Pub Date : 2020-02-07DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2019.1709784
Guranda Bursulaia
ABSTRACT Multiple studies in the Social Sciences and Humanities emphasize the importance of textbooks in shaping collective memory as well as the process of transmission to a new generation. The state is considered the main agent in the formation of dominant narratives transmitted through textbooks. This article attempts to demonstrate that public opinion and judgment are as such important vectors of the official rhetoric or policy meant to influence the prevailing discourse. In post-conflict societies, the wider scholarship suggests that silencing, a type of forgetting, is an effective tool when telling stories of traumatization. Silencing is not only a form of forgetting, but rather a self-sufficient, independent category, and a deliberately selected technique of remembering. It is an intentional strategy of voiceless speaking. Using a qualitative research method, I build my arguments on a textual analysis of the six most common Georgian school history textbooks from 1993 to 2018, focusing on chapters relating to the 1992–93 war in Abkhazia. I propose three types of silencing: traumatic, personalized and victimized. This study contributes to the vibrant discussion about memory agents, as well as correlations between individual, collective and official memory. It explores the impact of such memories on the national curricula.
{"title":"The voices of silence: The case of Georgian history textbooks","authors":"Guranda Bursulaia","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2019.1709784","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2019.1709784","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Multiple studies in the Social Sciences and Humanities emphasize the importance of textbooks in shaping collective memory as well as the process of transmission to a new generation. The state is considered the main agent in the formation of dominant narratives transmitted through textbooks. This article attempts to demonstrate that public opinion and judgment are as such important vectors of the official rhetoric or policy meant to influence the prevailing discourse. In post-conflict societies, the wider scholarship suggests that silencing, a type of forgetting, is an effective tool when telling stories of traumatization. Silencing is not only a form of forgetting, but rather a self-sufficient, independent category, and a deliberately selected technique of remembering. It is an intentional strategy of voiceless speaking. Using a qualitative research method, I build my arguments on a textual analysis of the six most common Georgian school history textbooks from 1993 to 2018, focusing on chapters relating to the 1992–93 war in Abkhazia. I propose three types of silencing: traumatic, personalized and victimized. This study contributes to the vibrant discussion about memory agents, as well as correlations between individual, collective and official memory. It explores the impact of such memories on the national curricula.","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"8 1","pages":"278 - 293"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-02-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2019.1709784","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47197943","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712911
Adrian Brisku
The case of the gortsy mountaineers of the North Caucasus, who came to view the Transcaucasian Federative Democratic Republic (TDFR) as a viable state structure for Transcaucasia and sought to join it, represents one of the clearest examples of support for the TDFR. All of the contributions to this collection have dealt in one way or another with the question of who wanted the TDFR, examining the positions at different points in time of the influential political forces in the constituent nationalities, the small regional entities, and the key policy-makers of the Great Powers, who had all in some way – in some cases decades before the onset of the First World War and for decades after it – conceptualized of a federative or confederative framework of co-existence and cooperation for the nationalities of the North and South Caucasus. Many viewed such elements of interaction and interdependence as appealing and progressive, both in historical and cultural terms, and also as a modern path toward economic and political development. Insightfully, many viewed such a framework as more attractive than that of the nation-state for the region’s nationalities. And while the appeal for a federative arrangement had grassroot support, a key issue that came to the fore as the result of the First World War, the collapse of the Russian Empire, and the subsequent establishment of de facto federative structures such as the Transcaucasian Commissariat and the Seim, was whether the constituent elements in these structures could or should declare independence from their former metropole, the Russian state, which was undergoing an existential crisis and revolutionary transformation that many found frightening. In this context the range of actors who viewed the independence of the TDFR as viable was more limited. In the Georgian case, the most powerful political party, the Social-Democratic Party, was split on this issue: Akaki Chkhenkeli and Noe Ramishvili became the most ardent promoters of independence, while the rest of the party merely acquiesced, as did other parties during the five weeks of the TDFR’s existence. In the Azerbaijani case, even though most of the political parties were sympathetic to Ottoman Turkey, they wanted the independence of the TDFR and rejected the idea of its incorporation into the Ottoman Empire. The Armenian political parties, too, especially the Dashnaks, opposed the TDFR, but were reluctant to part with it when faced with the option of taking on the Ottoman army all on their own, which, ultimately, they had to do. Although the three main nationalities of the Transcaucasus were divided among themselves and also vis-à-vis one another in their views towards the independence of the TDFR, the Ottoman Empire was the most explicit among the Great Powers in its support for such independence while it existed. The Ottomans had their reasons and motivations for doing this, even though their own political experience with federalism compelled them to
