阿富汗是亚洲的“十字路口”地带。历史上亚欧大陆的民族大迁徙以及由此引发的帝国征服，造成了阿富汗政权更迭频繁、难以实现统一等一系列问题。近代以来，民族问题仍然是影响阿富汗发展的关键。现代阿富汗的民族构成奠基于13世纪之后欧亚大陆的最后一波民族大迁徙。阿富汗民族构成多元且复杂。由于交往范围有限，历史上的族际关系大都为地方性的关系，不具有整体意义。但是，近代以来，伊斯兰教和民族主义重新塑造了阿富汗的族际关系，造成了一种“二律背反”的现象，一方面，阿富汗强调只有一个族群，即穆斯林，不承认少数族群的存在；另一方面，阿富汗存在族群的等级结构，普什图族长期垄断政权，打压其他少数民族。这造成了阿富汗国家认同薄弱，族群认同强大，并成为引发阿富汗问题的深层症结。当前，族群为其属民提供公共产品，并且成为军阀的重要载体和依托。特别是，阿富汗跨界的族群认同成为周边国家介入阿富汗问题的重要抓手，不仅进一步恶化了阿富汗的族群冲突，而且也使阿富汗问题进一步复杂化。
Starting from The Great Tang Records of the Western Regions，this paper compares the political situation and ethnic composition of Afghanistan in the seventh century with those of today's Afghanistan，concluding that both of them have the characteristics of internal and external political disorder，lack of unified national identity，and complex relations with neighboring countries.On this basis，this paper analyzes the influence of ethnic factors on the political situation in ancient and modern Afghanistan from the perspectives of ethnic relations and cross-border ethnic groups by using relevant ethnic theories，hoping to reveal the historical root of the formation of the disordered society in Afghanistan to some extent.
