Central Asia: Aspects of Transition

CENTRAL ASIA

What is the legacy of Soviet colonialism in Central Asia? How can nation states be formed in the twenty-first century? Does political Islamism pose a threat to the secular regimes of Central Asia? The collapse of the Soviet Union led to the creation of five states in Central Asia which had never before existed. Over the last decade, the region’s leaders have attempted to forge nations and carve countries from a complex political, historical and sociological mix. This pioneering collection examines the radical transition Central Asia experienced in the twentieth century – from Russian colonialism, through Soviet hegemony, to a sudden and largely unsought independence. The shifting approach to identity construction during the Soviet period continues to have crucial relevance today. Soviet educational and institution-building initiatives have provided the ideological, social and governmental building blocks manipulated by the leaders of the new independent states. Their success can be measured by the speed with which the nation states have been constructed, the political stability that has been prevalent in all but one of the five countries, and the ease with which institutional – if not constitutional – continuity has been maintained. Following President George W. Bush’s declaration of a ‘War on Terrorism’ and the subsequent ousting of the Taleban regime from power in Afghanistan, the strengths and policies of Central Asia’s regimes have become matters of geopolitical significance. This collection assesses these policies against the backdrop of a Soviet legacy and the vigorous attempts of these countries to build secular states within the Islamic world. Tom Everett-Heath is editor of the Middle East Economic Digest.

CENTRAL ASIA RESEARCH FORUM Series Editor: Shirin Akiner, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London Other titles in the series: SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN CENTRAL ASIA Edited by Shirin Akiner, Sander Tideman & John Hay QAIDU AND THE RISE OF THE INDEPENDENT MONGOL STATE IN CENTRAL ASIA Michal Biran TAJIKISTAN Edited by Mohammad-Reza Djalili, Frederic Gare & Shirin Akiner UZBEKISTAN ON THE THRESHOLD OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY: TRADITION AND SURVIVAL Islam Karimov TRADITION AND SOCIETY IN TURKMENISTAN: GENDER, ORAL CULTURE AND SONG Carole Blackwell LIFE OF ALIMQUL A Native Chronicle of Nineteenth Century Central Asia Edited and translated by Timur Beisembiev CENTRAL ASIA Aspects of Transition Edited by Tom Everett-Heath

THE HEART OF ASIA A History of Russian Turkestan and the Central Asian Khanates from the Earliest Times Frances Henry Skrine and Edward Denison Ross THE CASPIAN Politics, Energy and Security Edited by Shirin Akiner & Anne Aldis ISLAM AND COLONIALISM Western Perspectives on Soviet Asia Will Myer AZERI WOMEN IN TRANSITION Women in Soviet and Post-Soviet Azerbaijan Farideh Heyat THE POST-SOVIET DECLINE OF CENTRAL ASIA Sustainable Development and Comprehensive Capital Eric Sievers PROSPECTS FOR PASTORALISM IN KAZAKSTAN AND TURKMENISTAN From State Farms to Private Flocks Edited by Carol Kerven

CENTRAL ASIA Aspects of transition

Edited by Tom Everett-Heath

First published 2003 by RoutledgeCurzon 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by RoutledgeCurzon 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2003. RoutledgeCurzon is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group © 2003 Tom Everett-Heath editorial matter and selection; individual chapters the contributors All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with regard to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and cannot accept any legal responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions that may be made. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN 0-203-45135-X Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-45808-7 (Adobe eReader Format) ISBN 0–700–70956–8 (hbk) ISBN 0–700–70957–6 (pbk)

CONTENTS

Notes on contributors Acknowledgements

vii ix

Introduction

1

T O M E V E R E T T- H E AT H

1 Turkfront: Frunze and the development of Soviet counter-insurgency in Central Asia 5 ALEXANDER MARSHALL

2 The Kokand Autonomy, 1917–18: political background, aims and reasons for failure 30 PA U L B E RG N E

3 Ethno-territorial claims in the Ferghana Valley during the process of national delimitation, 1924–7 45 A R S L A N KO I C H I E V

4 Land and water ‘reform’ in the 1920s: agrarian revolution or social engineering? 57 GERARD O’NEILL

5 Nation building in Turkey and Uzbekistan: the use of language and history in the creation of national identity 80 ANDREW SEGARS

v

CONTENTS

6 Nation building and identity in the Kyrgyz Republic

106

RO B E RT L O W E

7 The use of history: the Soviet historiography of Khan Kenesary Kasimov 132 H E N R I F RU C H E T

8 Soviet development in Central Asia: the classic colonial syndrome? 146 ALEX STRINGER

9 Environmental issues in Central Asia: a source of hope or despair? 167 L A R S JA L L I N G

10 Instability and identity in a post-Soviet world: Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan

181

T O M E V E R E T T- H E AT H

11 The Uzbek Mahalla: between state and society

205

E L I S E M A S S I C A R D A N D TO M M A S O T R E V I S A N I

12 ‘Fundamentalism’ in Central Asia: reasons, reality and prospects 219 P E T R A S T E I N B E RG E R

13 Water: the difficult path to a sustainable future for Central Asia

244

KAI WEGERICH

Bibliography Index

264 283

vi

N OT E S O N C O N T R I BU TO R S

Paul Bergne served for many years as a member of HM diplomatic service, working mainly in the Middle East, during which time he studied Arabic at the Middle East Centre for Arabic Studies and Persian and Turkish at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He ended his overseas career as ambassador to Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. Since his retirement in 1996, he has been working in the Central Asian and Persian sections of the World Service of the BBC, as well as teaching and researching the early Soviet period of Central Asia at St Antony’s College, Oxford. Tom Everett-Heath graduated from Cambridge University with a BA in History. He subsequently earned an MA in Middle Eastern Area Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Since 1998, he has been working for the Middle East Economic Digest (MEED) in London and the United Arab Emirates. He is currently MEED’s editor. Henri Fruchet, a native of Montreal, earned a BA in History and East Asian Studies from McGill University, and an MA from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, where he focused on Central Asian and Chinese history. Lars Jalling was a post-graduate student at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Arslan Koichiev is an historian and a journalist, currently with the BBC. Areas of study include the history of the Khokand khanate and Kyrgyz documentary sources of the nineteenth century. He also writes on contemporary Central Asian affairs. Robert Lowe completed an MA in Asian History at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, in 1999. After an internship at the Kyrgyz Embassy in London, he worked for the Times of Central Asia newspaper in Kyrgyzstan. He now works for the Middle East Programme at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London.

vii

C O N T R I BU TO R S

Alexander Marshall graduated from Glasgow University in 1996 and the School of Slavonic and East European Studies at the University of London in 1997. He is currently completing a Ph.D. thesis at Glasgow University on the Asiatic Section of the Russian General Staff, 1800–1917. His interests include the military history of Eurasia, the steppe nomads, and Russian foreign policy towards the steppe frontier and the Far East. Elise Massicard graduated in political science and turcology in Paris and Berlin. She wrote her MA thesis on the Mahalla in Uzbekistan, and is currently working on her Ph.D. thesis on Alevi collective identity in Turkey and Europe. She is a fellow of the Franco-German research centre in Berlin. Gerard O’Neill completed a BA at Manchester University in Turkish and Persian languages and literatures, and Turkish/Ottoman and Iranian history. Subsequently he earned his MA in Turkish and Central Asian history, politics and society at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He has worked as an interpreter, translator and researcher on a variety of projects connected with the Turkish/Turkic world and the Middle East. Currently, he is focusing on late Ottoman–Iranian relations. Andrew Segars, after graduating from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, in 1997 with an MA in Modern Turkish Area Studies, spent nearly two years as a research student and lecturer at Almaty Abai State University in Kazakstan. He is currently Country Director for the American Councils for International Education in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. Petra Steinberger studied politics, journalism and philosophy at Munich University and has an MA in Middle Eastern Area Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. She currently works as a journalist for the German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung in Munich and is editor of Die Finkelstein-Debatte (Piper, 2001). Alex Stringer was a post-graduate student at the School of Oriental and African Studies, Universiy of London. Tommaso Trevisani studied philosophy and social anthropology in Rome, Berlin and Oxford. His interests include state–society relations in post-Soviet Central Asia, with a particular focus on the Ferghana Valley region. Kai Wegerich completed an MA in Social Anthropology & Political History at University College London and an M.Sc. in Development Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Currently, he is a Ph.D. student at the School of Oriental and African Studies, focusing on water management in Central Asia. His research interests include water management, environmental scarcity, social adaptive capacity, institutional change and conflict. Wegerich has worked as a consultant for the International Water Management Institute on a project addressing the sustainability of water user associations in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. viii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This collection of essays was conceived at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, in a seminar on Central Asian history led by Dr Shirin Akiner. Its contents have been inspired by the enthusiasm for Central Asian history instilled by Dr Akiner: most of the contributors have benefited directly from her teaching, and all have benefited from her wisdom. Without the advice, help and support of Dr Akiner, this work would not have been started or completed. Since its inception, this book has been through any number of permutations, and responsibility for editing has passed through different hands. Although she may not recognize its final shape, the efforts of Petra Steinberger, in particular, have been invaluable, and I am most grateful to her. I should like to thank my father, John Everett-Heath, who was kind enough to read and give his opinion on a number of the chapters. My thanks also go to Rachel Saunders at RoutledgeCurzon for both her assistance and her patience. Lastly, I should like to thank Claudia Pugh-Thomas, who not only gave constant guidance but also read and sub-edited the entire work, as well as offering tireless encouragement. Tom Everett-Heath, October 2002

ix

INTRODUCTION Tom Everett-Heath

On 1 March 2002, a website focusing on Uzbek news ran two headlines: ‘Kyrgyz and Uzbeks continue talking over frontier’ and ‘Uzbek national song festival ends in Tashkent’. The first story detailed the slow progress made in establishing the boundary between Kyrgyzstan and its southwestern neighbour. After two years of hard work, a mere 290 kilometres of the 1,400-kilometre-long frontier had been agreed. The Uzbek border was not alone in needing definition: Kyrgyzstan had only signed agreements on the delimitation of its frontier with two states, China and Kazakhstan, and even preliminary consultations had not been opened over what was likely to be its most heavily disputed flank, the border with Tajikistan. The second story focused on Uzbekistan’s first festival of national variety songs – ‘Aziz ona yurtim navolari’ (Melodies of the Motherland) – in which participants performed modern compositions based on folk songs and classical music ‘revised’ by Uzbek poets and composers. The news stories highlight two of the most important themes running through this collection of essays: the modern redefinition of frontiers underlines the political importance of the Soviet legacy in Central Asia; the complex methods by which identity has been negotiated during and after the region’s Soviet experience is illustrated by the contemporary need for national song festivals. A decade old, the five states of Central Asia that emerged from the ruins of the Soviet Union – Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan – are struggling still with their colonial past. The lines drawn on maps by the Soviets during the 1920s – which were initially adopted at independence in 1991 – are being redrawn, throwing into sharp relief the importance of the original Soviet methodology, its objectives and the way in which those objectives have shaped the political and economic development of the region. Equally important to any understanding of modern Central Asia are the Soviet attempts to forge national identities in the 1920s where no nations had ever existed. Some of the same tools, and many new ones, have been taken up by the regimes that assumed control a decade ago. The science or, perhaps, art (as in the case of national folk songs) of identity construction and nation building is once again of crucial importance to the very survival and stability of the region’s states. 1