{"title":"Afterword","authors":"Adrian Brisku","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2020.1712911","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712911","url":null,"abstract":"The case of the gortsy mountaineers of the North Caucasus, who came to view the Transcaucasian Federative Democratic Republic (TDFR) as a viable state structure for Transcaucasia and sought to join it, represents one of the clearest examples of support for the TDFR. All of the contributions to this collection have dealt in one way or another with the question of who wanted the TDFR, examining the positions at different points in time of the influential political forces in the constituent nationalities, the small regional entities, and the key policy-makers of the Great Powers, who had all in some way – in some cases decades before the onset of the First World War and for decades after it – conceptualized of a federative or confederative framework of co-existence and cooperation for the nationalities of the North and South Caucasus. Many viewed such elements of interaction and interdependence as appealing and progressive, both in historical and cultural terms, and also as a modern path toward economic and political development. Insightfully, many viewed such a framework as more attractive than that of the nation-state for the region’s nationalities. And while the appeal for a federative arrangement had grassroot support, a key issue that came to the fore as the result of the First World War, the collapse of the Russian Empire, and the subsequent establishment of de facto federative structures such as the Transcaucasian Commissariat and the Seim, was whether the constituent elements in these structures could or should declare independence from their former metropole, the Russian state, which was undergoing an existential crisis and revolutionary transformation that many found frightening. In this context the range of actors who viewed the independence of the TDFR as viable was more limited. In the Georgian case, the most powerful political party, the Social-Democratic Party, was split on this issue: Akaki Chkhenkeli and Noe Ramishvili became the most ardent promoters of independence, while the rest of the party merely acquiesced, as did other parties during the five weeks of the TDFR’s existence. In the Azerbaijani case, even though most of the political parties were sympathetic to Ottoman Turkey, they wanted the independence of the TDFR and rejected the idea of its incorporation into the Ottoman Empire. The Armenian political parties, too, especially the Dashnaks, opposed the TDFR, but were reluctant to part with it when faced with the option of taking on the Ottoman army all on their own, which, ultimately, they had to do. Although the three main nationalities of the Transcaucasus were divided among themselves and also vis-à-vis one another in their views towards the independence of the TDFR, the Ottoman Empire was the most explicit among the Great Powers in its support for such independence while it existed. The Ottomans had their reasons and motivations for doing this, even though their own political experience with federalism compelled them to","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"589 2","pages":"124 - 125"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712911","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41263036","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712905
Beka Kobakhidze
ABSTRACT The collapse of central power in the Russian Empire 1917 left the peoples of the Caucasus alone in the midst of the havoc of the Great War. While political elites were forced to detach the region from Soviet Russia, they simultaneously realized that Transcaucasia could survive only in unity, and thus formed first a Commissariat and then a Federation. Yet geopolitics, the shared imperial legacy, the economic prognoses, the complex ethnic demography, and the existing boundary disagreements ultimately made federation impossible. Nevertheless, the victorious Allies of the Great War saw their interests in the Caucasian “package”, advising that a Federation or a Confederation be created in the region. This article examines the geopolitical significance of the discourse surrounding this proposed Caucasian and Transcaucasian federation/confederation.
{"title":"Feeble projects and aspirations: the Caucasian and Transcaucasian federation/confederation in the geopolitics of 1918–1920","authors":"Beka Kobakhidze","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2020.1712905","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712905","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The collapse of central power in the Russian Empire 1917 left the peoples of the Caucasus alone in the midst of the havoc of the Great War. While political elites were forced to detach the region from Soviet Russia, they simultaneously realized that Transcaucasia could survive only in unity, and thus formed first a Commissariat and then a Federation. Yet geopolitics, the shared imperial legacy, the economic prognoses, the complex ethnic demography, and the existing boundary disagreements ultimately made federation impossible. Nevertheless, the victorious Allies of the Great War saw their interests in the Caucasian “package”, advising that a Federation or a Confederation be created in the region. This article examines the geopolitical significance of the discourse surrounding this proposed Caucasian and Transcaucasian federation/confederation.","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"8 1","pages":"69 - 80"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712905","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45815961","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712907
Timothy K. Blauvelt
ABSTRACT The Tiflis-born Stepan Shaumyan (1878–1918) was one of the most active revolutionaries in the Transcaucasus and a prolific theorist about the “national question” who corresponded regularly with Lenin and other leading Bolsheviks. In a crucial moment in the spring of 1918, as the Russian Empire was disintegrating and the Russian Civil War was breaking out, Shaumyan, appointed by Lenin as Commissar Extraordinary for the Caucasus, attempted to create a compelling internationalist and “Soviet” appeal to challenging the emerging nationalist paradigm in the Transcaucasus. Shaumyan’s efforts to consolidate Bolshevik rule in the “Baku Commune” in 1918 contributed to a bloody ethnic massacre, and his attempts to spread Soviet Power in the region failed, resulting in his execution together with the other “26 Baku Commissars” in September of that year. Making extensive use of Shaumyan’s writings, including his early work held in manuscript form in the Georgian Party Archives in Tbilisi, this article examines Shaumyan’s conceptions of the “nationality question” and their implementation in the Transcaucasus under his leadership in 1918, and the lessons that the Bolsheviks may have drawn from failure of his program for the later formulation of Soviet nationality policy.
