The classic study of resistance to Tsarist Russian colonialism, the genocide that followed, and its connection to the Bolshevik Revolution. In 1916, Tzar Nicholas II began drafting Russian subjects across Central Asia to fight in World War I. By summer, the widespread resistance of Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Tajiks, Turkmen, and Uzbeks turned into an outright revolt. The Russian Imperial Army killed approximately 270,000 of these people, while tens of thousands more died in their attempt to escape into China. Suppressed during the Soviet Era and nearly lost to history, knowledge of this horrific incident is remembered thanks to Edward Dennis Sokol’s pioneering Revolt of 1916 in Russian Central Asia. This wide-ranging and exhaustively researched book explores the Tsarist policies that led to Russian encroachment against the land and rights of the indigenous Central Asian people. It describes the corruption that permeated Russian colonial rule and argues that the uprising was no mere draft riot, but a revolt against Tsarist colonialism in all its dimensions: economic, political, religious, and national. Sokol’s masterpiece also traces the chain reaction between the uprising, the collapse of Tsarism, and the Bolshevik Revolution.

**** BCL3 lists the predecessor version carrying the subtitle A century of Russian rule (1967). A needed revision of the classic. Deals with the people, their intellectual lives, the land, history, nationalism, agriculture, industry, modernization. A cloth edition is reported at $57.50; we've not seen it. **** The first edition, titled Central Asia: A Century of Russian Rule (1967), is cited in BCL3. The present edition is a revision of Central Asia: 120 Years of Russian Rule (1989). This new, augmented edition preserves the previous 17 chapters intact. Besides writing a new final chapter that focuses mainly on the eventful period 1989-93, the editor has also revised the preface and notes about contributors, and has enlarged and updated the bibliography of English-language sources and readings. Paper edition (unseen), $26.95. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

This book explores the differing treatment of Russian minorities in the non-Russian republics which seceded from the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Providing detailed case studies, it explains why intervention by Russia occurred in the case of Ukraine, despite Ukraine’s benevolent and inclusive treatment of the large Russian minority, whereas in other republics with less benevolent approaches to minorities intervention did not occur, for example Kazakhstan, where discrimination against the Russian minority increased over time, and Latvia, where the country on its accession to the European Union was deemed to have good minority rights protection, despite a record of discrimination against the Russian minority. Throughout the book emphasises the importance of the perceptions of the republic government regarding the interaction between the minority’s kin-state and the minority, the role that minorities played within the nation-building process and after secession, and the dual threat coming from both the domestic and international spheres.

After almost four centuries of expansion the Russian Empire at the beginning of the 20th century covered vast territories on the Eurasian continent and included an immensely diverse population. How was the new Russian regime to deal with the complexity of its population? This book examines the role of nation and nationality in the Soviet Union and analyzes the establishment of national republics in Soviet Central Asia. It argues that the originally nationally minded Soviet communists with their anti-nationalist attitudes came to view nation and national identity as valuable tools in state building.

"In July 2007, the European Union initiated a fundamentally new approach to the countries of Central Asia. The launch of the EU Strategy for Central Asia signals a qualitative shift in the Union's relations with a region of the world that is of growing importance as a supplier of energy, is geographically situated in a politically sensitive area - between China, Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and the south Caucasus - and contains some of the most authoritarian political regimes in the world. In this volume, leading specialists from Europe, the United States and Central Asia explore the key challenges facing the European Union as it seeks to balance its policies between enhancing the Union's energy, business and security interests in the region while strengthening social justice, democratisation efforts and the protection of human rights. With chapters devoted to the Union's bilateral relations with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan and to the vital issues of security and democratisation, 'Engaging Central Asia' provides the first comprehensive analysis of the EU's strategic initiative in a part of the world that is fast emerging as one of the key regions of the 21st century."--BOOK JACKET.

A comprehensive diplomatic and military history of the Russian conquest of Central Asia, spanning the whole of the nineteenth century.