Conflict in the North Caucasus Global Impacts Post-2012

In 1991, war broke out in the Chechnya region of North Caucasus. By the early 2010s, people from the area had begun joining international terrorist groups en masse, with some militants rising to leadership positions in Jihadi groups. Despite the importance of this small region and the crucial role its inhabitants have played in major terrorist organizations, there is little known about the people involved and their activities after 2012. Conflict in the North Caucasus sheds light on the history of this war in North Caucasus, a conflict which has evolved into a security concern of international proportions. Over the course of five years, Vera Mironova conducted on-the-ground research among Chechen jihadists, who shared with her their ideologies, contemporary activities, and views of the events of the war. Mironova draws insights from this qualitative evidence to explain how fighters from North Caucasus ended up in the leadership of international Jihad, leaving readers with a more nuanced understanding of the far-reaching conflict and providing policymakers with the knowledge to make informed decisions about the region and activity there.

Vera Mironova is an Associate Fellow at the Davis Center at Harvard University. She received her doctorate in political science from the University of Maryland and was a pre-doctoral and post-doctoral fellow at Harvard's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, as well as at Harvard Law School. She has also held visiting professor positions at the University of Oxford, Science Po, and the University of Tokyo. Mironova's scholarship has been featured in publications including The New York Times, the BBC, The Economist, and the Sunday Times.