Book Description:  This book analyzes the "national delimitation", the establishment of national Soviet republics in Central Asia in the 1920s. Basing himself primarily on Communist Party archive material, the author argues that the predominant interpretation of this strategy as an act of divide-and-rule cannot be sustained. Rather, in the view of Soviet authorities, national identity emerged as a solution to a variety of problems and challenges regarding Soviet state building. Soviet communists with their anti-nationalist attitudes came to view nation and national identity as valuable and constructive tools in state constructions.  Moreover, an important line of argument is that the delimitation should not be seen from the perspective of Moscow alone. The book discusses the role of Central Asian communists in the delimitation, and argues that Central Asian political actors influenced the process considerably. As a consequence, the new territorial-political organization of Central Asia bore a considerable degree of historical continuity.