Strategic Silences and Narrative Power in International Relations: Ambiguity and Non-verbal Diplomacy in Reframing Central Asian Agency (Politics in Asia)

Developing a conceptual framework of strategic silence and applying it to various domains of Central Asian international relations, this book uncovers how silence allows states to navigate structural constraints, maintain flexibility, and assert subtle forms of resistance or alignment. Strategic ambiguity and restraint often characterize Central Asia’s response to major geopolitical shifts.This book frames these silences as forms of soft power and subtle resistance that reflect regional logics of survival, dignity, and diplomacy.By exploring the multifaceted ways in which the region’s states employ silence as part of their international behavior, the book introduces a new conceptual vocabulary in order to understand subaltern agency and regional identity construction in the post-Soviet space.Chapters explore strategic silence not as a uniform doctrine but as a contextual practice-emerging differently in response to Russian imperial nostalgia, Chinese economic expansion, Western engagem