{"title":"Ideology meets practice in the struggle for the Transcaucasus: Stepan Shaumyan and the evolution of Bolshevik nationality policy","authors":"Timothy K. Blauvelt","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2020.1712907","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712907","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The Tiflis-born Stepan Shaumyan (1878–1918) was one of the most active revolutionaries in the Transcaucasus and a prolific theorist about the “national question” who corresponded regularly with Lenin and other leading Bolsheviks. In a crucial moment in the spring of 1918, as the Russian Empire was disintegrating and the Russian Civil War was breaking out, Shaumyan, appointed by Lenin as Commissar Extraordinary for the Caucasus, attempted to create a compelling internationalist and “Soviet” appeal to challenging the emerging nationalist paradigm in the Transcaucasus. Shaumyan’s efforts to consolidate Bolshevik rule in the “Baku Commune” in 1918 contributed to a bloody ethnic massacre, and his attempts to spread Soviet Power in the region failed, resulting in his execution together with the other “26 Baku Commissars” in September of that year. Making extensive use of Shaumyan’s writings, including his early work held in manuscript form in the Georgian Party Archives in Tbilisi, this article examines Shaumyan’s conceptions of the “nationality question” and their implementation in the Transcaucasus under his leadership in 1918, and the lessons that the Bolsheviks may have drawn from failure of his program for the later formulation of Soviet nationality policy.","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"8 1","pages":"81 - 92"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712907","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42723655","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712902
Adrian Brisku
ABSTRACT This article looks at the historical perspectives and positions of key Georgian political figures – mostly leading Social Democrats such as Noe Zhordania and Akaki Chkhenkeli, as well as National Democrats such as Niko Nikoladze – on the making and unmaking of the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) by analyzing their reflections on the most heated political concepts of the first two decades of the twentieth century: nationality, nationalism, the nation-state, federation, economic development, and socialism in the Georgian, Transcaucasian and imperial contexts, given the rapidly shifting geopolitics of the region triggered by the onset of the Great War and aggravated by the Bolshevik Revolution of November 1917. The article demonstrates that already having conceptualized the socio-economic and cultural needs of the nation as developing outside of the framework of the nation-state, Zhordania and Chkhenkeli viewed these instead within a regional federative context under a revolutionarily transformed imperial centre, while assuming that the Social Democrats would hold the commanding political position in Georgia. This prepared them to take responsibility for establishing de facto federative political institutions for Transcaucasia. That responsibility facilitated the making and unmaking of the short-lived, independent TDFR.
{"title":"The Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) as a “Georgian” responsibility","authors":"Adrian Brisku","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2020.1712902","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712902","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article looks at the historical perspectives and positions of key Georgian political figures – mostly leading Social Democrats such as Noe Zhordania and Akaki Chkhenkeli, as well as National Democrats such as Niko Nikoladze – on the making and unmaking of the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) by analyzing their reflections on the most heated political concepts of the first two decades of the twentieth century: nationality, nationalism, the nation-state, federation, economic development, and socialism in the Georgian, Transcaucasian and imperial contexts, given the rapidly shifting geopolitics of the region triggered by the onset of the Great War and aggravated by the Bolshevik Revolution of November 1917. The article demonstrates that already having conceptualized the socio-economic and cultural needs of the nation as developing outside of the framework of the nation-state, Zhordania and Chkhenkeli viewed these instead within a regional federative context under a revolutionarily transformed imperial centre, while assuming that the Social Democrats would hold the commanding political position in Georgia. This prepared them to take responsibility for establishing de facto federative political institutions for Transcaucasia. That responsibility facilitated the making and unmaking of the short-lived, independent TDFR.","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"8 1","pages":"31 - 44"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712902","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41990944","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712903
Stefano Taglia
ABSTRACT This article interrogates Ottoman sources from the period leading up to and following the creation, in 1918, of the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) to shed light on the reasons behind Istanbul’s initial backing for this Caucasian state. Despite the suggestion that Ottoman Unionist policies were informed by pan-Turkist ideals, it emerges that Istanbul considered, first and foremost, the geopolitical interests of the Empire. Whether this entailed using foreign Muslims to control a strategic area or favouring the creation of a political entity that was not considered fully feasible, Ottoman self-interest was paramount. Controlling the Caucasus, limiting German, British and Russian influence, and re-gaining lost territory were the only considerations that guided Ottoman policies. This explains Ottoman ambivalence in supporting the emergence of the TDFR, as well as Ottoman willingness to pursue further territorial claims which undermined the very existence of the TDFR itself. The conclusions reached in this article have significance for the larger understanding of Ottoman policy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, as too often pan-Turkism and pan-Islamism are used to explain the policies of Istanbul, while the Ottoman political elite was more usually guided by pragmatic considerations.
