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Civic Dominion: Nation-Building in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan over 25 Years of Independence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 June 2022

Laurence Broers Open the ORCID record for Laurence Broers [Opens in a new window]  and
Ceyhun Mahmudlu
Laurence Broers*
Affiliation:
Russia and Eurasia Programme, Royal Institute for International Affairs at Chatham House, London, UK
Ceyhun Mahmudlu
Affiliation:
Department of Government, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
*
Corresponding author: Laurence Broers, email: laurencebroers@gmail.com
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Abstract

This article surveys nation-building in post-Soviet Azerbaijan over the country’s first quarter-century of restored independence. It examines the core dimensions of ethno-demographic and national minority issues, language policy, and the role of religion in the development of the state’s formal ideology Azerbaycançılıq (Azerbaijanism). The article highlights the nexus of nation-building and regime-building as a dominant trend over the last two decades, generating what we term “civic dominion”: the domination of a regime tradition, legitimated through the imagery and ideology of civic nationhood. Finally, the article considers the role of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict as a long-standing exception to the ostensibly civic ethos of post-Soviet Azerbaijani nation-building.

Keywords

Azerbaijannation-buildingpost-SovietKarabakh
Type
Special Issue Article
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 51 , Issue 1: Special Issue on Nation-Building in the Post-Soviet States , January 2023 , pp. 47 - 63
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Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Association for the Study of Nationalities

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