spatial representations are shaped and to measure their prevalence in a given population.
In the framework of a research project conducted in Kazakhstan in 2018-2020 seeking to address issues on mental representation of regionalization process, we found that the weight of the state in representations of global space was greater there than what we had previously observed in other countries of the world. In this proposal of communication, we will show to what extent the case of Kazakhstan illustrates the weight of ideologies and political discourses in the construction and the structuring of the mental representations of the world space, with regard to the construction of the State itself and its relation to the rest of the world.
The paper is based on the results of a survey conducted in 2018 and 2019 among 540 Kazakhstani students interviewed in 3 cities: Astana, Karaganda and Almaty. This survey focused on spatial representations of world regions based on the realization of a map of world regions. The analysis of the regions drawn by the students on the world map is characterized by a strong presence of the state, whether it is the Kazakh state or the other states of the world, which are identified much more often than in previous surveys conducted elsewhere. Kazakhstan itself is identified as a region in its own right, with an explicit discursive and graphic apparatus (hearts drawn on the map) showing the attachment of the students interviewed to their country. Moreover the country is placed at the center of a large Eurasian region and student’s discourses insist on the role of the country in the regionalization construction process: beyond the usual centering that can be observed, this Eurasian positioning includes large parts of the government's discourse on the country's regional role. We will show how Kazakhstani students' representations of global space are shaped by the geopolitical rhetoric promoted by the Kazakhstan state since its independence in 1991.