T O M E V E R E T T- H E AT H

Also significant is the exceptional speed and extent of Central Asia’s period of transition. In Kazakhstan, for example, communities were transformed from nomadic animal husbandry to heavy industrial labouring within a single generation. Perhaps only the indigenous inhabitants of the Arabian peninsula, after the discovery of oil, experienced such a rapid shift from the pre-agricultural to the post-modern. In contrast to the Arabian experience, however, that of Central Asia was complicated by the imposition of Soviet ideology. More importantly, the transition was controlled by external forces – the over-arching demands of Moscow – as opposed to being a semi-organic process engendered by domestic needs. This century of upheaval contains the defining forces of contemporary Central Asia. Just as the very existence of five independent states is the direct result of the early Soviet nationalisation programme, so can many of the major issues facing each of these states find roots either in the period of Soviet rule, or in the indigenous reaction to that experience. The legacy extends far beyond the political or the macroeconomic: another headline of 1 March 2002 read, ‘Kazakhstan: Study says fallout from nuclear tests affected three generations’. The impact of Soviet nuclear experiments in Semipalatinsk is as serious an issue today as the environmental crisis in Uzbekistan that has resulted from Soviet attempts to establish a cotton monoculture. The trials of independence are inextricably linked to the region’s colonial past, a fact which encourages the chronological division of the essays in this collection: seven chapters focus on the years of Soviet rule, the other six concentrate on the post-independence period. The first group includes a case study by Arslan Koichiev of the Soviet approach to national delimitation during the 1920s. Then, as today, complex issues of ethnicity and the tessellated nature of settlements and enclaves provoked fierce controversy. That these borders are once again under dispute is a reflection not only of the arbitrary nature of the previous attempt at delimitation, but also of how the ideological connection between ethnicity and nationalism – first introduced in the 1920s – has taken root and flourished. Two detailed examinations analyse indigenous resistance to Soviet hegemony. Alexander Marshall explores the Soviet response to the Basmachi uprising, which, despite a lack of political coherence, posed such a considerable threat to the Revolution in the east that the military establishment was forced to develop an entirely new approach to counter-insurgency. The legacy of the Bashmachi movement, having rapidly entered the realms of folklore, was fought over and rewritten by Soviets, nationalists and separatists alike. Equally, the Kokand Autonomy, a brief and doomed attempt to establish an independent government within present-day Uzbekistan, has become an historical battleground, as discussed by Paul Bergne. Other chapters deal directly with the Soviet impact on the development of the region. Gerard O’Neill looks closely at the transformation of landownership. The diktats of Marxist-Leninist thought – and later the realpolitik of Stalinism – demanded the abolition of traditional structures of land tenure and the forma2

I N T RO D U C T I O N

tion of vast collective farms. The re-engineering was as much a social as an agricultural process, but it paved the way for the subsequent drive for massive cotton production, particularly in Uzbekistan. Fuelled by the political will and the economic needs of the core – Moscow – large parts of Central Asia underwent the most radical of transformations, the results of which are still felt keenly today. The micro and macro benefits of a cotton monoculture continue to be fiercely debated, and the associated impact on the environment and patterns of water use has become a highly contentious issue. Alex Stringer offers a broad assessment of colonial influence, significantly focusing on the benefits to the Central Asian republics of inclusion in the broader Soviet superstructure. Tempting as many in the West have found it to identify only the negative elements of the Soviet period, rule from Moscow brought massive advances to the availability and quality of healthcare and education, as well as dramatically developing intangibles, such as the emancipation of women. The Soviet authorities also actively sought social transformation through ambitious identity-building programmes. While boundaries were used to carve Russian Turkestan into five discrete Soviet Socialist Republics, initiatives were launched to create and shape national identity within these states. Although the ultimate goal was to be the emergence of New Soviet Man, the efforts made during the 1920s and 1930s provided the foundations upon which more recent attempts at nation building have been based. Andrew Segars offers a compelling comparison of the Soviet use of history and language to forge a new framework for identity construction in Uzbekistan with contemporaneous efforts by Atatürk to build a strong concept of ‘Turkishness’ from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. Henri Fruchet tackles a similar theme from a different perspective. His study of the historiography of Khan Kenesary Kasimov illustrates the importance of doctrinal orthodoxy within Soviet Central Asia and the urgency with which accounts and analysis of the recent past were moulded to suit the ideologies of the present. Many of the instruments used by the early Soviets to build national identity, such as the rewriting of history and legend and the reworking of custom and tradition, have been taken up again by the post-independence regimes. Robert Lowe examines the process in Kyrgyzstan where semiotics and ‘ethnosymbols’ have been used by the regime of President Akaev with both sophistication and simplicity. From the inclusion of tent-shaped designs on the national flag, symbolic of the nomadic past, to the country’s preoccupation with the mythical hero Manas, the state has sought to construct a new Kyrgyz identity. In Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and other post-independence Central Asian states, one of the greatest barriers to successful nation building has been ethnic diversity; when consensus is lacking, attempts to construct national institutions can be more divisive than cohesive. In Kazakhstan, the continued presence of a substantial number of Russians, particularly in the north of the country, has 3

T O M E V E R E T T- H E AT H

proven destabilising and disruptive to attempts to build a Kazakh nation and state. Tom Everett-Heath offers a case study that illustrates how clumsy identity construction in Kazakhstan and the perceived threat of radical Islamism in Uzbekistan – together with deteriorating economic conditions and threatening demographic trends – could prove to be the fault-lines along which internal tension and instability might emerge. The issue of radical Islamism is examined more closely by Petra Steinberger, who argues that the term ‘fundamentalism’ is misunderstood and misused, and that the Central Asian approach to Islam on both state and individual levels remains a crucial tool of identity construction as well as an instrument of authority, control and political opposition. Elise Massicard and Tommaso Trevisani contribute a focused study of a different use of tradition for the support of the state and the extension of its influence into the private sphere of life in Uzbekistan. The memory of the Mahalla has been reawoken and is being warped into an instrument of rule through which the central government’s authority has been legitimised and enhanced. The remaining two essays of the collection dealing with the post-Soviet period focus on the environmental challenges faced by the region. The first, by Lars Jalling, addresses issues on a broad front: the impact of nuclear tests in Kazakhstan; soil erosion; the desiccation of the Aral Sea; and the ways in which environmental issues have been politicised. Kai Wegerich offers a detailed and sophisticated analysis of the politics and practicalities of water usage in the Amu Darya and Syr Darya basins and the future of the Aral Sea. The core themes of Central Asia’s decades of transition are addressed from multiple directions due to the diverse subject matter of these essays and the eighty-year period covered by the collection. Two simple conclusions can be extracted. The Soviet legacy – be it political, economic, social, ideological or environmental – is crucial to an understanding of contemporary Central Asia. More importantly, this legacy and the reactions to it – the fruits of transition – will be the key determinants of the region’s future.

4

1 TURKFRONT Frunze and the development of Soviet counter-insurgency in Central Asia Alexander Marshall The revolt begins, 1916–19 The Russian Civil War witnessed a sudden upsurge of separatist and anarchist guerrilla movements in many parts of the old Tsarist Empire, but in few areas was one so pronounounced as in Central Asia, where groups of mounted raiders – Basmachi, to use the local term, meaning ‘bandit’1 – conducted a sporadic and violent struggle against the Soviet authorities for over ten years. During this period of violent civil unrest, the nascent Red Army was driven to collate and assess both its own civil war experience of high manoeuvrability (militarily and politically) and some of the practical experiences of its Tsarist predecessor to produce a formula that would enable the settlement of this territory. The methods of one man in particular – the future ‘Soviet Clausewitz’, M. V. Frunze, himself a son of settlers in Central Asia – provided the Reds with the key to achieving victory against their disorganised, yet elusive, foes.2 This was a key that would notably elude the Soviet Army over sixty years later when it found itself fighting a similar opponent in Afghanistan. The reason for the loss of this key may lie ironically with Frunze himself, whose lasting legacy to Soviet military art was that of the ‘Unified Military Doctrine’ – a doctrine of flexibility in his own day that came to exhibit increasing intellectual rigidity under later proponents. The crisis that arose in the Tsarist system in Central Asia in 1916 had a considerable prehistory, stretching back to the nineteenth century. Ever since the Andijan uprising of 1898, the indigenous population of Central Asia had expressed increasing dissatisfaction with a corrupt bureaucratic regime that first drove them into a cotton monoculture, with attendant economic complications, and then repeatedly and openly seemed to steal from them via the expropriation of ‘surplus lands’ to Russian settlers. This latter movement resulted in yearly famines between 1910 and 1913.3 Fears of future rebellions led by fanatical mullahs grew and led to something of a ‘siege mentality’ amongst the Russian population – every Russian settler was issued with a Berdan rifle,4 and administrative posts came to resemble miniature forts.5 When, in 1916, the manpower crisis on the Eastern Front led to the call-up of the Central Asians to serve as 5

ALEXANDER MARSHALL

labour workers behind the front lines, these fears proved justified as a vicious rebellion exploded amongst the Sarts, Kyrgyz, Kazakhs and Turkomen, swiftly assuming the aspect of a savage ethnic conflict. Russian settlers were killed, their wives raped, their houses burnt, in an uprising so violent that Cossack and artillery units had to be withdrawn from the Eastern Front to help deal with it.6 Whilst the Russians, under Governor-General Kuropatkin, eventually dealt with this revolt using their own extreme methods, several leaders emerged (notably Dzhunaid Khan) who were to head the roving Basmachi bands in future years.7 A condition of general anarchy was created which the Bolsheviks took several years to overcome. The stability of the civil state was further eroded by no less than four political upheavals over the following three years: the February Revolution saw the power of Governor-General Kuropatkin replaced by the dual authority of a Provisional Government committee and Soviet in Tashkent; Muslim congresses called by Muslim nationalists in May led to the formation of the Muslim Provisional Government of Autonomous Turkestan in Kokand in November 1917; the Bolsheviks, meanwhile, having set up their own government that same month in Tashkent in opposition to their Menshevik and Socialist Revolutionary (SR) rivals, launched an attack on Kokand which culminated in an infamous pogrom on 18 February 1918. They were then themselves challenged by the ‘January Events’ of the Osipov rising in Tashkent in 1919 before the final arrival of Frunze and the Turkkommissia. This hurricane of events played a large part in the formation of the Basmachi revolt, and figures prominently in the Soviet and Western historiography of the period. The nature of the Revolution in Central Asia received cogent analysis from early Marxist historians in the USSR during the 1920s, who suffered in considerable number under Stalin. Their studies, whilst necessarily rather rigidly class-based, give an important insight into the events of the early revolutionary period and the errors of the first Bolshevik government in Tashkent, the Sovnarkom, which was widely blamed in early Soviet literature for the explosion in Basmachi strength between 1918 and 1925. (Later, even more ideological accounts stressed the role of ‘foreign interventionists’ in sparking the Basmachi revolt, often arguing from flimsy evidence.8) The political situation in Central Asia in 1917–20 evolved from the peculiarities of the Tsarist administration, where 400,000 Russians (less, if one counts actual administrators alone) ruled approximately six million natives.9 Local politics focused on the interaction of three groups: the Russian colonists, cut off from contact with Moscow for nearly two years by the forces of the White Cossack, Ataman Dutov, at the so-called ‘Orenburg cork’, who correspondingly developed their own form of communism in relative isolation; the ‘traditional’ rulers and leaders of the local population, the Khans, Beks and Mullahs; and the new and fragile generation of Muslim intellectuals who had grown up between the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth under the influence of Ismail Gasprinskii – the ‘Jaddidists’ who formed the ‘Young Khivan’ and ‘Young Bukharan’ movements. 6

