Beyond the Steppe Frontier - (Studies of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute) by Soeren Urbansky (Paperback)

About the Book

"Over two thousand miles long, the boundary between Russia and China is the world's longest land border. Though sometimes considered a backwater, the border region was always of critical geopolitical importance and has a fascinating history. Not only did this border divide the two largest Eurasian empires, it was also the place where European and Asian civilizations met, where nomads and settled peoples mingled, where the imperial interests of Russia, China, and Japan clashed, and where both conflicts and gestures of friendship between the world's largest Communist regimes were staged. This book is a history of this border from the late nineteenth century until the fall of the Soviet Union. The border has undergone a remarkable transformation since the late nineteenth century. As late as the 1920s, Russian, Chinese, and native worlds were intricately interwoven in the region, and the frontier was barely regulated. By the end of the twentieth century, however, the two countries had succeeded in cutting kin, cultural, economic, and religious connections between the two sides through deportation, forced assimilation, and nationalist propaganda campaigns. Only with the collapse of the Soviet Union would China and Russia reopen the border, but even today the line between countries demarcates two distinct regions with remarkably different worldviews and cultures. Drawing on sources in seven languages, including extensive archival research, interviews, and oral histories, Urbansky stresses the significant role of the local population in supporting, or more often undermining, the two states' border-making efforts"--

Book Synopsis

A comprehensive history of the Sino-Russian border, one of the longest and most important land borders in the world

The Sino-Russian border, once the world's longest land border, has received scant attention in histories about the margins of empires. Beyond the Steppe Frontier rectifies this by exploring the demarcation's remarkable transformation--from a vaguely marked frontier in the seventeenth century to its twentieth-century incarnation as a tightly patrolled barrier girded by watchtowers, barbed wire, and border guards. Through the perspectives of locals, including railroad employees, herdsmen, and smugglers from both sides, Sören Urbansky explores the daily life of communities and their entanglements with transnational and global flows of people, commodities, and ideas. Urbansky challenges top-down interpretations by stressing the significance of the local population in supporting, and undermining, border making.

Because Russian, Chinese, and native worlds are intricately interwoven, national separations largely remained invisible at the border between the two largest Eurasian empires. This overlapping and mingling came to an end only when the border gained geopolitical significance during the twentieth century. Relying on a wealth of sources culled from little-known archives from across Eurasia, Urbansky demonstrates how states succeeded in suppressing traditional borderland cultures by cutting kin, cultural, economic, and religious connections across the state perimeter, through laws, physical force, deportation, reeducation, forced assimilation, and propaganda.

Beyond the Steppe Frontier sheds critical new light on a pivotal geographical periphery and expands our understanding of how borders are determined.

Review Quotes

"Richly detailed. . . . Beyond the Steppe Frontier sheds new light on the history of the Sino-Russian border by its effort to consider the varied perspectives of its inhabitants."---Elizabeth Wishnick, The Middle Ground Journal

"Beyond the Steppe Frontier is a great read and a very important book for anyone studying Chinese and Russian history, but it is also for students of other border regions. Certain lacunae in presenting a big-ger picture are compensated by skill-ful reconstruction of the processes on the ground. The book makes one want to read the next study."---Camille Neufville, Ab Imperio Quarterly

"Beyond the Steppe Frontier gives life to the Sino-Russian border. [Urbansky] has brilliantly served students, scholars, and history enthusiasts by presenting a compelling, innovative, and well-researched book on the recent Sino-Russian past that reminds us that human interactions make history. This human dimension, which is so central to the volume, is also responsible for making Urbansky's thought-provoking work such an enjoyable read."---Giulia Sciorati, E-International Relations

"A brilliant cross between a Lonely Planet Guide for the place you never wanted to visit and a serious academic study of life in imperial borderlands. It's an interdisciplinary cocktail of history, politics, economics, sociology and anthropology."---Sergey Radchenko, China Quarterly

"This is a rich account of one of the world's longest national borders."---K.E. Stapleton, Choice

"Urbansky's remarkable study manages to embed the history of Sino-Russian international relations into the messy and wavering social reality of a borderland that was also shaped by the cultures, agendas, and material interests of the successive generations of its inhabitants."---N. Pianciola, Slavonic and East European Review

"Winner of the Central Eurasian Studies Society Book Award, History & Humanities category"

About the Author

Sören Urbansky is a research fellow at the German Historical Institute in Washington, DC. He is the author of Kolonialer Wettstreit: Russland, China, Japan und die Ostchinesische Eisenbahn.