Ripping Up the Ties: Tracing Rising Alienation in Bilateral and Cross-Border Relations of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, 1991–2006

This article is a foundational study of a largely unstudied borderland between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Drawing on Oscar Martinez’s typology of cross-border interactions, it traces the border’s transformation during the first fifteen years of independence (1991–2006) from an open administrative boundary within the Soviet socio-economic system to an alienated, militarized, and conflict-prone international border. The article makes three contributions. First, it sheds light on a border that has remained largely out of the limelight of border scholarship due to the scarcity of secondary sources and difficult field access. Second, it shows what it means to become an alienated borderland through the lens of everyday and political realities. Third, the article illuminates what borderland alienation entails in the authoritarian context. The article underlines that Turkmenistan, the weaker state with a harsher authoritarian regime, has been the main driver of the measures that led to border closures.