Effect of Hydropolitics Relations on the Nation-Building Process, Case Study: Rogun Dam Superstructure in Tajikistan

فصلنامه آب و توسعه پایدار

Article 3, Volume 7, Issue 4 - Serial Number 18, March 2021, Pages 11-20   

Document Type: Applied Article

DOI: 10.22067/jwsd.v7i4.86939

Abstract

The pursuit and construction of superstructures by the rulers has a special place in the process of nation Building of many countries. In post-Soviet countries, rulers have sought to politically manage space and maintain social influence and control over the past two decades to demonstrate their legitimacy by building large water-based infrastructures. The Rogun Dam in Tajikistan is a superstructure on the Vakhsh River, which if built at 335 meters, is the highest dam in the world, providing the country's energy self-sufficiency. By presenting a geopolitical conception of national progress and pride, these identities have been able to play a role in the emergence and empowerment of nationalist discourse in this country. The present article is based on the hypothesis that the symbolic meaning of the Rogun Dam in the geopolitical code nationalization process is to explain the Tajik government's insistence over the past two decades to complete this costly and tense plan with neighboring countries. The information required for the research is collected by the library method and the methodology governing the text is descriptive-analytical in nature. The results showed that the idea of building the Rogun Dam enables Tajik political elites to divert people's attention from internal challenges, promising them a better future, arousing a sense of national pride and increasing their legitimacy, the country's survival and guarantee the government. Uzbekistan's opposition to the construction of the Rogun Dam could also be used as a kind of hydro political confrontation to strengthen national solidarity against the Uzbek enemy. Because those who challenge its construction are the enemy of the nation.

Keywords

Hydropolitic; Nation Building; Symbol; Tajikistan; Rogun Dam

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