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A richly interdisciplinary challenge to mainstream approaches to area studies through focus on the Middle East's relationship to West Asia
Rethinking the Middle East as West Asia reframes a region long constrained by Euro-American strategic narratives. By situating the Middle East within its relationships to wider Asia, the volume opens a fresh analytical lens on power, mobility, and connection across the continent. Moving beyond state-centric and siloed approaches, it illuminates the dense and rapidly evolving ties that bind East and West in new and consequential ways. Rethinking the Middle East as West Asia brings together a wide group of interdisciplinary scholars from the Middle East, China, and the West to rethink how knowledge about the region is produced. It offers a methodological invitation to question inherited geopolitical categories and to develop comparative and transregional approaches suited to the contemporary global landscape.
Contributors:
Lori Allen, SOAS, University of London, UK
Mohammed Alsudairi, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
Holly Danzeisen, InterAsia Partnership, New York City, USA
Jiuzhou Duan, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
Adam Hanieh, SOAS, University of London, UK
Marya Hannun, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
Arang Keshavarzian, New York University, New York City, USA
Laleh Khalili, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
Yi Liu, Shanghai University, Shanghai, China
Zachary Lockman, New York University, New York City, USA
Yue Ma, Beijing International Studies University, Beijing, China
Sajjad Rizvi, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
Alam Saleh, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
Seteney Shami, The Arab Council for the Social Sciences, Beirut, Lebanon
Degang Sun, Fudan University, Shanghai, China
Yuting Wang , American University of Sharjah, Sharjah, UAE
Zakiyeh Yazdanshenas, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
Chuchu Zhang, Fudan University, Shanghai, China
Rafeef Ziadah, Kings College London, UK
"This extraordinary collection promises to advance debates about Area Studies for years to come. In emphasizing the myriad interconnections that make up West Asia and its environs, the authors show readers what an Area Studies divorced from strategic studies and instead attuned to the formations, patterns, and circuits that make up regions should look like."—Samer Abboud, Villanova University
“This volume brings together leading and emerging scholars to rethink the Middle East as West Asia amid a changing international balance of power. It examines rising state autonomy, diverse interests and resources, and growing East and South Asian engagement with MENA. Offering fresh perspectives on power, education, law, and inter-regionalism, the volume opens up new avenues for understanding an increasingly interconnected Asia. Highly recommended.”—Robert Mason, Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy
Adam Hanieh is a professor in Development Studies at SOAS, University of London, and director of the SOAS Middle East Institute. He was previously joint chair in Middle East Studies between the Institute of International and Area Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing, and the University of Exeter. His research focuses on global political economy and the Gulf states of the Middle East. His most recent book Crude Capitalism: Oil, Corporate Power, and the Making of the World Market (2024) was co-winner of the 2025 Best Book by an International Scholar, Global and Transnational Section of the American Sociological Association.
Jiuzhou Duan is assistant professor at the Institute for International and Area Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing. His primary research interests include the political economy of development, civil-military relations, state-business relations, and Middle East Studies. He is also an expert on China-Middle East relations, focusing extensively on the strategic synergy and development cooperation between China and Middle Eastern states. Duan was previously visiting scholar at Harvard Kennedy School, the American University in Cairo, and the Middle East Technical University. Currently, he serves as a council member of the Chinese Association for Middle East Studies and the Chinese Society of African Historical Studies.
Acknowledgments
Note on Contributors
Preface
Adam Hanieh and Jiuzhou Duan
SECTION ONE: Framing Knowledge Production in/on the Region
1. The Middle East and West Asia: Spaces and Scales
Zachary Lockman
2. Beyond Eurocentrism: Mapping Middle East Studies in China
Jiuzhou Duan
3. West Asia’: Academic Categories, Political Implications
Seteney Shami
4. Sketching the Dilemma and Possible Pathway for Building Sinology/Chinese Studies in the Arab World
Mohammed Alsudairi
5. Reflections on Building a Network of Transnational Scholars
Holly Danzeisen
6. The Concept of 'Asia' in Early 20th Century Afghan Anti-Colonial Thought and Practice
Marya Hannun
7. Conceptualizing Islam in West Asia: The Decolonial Turn
Sajjad Rizvi
SECTION TWO: Emerging Themes and Interconnections
8. The GCC-SCO Strategic Cooperation: A Looming Greater Asia?
Sun Degang
9. Reflecting on China and a Post-American Persian Gulf: Hegemonic Transitions and Layered Histories in the Midst of an Interregnum
Arang Keshavarzian
10. Asianization of the Persian Gulf and Iran’s Look to the East Policy
Zakiyeh Yazdanshenas and Alam Saleh
11. The Afterlives of Nationalisation of Oil: A Methodological Perspective
Laleh Khalili
12. The Middle East, China, and East Asia: Shifting Geographies of Oil and the Climate Emergency
Adam Hanieh
13 .Rethinking Power Geometries through Logistics: Infrastructure, Trade, and Militarism in West Asia
Rafeef Ziadah
14. Why is the UAE becoming more attractive to Chinese migrants? Education as the new pull factor
Yuting Wang
15. China’s Public Diplomacy in the Middle East: Evolution and Approaches
Zhang Chuchu
16. Fascism’s Mobilizing Passions: Learning from India to Understand Israel
Lori Allen
17. Beyond the East and the West: Rethinking the Role of Türkiye in International Politics
Liu Yi
18. Comparative Law in Area Studies: A Perspective on Islamic Financial Law
Ma Yue