T U R K F RO N T

The Central Committee of the Communist Party in Moscow itself recognised the deep flaws in the policies of the early Tashkent Soviet: Cut off by White bands almost from the first days of the revolution in Soviet Russia, Turkestan found itself left to rely on its own strength. Not having itself a strong revolutionary tradition or experience of sustained class struggle, the thin layer of Russian workers, naturally, to a considerable degree fell under the influence of colonial-nationalist elements and involuntarily moved to politics at odds with the international interests of proletarian revolution. … Former servants of the Tsarist regime, adventurists and kulaks under the guise of class struggle, carried on their own wild persecution of the local population.10 Local observers were even more blunt and frank in their criticisms of the Sovnarkom’s failings. Ryskulov, a leading member of the Young Kazakh party, recorded Tobolin, a member of the Tashkent Soviet at the time, as saying that resources would be better expended on the war fronts than in trying to preserve the lives of the famine-wracked Kazakhs, who were doomed anyway.11 It was estimated in 1919 that one half of the population was starving. Taking into account those also affected by the epidemics of typhus and malaria, Ryskulov later calculated that ‘about one third of the population must have died’.12 Having enumerated the faults of the Tashkent committee – ‘recognition of Armenian ‘Dashnaktsutiun’ party, ruination of the Ferghana population, collaboration with Semirechie kulaks, the [first] expedition to Bukhara, and incomprehension of our mission in relation to the dekhkans [peasants]’ – he opined that communism in Turkestan had only been saved by the actions of ‘a handful’ of native revolutionaries.13 Some of these same criticisms were repeated even by later Soviet historians, who, at the same time, were anxious to accentuate the fact that the Kokand government was a creation of White Guards and foreign interventionists; Shamagdiev claimed that in about fifteen months the Armenian dashnaks employed by Tashkent had tortured and murdered around 20,000 people,14 and admitted that local Red Guard detachments were ‘not regulated by discipline … [and] supplied themselves from the [local] population’.15 Most accounts, even later Soviet ones, therefore acknowledge the crucial role of the Sovnarkom’s policies in antagonising the local population:16 by banning Muslims from participating in the political life of the Soviet, claiming they were not members of the proletariat (which, from the Marxist perspective, was true), by banning the rule of shariah, and by actual aggressive acts, such as the requisitioning of waqf lands and persecution of the natives, the Sovnarkom swelled the ranks of the criminal bands traditionally known as Basmachi with both starving peasants and a small number of disaffected Muslim intellectuals.17 The influence of the latter should not, however, be exaggerated; one of the great flaws of the Basmachestvo was that at no time did it become a modern nationalist movement, despite the claims 7

ALEXANDER MARSHALL

made for it by individual participants such as Professor Zeki Veledi Togan, whose views were influential amongst Western scholars over a considerable period.18 Rather, it remained in many aspects essentially a tribal rebellion, and what organisation and strength it later developed, particularly under Ibrahim Bek (Ibragim, in Russian accounts), revolved around its tribal character and the support granted it by the feudal Emir of Bukhara and the rulers of Afghanistan. Mustafa Chokaev, who, as leader of the Kokand Provisional Government, was in a good position from which to judge Turkestan’s political development, was adamant about the true situation in Turkestan at the time of the Revolution – the fall of Kokand had effectively quashed any hopes of the political nationalist movement gaining power, and the Basmachi movement bore no relation to that struggle: The movement became a sheer spontaneous struggle of the masses against the ‘Soviet colonisers’. This was the weak point of the movement. Each of the leaders of the [basmachi] detachments, whose numbers constantly increased, the so-called ‘Kurbashi’, set himself his own aim and programme. … The front was not a national or nationalpolitical one. The Turkestan Basmaji movement is the evidence of our political weakness.19 So it was that the Basmachi evolved from being pre-war bandit gangs to functioning as large-scale symptoms of the famine, terror, distress and repression prevalent in Central Asia during the early Civil War, while simultaneously becoming real enemies of Russian rule. Invariably mounted on horseback, swiftmoving and chiefly armed with swords, grenades and carbines, the Basmachi could offer no real resistance to Soviet forces on the field of battle, yet they made maximum use of their knowledge of the local terrain to carry out raids and ambushes.20 Whereas in the Ferghana Valley, Basmachi activity remained limited to hit-and-run raids, in both Lokai and the deserts of Turkmenistan it took on a much greater scale, with larger defensive battles. Under the Turkmen leader, Dzhunaid Khan (possibly the most able Basmachi leader bar Ibrahim), attacks were made on villages and cities, and Khiva itself was occupied temporarily.21 Against such opponents, the early Soviet government had the great advantage (noted by Chokaev) of retaining control of most of the cities and lines of communication from the very beginning. However, its army, mostly composed of foreign prisoners-of-war and mercenaries like the dashnaks, fatally lacked the element of discipline so necessary to fighting an irregular opponent.22 This was never more evident than in the aftermath of the fall of Kokand. In Soviet accounts this is usually presented as a heroic rescue of the besieged local Soviet garrison23 (Soviet claims that they were ‘forced’ to intervene would become a recurring theme of their foreign policy), but this does little to explain the slaughter of 14,000 people there or the days of rape and looting that followed.24 So weak was the army’s discipline, in fact, that in the subsequent expedition to Bukhara in March 1918, the city’s enraged population savagely repulsed the soldiers after a brief parlay. By the 8

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time the main Red Army broke through to reach Tashkent, the local communist authorities had ceased even trying to rule the countryside. Instead of pursuing the Basmachi, the authorities negotiated with them. The two main leaders of the Basmachi at the time of the arrival of the Turkkommissia were Madamin-Bek and Irgash, who ruled the Margelan and Kokand areas, respectively. Madamin was aided by Monstrov’s ‘Peasant Army’ – a group of armed Russian peasants – whom the Sovnarkom, with typical political incompetence, had managed to alienate. With the arrival of Frunze and his fellow colleagues from Moscow, however, Soviet policy in Central Asia was about to change dramatically.

The revolt encompassed, 1920–6 M. V. Frunze Mikhail Vasil’evich Frunze was perhaps the most successful military commander produced by the Bolsheviks during the Civil War to come to Central Asia. In early 1920, aged only 34, he had risen through the ranks of the early Bolsheviks by virtue of unswerving diligence to the cause and his long-recognised ability to study the military implications of implementing a political revolution. As a result, on taking command of the Eastern Front in 1919 against the armies of Kolchak, he immediately demonstrated his grasp of tactics and the need for political work alongside military operations. His regrouping of forces for the Ufa counter-attack, where a brilliant victory was achieved by manoeuvre rather than any overwhelming overall numerical superiority, can be seen as the first steppingstone in the development of Soviet ‘operational art’. His actions thereafter on the Turkestan Front revealed his continuing dedication to manoeuvre and envelopment operations. Overall, his achievements in practice during the war, and as a theorist after it, easily excelled those of his only slightly younger contemporary, Tukhachevskii, though the latter’s name remains better known in the West. On his final arrival in Tashkent on 22 February 1920, in addition to his military abilities, Frunze brought three valuable factors. He was the only man in the six-man policy-making Turkkommissia with personal experience of Central Asia, having been born in Pishpek amongst the Kyrgyz and speaking fluent Kazakh. Secondly, he had already established a harmonious and fruitful relationship with Kuibyshev, the political officer who would serve as his right-hand man in Central Asia, and who was also a member of the commission. And finally, he also brought two disciplined, well-equipped and battle-hardened armies, the 1st and 4th, with junior commanders who knew his methods, and a large Muslim element (Tatars and Bashkirs) which would prove useful in political work. Between 1920 and 1923, this force amounted to between 120,000 and 160,000 men, with artillery, aircraft, armoured cars and trains, a naval flotilla and heavy machine-gun support. Nothing like it had ever been seen before in Central Asia. Although his influence and precepts would prove to be the decisive element in turning the tide of the Basmachestvo, Frunze’s actual time in Turkestan would be 9

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short – from February to his departure again to the Southern Front against Wrangel in September 1920. In addition, he was preceded by his five fellow commission-members, who reached Tashkent in November 1919, and immediately began the important political work that would soon change Soviet fortunes. The numerous independent supply organisations were unified, the Turkestan Cheka were disbanded, as were the notorious Armenian units, and the more prominent local Russian officials put on open trial, with about 1,000 expelled. Troops were dispatched to purge local authorities and aid resettlement of the persecuted Kyrgyz and Kazakhs.25 On Frunze’s arrival, however, a political crisis had arisen which he alone addressed and resolved. Local Muslim intellectuals, led by Ryskulov and with the sympathy of Eliava, a member of the Turkkommissia, had come forward via the Fifth Conference of the Turkestan Communist Party with demands for more autonomy for Turkestan. This issue demanded control of foreign policy, an individual Turkic Communist Party and a Turkic Red Army. Frunze’s reaction to these proposals was to reject them categorically and to instruct the Turkkommissia to place its own men in all organs of party and government so as to prevent such nationalist deviations arising. Although this may appear to have been a reprehensible and even backward step on Frunze’s part, from a military perspective it was vital and necessary. It immensely simplified lines of supply and administration between the centre and the periphery at a time when the Red Army was on the verge of making an allout effort to suppress the Basmachi. In trying to re-create a stable civil society from a state of chaos, the first demand had to be administrative simplicity; to have attempted to create devolved local authorities at this stage, when all else was still in flux, could have proven truly disastrous and set back stability in Turkestan even further. Although Ryskulov and his fellow local communists took an appeal against the decision to Moscow, Frunze’s decision stood, leading ultimately to their resignation in protest.26 Frunze’s second political success, which puts the first in perspective, was to banish the local communist organisation of ethnic Russian railway workers. These men had been behind the original revolution in Tashkent, and believed that they alone had a right to the reins of power. Some of them had been plotting a ‘second October’ against the Turkkommissia, which was seen as too sympathetic to native demands.27 Their expulsion ended this danger. Frunze’s measures ensured that communist efforts in Central Asia would henceforth neither be complicated by party-nationalists nor be stained with the same racial bias as the previous Sovnarkom. For his opposition to autonomy, Frunze has sometimes been seen by Western historians as simply the brutal instrument of Russia’s centralising desires, a man who conquered Central Asia simply by virtue of the large forces at his command. In actual fact, numbers can prove an illusory advantage in a guerrilla war, as later generations have time and again discovered, and Frunze’s policies were considerably subtler. By May 1920 he had already outlined the general tactics that he and his successors would pursue against the Basmachi: 10

