ABSTRACT

This article uses original ethnographic data to document the kinds of informal diplomacy conducted by members of a transnational kinship group embedded in both the Syrian and the Russian regimes. As such it provides a rare ethnographic perspective on international relations of strongmen regimes in Syria and Russia. Relatively few studies have explored relationships of cooperation between modern political regimes which are mediated by transnational kinship networks. Rather than approaching transnational kinship networks as instrumental channels that states use to achieve their purposes, the article argues that this network has been able to colonise the Syrian state, by deploying violence on an urban scale and maintaining high-ranking diplomatic connections on a transregional scale. It also argues that such networks should not be understood by negation, as the absence of formal institutions, or as an alternative to the ‘real channels’ of diplomacy. From the perspective of the autocratic Asad regime, they have arguably provided a more durable infrastructure, through a period of global ideological change and regional realignment, than Baathist political institutions and diplomatic cadres.

摘要

本文使用原始民族志数据记录了叙利亚和俄罗斯政权中的跨国亲属团体成员进行的各种非正式外交。因此，它为叙利亚和俄罗斯强人政权的国际关系提供了罕见的民族志视角。相对较少的研究探讨了以跨国亲属网络为中介的现代政治体制之间的合作关系。这篇文章并没有将跨国亲属网络作为国家用来实现其目的的工具渠道，而是认为，通过在城市范围内部署暴力并在跨区域范围内维持高级外交联系，该网络已经能够殖民叙利亚国家. 它还认为，这种网络不应被否定理解为缺乏正式机构，或作为外交“真实渠道”的替代品。从专制的阿萨德政权的角度来看，与复兴党政治机构和外交干部相比，在全球意识形态变革和地区重组的时期，他们可以说提供了更持久的基础设施。