The end of the Cold War has fundamentally changed the nature of borders within the emerging political spaces of the former Soviet Union. The collapse of the Soviet Union created thousands of kilometres of new state borders which have been redefined in terms of national sovereignty, as frames for free and sovereign action, but which also have becomes sites of hardening, closure, of new visa restrictions and, perhaps most seriously, of territorial conflict. This conference will focus on Post-Soviet states and their borders. But it is not simply about state borders as such – it is also about border conflicts, patterns of economic, political and social interaction, and actual and potential projects of regional cooperation and the geopolitical role of the European Union in contributing to regional stability.
This conference is timely in that it will bring together researchers who been studying regional issues in Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, Central Asia and the Black Sea. Furthermore, a major objective of the conference is to debate the role and aims of the EU in redefinition, negotiation and conflict over post-Soviet space. This includes local perceptions of the evolving quality of the EU’s social and political influence within Post-Soviet contexts, e.g. in countries such as Georgia, Armenia, Belarus, Azerbaijan, Moldova, Tajikistan and Ukraine.
Possible topics for panels and papers include: Post-Soviet nation-building: e.g. through the renegotiation of state-society relations, new interpretations of history, identity-politics, etc. Post-Soviet politics of borders: e.g. in terms of visa restrictions and the shrinking of CIS free visa areas, migration policies, local border regimes, etc.
Regional practices and political language of cooperation within different regional contexts (in particular Caspian Sea, Black Sea, Southern Caucasus and Eastern Europe) Natural resources, borders and interstate conflicts within different regional contexts Europeanization and Neighborhood relations: e.g. as manifested in discourses and practices of regional co-operation and institutional engagement (partly within the context of potential EU membership) between the EU as a political actor and its neighbors The Black Sea as political/economic region and shifting Black Sea geopolitics In addition to this research focus, we will welcome panels and papers that address borders and border-related issues more generally. Organisers: Georgian Institute of Public Affairs University of Eastern Finland – Karelian Institute and VERA Centre for Russian and Border Studies University of Warsaw - European Institute for Regional and Local Development (Euroreg) Carleton University - Centre for Governance and Public Management
Fees: Participation fees of ca. 100 USD per person (75 USD for students) will be charged in order to cover local organization costs. Participant number will be approximately 40-50
Conference days are 28 and 29 April 2013 Excursion: Starting on 30 April there will be a 1 - 1,5 day excursion to border regions (TBA)
Deadlines and abstracts: Proposals for panels as well as individual presentations will be accepted. Please include the following information (max. 300 words per paper) • Name of authors/contributors • Institutional affiliations, titles • Contact: telephone, fax, email, mailing address • Title of the paper • Abstract: Subject, empirical frame, analytical approach, theme
Send your proposals via email in Word format to james.scott@uef.fi and gorzelak@post.pl Conference Dates and Deadlines: December 15th 2012 : deadline for submitting abstracts and proposals December 2012 : proposals selection and notification sent to presenters March, 15th 2013 : submission of papers to discussants April 28th-30th 2013: Conference in Tbilisi.