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(1) Quickly to set about decisive action against remnants of Basmachi bands, setting the goal of their complete annihilation. (2) To produce for this a definite plan, including 1) occupying with strong garrisons all the most prominent oblasts, capable of being bases of Basmachi, such as, for example, Uch-Kagan, Balikchi, Naukat, Sharikhan and so on. 2) The formation of sufficiently strong detachments for carrying out active operations. Attached to every garrison there is to be a flying column for the destruction of petty bands appearing in their area. (3) In action to display firmness and decisiveness. Every kind of negotiation with [Basmachi] band ringleaders is to cease.28 This order should be taken in conjunction with his later private conversation with Mel’kumov: ‘The liquidation of the basmachi is a necessity in a short time. … This is possible. It is necessary only to isolate the Basmachi from the peaceful population, who are exhausted by the extortions of the Kurbashis.’29 Frunze’s policies showed a remarkable grasp of the necessities of twentiethcentury counter-insurgency. By creating a ‘sieve’ of forts to occupy ground and flying columns able to catch the guerrillas, he hoped to separate the Basmachi from the population amongst whom they hid, and to destroy them in open battle. The effect of the forts was to be complemented by the creation of home-guard units in the small kishlaks (the winter quarters of nomadic tribes), cutting off the predatory Basmachi from their main sources of supply and support.30 As well as demonstrating the counter-insurgent response to Mao’s ‘fish-in-water’ thesis of the modern guerrilla, almost ten years before Mao himself wrote on the subject, this also suggests that Frunze must have had some knowledge of the Boer War, where such techniques were first attempted on a large scale by Lord Kitchener.31 Frunze knew, however, that military policy had to be buttressed by a suitable political stance. He was the first Red Army commander to understand the true nature of the Basmachestvo, having condemned the Sovnarkom, claiming that under them ‘[c]ontrolling organs of power were seized by a group of adventurists, desiring to fish in troubled waters.’32 He then went on to note: The Basmachi are not simply brigands: if they were, then obviously they would long ago have been killed off. No, the main strength of the Basmachi consists of hundreds and thousands of those who, one way or another, were blocked or offended by the previous authority: not seeing anywhere any defenders they fled to the Basmachi and imparted to them fantastic strength.33 Political education and political reform were fundamental to Frunze’s overall plans for Central Asia. The direct attacks on Islam that had occurred under the 11

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Sovnarkom were curtailed, native religious schools and courts were allowed to continue functioning, and waqf land was returned. Party schools opened in every oblast of Turkestan, and the prosecution of those associated with the crimes of the previous Soviet regime continued, with Kuibyshev disarming and disbanding the Soviet 4th Regiment for committing crimes against the populace.34 The implementation of the New Economic Policy (NEP) in Central Asia continued this constructive political work, as bazaars were reopened and the grain requisitioning of ‘War Communism’ was replaced by prodnalog (tax in kind), tax assistance for peasants, and the delivery of seed to farmers. Kuibyshev urged the use of magic lantern shows and cinematographs to spread the Soviet message to the largely illiterate population.35 Two ‘agitation trains’, the Rosa Luxemburg and Red East, made rapid cross-country propaganda tours.36 Despite the generally progressive nature of his policies, which in the long term assured Soviet victory in Turkestan, during his actual stay there Frunze undoubtedly made some political errors as well. First, despite the aforementioned instructions to cease all contact with Basmachi ringleaders, negotiations continued intermittently, causing lulls in activity that gave the deceptive impression of peace. Monstrov’s army, having suffered a severe defeat during its joint attack with Madamin-Bek on Andijan from the forces of the newly arrived Red Army in September 1919 – losing in battle over 1,000 dead and injured – defected to the Russian (Soviet) side in early 1920.37 Following the mysterious death/disappearance of Irgash in 1919, negotiations opened with MadaminBek, the premier Basmachi leader, which led to Madamin himself becoming a Soviet emissary.38 The futility of such policies was demonstrated, however, when Madamin was assassinated during negotiations with a fellow Basmachi leader. Such Basmachi as did transfer their allegiance to the Soviet side were invariably only ‘winter Bolsheviks’, those who would return to their original bands, freshly armed, the following spring. On 7 May, Frunze signed a directive to conscript 35,000 Central Asians into the Red Army, allowing entire units of individual nationalities (Turkoman, Kyrgyz) to be set up, despite his earlier opposition to autonomous forces. Such decrees created fierce opposition in a country unaccustomed to military service, as the earlier Tsarist decree had demonstrated, and Frunze’s armies had too few native cadres to deal with the influx of reluctant recruits. Many Muslim draftees fled to the Basmachi with their arms, and the Bolsheviks were forced to disarm the 1st Uzbek Cavalry Brigade. The ambitious conscription decree proved a disastrous failure due to the lack of resources necessary to ensure its efficient implementation, and the final effect was to swell Basmachi strength to 30,000 during the summer of 1920.39 The final political drawback during Frunze’s stay in Central Asia, though an unavoidable one in the circumstances, was the complication created by his own attack on Bukhara, which resulted in the forces of the large army hastily recruited by the Emir eventually joining and supplementing Basmachi strength. The Emir, who had pursued increasingly reactionary policies since his first 12

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encounter with the Soviets in 1918, was now seen as a menace to the Soviet regime, and an attack under Frunze’s guidance was launched on his capital in September 1920. The aim of Frunze’s forces was, allegedly, to aid the local rising of the ‘Young Bukharans’, though it is questionable how many of these were left after the failure of Kolesov’s initial contact with Bukhara and the repression of liberal elements that followed. Certainly, if they were anything like their kindred ‘Young Khivans’, whom Soviet forces had ‘aided’ in finally expelling Dzhunaid Khan from Khiva in January 1920, their contribution must have been small. Skalov, the major Red Army participant, was driven to comment on the latter: ‘The strength of the Young Khivans is more inflated than a soap bubble, their influence in Khiva is almost nil, and they do not conduct any work at all. One has to watch them all the time in case they commit some stupidity.’ 40 Frunze’s operation against Bukhara, a classic encirclement by four independent operational groups which assembled and deployed in complete secrecy, encountered fierce resistance and unexpected difficulties – the city’s thick ancient walls absorbed artillery shells without any effect, leading fire to be concentrated on the gates and so reducing avenues of attack – but after five days it resulted in the fall of the capital.41 The Emir managed to escape, however, retreating to his residence at Dushanbe, from where he needled the Soviet authority in Central Asia. During an expedition to complete the rout of the forces at the Emir’s disposal – from his sanctuary in Eastern Bukhara he gathered around him the forces of Kurshirmat, a leading Basmachi, and Ibrahim, destined to be his most loyal supporter – the difficulties of local conditions became fully apparent for the first time. The first problem was one of supply. During the ‘Gissar [Hissar] Expedition’ in February 1921, men were issued 200 cartridges and machine-guns limited to five belts of ammunition from the outset. Light machine-guns enabled the Red cavalry forces to repulse the mass charges of the enemy they encountered and artillery provided effective cover for their own attacks, but climatic conditions were severe, with two days spent in a malaria-infested valley.42 The Basmachi demonstrated for the first time their alarming propensity to avoid, and to infiltrate behind, large columns of troops.43 Ultimately, the Emir again escaped, this time to the safe haven of Afghanistan, from whence he continued to fund Basmachi activity. With the fall of the fort at Gissar, and the subsequent occupation of Dushanbe, the Basmachi practically gave up defending fixed positions and the war took on a fully mobile character. In 1921–2, the Red Army began to conduct large-scale sweeps. Whole cavalry brigades with air support advancing on wide fronts from their well-garrisoned bases and strong points may have managed to capture large numbers of Basmachi, but the main ringleaders and their small corps of hard-line followers always escaped.44 The war might have continued for some time in this desultory manner but for the rise of a Basmachi leader who enabled the Reds to destroy their mobile opponents in precisely the fixed battles they sought. It is ironic, therefore, that most Western sources should consider this 13

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man the greatest leader the Basmachi had, a view usually based on the pan-Turkic writings of the aforementioned Professor Togan.45 But this leader was already famous, if not for his military competence. His name was Enver Pasha. Enver When Enver Pasha, the former Turkish Minister of War, arrived in Central Asia in 1921, following an eventful journey via Berlin and Riga, he came initially as a Bolshevik ally and participant at the Baku Congress of Toilers and Workers of the East.46 Not long after his own participation at that conference, however, Enver, who had always been prone to pan-Turkic dreams, defected to the Basmachi side and rode out of Bukhara on an alleged hunting trip to meet Basmachi ringleaders. With him he took a number of disaffected Bukharan Jaddidists, the most prominent amongst them being Usman Khodzaev, along with some of his own entourage of seventy-four Turkish officers whom the Russians had hoped would help to raise a loyal Muslim army. It is symbolic of Enver’s own alien status as a Western Turk in Central Asia, however, that Ibrahim Bek immediately took him prisoner on suspicion of his being a double agent. With the Emir’s intercession, he was released eventually and given permission to raise an ‘Army of Islam’ to combat the Soviet presence. He came at the crest of a wave of renewed Basmachi activity, the reasons for which are disputed in the existing literature – Mel’kumov implied that certain nationalist Young Bukharans deliberately fostered differences between the Red Army and the local population,47 whilst the Emir claimed that it was the depredations and routings by the Red Army that created a backlash in the countryside.48 In January 1922, Enver launched a successful attack on Dushanbe, taking the town, 120 rifles and two machine-guns.49 With that success behind him, he proceeded to launch a series of fruitless attacks on Baisun, defended by the 5th Rifle Regiment, each charge withering under the concentrated fire of the Russian troops. Baisun was symbolic of Enver’s ambitions – a small town, it lay on the approach to the ‘Iron Gates’, the strategic pass through the mountains between Eastern and Western Bukhara, so-called from the days of Tamerlane.50 Such an objective would have been suitable for an army, but not a guerrilla force. The Red Army, seizing this opportunity to destroy concentrated numbers of Basmachi in the field (estimates of the strength of Enver’s army vary wildly between 7,000 and 17,000 men), abandoned their former policy of slow ‘partridge drives’ on a wide front in favour of lightning strikes by small, mobile columns.51 Red Army forces possessed no overwhelming numerical superiority – the main (right) striking column mustered only 1,500 sabres, 800 bayonets and eight guns – but were considerably more disciplined and better equipped.52 On 15 June, the right column, divided into a number of smaller tactical groups and marching to their starting positions by night to achieve surprise, surrounded and destroyed Enver’s headquarters at Kofrun. Many of his troops, trapped in the trenches devised for them by their Turkish advisers, lacking artillery or reserve ammunition, were 14

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annihilated in a storm of shrapnel, high-explosive and machine-gun fire.53 As his defences crumpled under repeated cavalry and infantry attacks, Enver and a small group of men escaped to the mountains to the south, but in Mel’kumov’s apt words: ‘The Army of Islam ceased to exist.’54 In contrast with previous operations, Red Army pursuit, aided by consistently accurate information from their scouts and agentura (local informers), was to prove relentless for over two months. Enver fought for three days to hold a bridgehead at Denau at the end of June, but retired ultimately, leaving 165 dead on the field. Dushanbe was retaken in July, the Basmachi once more dying in their trenches in precisely the type of setpiece confrontation they should have avoided, and Enver was driven further and further east to Bal’dzhuan. A three-day battle ensued in this town in August 1922, with Red Army ‘artillery preparation’ allegedly leading to around 12,000–15,000 Basmachi casualties being taken out of the town when it fell.55 Enver escaped again, but Red Army cavalry caught up with him at a small kishlak to the north-east of Bal’dzhuan on 4 August. The first squadron spread out and, moving uphill to Enver’s camp, was met by a charge from their quarry – in the vanguard on his favourite grey horse, Dervish – and twenty-five of his men, and driven back downhill. At that moment, however, Enver’s men came under fire from a machine-gun squadron dismounted in the rear to cover just such an eventuality. Enver was hit five or six times in the chest and head and killed instantly, as was his second-in-command, Davlet, a few seconds later. The Reds retired without apprehending the extent of their victory.56 Although it is difficult to extract true figures of casualty returns from the available sources, there is little doubt that Enver’s campaign struck a disastrous blow to the Basmachi movement, inflicting losses due to a premature move to semi-regular warfare from which it never really recovered. Far from being a visionary leader, Enver, displaying the same mixture of ineptitude and arrogance that had destroyed his Third Army at Sarikamis in 1915, gave the Bolsheviks an assured victory.57 It is little wonder that Ibrahim Bek, the most tactically astute Basmachi leader, would have nothing to do with Enver, though their differences were undoubtedly over political as well as military matters. Achieving as much as Enver (forming disciplined semi-regular forces with uniforms and standardised equipment), and at less cost, Ibrahim symbolised the paradoxes of the Basmachi movement.58 A brilliant leader, he was also a political reactionary, and the Emir’s man, and would even aid the Soviets in the persecution of the liberal Jaddidist nationalists, whom he loathed.59 During Enver’s campaign he carried out his own independent raids. As if deliberately trying to highlight Enver’s shortcomings as a guerrilla leader, Ibrahim’s ambushes and retreats were, more often than not, highly successful. Even Soviet historians conceded that ‘[i]n October 1922 Ibrahim Bek was struck some appreciable blows, but he on every occasion managed to hide in the mountains.’60 Measured objectively, therefore, few of the claims made for Enver – that he was ‘a leader of overriding authority’ or that he alone provided ‘an efficient army organisation’ – stand up to close scrutiny.61 Even the claim that he may 15

