Eurasian Regionalism from the Perspective of Scale


This article argues that the analytical concept of scale can provide researchers with a more holistic, entangled, and decolonised research perspective on Eurasian regionalism. By drawing on the socio-spatial analytical perspective of scale, I show how we can overcome theoretical biases and conceptual divides in and between the entangled fields of ir and Eurasian studies.1 A scalar perspective helps to dissolve these biases and divides by de-essentialising Eurasia as a region and conceptualising it as a contested, constructed and contentious political geography, formed by powerful actors who use the notion of ‘region’ to further their political interests. One virtue of a scalar perspective is that it reveals the multidimensional character of Eurasian regionalism and its connectedness with the global, depending on the imaginaries activated, the vested power interests pursued, and the regional, inter-regional and international networks created in a specific issue area.