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In lieu of our in-person annual gathering, the CAMCA Regional Forum organizers  are hosting a virtual e-CAMCA Week.

The June 2020 CAMCA Forum, to be held in Almaty, Kazakhstan, was postponed until June 2021. In its place, CACI and the Rumsfeld Foundation organized the e-CAMCA week of online events and publication. Find recordings of the e-CAMCA Week virtual events held over June 15th-19th at the CAMCA Forum YouTube Channel, as well a variety of original #CAMCAweek publications and resources for our CAMCA Forum community at www.camcaforum.org,. 

 

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CAMCA 2020 pic 2 

CAMCA 2020 part 3

E-CAMCA WEEK PUBLICATIONS

The Value of CAMCA 

A joint statement on the value of the CAMCA Regional Forum by three distinguished regional representatives: Amb. Tedo Japaridze, Sen. Sodyq Safoev and Amb. Hafiz Pashayev

Welcome Letter

Letter from Secretary Donald Rumsfeld

 and Dr. S  Frederick Starr for

e-CAMCA Week 2020 participants

Meet CAMCA Entrepreneurs

View features of some successful regional entrepreneurs from our CAMCA Network

"Caucasus & Central Asia Post COVID-19" Series- Volume I

The Strasbourg Policy Centre's Series brings together statesmen and scholars that reflect on how the current pandemic affects the economy and power distribution in the region bridging the Atlantic and the Pacific economies

Digital Transformation in the CAMCA Region

A jointly authored article by two CAMCA Network members - Mariam Lashkhi, Deputy Chairperson of Georgia’s Innovation & Technology Agency, and Talant Sultanov, Co-Founder of the Internet Society-Kyrgyz Chapter

Post COVID-19: Challeges & Opportunities for the Region

A comprehensive collection of brief commentaries on the short and long-term impacts – economic, political and social – of the COVID-19 pandemic on the CAMCA region.  Contributors to this unique publication include more than 20 experts and professionals from over 10 countries representing think tanks, business, academia, government and more.  Read these wide-ranging perspectives, including insights directly from the region, curated for our CAMCA Forum community.

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Click here to sign up for CACI Forum mailing list

Published in Forums & Events
Monday, 15 June 2020 00:00

e-CAMCA Week 2020

Screen Shot 2020-06-17 at 9.22.34 AM

In lieu of our in-person annual gathering, the CAMCA Regional Forum organizers  are hosting a virtual e-CAMCA Week.

From June 15th-19th we will be hosting a daily live speaker session or panel, as well as releasing a variety of original content and helpful resources, for our CAMCA Forum community. We’ve pulled together a terrific collection of experts from across sectors, including members of the CAMCA Network, that will be delivering the latest on what you need to know about the region during the COVID-19 crisis and beyond.  

Live video events will take place at 10 AM EST daily from June 16th-19th .

TUNE IN HERE  to our Facebook page for live video events (full agenda below) and

SUBSCRIBE BELOW to receive the aforementioned release

VIEW THE FULL AGENDA DETAILS HERE

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CAMCA 2020 pic 2 

CAMCA 2020 part 3

E-CAMCA WEEK PUBLICATIONS

The Value of CAMCA 

A joint statement on the value of the CAMCA Regional Forum by three distinguished regional representatives: Amb. Tedo Japaridze, Sen. Sodyq Safoev and Amb. Hafiz Pashayev

Welcome Letter

Letter from Secretary Donald Rumsfeld

 and Dr. S  Frederick Starr for

e-CAMCA Week 2020 participants

Meet CAMCA Entrepreneurs

View features of some successful regional entrepreneurs from our CAMCA Network

"Caucasus & Central Asia Post COVID-19" Series- Volume I

The Strasbourg Policy Centre's Series brings together statesmen and scholars that reflect on how the current pandemic affects the economy and power distribution in the region bridging the Atlantic and the Pacific economies