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have been able to draw additional aid from Afghanistan, as ‘a man very popular’ there,62 should be questioned. Madamin-Bek had received aid from the Afghans as early as 1919,63 and Glenda Fraser argues that Enver may have discouraged aid from that country by his foreign, pan-Turkic ideology.64 What is certain is that 1922 marked a crucial turning point in the war between the Soviets and Basmachi: ‘The year … was the last in which the Basmachi could be said to rival the Soviets in apparent power in Turkestan.’65 The year ended with the Bolsheviks in the ascendant. Responsibility for that must lie in greater part with Enver Pasha. Ibrahim Bek 1923–6 With his death, Enver left his most lasting positive input to the Basmachi movement: his grave became a shrine, symbol and gathering point for mullahs until the Soviets banned meetings there after a few years, realising its political value to the Basmachis.66 The war continued meanwhile, though increasingly difficult political conditions for the Basmachi compelled them to take refuge either in remote mountainous or desert areas, or in Afghanistan itself. The Basmachestvo had, by now, largely ceased to be a mass movement and was increasingly peopled purely by professional guerrillas, who formed two main groupings: the followers of Dzhunaid Khan, who carried out his own private campaign in the deserts of the Kara-Kum, a sideshow within a sideshow; and those Kurbashis who worked under the guidance of the ex-Emir of Bukhara in Kabul. Haji Sami, Enver’s immediate successor (and the Salim Pasha of Soviet accounts), formed part of the latter group, though, like his former master, he had his own dictatorial tendencies. Conditions were increasingly difficult for subversive activity in Turkestan itself. Bolshevik propaganda continued apace. The country began to be flooded with Cheka intelligence agents, while Tatars operated in the Sovietbacked Bukharan secret police. The Reds’ administrative grasp on the state tightened, symbolised by the increasing number of Bolshevik-initiated local congresses, or kurultais, and Moscow’s growing success in insisting that dekhkans play a role in government. The holding of such a kurultai of Lokai, Ibrahim’s own tribe, in December 1923, represented a particular coup for the Bolsheviks.67 The tribal authorities of the kishlaks and the feudal classes were increasingly undermined by practical aid and propaganda, and in 1923 the Bolsheviks conceived a further political tool to unseat the Basmachi by forcing the peasants to grow cotton. The principle was simple: corn, normally prohibitively expensive to the country dekhkan, was offered on the condition that it was only for food and not for sowing, and that the peasants planted only cotton. ‘By reducing the sowings of wheat in the spring of 1923, the Russians succeeded in driving the Basmachi into forcible extortion of corn, alienating the sympathies of the natives and causing dissension among the Basmachi bands.’68 This political policy was complemented by continued military campaigns, which once again assumed the form of large-scale sweeps and clearing opera16

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tions, but with tactical modifications. From 1923 onwards, a key aspect in all Soviet operations was the increasing political disaffection of the local population from the Basmachestvo. By now, Red Army expeditions were invariably accompanied by small groups of militia and volunteer detachments (dobrovol’cheskie otriady), which might occasionally be political liabilities, but did provide invaluable knowledge of local terrain. A special sixty-man cavalry unit of Lokai tribesmen was formed, for example, to track down Ibrahim, their fellow Lokai.69 The effect of these changes was manifested when the Basmachi launched their spring campaign of 1923. This marked the first time that the Basmachi consciously tried to operate as a coordinated body: the tactics and strategy had been decided during a meeting between the Emir and leading Kurbashis at Kabul in August 1922.70 This presaged the growing tendency for professionalism associated with the Basmachi that later would lead, through strict accounting of weaponry, not only to the assignment of each Kurbashi to a particular sphere of action, but also to a better system of communications to ‘the best Basmachi force, man for man, ever fielded’ under Ibrahim Bek.71 Coordinated plans demanded greater internal discipline. This was encouraged during the latter part of 1922 when Haji Sami recrossed the border from Afghanistan to settle local disputes between Basmachi leaders and have himself declared supreme leader of the movement. The introduction of discipline required stern measures, and Haji’s intervention in the dispute between Fuzail Maksum and the brothers Ishan Suleiman and Ishan Sultan concluded with the latter two being hanged.72 At the subsequent meeting of Basmachi leaders at Muminabad (within Soviet territory) the plans for the coming campaign were articulated, and Haji was recognized as lashkar bashi (commander-in-chief). The Basmachi plan was ambitious, based on the reoccupation of Eastern Bukhara through uniting all Basmachi forces, whilst at the same time increasing their numbers through local agitators – a goal that the Basmachi largely achieved. The general number of Basmachi increased from 2,945 to 5,030 men between December 1922 and June 1923.73 Attacks were to be launched on Soviet garrisons, but also this time on the Russian’s Revkoms (Revolutionary Commissions) and local party workers, reflecting the Basmachis’ understanding that they were now fighting a political, as much as a military, war. Basmachi strategy had become far more sophisticated than anything that had preceded it. Nonetheless, this plan failed, partly because of the improved methods of the Soviets, and partly because Haji Sami remained, like his late master, over-ambitious. His initial attack on the Red Army garrison at Kuliab in December 1922–January 1923 was successful: the fort fell after its ammunition supply was exhausted, but Sami’s band was driven from that point shortly afterwards by relieving forces of the 15th Cavalry Regiment. Retiring and regrouping in the Gissar Valley, Sami united his forces with Ibrahim Bek’s in February. Leaving Ibrahim to cover his rear in Lokai, he proceeded westwards with 600 men to spread the revolt throughout the thinly garrisoned Karsh–Kerk–Termez–Baisun area. Here, however, he was outmanoeuvred by the vigorous activity of the Turkfront commander A.I. Kork (later a 17

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prominent victim of Stalin’s purges). Kork dispatched the 3rd Cavalry Brigade with a 76 mm battery to surround and annihilate Sami’s group as they advanced. These Red Army forces, conducting an encircling manoeuvre over a distance of more than 175 kilometres, trapped Haji Sami’s force in the triangle of Koludar–Guzar–Tegi Khoram on 13 March and routed them.74 Retiring in disarray, Sami retreated through Denau to Kelif, where a further blow completed his forces’ disintegration and ended the Basmachis’ short-lived unity of command. In the words of the Russian official history, the detachments of Sami now split into two groups, ‘those content and discontent with Salim Pasha’.75 This situation continued until July 1923, when Sami fled across the border to Afghanistan, never to return. He was to die shortly afterwards, far away from Central Asia, at the hands of Kemalist secret police.76 With the defeat of the Basmachi advance, the initiative passed to the Bolsheviks, who launched their own campaign in March under the auspices of the newly arrived corps’ commander, the renowned Civil War leader Pavel Andreevich Pavlov. Pavlov instituted three measures that rendered the Bolshevik counter-offensive particularly devastating. First, he instituted the principle that attention would be focused on seizing and occupying the bases of Basmachi support, rather than on fruitless pursuit of the bands themselves. Three main such ‘seats of Basmachestvo’ now existed: the mountainous stronghold of Matcha; the adjoining areas of the Lokai and Gissar Valleys to the south; and the capital of Fuzail Maksum, mountainous Garm, far to the east. For executing his mission, Pavlov possessed greatly increased forces. In response to the requests of the Bukharan Soviet, Moscow bolstered the Turkfront to the point where 5,832 men with 222 machine-guns and artillery pieces were operating in Eastern Bukhara in 1923.77 Second, he planned to strike against all three Basmachi bases simultaneously, allowing them no time to prepare or regroup. Lastly, he earned Mel’kumov’s admiration by freeing the cavalry from being bound to follow the pace of accompanying infantry, increasing their effectiveness by allowing them greater independence and freedom of movement.78 The campaign that followed was notable for the striking successes achieved in difficult conditions. Matcha, for example, had long proved particularly difficult to penetrate, with the snow-capped peaks and avalanches common to the area giving it a resemblance to the Caucasus. In 1922, elements of the 11th Cavalry Division, part of the famous 1st Cavalry Army, had suffered a serious tactical reverse in Matcha. The Division’s indigenous field guns and machine-gun carts (tachanki), so suitable for fighting on the plains, proved difficult to transport into the mountains, and division officers were so inexperienced in mountain fighting that they neglected to send dismounted scouts ahead of the main column. The resulting retreat of the 2nd Brigade had come close to being a military disaster.79 The March offensive of 1923 was marked, by contrast, by methodical advance and suitable supply and transport; all guns and machine-guns were assigned to pack trains, and supplies were stockpiled on the Samarkand–Pendzhikent line in 18

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advance.80 In the fighting that followed, the three Red Army columns, greatly aided by local volunteers who served as interpreters, scouts and engineer labour, eventually took and occupied the main kishlak of Oburdon and its accompanying arsenal on 2 April 1923. An advance by two columns from the Dushanbe and Samarkand military districts against Garm to the east proved equally successful. Garm fell on 29 July after a twelve-hour battle and Fuzail Maksum fled to Afghanistan, slightly wounded, on 12 August.81 Only in the southern Gissar–Lokai area was Soviet action less than decisive. However, as long as Haji Sami remained in the country, the Soviets exploited the rift between him and Ibrahim Bek to strike blows at both men’s forces. The greatest gains came from the increased level of political work carried out in the Lokai Valley, culminating with the introduction of land reform in November and the kurultai in December, where it was declared that Islam was not incompatible with communism. These measures were to benefit some of the military campaigns in the shape of growing numbers of local informers, as Mel’kumov noted: ‘The new tactics, adhered to by Pavlov, countered the traditional representatives of the Basmachi. In May 1923 the forces of Ibrahim Bek were struck blows wherever they appeared.’82 In September, however, Ibrahim, by now lashkar bashi and the last major Basmachi leader still in Eastern Bukhara, retained enough strength to launch his own counter-attack. His plan, typically well conceived, was to strike the Soviet garrison at Naryn at the moment when Soviet recruitment turnover meant that the greatest number of inexperienced, untested troops would be in position there.83 Soviet political measures had had some success in separating the Basmachi from the local population, however, and Mel’kumov claimed that Ibrahim was reduced to threats of execution to help raise troops.84 The garrison held out long enough to be relieved, and the final result was a string of serious defeats for Ibrahim. Soviet sources put his losses at 117 Kurbashis and 1,565 soldiers.85 A lull ensued in the conflict. Ibrahim remained active, however, and sought professional soldiers for his movement, a process that involved not only greater regimentation and centralisation of command, but also the formation of special propaganda groups to counter the Soviet message in the auls and kishlaks.86 In the interim, the Soviets maintained their political effort, whilst their military forces concentrated on inflicting a major defeat on Dzhunaid Khan in the Khorezm Desert in 1924.87 The following year was notable for a Soviet impetus whose repercussions were felt in the wider political situation. Red Army forces occupied the island of Urta-Tugai on the Soviet–Afghan border, forcing the Afghan government to tighten their border controls, and rendering the traffic of Basmachi between Afghanistan and Turkestan considerably more difficult. If Enver Pasha’s misconceived 1922 campaign had done much to destroy the Basmachi as a mass movement in the field, Pavlov’s 1923 campaign had done much to remove the natural roots of the hard-line insurgents. Though Ibrahim continued to receive residual support from the Lokai, and though Fuzail Maksum would return to Garm on a wave of popular support in 1929, the 19

