Content area
Full Text
Suha Bolukbasi. Azerbaijan: A Political History. London: I.B. Tauris, 2011. ISBN: 10: 1848856202 (Pbk), ISBN: 13: 978-1848856202 (Hbk). Pp. 292.
Based on Russian, Azerbaijani, and Armenian scholarly and literary works, this book analyzes the political history until 1994 of Northern Azerbaijan, which regained its independence in 1991 at the time of the Soviet Union's disintegration. Bolukbasi's thoroughly documented analysis, useful for both political scientists and historians, largely omits Southern Azerbaijan, which lies in northern Iran. In seven chapters and a conclusion, the author examines pre-Soviet, Soviet, and post-Soviet developments in the country.
Chapter 1 surveys the history of Azerbaijan up to the Soviet era and analyzes the intellectual movements in Azerbaijan under imperial Russian rule. Bolukbasi gives close analysis to the causes and consequences of the 1905 Azeri-Armenian intercommunal conflict and the effects of the 1917 October Revolution in Azerbaijan. The Soviet era is controversial, and Bolukbasi concludes his evaluation of contrasting scholarly views with remarkable balance.
Much of chapters 2 to 6 deals with Azerbaijan's relations with Armenia, particularly the conflict over the Nagorno Karabakh region. Highly critical of Armenia's irredentism vis-à-vis Nagorno Karabakh, Bolukbasi argues that the roots of the 1988-94 war over Karabakh lie in the...