Popular Geopolitics and Nation Branding in the Post-Soviet Realm

Description

This seminal book explores the complex relationship between popular geopolitics and nation branding among the Newly Independent States of Eurasia, and their combined role in shaping contemporary national image and statecraft within and beyond the region. It provides critical perspectives on international relations, nationalism, and national identity through the use of innovative approaches focusing on popular culture, new media, public diplomacy, and alternative "narrators" of the nation. By positing popular geopolitics and nation branding as contentious forces and complementary flows, the study explores the tensions and elisions between national self-image and external perceptions of the nation, and how this complex interplay has become integral to contemporary global affairs. Popular Geopolitics and Nation Branding in the Post-Soviet Realm- Front Cover Popular Geopolitics and Nation Branding in the Post-Soviet Realm Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Contents List of figures List of tables Acknowledgments Introduction: [Not] made in the USSR Notes References Chapter 1: Of idols and idylls: The question of national image Towards a holistic understanding of national image Related concepts: Nationalism, national identity, and national character National image in history, or the politics of stereotypes Russia’s national image: A case study Notes References Chapter 2: The supermarket of nations: Competitive identity and the brand state The nation as brand: The prehistory of and precursors to a concept More than words: Distinguishing nation branding from other oft-conflated concepts Unlocking the matrix: Developing and measuring competitive identity Tools of the trade, or how to become a brand state The brand state: An overview of three successful branding campaigns Notes References Chapter 3: The mind’s eye: Popular culture, geographical imagination, and international relations “Real” and “unreal”: Representation and the making of geographical imagination The promiscuous origins of popular geopolitics At the nexus: Situating the inter-discipline of popular geopolitics Medium–message relations: Platform, genre, subject Notes References Chapter 4: A brand new Eurasia: Places, spaces, and peoples of the post-Soviet realm Russia: Eurasia’s heartland The Baltic States: From Russia’s “window to the West” to Norden’s “East” The Western Republics: The “new” Eastern Europe Transcaucasia: The Euro-Asian borderlands The Central Asian Republics: Europe in Asia Notes References Chapter 5: The post-Soviet bogeyman: A guide to the dangerous personae of the former USSR The fall of the “Red Giant” and Russia’s “resurrection” The villainous “post-Soviet” archetype in Western popular culture The revanchist: Restoring the lost empire by any means necessary The wild-eyed terrorist: Filling the ideological hole with nihilism The ruthless mercenary: Killing for cash and the rush in the new Eurasia Between oligarch and mafioso: The new “biznezman” and monstrous capitalism unleashed The mad scientist: Abandoned geniuses and orphaned technologies The existential exception: A deviation from the norm? Notes References Chapter 6: Laughable nations: Parodying the post-Soviet republics (En)visioning the post-Second World: Distorted representations and perspectival prejudices Dumbing down the world: The Onion’s post-Soviet landscape Out of the Antipodean mind: Molvanîa as a post-Soviet caricature A guide to Boratistan: Sacha Baron Cohen’s final salvo at Kazakhstan Post-Soviet space as a comedic prop: An analysis of the faux geographies of the former USSR Notes References Chapter 7: Mapping Trashcanistan: The post-Soviet badlands in popular culture, news media, and academe Projecting place and space: Popular cartography, affective landscapes, and (geo)politicized aesthetics Eurasia’s “danger zones”: An analysis of four semiotic landscapes Putting popular-culture codes and visions to work: Tabloid realism and the post-Soviet frame Notes References Chapter 8: Branded!: Marketing Eurasia’s new nations to the (Western) world Rebranding Russia: Paroxysms, paradoxes, and Putin The Baltic Wunderkinder: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania Out of the shadows: The Commonwealth of Independent States Notes References Conclusion: Post-Soviet Eurasia: The once and future geopolitical imaginary Notes References Index