What Capital Cities Say About State and Nation Building

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In late 1997 Kazakhstan—at tremendous expense—shifted its capital city from scenic Almaty to windswept Akmola (later renamed Astana). Why would an elite undertake to move its capital city from one location to another? I will suggest that it is fruitful to view capital relocation—that is, the physical move of the central state apparatus—as a response to the challenges posed by a state's cultural geography. Capital relocation is an attractive strategy for post-colonial elites who face particularly acute state and nation building dilemmas. The capital shift in Kazakhstan was unique in post-Soviet space, and this uniqueness tells us much about the different nature of post-Soviet space versus other post-colonial contexts. In turn, this allows us to characterize the terrain upon which identity politics occurs.