In this episode, Ispoke with Dr. John Heathershaw, Associate Professor in the Department of Politics at the University of Exeter about his new book with Alexander A. Cooley, Dictators without Borders: Power and Money in Central Asia, published this month by Yale University Press. The book challenges the typical situating of post-Communist Central Asia as an isolated hinterland by illustrating the ways in which Central Asian authoritarian regimes use their “connectivity” with global financial and law enforcement mechanisms to stash national assets offshore and punish their opponents abroad. It builds its sophisticated critique of conventional wisdom on detailed and up to date case studies from Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, drawing on the research compiled in the Central Asia Political Exiles database compiled by Exeter Central Asian Studies Network. Key references: J.C. Sharman, The Despot’s Guide to Wealth Management: On the International Campaign against Gr...