| Publication |
2010.
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article explores the legal and fiscal dynamics of land tenure in pre-colonial Islamic Central Asia. It argues that controversies regarding property rights and taxation of Muslims in Russian Turkestan reflect not only colonialist misunderstandings and manipulations of legal concepts and practices of the local Islamic population during the transition to colonial rule. These issues were also rooted in a long history of contested and ambiguous property relations in pre-colonial Central Asia. By looking at documented cases of ambiguity or controversy over the legal and fiscal status of land, it is hoped to shed new light on the dynamic interplay between legal concepts and their application in pre-colonial Central Asia.
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