Digital Transformation in the CAMCA Region

A jointly authored article by two CAMCA Network members - Mariam Lashkhi, Deputy Chairperson of Georgia’s Innovation & Technology Agency, and Talant Sultanov, Co-Founder of the Internet Society-Kyrgyz Chapter

Post COVID-19: Challeges & Opportunities for the Region

A comprehensive collection of brief commentaries on the short and long-term impacts – economic, political and social – of the COVID-19 pandemic on the CAMCA region.  Contributors to this unique publication include more than 20 experts and professionals from over 10 countries representing think tanks, business, academia, government and more.  Read these wide-ranging perspectives, including insights directly from the region, curated for our CAMCA Forum community.

Screen Shot 2020-06-17 at 9.36.51 AM

Click here to sign up for CACI Forum mailing list

Published in Forums & Events

Azerbaijan in a Changing Caucasus: Developments in Foreign and Domestic Policies

Azerbaijan has recently embarked on a series of reforms to modernize the country’s economic and social policies. In foreign relations, Azerbaijan is in the final stages of negotiating an enhanced cooperation agreement with the European Union, and continues to work toward the realization of the Southern Gas Corridor. Increased diplomatic activity has intensified expectations surrounding the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh, while U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton's visit to the South Caucasus in October also suggests growing U.S. engagement. The American Foreign Policy Council's Central Asia-Caucasus Institute and the Center for Strategic & International Studies held a discussion with three senior Azerbaijani parliamentarians, who provided an update on developments in Azerbaijan and the region.

Speakers: 

Mr. Samad Seyidov – Chairman of the Committee on Foreign and Interparliamentary Relations of Parliament, Head of Azerbaijan-USA working group on interparliamentary relations 
Ms. Sahiba Gafarova – Member of the Committee on Foreign and Interparliamentary Relations of Parliament
Mr. Asim Mollazada – Member of the Committee on Foreign and Interparliamentary Relations of Parliament

Introduction: Svante Cornell, Director, Central Asia-Caucasus Institute

Moderator: Jeff Mankoff, Deputy Director, Russia & Eurasia Program, CSIS

 

Where: Center for Strategic and Intenational Studies: 1616 Rhode Island Avenue NW, Concourse Level, Washington, DC 20036

When: Friday, March 29, 2019 from 12:00 - 1:30 pm

Published in Forums & Events

By Mamuka Tsereteli

Landmark Caspian Deal Could Pave the way for Long-Stalled Energy Projects

September 2018

Click for full article

Published on: September 7, 2018 
 
Mamuka Tsereteli, Ph.D., is a senior fellow at the Central Asia Caucasus Institute of the American Foreign Policy Council in Washington, D.C.

 

Published in Staff Publications

Visions of Azerbaijan

Spring 2017

 

By Svante E. Cornell

 

Predicting the future of US relations with any country under the Trump Administration may appear a fool’s errand. The new president has little political background, especially in foreign policy; and he has explicitly made unpredictability a mark of honour. Can anything, then, be said about the Trump Administration’s likely approach to Azerbaijan and the Caspian region? At this early date, only several preliminary conclusions can be drawn.

However, to appreciate the prospects of America’s approach to the region, it is useful to briefly examine the history of the past 25 years. Simply put, for the first half of the quarter-century since independence, there was a bipartisan consensus that held that the Caspian was an important region for American national security interests, and both Democratic and Republican administrations pursued balanced foreign policies that sought to advance security, trade, and democratic development. Yet in the second half of the period, this began to change, and an American disengagement from the South Caucasus and Central Asia has been very visible. This disengagement was most visible in the areas of security and trade; whereas the normative agenda of supporting democracy and human rights remained in full vigour, creating a lack of balance in US policies.

Published in Staff Publications

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News

  • Read CACI Chairman S. Frederick Starr's recent interview on the resurgence of Imperial Russia with The American Purpose
    Tuesday, 23 May 2023 00:00

    Why Russians Support the War: Jeffrey Gedmin interviews S. Frederick Starr on the resurgence of Imperial Russia.

