Although many Americans today tend to think of Central Asia as a far away land of little importance, this was not always so. In 1904, geographer Halford Mackinder gave a talk to the Royal Geographical Society in London, arguing that Central Asia was the "pivot point" of the world.
Mackinder's views were widely disseminated in the former Soviet Union, which controlled the region until its collapse. Today, independent Uzbekistan lies at the pivot point of Central Asia (just above Afghanistan). As I discovered while teaching last year at Tashkent's University of World Economy and Diplomacy (UWED), Mackinder's geopolitics are still taught, not least because they give Uzbekistan some importance in world historical development. Indeed, this December UWED will be hosting an international conference in honor of Mackinder, celebrating the 100th anniversary of his "Pivot Point" lecture. It is being co-ordinated with Cambridge University, thanks to the efforts of Nick Megoran, a geographer at Sidney Sussex College.
In the June 10th issue of the New York Review of Books, Paul Kennedy revives interest in Mackinder, in a discussion of Niall Ferguson's new book on American Empire (unfortunately, the text is not available online to non-subscribers). So, to give some background on the Mackinder revival, the title line above links to a Mackinder page at the University of North Carolina.