{"title":"Pragmatism and expediency: Ottoman calculations and the establishment of the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic","authors":"Stefano Taglia","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2020.1712903","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712903","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article interrogates Ottoman sources from the period leading up to and following the creation, in 1918, of the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) to shed light on the reasons behind Istanbul’s initial backing for this Caucasian state. Despite the suggestion that Ottoman Unionist policies were informed by pan-Turkist ideals, it emerges that Istanbul considered, first and foremost, the geopolitical interests of the Empire. Whether this entailed using foreign Muslims to control a strategic area or favouring the creation of a political entity that was not considered fully feasible, Ottoman self-interest was paramount. Controlling the Caucasus, limiting German, British and Russian influence, and re-gaining lost territory were the only considerations that guided Ottoman policies. This explains Ottoman ambivalence in supporting the emergence of the TDFR, as well as Ottoman willingness to pursue further territorial claims which undermined the very existence of the TDFR itself. The conclusions reached in this article have significance for the larger understanding of Ottoman policy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, as too often pan-Turkism and pan-Islamism are used to explain the policies of Istanbul, while the Ottoman political elite was more usually guided by pragmatic considerations.","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"8 1","pages":"45 - 58"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712903","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46509790","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712910
Timothy K. Blauvelt, Stanislav Tumis
ABSTRACT While the state of communications technology, the vicpen issitudes of war and revolution, and vast distances created obstacles to communication and interaction on the territory of the former Russian Empire during 1917–1918, very often during these revolutionary years, events in one region of the periphery were profoundly shaped by similar things taking place in others. Through a cross-regional and comparative analysis, this article considers the parallels between the situations in the Ukrainian and Transcaucasian theatres, and also the interactions that took place between the independent Ukrainian governments and the Transcaucasian Seim and Federation during this period, and also the ways in which the similar experiences and challenges facing the actors in these spaces, particularly among the ultimately victorious Bolsheviks, influenced their longer-term perspectives towards issues of nationalism, national sentiments, autonomy and federation in the minority regions of the periphery.
{"title":"Ukraine and the Transcaucasus in 1917–1918: parallels, interactions, influences","authors":"Timothy K. Blauvelt, Stanislav Tumis","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2020.1712910","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712910","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT While the state of communications technology, the vicpen issitudes of war and revolution, and vast distances created obstacles to communication and interaction on the territory of the former Russian Empire during 1917–1918, very often during these revolutionary years, events in one region of the periphery were profoundly shaped by similar things taking place in others. Through a cross-regional and comparative analysis, this article considers the parallels between the situations in the Ukrainian and Transcaucasian theatres, and also the interactions that took place between the independent Ukrainian governments and the Transcaucasian Seim and Federation during this period, and also the ways in which the similar experiences and challenges facing the actors in these spaces, particularly among the ultimately victorious Bolsheviks, influenced their longer-term perspectives towards issues of nationalism, national sentiments, autonomy and federation in the minority regions of the periphery.","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"8 1","pages":"105 - 93"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712910","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47655481","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1714877
L. Bakradze
ABSTRACT At the onset of the First World War in August 1914, a group of Georgian émigrés in Europe and the Ottoman Empire offered their cooperation to the German side. Intent on weakening the Entente through supporting uprisings among those states’ colonized nations, the German government was interested in such cooperation. In September 1914 the “Committee for Georgia’s Independence” was formed, which up until 1918 maintained close relations with various state agencies of Germany and its allies, as well as with the anti-Russian forces of the Caucasus and the Russian Empire. The Committee for Georgia’s Independence aspired to present itself as a firm pillar for Germany among what the Germans referred to officially as the “revolutionizing” of the Caucasus. What vision of the future for Georgia and the Caucasus did this Georgian Committee harbour? To what extent did these visions influence German policies? And did the Committee play any role in the events that unfolded in the Caucasus in 1917–1918?
