Turning strategic infrastructure into a regional connectivity hub has become one of the more persistent questions in the study of transnational transport networks. Chabahar Port sits squarely inside that debate: as a key component of the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC), it has drawn a good deal of attention for what it might do — link the Indian Ocean with Central Asia and, beyond that, with the Eurasian hinterland. What the literature has tended to emphasize, however, is the port’s geopolitical significance. How connectivity capacity is actually built, and through what process, remains rather less clearly explained. Drawing on work on economic corridors, port regionalization, and connectivity governance, this study sets out an analytical framework in three dimensions: node formation, network embedding, and governance support.The analysis shows that Chabahar Port’s regional connectivity capacity is not the simple product of location and investment; it takes the interaction of spatial conditions, transport networks, and institutional arrangements for that capacity to appear at all. Joining the INSTC has certainly widened the port’s potential. Even then, infrastructure gaps, day-to-day operational limits, and the uncertainty that still hangs over cross-border cooperation keep the port from working as a full regional hub. By following the port’s path from strategic infrastructure node to regional connectivity hub, the study arrives at a framework for explaining how young transport corridors manage to generate connectivity under difficult geopolitical and institutional conditions.

Yujuan Zhou. From Strategic Node to Regional Connectivity Hub: The Formation Mechanism of Chabahar Port under the International North-South Transport Corridor. The Frontiers of Society, Science and Technology (2026), Vol. 8, Issue 4: 1-7. https://doi.org/10.25236/FSST.2026.080401.

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