Unrepresented Nations And Peoples Organization Research Articles

Activities of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) during the Georgian-Abkhaz Conflict in the 1990s

Abstract The article deals with the activities of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) in mediating the Georgian-Abkhazian conflict both during the war (1992–1993) and after it in the 1990s. These activities of UNPO were mainly coordinated from the Estonian city of Tartu, where the UNPO Tartu Coordination Office was located. The task of the Office was to organize the work of the UNPO on the territory of the former Soviet Union. Many of the regional meetings of the UNPO, which discussed the Georgian-Abkhazian conflict, took place in different Estonian cities in the 1990s. The article analyses also the UNPO’s missions in the conflict area. The documents of the UNPO Tartu Coordination Office, which are compiled in Tartu, were used as the main sources.

Liminal geopolitics: the subjectivity and spatiality of diplomacy at the margins

This paper argues that the lens of liminality has the potential to enrich scholarship in critical geopolitics by offering a nuanced approach to the geographies and ambivalence of political subjectivity. In the context of a perceived proliferation of ‘new’ actors the paper turns critical attention to what happens at the threshold between the categories of state and non‐state, official and unofficial diplomacy. It asks what such a perspective on diplomacy might mean for understandings of who is, and who should be, a legitimate actor in international politics by turning to the notion of liminality as developed in cultural anthropology. This is a concept that surprisingly has been overlooked in political geography and this paper asks how geographers might engage more productively with it, particularly in light of emergent critical international relations research on liminality as a paradigm for understanding stability and change in institutionalised orders. Empirically, the paper focuses on the articulation of liminal political subjectivities and spatialities through the lens of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO), a coalition of almost 50 stateless nations, indigenous communities and national minorities that currently are denied a place at international diplomatic forums. Drawing on this case study, the paper examines three areas of geopolitical enquiry that the notion of liminality opens up. First is the spatiality of diplomacy in terms of the out‐of‐placeness of liminal actors and the construction of transformative spaces of quasi‐official diplomacy. Second are particular qualities of political subjectivity, including the blurring of boundaries between diplomacy and activism, and the notion of geopolitical shapeshifters. Finally, attention turns to the notion of communitas to draw out the politics of belonging, recognition and legitimacy. The paper concludes by suggesting that the idea of ambivalence that underpins liminality is a useful provocation to take creativity and aspiration seriously in geopolitics.

When two ambiguities collide: the use of genocide in self-determination drives

I explore the nexus between genocide and secession. I argue, first, that legal ambiguity creates space for overlap, with genocide claims frequently proving to be the weapon of choice for relatively weak secessionist entities struggling to enhance their bargaining position and achieve international legal status. Using new data, I find that nearly three-quarters of pro-autonomy entities belonging to the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) have made genocide allegations an important part of their struggle. Next, I use the three secessionist cases of South Ossetia and Abkhazia (Georgia) and Kosovo (Yugoslavia) to analyze how genocide allegations alter local and international stances and significantly complicate the nature of conflict resolution.