Political Theory and Central Asia: An Introduction

Abstract

This chapter introduces the reader to the main idea of the book: to move beyond Central Asia as a field reserved to regional studies and towards the opportunities that it provides for theorizing politics. After a review of the scholarly debates and the main literature, it makes the case for a new take on generating theories of the political starting from this region. It concludes by introducing the analyses of the authors chapter by chapter along the three sections of the book: models of governance and power, revealing ideological justifications and reframing the state and order.