Program Description
The Caucasus and Central Asia studies at UC Berkeley is a research and graduate training program administered by the Institute of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ISEEES) at the University of California, Berkeley (UCB). Its mission is to promote scholarship and research from all academic disciplines working on the Caucasus and Central Asia. CCAsP builds on the Berkeley Caucasus/Caspian littoral initiative undertaken by the Berkeley Program in Soviet and Post-Soviet Studies (BPS) between 1995 and 2001.
CCAsP has a broad regional focus, including the post-Soviet states of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, as well as Afghanistan, Xinjiang Province in western China, Mongolia, and Buryatia, Gorno-Altai, Khakassiya, and Tuva in the Russian Federation.
The attacks of September 11, 2001, the U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan, tensions in U.S.-Iranian relations, and the war in Iraq have helped place Central Asia and the Caucasus at the forefront of world attention. While CCAsP has responded to increased demand for public outreach and scholarship on contemporary developments in the region, we also believe that scholarship should not be viewed solely through the lens of current events. We therefore combine a focus on today’s challenges with research and training activities on history and culture.
