Nimra Zahid
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Nimra Zahid
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Research · Regional security

Rethinking Afghanistan’s regional role.

I study how Afghanistan shapes the security of the regions around it: not only as a buffer, but as a driver.

A question that connects my work.

Regional Security Complex Theory offers a way to understand the security relationships that connect neighbouring states. In it, Afghanistan is classed as an insulator: a state on the edge of several complexes that keeps their dynamics apart.

My research asks what changes when Afghanistan is understood instead as an active force in those relationships. From Russia–Afghanistan relations to the wider regional effects of the Global War on Terror, I am building an agenda around the connections between South Asia, Central Asia and their neighbours.

Fig. 2 · Two readings of regional securityAfter Buzan & Wæver, Regions and Powers (2003) · abstract diagram, not a map
Reading A · InsulatorRSCT, 2003
CENTRAL ASIA · POST-SOVIETCENTRAL ASIAMIDDLE EAST · GULFMIDDLE EASTSOUTH ASIASOUTH ASIAAFGINSULATOR
Afghanistan sits between the post-Soviet, Middle Eastern and South Asian complexes, absorbing rather than transmitting their security dynamics.
Reading B · InstigatorMy argument
CENTRAL ASIA · POST-SOVIETCENTRAL ASIAMIDDLE EAST · GULFMIDDLE EASTSOUTH ASIASOUTH ASIAAFGINSTIGATOR
Dynamics generated in and around Afghanistan travel outward and shape security inside the neighbouring complexes.
Outputs

Three projects, one developing question.

2024MA DISSERTATION

Deconstructing the Role of Afghanistan in Regional Security Complex Theory

Challenges Afghanistan’s classification as an insulator and examines it as a driver of regional security dynamics.

UNIVERSITY OF NORTHAMPTON · COMPLETED 2024 · FULL TEXT ON REQUEST
RSCTTHEORY-DRIVEN ANALYSIS
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Regional Security Complex Theory (RSCT), developed by Barry Buzan and Ole Wæver, explains international security through regions: clusters of states whose security concerns are so closely linked that they cannot sensibly be analysed apart. States that sit between these regions are described as “insulators”, places where neighbouring security dynamics meet and are absorbed rather than transmitted. In the theory’s best-known account, Afghanistan is one of them, standing between South Asia, the Gulf and the post-Soviet states of Central Asia.

My dissertation deconstructs that classification. It asks whether a label that implies passivity can describe a country that has repeatedly been at the centre of regional and great-power security concerns. Reading RSCT’s own criteria against Afghanistan’s position, I argue that Afghanistan does not simply separate its neighbours’ security concerns but helps to generate and connect them.

On that basis I propose understanding Afghanistan as an “instigator” of regional security dynamics. The dissertation reflects on what this shift means for the theory, in particular for how RSCT treats the states on the edges of regional security complexes.

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2020CONFERENCE PAPER

The Global War on Terror, Afghanistan and Turkey

Research on the Global War on Terror and the roles of Afghanistan and Turkey in regional security.

ISTANBUL SABAHATTIN ZAIM UNIVERSITY · PRESENTED JUNE 2020 · FULL TEXT ON REQUEST
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The Global War on Terror placed Afghanistan at the centre of international security after 2001. Turkey, a NATO member with long-standing ties to Afghanistan, played a distinctive part in the international presence there.

This paper, presented at the Istanbul International Social Science Conference in June 2020, considers the roles of Afghanistan and Turkey in regional security in the context of the Global War on Terror.

It extended my regional security research beyond Afghanistan’s immediate neighbours, towards the wider set of states whose security became connected to it.

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2018MPHIL THESIS

Russia–Afghanistan relations and regional stability

Examines Russia–Afghanistan relations and their implications for regional stability: the foundation of my continuing work.

NATIONAL DEFENCE UNIVERSITY, ISLAMABAD · CONFERRED DECEMBER 2018 · FULL TEXT ON REQUEST
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Russia’s relationship with Afghanistan carries a long history, from the Soviet intervention of 1979–89 to Moscow’s renewed diplomatic engagement in the 2010s. For Russia, Afghanistan has been closely tied to the security of Central Asia and to concerns about militancy and narcotics crossing into the post-Soviet space.

My MPhil thesis examines Russia–Afghanistan relations and considers their implications for regional stability. It treats the relationship not as a purely bilateral matter but as part of the security of the surrounding region.

This was the project in which my interest in Afghanistan’s regional role first took shape, and it laid the foundation for the questions I later developed through Regional Security Complex Theory.

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Proposed PhD project · 2027 entry

Where the questions lead next.

The doctoral project tests the instigator category on post-2014 Afghanistan, using Turkey and Myanmar as contrast cases, and asks whether shared threats are forming a new regional security complex.

See the PhD proposal Research areas

“Her written work demonstrated excellent analytical and critical thinking skills, and she showed a clear ability to engage deeply with academic literature to formulate sophisticated, evidence-based arguments.”

Dr Edgar B. A. Tembo · Module tutor, MA International Relations, University of Northampton

Could you supervise this research?

The proposal sets out the questions, cases and method.

See the PhD proposal