Eurasianism and the Concept of Central Caucaso-Asia

46
Eldar Ismailov and Vladimer Papava
Based on the present-day state of each individual Central Caucasian country
and their interrelations in particular, 140 the integration prospects in the
Caucasus 141 remain rather provisional in nature. Believing that integration in
the Caucasus (and in any part of them) is nothing more than a pipe dream,
since there has never been any political or cultural integrity in its history, 142
would mean accepting that social processes are historically determined, even
though such an approach has repeatedly been proven unsound by history. 143
Even the most extreme position, which presumes the complete disunity of
the Caucasian peoples throughout their many centuries of history, in no way
excludes the possibility of the countries and peoples of the region finding
close or common interests today in the contemporary globalizing world.
Furthermore, regarding the Central Caucasus, one must recognize the
existence of three conflicts 144 or, to be more precise, occupied entities on its
140 It should be admitted that even between Azerbaijan and Georgia, the regional
interests of which largely coincide, there is far from full mutual understanding, the
conflict regions being a graphic case in point (for example, Cory D. Welt, “Making the
Caucasus Whole Again: A Cooperation Approach to Restoring the Domestic Status
Quo,” in Caucasus Regional Security for the 21st Century. Materials of International
Conference (March 13-14, 1999, Tbilisi, Georgia) (Tbilisi: CIS and Peaceful Caucasus
State Affairs Bureau and ICCN, 1999), pp. 97-101).
141 Ismailov, “O geopoliticheskikh predposylkakh”; Ismailov and Kengerli, “Integratsia
Kavkaza”; Ismailov and Kengerli, “O kategroii Kavkaz”; Ismailov and Kengerli, “The
Caucasus in the Globalizing World”; Ismailov and Papava, The Central Caucasus:
Essays, pp. 7-9; Ismailov and Papava, “A New Concept for the Caucasus”; Ismailov
and Papava, The Central Caucasus: Problems, pp. 6-8.
142 Nino Chikovani, “A United Caucasus: Reality Rooted in the Past or High-Flown
Political Illusions?” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 5 (35) (2005), pp. 45-54.
143 For example, Mariam Lordkipanidze, “K voprosu ‘Kavkazskogo edinogo doma’”
[On the Question of a “United Caucasian Home”], Caucasica. The Journal of Caucasian
Studies, Vol. 2 (1998), pp. 163-169; Roin Metreveli, “On the Problem of War and Peace
in the Caucasus,” Caucasica. The Journal of Caucasian Studies, Vol. 2 (1998), pp. 170-182.
144 For example, Oksana Antonenko, “Frozen Uncertainty: Russia and the Conflict
over Abkhazia,” in Bruno Coppieters and Robert Legvold, eds., Statehood and Security:
Georgia after the Rose Revolution (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2005), pp. 205-269; Gary
K. Bertsch et al., eds., Crossroads and Conflict: Security and Foreign Policy in The Caucasus
and Central Asia (New York: Routledge, 2000); Julian Birch, “The Georgian/South
Ossetian Territorial and Boundary Dispute,” in John F.R. Wright, Suzanne
Goldenberg, and Richard Schofield, eds., Transcaucasian Boundaries (New York: St.
Martin’s Press, 1996), pp. 151-189; Vicken Cheterian, War and Peace in the Caucasus:
Ethnic Conflict and the New Geopolitics (New York: Columbia University Press, 2008);
Levon Chorbajian, Patrick Donabedian and Claude Mutafian, The Caucasian Knot. The
History and Geo-politics of Nagorno-Karabakh (London: Zed Press, 1994); Bruno
Coppieters, Federalism and Conflict in The Caucasus (London: Royal Institute of