Doctoral Dissertation Research: Territory and Identity in the Borderlands: The Moldovan Case

这个项目考察了相互竞争的政府界定和控制摩尔多瓦领土的努力如何影响罗马尼亚、德涅斯特河沿岸和乌克兰边境地区的人民。博士生亚当·利维将在约翰·奥洛夫林博士的指导下探索这些边境地区，以及它们如何成为旨在重建国家主权的政府干预的关键地点。这个项目将分析摩尔多瓦公民身份和身份不确定性背后的关键紧张局势。这些紧张局势表明，虽然各国政府正试图重新划分这些边境地区的领土，但由于零散的签证和劳工限制，个人正在非正式地经历这些地区的非领土划分。关键的研究问题是：摩尔多瓦公民身份对边境地区的人们意味着什么，他们的观点与政府的观点相比如何？该项目使用包括访谈、调查、焦点小组和参与者观察在内的混合方法来了解那些可能认为自己是摩尔多瓦人或可能不认为自己是摩尔多瓦人的人如何应对新的政府法规，如欧盟移民政策或罗马尼亚护照管制。这种方法将使人们能够将关于国家和地区建设的正式想法和态度与生活在这些地区的人们的想法和态度进行比较。为该项目收集的数据将绘制对民族/国家的看法、对种族语言社区的忠诚度、家庭迁徙历史以及关于标志性景观作为身份认同和对地方依恋的衡量标准的想法。这项研究还将展示几代人对民族认同和地区地缘政治事件的理解。因此，这些发现将解决有关欧洲关系和后苏联身份如何被遗忘的基本问题。这项研究的更广泛影响突出了摩尔多瓦的罗马尼亚和乌克兰边境，以显示像摩尔多瓦这样的国家在欧盟(EU)或北约等经济和安全共同体中的位置和方式。这个项目的实际政治应用包括更好地理解欧洲和前苏联的边界是如何想象和管理的。与摩尔多瓦民族主义和欧盟/北约“双重扩张”的分析不同，该项目将关注生活在边境地区和穿越边境地区的人--而不仅仅是这些地区的管理官员。这项研究与被定义为不同世代政府官员、学生、教师、农民、商人、活动家、养老金领取者、政治家和回返移民的边境地区利益攸关方合作，将突出对国家认同的正式和非正式理解之间的真实和概念上的差距，以研究这些观点与公民身份概念之间的关系。这种方法侧重于非正式的理解，而不是正式的理解，它将准确地详细说明在边境地区如何经历和争夺权威和身份的转变。因此，这项研究为国家、国家和领土如何整合的关键地缘政治问题提供了答案。更多的贡献将提高人们对在黑海地区等传统“挤压地带”如何划定、管理和感知边界的了解。对欧盟/北约分部和移民管理感兴趣的学者、政策制定者和管理人员将从这些发现中受益。这个项目将为重大的社会和政治问题提供新的答案，这些问题涉及在哪里以及如何努力标记欧洲国家的界限。

This project examines how competing government efforts to define and control Moldovan territory affect the people in the border zones of Romania, Transnistria, and Ukraine. Doctoral student Adam Levy, under the supervision of Dr. John O'Loughlin, will explore these border zones and how they have become key sites of government intervention aimed at re-establishing national sovereignty. This project will analyze the key tensions underlying uncertainties about Moldovan citizenship and identity. These tensions indicate that while governments are attempting to re-territorialize these border regions, informally individuals are experiencing de-territorialization of these regions because of fragmented visa and labor restrictions. The key research question is: What does Moldovan citizenship mean to people in the border zones and how does their view compare to governmental perspectives? This project uses mixed methods including interviews, surveys, focus groups, and participant observation to understand how people who may or may not identify as Moldovan respond to new governmental regulations, like EU migration policies or Romanian passport controls. This approach will enable a comparison of formal ideas and attitudes about state- and region-building with those of the people who live in these regions. Data collected for the project will chart perceptions of nations/states, allegiances to ethno-linguistic communities, household migration histories, and ideas about iconic landscapes as measures of identity and attachment to places. The research will also show how ethno-national identity and regional geopolitical events are understood across generations. The findings will thus address basic questions about how European relations and post-Soviet identities are forged.The broader impacts of this study highlight Moldova's Romanian and Ukrainian frontiers to show where and how states like Moldova are situated within economic and security communities like the European Union (EU) or NATO. Practical political applications of this project include better understandings about how borders are imagined and administered across Europe and the former Soviet Union. Unlike analyses of Moldovan nationalism and EU/NATO "double enlargement", this project will focus on people living in and traversing border zones - not just the governing officials of these regions. Working with borderland stakeholders defined as different generations of government officials, students, teachers, farmers, traders, activists, pensioners, politicians and return-migrants, this research will highlight the real and conceptual distance between formal and informal understandings of national identity to study how such views relate to conceptions of citizenship. Focusing on informal understandings in contrast to formal ones, this approach will detail exactly how the transformation of authority and identity is experienced and contested in borderlands. As such, this study contributes answers to key geopolitical questions about how nations, states, and territory are consolidated. Additional contributions will improve knowledge about how borders are made, managed, and perceived in traditional "crush zones" like the Black Sea region. Academics, policy-makers, and administrators interested in EU/NATO divisions and migration management will profit from these findings. This project will generate fresh answers to big social and political questions about exactly where and how efforts to mark the limits of European countires are unfolding.