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Basmachi bands that continued to operate in Central Asia were considerably reduced in number, and poorly supported. The Soviet campaign of 1926, intended to remove Ibrahim Bek once and for all, was launched on the command of Inspector of Cavalry Semen Mikhailovich Budenny in March. It relied on crushing Red Army numerical superiority to carry out an intensified form of the type of operations first conceived by Frunze in 1920. By the construction of many more forts on the valley floors to isolate Basmachi sources of supply, and the activity of special flying columns composed of the best men and horses, the Basmachi were to be hounded out of existence. The constant recurrence of these tactics, incidentally, would fully justify Frunze’s claim to be the true ‘Father of Modern Soviet Counter-Insurgency’, and not the more commonly mentioned Tukhachevskii.88 In 1926, radio was still unavailable, but heliograph stations were set up to help coordinate the actions of the garrisons and flying columns, alongside a permanently mobile field staff.89 Implicated against their will in this increasingly dense web, the isolated Basmachi under Ibrahim Bek faced either starvation coupled with harassment in the hills, or military annihilation on the valley floors. Despite being a war of attrition, the turning point of the campaign was not a military encounter, but the seizure of 1,500 head of sheep belonging to Ibrahim by one of the flying columns.90 An attempt by Khurram Bek to join Ibrahim met with a series of disasters, Khurram being pursued by cavalry only to cross the path of garrison forces warned of his approach in advance by a heliograph signal. Meanwhile, the small force Ibrahim dispatched to learn what had happened to Khurram was completely annihilated. On 21 July, Ibrahim crossed the border to Afghanistan, unable to operate any longer under the burden of military pressure. To the minds of many, the Basmachestvo was now truly finished.

The forgotten revolt: 1929–33 Though both émigré and later western observers were loath to recognise it, the success experienced by the Russians in their war against the Basmachestvo following Frunze’s debut in Central Asia owed much to the Bolsheviks’ astute adjustments to local political conditions, and to the legal and administrative reforms they had introduced. During the latter half of the 1920s, however, the Bolshevik political approach to Central Asia became more rigid and tightly centralised, leading to policies that alienated the local population and favoured a recurrence of the Basmachestvo. The first sign of this Moscow-led change of policy came with the khudzhum campaign of 1927, which sought to alter the social status of Muslim women. In that same year, traditional courts were finally abolished, efforts to increase secular education were redoubled, and waqf lands were substantially reduced. The onset of the campaign of collectivisation, which sought in particular to settle the nomad population, and which took grip from 1929 onwards with devastating results, completed this cycle of political change. This political transformation was soon inciting local unrest at the same time as 20

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the Soviet military, particularly in Tajikistan, were operating at greatly reduced strength.91 These altered political conditions coincided with a period of political instability in Afghanistan, which benefited the émigré Basmachi community, who were carrying out cross-border raids. In particular, during the temporary rule of Bacha-i-Saqao on the throne of Afghanistan, the Soviet–Afghan Treaty of 1926 was nullified and the Basmachi given a free hand to use northern Afghanistan as a recruitment and supply base. In January 1929, the ex-Emir of Bukhara held a meeting of the leading Kurbashis in Kabul, aiming to take advantage of this turn of events. Measures were implemented to increase the Basmachis’ military and political strength: recruitment bounties were instituted; and all fighters were equipped with modern British-model equipment from the Afghans, including machine-guns and hand grenades. Great use was made of an old, unratified treaty to assert the claim before potential followers that the Basmachi enjoyed full British political support as well.92 Kurbashis were dispatched individually across the border to foment political unrest, while a large intelligence-gathering network was set up with the aid of a rogue Orenburg Cossack named Pimenov. In the spring of 1929, the Basmachi began to launch attacks on the Soviet border that, although disjointed, served to stretch the resources of the border guards and local Obedinennoye Gosudarstvennoye Politicheskoye Upranlenie (OGPU) units to the limit.93 Finally, in April, there was a critical breakthrough when Fuzail Maksum slipped across the border with fifteen men to rendezvous with his local followers in Eastern Tajikistan. Fuzail’s main task was to raise local support and pave the way for the arrival of Ibrahim Bek accompanied by the main Basmachi force. He came very close to fulfilling these tasks. He had quickly raised 200 men and was moving on Garm, which was defended by a weak Soviet paramilitary unit, the Garm Regional Regiment. Support of the isolated garrison was dependent upon retention of the primitive Garm airfield outside the town, to which reinforcements could be airlifted from Dushanbe. This was to prove vital, as Maksum proved adept at outmanoeuvring the Soviet forces in the mountains of his native Darvaz. Killing Soviet representatives in the towns he passed through, including three female schoolteachers in Tadzhikabad, he destroyed a Soviet volunteer detachment on 21 April that was itself clearing the road to Garm. In light of these developments, the Soviet overall commander in Central Asia, General P. E. Dybenko, made a series of emergency measures to counter the Basmachi advance. The seriousness of Fuzail Maksum’s threat can be judged by the fact that these included the only real political adjustments to local conditions ever ordered during the 1929–33 campaigns. That spring, Dybenko ordered both the raising of local self-defence units and an intensification of local political work in Eastern Tajikistan. He even suggested manipulating traditional antagonisms within the local populations to help defeat the movement, believing, amongst other things, that the Turkomen, as traditional cattle-breeders, felt naturally hostile to the Basmachi since they had most to lose.94 This contradicted later 21

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Soviet policy, which in general, and in contrast to earlier periods, relied on pure military force. Andijan, Namagan and Dushanbe were to be razed to the ground in the period leading up to 1933, and 270,000 Turkestanis forcibly deported on suspicion of collaboration.95 Local conditions were taken into consideration, mainly at the tactical level, where the Soviets concentrated on achieving the right mix of OGPU, border guard, Red Army and local party personnel in their strike units to achieve success. Soviet military fortunes brightened briefly in late April 1929, when the main force of Ibrahim Bek was savagely repulsed on trying to cross the border by an ambush laid by the 81st Cavalry Regiment. Around Garm, however, Fuzail Maksum now had 800 men, and the local Soviet commander retired from the town itself to dig in and defend the airfield with just sixteen men. In response to an urgent telegraph to Dushanbe, reinforcements were sent by air at the same time as a seventy-five-strong cavalry regiment marched out to relieve the town by more conventional methods. At six in the morning, on 23 April 1929, five aircraft landed at Garm (in what was the first combat airlift in military history) to unload forty Red Armymen who carried an above-regulation supply of machineguns and ammunition. These forces marched out to meet the Basmachi. Soon, firing down at the milling horsemen from the heights around the town, they put Fuzail Maksum’s large band to flight. The cavalry continued to pursue the Basmachi the following day, having marched 150 kilometres in thirty hours to reach Garm at nightfall on 23 April. The tide had been turned. On 3 May, badly wounded, Fuzail Maksum was forced to retire to Afghanistan. Fuzail Maksum’s defeat at Garm heralded the swansong of the later Basmachestvo. The Soviet administrative grip on the country was tightened. A special campaign was launched by the OGPU that targeted the social groups – mullahs, Beks and former Bukharan officials – held responsible for assisting Fuzail to raise such dangerous numbers from such a low initial strength. Military tribunals were set up in centres of disaffection, and ‘a liberal programme of shooting’ ensued.96 An incursion was even made onto Afghan territory to attempt a communist takeover, but the rise of Nadir Khan to the throne rendered the Soviet mission defunct before they reached Kabul. Continued Soviet pursuit of the Basmachi into Afghan territory prompted the Afghan government to launch their own campaign against the Basmachi base in the north of their country. This pressure on his rear provoked Ibrahim Bek to initiate what was intended to be his main campaign on Soviet territory in 1931. In the first week of April, Ibrahim Bek crossed the border into Soviet territory with approximately 800 men. Immediately, he began a campaign of sabotage and subversion, dispatching Kurbashis into the country. Like any classic political insurgent, he issued orders for troops to be raised and for battle to be avoided. However, changed political conditions and relentless Red Army pressure conspired to crush this insurgency within a very short space of time. Though he might promise a new start, Ibrahim soon found that his actual policies – a return to tribal law and the rule of the Emir – no longer attracted followers. This failure 22

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to raise local troops would have been less disastrous had reinforcements from Afghanistan been forthcoming. The attempts by Ibrahim’s subordinates to cross the border and join him met catastrophe, however, with the Basmachi suffering crippling losses from the border-guards’ machine-guns. The Soviets formed a unified political-military command to tackle Ibrahim Bek. A special two-division OGPU formation was assigned to pursue Ibrahim, aided by a small volunteer detachment under Muksum Sultan.97 In addition, sixteen companies of OSNAZ (Osobogo Naznacheniia), special task units formed from local communist and Komsomol members, complemented the volunteer detachments and the Krasnopalochniki (local militia units based around a core unit of five to ten Red Armymen). In the second half of May, a Red Army amnesty incited a series of mass Basmachi surrenders: 12 Kurbashis and 653 soldiers surrendered on 20 May alone.98 According to Soviet accounts, Ibrahim spent his last days in straitened circumstances, hiding with just fifteen men in the foothills of the Baba-Tag, in fear of being poisoned or assassinated by his own men.99 On 23 June 1931, while attempting to cross the River Kafirnigan, he was betrayed by locals and captured by the volunteer detachment of Sultan. Within a short space of time, he was transported to Tashkent, tried and executed. Although a revolt in Turkmenistan in which Dzhunaid Khan took part would continue to occupy Soviet forces until Dzhunaid fled to Iran in 1933, the death of Ibrahim can be taken as marking the final passing of the Basmachi movement as a true political insurgency. The revolt in Turkmenistan in its latter stages was well organised, with a central command and modern equipment, but it continued to be split by tribal and ethnic divisions. In addition, local conditions generally – in the main waterless open desert, exposed to Red Army airpower – were less favourable to a true guerrilla movement than Eastern Tajikistan. The capture of Ibrahim by well-ordered columns in which local natives took part, therefore, marked the culmination of the process initiated by Frunze over ten years previously. Perhaps the only thing more remarkable than the campaigns themselves was the speed with which the Red Army seemed promptly to forget all the lessons it had learned.