    The American Purpose, May 23, 2023

    Jeffrey Gedmin: Do we have a Putin problem or a Russia problem today?

    S. Frederick Starr: We have a Putin problem because we have a Russia problem. Bluntly, the mass of Russians are passive and easily manipulated—down to the moment they aren’t. Two decades ago they made a deal with Vladimir Putin, as they have done with many of his predecessors: You give us a basic income, prospects for a better future, and a country we can take pride in, and we will give you a free hand. This is the same formula for autocracy that prevailed in Soviet times, and, before that, under the czars. The difference is that this time Russia’s leader—Putin—and his entourage have adopted a bizarre and dangerous ideology, “Eurasianism,” that empowers them to expand Russian power at will over the entire former territory of the USSR and even beyond. It is a grand and awful vision that puffs up ruler and ruled alike.

    What do most Russians think of this deal? It leaves them bereft of the normal rights of citizenship but free from its day-to-day responsibilities. So instead of debating, voting, and demonstrating, Russians store up their frustrations and then release them in elemental, often destructive, and usually futile acts of rebellion. This “Russia problem” leaves the prospect of change in Russia today in the hands of alienated members of Putin’s immediate entourage, many of whom share his vision of Russia’s destiny and are anyway subject to Putin’s ample levers for control. Thus, our “Putin problem” arises from our “Russia problem.”

    Click to continue reading...

  • CACI director Svante Cornell's interviewed on the 'John Batchelor Show' podcast regarding Turkey's 2023 presidential election
    Friday, 19 May 2023 00:00

    Listen to CACI director Svante Cornell's recent interview on the 'John Batchelor Show' podcast regarding Turkey's 2023 presidential election. Click here!

  • New Article Series on Changing Geopolitics of Central Asia and the Caucasus
    Wednesday, 24 November 2021 11:53

    Eurasia

  • CACI Initiative on Religion and the Secular State in Central Asia and the Caucasus
    Sunday, 24 January 2021 13:53

    In 2016, the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program launched an initiative on documenting the interrelationship of religion and the secular state in the region. This initiative departed from the fact that little systematic reserch had been undertaken on the subject thus far. While there was and remains much commentary and criticism of religious policy in the region, there was no comprehensive analysis available on the interrelationship of religion and the state in any regional state, let alone the region as a whole. The result of this initiative has been the publication of six Silk Road Papers studying the matter in regional states, with more to come. In addition, work is ongoing on a volume putting the regional situation in the context of the Muslim world as a whole.

     

    Case Studies

    Each study below can be freely downloaded in PDF format.

    az-formula-SRSP

    Azerbaijan's Formula: Secular Governance and Civil Nationhood
    By Svante E. Cornell, Halil Karaveli, and Boris Ajeganov
    November 2016   




    2018-04-Kazakhstan-SecularismReligion and the Secular State in Kazakhstan
    By Svante E. Cornell, S. Frederick Starr and Julian Tucker
    April 2018

     

     

     

    1806-UZ-coverReligion and the Secular State in Uzbekistan
    Svante E. Cornell and Jacob Zenn
    June 2018

     

     

     

    2006-Engvall-coverReligion and the Secular State in Kyrgyzstan
    Johan Engvall
    June 2020

     Event video online

     

    2006-Clement-coverReligion and the Secular State in Turkmenistan
    Victoria Clement
    June 2020

    Event video online

     

     

     

    Articles and Analyses

    Svante E. Cornell, "Religion and the State in Central Asia," in Ilan Berman, ed., Wars of Ideas: Theology, Interpretation and Power in the Muslim World, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2021.

    Svante E. Cornell, "Central Asia: Where Did Islamic Radicalization Go?" in Religion, Conflict and Stability in the Former Soviet Union, eds. Katya Migacheva and Bryan Frederick, Arlington, VA: RAND Corporation, 2018.