This book analyses the role of the mobility factor in the spread of
Russian rule in Eurasia in the formative period of the rise of the
Russian Empire and offers an examination of the interaction of Russian
authorities with their nomadic partners.
Demonstrating that the mobility factor strongly shaped the system of
protectorate that the Russian and Qing monarchs imposed on their nomadic
counterparts, the book argues that it operated as a flexible
institutional framework, which enabled all sides to derive maximum
benefits from a given political situation. The author establishes that
interactions of Russian authorities with their Kalmyk and Qazaq
counterparts during the mid-16th to the mid-19th centuries were strongly
informed by the power dynamics of the Inner Asian frontier. These
dynamics were marked by Russia's rivalry with Qing Chinese and Jungar
leaders to exert its influence over frontier nomadic populations. This
book shows that each of these parties began to adopt key elements of
existing steppe political culture. It also suggests that the different
norms of governance adopted by the Russian state continued to shape its
elite politics well into the 1820s and beyond. The author proposes that,
by combining key elements of this culture with new practices, Russian
authorities proved capable of creating innovative forms of governance
that ended up shaping the very nature of the colonial Russian state
itself.
An important contribution to the ongoing debates pertaining to the
nature of the spread of Russian rule over the numerous populations of
the vast Eurasian terrains, this book will be of interest to academics
working on Russian history, Central Asian/Eurasian history and political
and cultural history.