Conclusion: Frunze, the Soviet Army and the CIS today Although he was in command of the Turkfront for barely eight months, the arrival of M. V. Frunze in Central Asia marked the turning point in Soviet fortunes in their war against the Basmachi. In Central Asia, as elsewhere during the Civil War, Frunze excelled at melding political and military approaches harmoniously, and at shaping his strike forces to deal appropriately with the task they faced. Consequently, where he relied on the triumvirate of cavalry, airpower and garrison troops in Central Asia, so too in his campaign against Baron Wrangel in the Crimea did he reshape his strike troops so that artillery, infantry and engineers came to the fore to deal with the fortified trench systems that Wrangel had prepared. It was this flexibility of approach, combined with serious 23

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scientific analysis of the needs of each particular theatre and combat situation, that brought Frunze success on every front on which he served in the Civil War. Shortly before he died under the surgeon’s knife in 1925, he wrote a critique of the contemporary war in Morocco between France and the Rif. He criticised the French for carrying out the war with a ‘lifeless doctrinarism’ – failing to shape their forces to local conditions and relying instead on the enormous artillery bombardments which had become standard during the First World War to ensure any advance.100 Yet, approximately sixty years later, the Soviet Army was fighting guerrillas in Afghanistan with techniques more appropriate to a Second World War armoured offensive. The flexible military-political instrument Frunze had helped to create appeared to have been discarded. The Soviet Army was, above all else, a political instrument of the party. From Lenin onwards, the Communist Party was fanatical about retaining full control of the army, due to a paranoid fear of Bonapartism. Thus, when viewing apparent doctrinal changes in the army, one must also examine changes in Russian political policy. In his magisterial study of the war in Afghanistan, Colonel Scott R. McMichael ascribed the lack of a Counter-Insurgency (CI) policy in Soviet military thought to the rigidity of Marxism-Leninism itself: ‘Since the end of the Second World War, the Soviets have maintained that the very concept of CI war is an imperialist one.’101 However, to trace this blind spot right back to the writings of Lenin as McMichael does is to ignore the flexibility that Marxism-Leninism gave Red Army forces in their early combat with guerrilla forces; a flexibility and effectiveness, in fact, that probably no contemporary army could match. As Robert F. Baumann notes: Although Marxism-Leninism provided no clear blueprint for victory in Central Asia, it predisposed the Bolsheviks to undertake a social analysis of the theatre of conflict. Above all, the Bolsheviks were aware of the significance of ‘political consciousness’, whether more or less developed, in determining the will of a people to resist or seek accommodation.102 In tracing the development of rigidity in Soviet military tactics, therefore, one must also identify rigidity in Marxism-Leninism. Only towards the start of the 1930s did the Soviets begin to display some of the rigidity and crude tactics in Central Asia that would appear, more fully evolved, in Afghanistan. In tracing the cause of this change, one is drawn to the influence of an otherwise unlikely partnership – Stalin and Marshal Tukhachevskii. Under Frunze, the Soviet Army, though one of the most poorly equipped in the world, was also one of the most doctrinally imaginative. Night operations and partisan units were established and studied, not merely to supplement the weak regular army, but because they were thought to give the Soviets a possible advantage over more conventionally minded opponents.103 However, Frunze’s Unified Military Doctrine, which 24

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identified the West as the Soviet Union’s main enemy, lent itself to greater doctrinal rigidity once Stalin’s programme of high-speed industrialisation, Tukhachevskii’s concentration on armoured warfare and, above all, four very costly years of war with Nazi Germany concentrated the Soviet Army’s attention on conventional warfare, leaving the art of political counter-insurgency increasingly in the hands of the KGB and border-guard forces. This division of interests persists to this day, with a division between Regular and Interior Ministry troops, and fatally undermines the otherwise potentially fruitful legacy of the Soviet forces’ experience against the Basmachestvo. Perhaps the most shocking visible defect of the Russian operations in Afghanistan, and later in Chechnya, was the loss of that Soviet virtue of edinonachaliia (one-man command), illustrated by political and military efforts in these campaigns that were totally uncoordinated. In contrast, during the 1920s, in Central Asia, the example of Frunze and later of the Sredazbiuro RKP and SAVO (Sredneii Aziatskim Voennym Okrugom) provided glowing examples of unified political-military effort. Today the Russian Army, like all modern armies, is struggling to meet the twin threats of conventional conflict and unconventional warfare. Alongside others, the Army has hypothesised that the solution may lie in a doctrine of ‘non-linear warfare’, rather than the treatment of counter-insurgency as a special and separate sphere. Soviet activities in Central Asia during the 1920s present many examples of this supposedly modern concept of ‘non-linear’ conflict, Pavlov’s 1923 campaign being an outstanding example. If the armies of Russia, and elsewhere, are to create reaction forces capable of meeting the twin outstanding threats of the modern world, the answer may ironically lie with rediscovering the writings and influence of the father of the old Soviet Army, M. V. Frunze.

Notes 1 From the Turkic verb basmak, literally ‘to tread on; to oppress’. 2 Walter Daniel Jacobs, Frunze: The Soviet Clausewitz 1885–1925 (The Hague: Martinus. Nijhoff, 1969). This is the only significant English-language biography of Frunze and is a rather unsympathetic account of his career and character that plays down his influence in the defeat of the Basmachestvo: The irregular Basmachis … led him a rather spirited chase about the countryside. Frunze did not succeed in finally defeating them (although they were later put down by other Soviet commanders). His actions did help to add Central Asia to the Soviet Empire. (p. 208) 3 Michael Rywkin, Moscow’s Muslim Challenge. Soviet Central Asia (Armonk, NY and London: M. E.Sharpe, 1982), p. 17. 4 Edward Dennis Sokol, The Revolt of 1916 in Russian Central Asia (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1954), p. 114. 5 Iu. A. Mel’kumov, Turkestantsy (Moscow: Ministerstva Oborony Soyuza SSR, 1960), p. 16. 6 Sokol, op. cit., p. 126.

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7 During the revolt in Samarkand oblast among the Sarts, the uyezd of Jizak suffered the effects of a Russian punitive column: kishlaks were burnt to the ground and natives expelled from their land. During the most violent phase of the revolt in Semirechie whole villages were flattened by artillery fire and Kuropatkin himself gave the order ‘not to spare the cartridges’. Ibid., pp. 94, 127. 8 G. Safarov, Kolonial’naia revoliutsiia (Opyt Turkestana), Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel’stvo 1921 (Oxford: Society For Central Asian Studies Reprint Series No. 4, 1985) is the primary example of early Soviet accounts of the Revolution in Central Asia. Safarov himself was later purged. The later, more rigidly ideological approach can be seen in such works as A. I. Zevelev, Iu. A. Poliakov and A. I. Chugunov, Basmachestvo: Vozniknovenie, Sushchnost’, Krakh (Moscow, 1981). 9 Figures given in Richard Pipes, The Formation of the Soviet Union: Communism and Nationalism 1917–1923 (rev. edition; Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 1964), p. 88. 10 12 August 1920 Central Committee RKP(b), No. 15613N. F. Kuz’min, G. G. Alakhverdov, L. M. Danilova et al. (eds), Iz Istorii Grazhdanskoi Voiny v SSR. Sbornik dokumentov i materialov v trekh tomakh. (3.) (Moscow, 1961), pp. 573–4. 11 Turar Ryskulov, ‘Predislovie k sborniku statei’ in Revoliutsiia v Srednei Azii glazami musul’manskikh bol’shevikov (Oxford: Society For Central Asian Studies Reprint Series No.3, 1985), p. 22. 12 Mustafa Chokaev, ‘Turkestan and the Soviet Regime’, Journal of the Royal Central Asian Society, Vol. XVIII, 1931, p. 410. 13 Ryskulov, op. cit., pp. 23–4. 14 Sh. A. Shamagdiev, Ocherk Istorii Grazhdanskoi Voiny v Ferganskoi Doline (Tashkent: Izdatelstvo Akademii Nauk Uzbekskoi SSR, 1962), p. 56. 15 Ibid., p. 61. 16 The corruption of the Chairman of the Tashkent Soviet, Kolesov was so notorious that news of it even reached Colonel Bailey, a British officer in the country at the time who would figure prominently as a ‘famous spy’ and foreign interventionist in later Soviet literature. Lt.-Col. F. M. Bailey, Mission To Tashkent (London: Jonathan Cape, 1946), pp. 55–6. 17 To the extent where ‘[b]y April 1918 every village in Ferghana had its Basmachi partisan unit.’ Anonymous, ‘The Basmachis: The Central Asian Resistance Movement, 1918–24’, The Central Asian Review, Vol. 7 (3), 1959, p. 237. 18 See particularly Olaf Caroe, Soviet Empire: The Turks of Central Asia and Stalinism, 2nd edition (London: Macmillan and Co. Ltd, 1967), p. 130, quoting Togan approvingly: ‘The Basmachi movement showed that the Turks of Central Asia were not a dead corrupt nation. … it was … the start of a new period in the life of Turkistan.’ 19 [My italics.] Mustafa Chokaev, ‘The Basmaji [sic] Movement in Turkestan’, The Asiatic Review, 24, 1928, pp. 280–7. This did not prevent Chokaev sharing the same panTuranian delusions as Togan, as when he claimed that the only two natural tribes in Central Asia were Turks and Tadjiks: ‘… population of Turkestan [with exception of Tadjiks] consists of Turks by blood and tongue.’ Chokaev, ‘Turkestan and the Soviet Regime’, op. cit., p. 414. 20 H. A. Ayem DeLageard, ‘The Revolt of the Basmachi According to Red Army Journals (1920–1922)’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 6 (3), 1987, p. 7. 21 Marie Broxup, ‘The Basmachi’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 2 (1), 1983, pp. 63–4. 22 Chokaev, ‘The Basmaji [sic] Movement’, op. cit., p. 283. 23 For instance Shamagdiev, op. cit., pp. 46–7. 24 Anonymous, ‘The Red Army in Turkestan, 1917–1920’, Central Asian Review, Vol. 13 (1), 1965, p. 33; Pipes, op. cit., p. 176. 25 Ann Shukman, ‘The Turkestan Commission, 1919–20’, Central Asian Review, Vol. 12 (1), 1964, p. 7.