1914年8月第一次世界大战爆发之际，一群在欧洲和奥斯曼帝国的格鲁吉亚人向德国方面提出合作。德国政府意图通过支持这些国家的殖民地的起义来削弱协约国，因此对这种合作很感兴趣。1914年9月，“格鲁吉亚独立委员会”成立，直到1918年，该委员会与德国及其盟国的各个国家机构，以及高加索地区的反俄势力和俄罗斯帝国保持着密切的关系。格鲁吉亚独立委员会(Committee for Georgia ' sindependence)渴望在德国官方所称的高加索地区“革命者”中，把自己塑造成德国的坚定支柱。格鲁吉亚委员会对格鲁吉亚和高加索地区的未来抱有怎样的设想?这些愿景在多大程度上影响了德国的政策?委员会在1917-1918年发生在高加索地区的事件中发挥了任何作用吗?
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Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712901
Georges Mamoulia
ABSTRACT This article examines the origins, negotiations and considerations surrounding the formation and then rapid dissolution of the independent Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) in 1918 from the perspective of Azerbaijani statesmen. Left with few alternatives in the rapidly changing geopolitical situation to accomplish their goals and assure their interests – primarily the economic and physical security of the Azerbaijani Muslim population, and also the recovery of Baku from Bolshevik control – other than to seek the backing of Ottoman Turkey, the Azerbaijani faction in the Transcaucasian Seim nevertheless advocated for the principle of federation, stood up against Turkish intentions regarding the status of Batumi, and did not support the incorporation of their country into the Ottoman Empire. In order to properly evaluate the role of the Azerbaijanis in the creation of the ephemeral TDFR, it is essential to examine the fundamentals of the history of Transcaucasia from the Bolshevik October coup in 1917 until the creation of the TDFR on 22 April 1918 and its dissolution into independent states on 26–28 May 1918.
{"title":"Azerbaijan and the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic: historical reality and possibility*","authors":"Georges Mamoulia","doi":"10.1080/23761199.2020.1712901","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712901","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article examines the origins, negotiations and considerations surrounding the formation and then rapid dissolution of the independent Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) in 1918 from the perspective of Azerbaijani statesmen. Left with few alternatives in the rapidly changing geopolitical situation to accomplish their goals and assure their interests – primarily the economic and physical security of the Azerbaijani Muslim population, and also the recovery of Baku from Bolshevik control – other than to seek the backing of Ottoman Turkey, the Azerbaijani faction in the Transcaucasian Seim nevertheless advocated for the principle of federation, stood up against Turkish intentions regarding the status of Batumi, and did not support the incorporation of their country into the Ottoman Empire. In order to properly evaluate the role of the Azerbaijanis in the creation of the ephemeral TDFR, it is essential to examine the fundamentals of the history of Transcaucasia from the Bolshevik October coup in 1917 until the creation of the TDFR on 22 April 1918 and its dissolution into independent states on 26–28 May 1918.","PeriodicalId":37506,"journal":{"name":"Caucasus Survey","volume":"8 1","pages":"21 - 30"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/23761199.2020.1712901","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49333575","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/23761199.2020.1712898
Mikayel Zolyan
ABSTRACT The period of the short-lived Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) or Transcaucasian Federation was from the Armenian perspective a traumatic one, defined by the military threat coming from the Ottomans and by the complicated relations with the other major ethnic groups of the region. The Armenian political elite and “common Armenians” were caught off-guard by the Russian revolution. The Turkish advance of the Caucasus Front was seen by Armenian political forces as an existential threat, yet this assessment was not necessarily shared by counterparts in the Transcaucasian Federation, especially the Muslim (Azerbaijani) political forces, leading to bitter divisions within the emerging Transcaucasian institutions. These two factors determined the Armenian perspective on the Transcaucasian Federation. The Armenian political entities (first and foremost the Dashnaktsutyun) were opposed to the creation of the Transcaucasian Federation, as they saw its emergence as the result of Ottoman pressure. Yet they were equally reluctant when it came to the transition from the Transcaucasian Federation to independent nation-states. This attitude was reflected in the fact that the Armenian National Council lagged behind its Georgian and Azerbaijani counterparts when it declared itself to be the central body of power in the Armenian-inhabited lands.
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