Ashgabat

Ashgabat is one of the world's most surreal capitals—a white marble city rising from the Karakum Desert that holds the Guinness record for highest density of white marble-clad buildings. The authoritarian state channeled gas revenues into monumental architecture: gilded statues, enormous mosques, wedding palaces, and ministry buildings that dwarf their occupants. Soviet planners built Ashgabat after the 1948 earthquake destroyed the previous city (110,000 dead, long suppressed from official history), creating a modernist grid later overlaid with post-Soviet megalomaniac aesthetics. The city of 1+ million residents concentrates government employment, universities, and what passes for private enterprise in a state where 84.9% of exports are hydrocarbons controlled by the government. With Turkmenistan producing 77.6 bcm of gas (2024) and exporting primarily to China, Ashgabat serves as the distribution point for hydrocarbon rents—allocating construction contracts, import licenses, and bureaucratic positions that constitute the real economy. The Heritage Foundation ranks Turkmenistan 176th of 177 countries for economic freedom. By 2026, Ashgabat's fate depends on Chinese gas demand and whether President Serdar Berdimuhamedov (son of the previous president) can maintain the personality cult infrastructure while managing succession tensions.