Partition Machine: Legacies of Territoriality in a Violent World, Proceedings of the British Academy (forthcoming), co-edited with Jay Sarkar

From Gaza and Ukraine to Kashmir and Northern Ireland, the language of partition—of buffer zones, ceasefire lines, and “two-state solutions”—continues to define global politics. Partition Machine traces the long history behind these ideas. It argues that dividing territory to manage diversity, contain violence, or preserve order is not a new invention but the outcome of more than a century of experimentation across empires.

Bringing together leading scholars of empire, decolonisation, and international history, the volume explores how partitions became part of the global repertoire of governance—from the “scramble for Africa” and the partition of Bengal to the Treaty of Lausanne and the post-1945 divisions of Palestine, India, and Korea. Its contributors connect the moral shock of separation—the displacement, loss, and endurance it entails—with the bureaucratic logic that made partition appear as a rational solution. The essays follow the circulation of partitionary ideas, officials, and practices through Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and South Asia. By viewing partitions as interconnected rather than isolated national traumas, Partition Machine reframes them as a global phenomenon that shaped the modern international order.

Timely and unsettling, the book speaks to historians, policymakers, and readers seeking to understand how the map of our world was made—and why it remains so violently contested.