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| Article name | The Border with Mongolia in the System of Production of Imperial Knowledge at the Turn of the 19th and 20th Centuries |
| Authors | Mikhalev Aleksey V. Aleksey V., Doctor of Political Science, Director of the Center for the Study of Political Transformations, mihalew80@mail.ru,Buryat State University named after D. Banzarov, 24a Smolina st. Ulan-Ude, Russia, 670000 |
| Bibliographic description | Mikhalev AV. The Border with Mongolia in the System of Production of Imperial Knowledge at the Turn of the 19th and 20th Centuries. Humanitarian Vector. 2026;21(2):146-153. (In Russian). https://www.doi.org/10.21209/1996-7853-2026-21-2-146-153 |
| Section | Social Interaction in Historical Development |
| UDK | 910.4(571.5+517.3) |
| DOI | https://www.doi.org/10.21209/1996-7853-2026- 21-2-146-153 |
| Article type | Original article |
| Annotation | This article examines the history of knowledge formation on the Russian-Mongolian border in the late imperial period, drawing on a diverse set of pre-revolutionary texts published by military scholars, geographers, and travelers. The aim of the study is to analyze the influence of scientific and technological progress (the geodesic revolution) on the formation of border knowledge. Using a combination of historical research methods (comparative, historical-genetic, systemic-historical), the reform plans of the Separate Border Guard Corps (OKPS) commander, General A. D. Svinyin, are compared with the situation in western Transbaikalia. The creation of the Separate Border Guard Corps significantly contributed to the study of the Far East, understanding the prospects for its development and the defense of its borders. Each OKPS headquarters encountered a diversity of landscapes, as well as cultural and economic systems. The situation in Transbaikalia was one of the most complex. Information on the situation on this particular section of the border is drawn from the texts of researchers and analysts who studied both the border demarcation system and its policing methods. These published historical sources are used. Ultimately, pre-modern forms of demarcation between countries were identified and how they conflicted with the modern understanding of state borders. The article suggests that the primary goal of border reform in Transbaikalia was to eliminate archaic forms of demarcation and create a universal system of state symbols. In this context, we are talking about exclusive imperial knowledge, created for effective governance, not just for the narrow purposes of military planning. Much of this scholarly research on borders was the result of “imperial self-discovery”. We suggest that in the late imperial period, a process of systematization, recording, and control of imperial borderlands took place, based on advances in geography and the revolution in geodetic instrumentation. The article emphasizes that military researchers addressed the state task of describing the boundaries and borders of the empire. This task was not only military but also economic and scientific. |
| Key words | border, empire, science, Inner Asia, modernism, border guards, expeditions |
| Copyright holder | Mikhalev A.A. Все статьи журнала «Вестник ЗабГУ» публикуются на условиях лицензии Creative Commons «Attribution» («Атрибуция») 4.0 Всемирная.
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| Full article | The Border with Mongolia in the System of Production of Imperial Knowledge at the Turn of the 19th and 20th Centuries |
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