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26 27 28 29 30 31

32

33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

42 43 44 45

46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53

Ibid., p. 13. Ibid., p. 10. Frunze, 15 May 1920 Prikaz No. 522. Kuz’min et al., op. cit., pp. 555–6. [My italics] Mel’kumov, op. cit., p. 30. Ibid., pp. 31–2. Mao wrote that the guerrilla is like a fish who hides in the water of the surrounding population; later scholars developed the thesis, most effectively applied in British Malaya, that the job of the counter-insurgent is to ‘dry the water up’ by barriers and ‘strategic hamlets’ in order to catch the opponent on one’s own terms. M. V. Frunze, Sobranie Sochinenii pod obshchei redaktsiei A. S. Bunova Tom Pervyi 1905–1923 gody (Moscow, 1929), p. 133. One later Soviet account implies that Frunze was referring to the Tsarist system in his reference to the ‘previous authorities’. However, it is clear from the original context that the Sovnarkom is meant. See A. A. Kotenev, ‘O razgrome basmacheskikh band v Srednei Azii’, Voenno-Istoricheskii Zhurnal, Vol. 2, 1987, p. 63. Frunze, op. cit., p. 133. Robert F. Baumann, Russian–Soviet Unconventional Wars in the Caucasus, Central Asia, and Afghanistan. (Ft Leavenworth, KS: Leavenworth Papers No. 20, Combat Studies Institute, 1993), p. 103. Kuz’min et al., op. cit., pp. 565–6. Baumann, op. cit., p. 104. Shamagdiev, op. cit., p. 133–4. Anonymous, ‘The Basmachis’, op. cit., p. 238. Baumann, op. cit., p. 99. Ann Sheehy, ‘The End of the Khanate of Khiva’, Central Asian Review, Vol. 15 (1), 1967, p. 13. Mel’kumov, op. cit., pp. 24–5. Accounts of the fall of Bukhara vary wildly, as might be expected. The Emir claimed that he abandoned the city on the first day, but that it was then bombarded pointlessly and ruthlessly looted. See Glenda Fraser, ‘Alim Khan and the Fall of Bukharan Emirate in 1920’ inCentral Asian SurveyVol. 7 (4), 1988, p. 50, and her earlier article, ‘The Basmachi – I’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 6 (1), 1987, pp. 48–9. With the debut of the Red Army the Basmachi encountered machine-guns on a large scale for the first time. They soon called them the sheitan mashinka – the devil’s machine. DeLageard, op. cit., pp. 7–8. Mel’kumov, op. cit., pp. 42–50. Kotenev, op. cit., p. 60. See, for instance, Martha Brill Olcott, ‘The Basmachi or Freemen’s Revolt in Turkestan 1918–24’, Soviet Studies, Vol. 33 (3), 1981, pp. 358–9; ‘Observer’, ‘Soviet Press Comments on the Capture of Ibrahim Bey’, Asiatic Review Vol. 27, 1931, pp. 687–8; and many others. Soviet accounts are equally prone to exaggerating Enver’s importance as, being a foreigner, he serves their own polemical argument that the Basmachestvo was supported and sustained by foreign intelligence services. See, for instance, Mel’kumov, op. cit., p. 112. See Azade-Ayse Rorlich, ‘Fellow Travellers: Enver Pasha and the Bolshevik Government’, Asian Affairs Vol. 13 (3), 1982, for full details of this bizarre journey. Mel’kumov, op. cit., p. 47, 77. Fraser, ‘The Basmachi-I’, op. cit., p. 52. Ibid., p. 58. Mel’kumov, op. cit., p. 39. Mel’kumov credits himself with some influence in this change: ibid., pp. 106–8, 109. Ibid., p. 108. Ibid., pp. 111–12.

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54 Ibid., p. 113. 55 Kotenev, op. cit., p. 61. 56 Peter Hopkirk, Setting the East Ablaze: Lenin’s Dream of an Empire in Asia (London: John Murray, 1984), pp. 169–70. Fraser, ‘The Basmachi – I’, op. cit., p. 61. Fraser gives the number of men who rode with Enver’s charge as 100. Mel’kumov gives an altogether less glamorous account of Enver’s demise, differing in important details; Mel’kumov, op. cit., pp. 126–7. 57 This fact is little represented in Western historiography, which mostly follows Togan’s account of Enver as romantic hero. Few convicted war criminals can have received such a good press in Western circles, Sir Olaf Caroe even calling Enver ‘a gallant foe’ and ‘national hero’: Caroe, op. cit., p. 127. 58 William S. Ritter, ‘The Final Phase in the Liquidation of Anti-Soviet Resistance in Tadzhikistan: Ibrahim Bek and the Basmachi, 1924–31’, Soviet Studies, Vol. 37, 1985, p. 485. Ibrahim achieved this without the dubious ‘benefit’ of Turkish officers. 59 Fraser, ‘Basmachi – I’, op. cit., p. 58. 60 Zevelev et al., op. cit., p. 126. 61 Fraser, ‘The Basmachi – I’, op. cit., p. 62. 62 Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’, op. cit., p. 487. 63 Anonymous, ‘The Basmachis’, op. cit., p. 238. 64 Fraser, ‘The Basmachi – I’, op. cit., p. 63. 65 Glenda Fraser, ‘The Basmachi – II’, Central Asian Survey Vol. 6 (2), 1987, p. 8. 66 Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’, op. cit., p. 486. 67 Zevelev et al., op. cit., p. 134. 68 Fraser, ‘The Basmachi – II’, op. cit., p. 11. 69 Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’, op. cit., p. 486. 70 Zevelev et al., op. cit., p. 125. 71 Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’,op. cit., p. 485. 72 M. Irkaev, Istorii Grazhdanskoi Voiny v Tadzhikistane Izdatelstvo ‘Irfon’ (Dushanbe, 1971), p. 382. 73 Ibid., p. 384. 74 Ibid., pp. 388–9. 75 Ibid., p. 390. 76 Glenda Fraser, ‘Haji Sami and the Turkestan Federation, 1922–3’, Asian Affairs, Vol. 18 (1), 1987, p. 19. 77 Irkaev, op. cit., p. 392. 78 Mel’kumov, op. cit., pp. 149–50. 79 Ibid., pp. 136–7. 80 Irkaev, op. cit., pp. 393–4. 81 Ibid., pp. 404–5. Irkaev gives the date of Garm’s fall in main text as 29 August, but it is clear from one of his footnotes that July is intended. 82 Mel’kumov, op. cit., p. 167. 83 Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’,op. cit., p. 485; Zevelev et al.., op. cit., pp. 130–1. 84 Mel’kumov, op. cit., p. 184. 85 Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’, op. cit., p. 485. 86 Zevelev et al.., op. cit., p. 139. 87 Anonymous, ‘Dzhunaid Khan ‘King of the Karakum Desert’, Central Asian Review, Vol. 13 (3), 1965, pp. 223–4. 88 For the more common view favouring Tukhachevskii’s right to the title, see Ian F. W. Beckett, ‘The Soviet Experience’, in Ian F. W. Beckett (ed.), The Roots of CounterInsurgency. Armies and Guerrilla Warfare, 1900–1945 (London: Blandford Press, 1988), pp. 100–1; Scott R. McMichael, Stumbling Bear: Soviet Military Performance in Afghanistan (London: Brassey’s [UK] Defence Publishers, 1991), p. 40. 89 Mel’kumov, op. cit., pp. 246–7.

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90 Ibid., pp. 246–7; Irkaev, op. cit., p. 574. 91 William S. Ritter, ‘Revolt in the Mountains: Fuzail Maksum and the Occupation of Garm, Spring 1929’, Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 25, 1990, pp. 551–2. 92 The number of British weapons in Basmachi hands, and the coincidental presence of T. E. Lawrence on the North-West Frontier, led later Soviet scholars to claim that Lawrence and the British intelligence services were behind the resurgence of the later Basmachestvo: see for instance Irkaev, op. cit., p. 616. 93 Unifed State Political Directorate. 94 Irkaev,op. cit., p. 622. 95 Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’, op. cit., p. 488. 96 Fraser, ‘The Basmachi – II’, op. cit., p. 22. 97 A. I. Chugunov ‘Bor’ba s basmachestvom v Srednei Azii (1931–1933)’, in Istoriia SSSR II (1972), p. 100. 98 Zevelev et al., op. cit., p. 167. 99 Irkaev, op. cit., p. 674. 100 Col.-Gen. M. A. Gareev, M. V. Frunze Military Theorist (Washington, DC: Pergamon/Brassey’s International Defence Publishers, 1988), pp. 196–7. By highlighting Frunze’s stress on the importance of ‘particular locational conditions’, Gareev was undoubtedly making a veiled comment on the contemporary conflict in Afghanistan. Right up until the last years of their occupation, most Soviet offensives continued to be heralded by a heavy preliminary artillery or air bombardment, which only served to alert the Mujahedin of the oncoming attack. 101 McMichael, op. cit., p. 40. 102 Baumann, op. cit., p. 114. 103 See A. A. Maslov, ‘Concerning the Role of Partisan Warfare in Soviet Military Doctrine of the 1920s and 1930s’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, Vol. 9 (4), 1996.

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2 THE KOKAND AUTONOMY, 1917–18 Political background, aims and reasons for failure Paul Bergne An historical summary On 12 November 1917, following the Bolshevik military victory in Tashkent over the forces of the Provisional Government under General Korovnichenko, the conservative and largely clerical Muslim group known as the Ulema Jamiati called the Third Congress of Central Asian Muslims, in Tashkent, to agree a common Muslim approach to the new government. The congress offered to form a coalition government with the Soviets, in the former Governorate General of Turkestan, with a regional council in which half of the seats would be held by non-Muslims. Simultaneously, the Third Regional Congress of Soviets was held (in which no Muslims participated), which declared Soviet power in Central Asia and planned to set up the new government, or Sovnarkom (Council of People’s Commissars), with Menshevik support. Kolesov, the president of the Sovnarkom, rejected the Muslims’ proposal, however, on the grounds that their attitude towards the Soviets was doubtful and that there were no Muslim proletarian organisations that the Bolsheviks could accept into the highest organs of the regional government. Disillusioned at this rejection, the Ulema Jamiati joined their old political opponents who had been campaigning for Central Asian participation in the Provisional Government, the ‘National Centre’ (Milli Markaz), and called the Fourth Congress of Central Asian Muslims in the city of Kokand. The Congress opened on 25 November 1917 and was attended by representatives from all over the Turkestan Governorate General, albeit with a strong majority of 150 out of 200 from the nearby Ferghana Valley. The exception was Yeti Su, due to the continuation of disturbances that had started with the 1916 uprising. There were four principal questions on the agenda: • •

the declaration of a new Turkestan government, and a definition of its nature; whether or not the new government should join the South-East Union of Ataman Dutov, whose forces at that time still controlled large areas of central Russia; 30

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• •

the election of an executive committee; preparations for the election of a Constituent Assembly for Turkestan, the date for which was fixed as 18 March 1918.

The conference established a People’s Council with 54 members (36 Muslim, 18 non-Muslim, of which most were Russian), with Sher Ali Lapin, leader of the Ulema Jamiati, as chairman. The Council in turn elected an executive committee of 13 ministers, with the Kazakh reformer Muhammadjan Tinishbey as president. The Kokand government’s policy towards the Tashkent Soviet was initially conciliatory, but hardened after Red troops fired on the civilian population of Tashkent as they were celebrating the announcement of the Kokand Autonomy on the Prophet’s birthday, 13 December 1917. Subsequent Soviet accounts claimed that the demonstrators had broken open the prison and released prisoners being held there. That December, the new Kokand government dispatched Foreign Minister Mustafa Chokaev for talks with Ataman Dutov in Orenburg. Chokaev concluded that Dutov’s aims for a Cossack-dominated state were incompatible with the autonomy of Turkestan and, on his return, advised the Kokand government not to enter into an alliance with Dutov. Soviet sources also claim that Chokaev met Colonel Zaitsev, Dutov’s local field commander, in Charjui in January 1918, to agree a British-sponsored plan for a joint attack on Tashkent.1 Kokand sought other alliances – with the Alash Orda regime in the Kazakh steppe, and with the Emir of Bukhara – with no success. When an attempt to withdraw funds from the Turkestan Central Bank was forestalled by the Soviets, the Kokand government successfully raised a loan of 30 million roubles from its local supporters. However, an attempt to buy arms from the Cossacks in Samarkand was prevented by Kolesov’s personal intervention. In January 1918, Red forces broke Ataman Dutov’s blockade of Orenburg, opening the route for military supplies and reinforcements to the Tashkent Soviet. With these, and with troops recruited from the Austro-German prisonersof-war and Armenian dashnaks who were still in Central Asia, the Soviet force was able both to defeat Zaitsev’s forces at Rostovtsevo (30 kilometres from Samarkand), and to attack Kokand. In the course of the fighting, which lasted a week, a large area of the city was devastated. According to British intelligence reports after the event, some 14,000 people were killed.2 Flushed with success, Kolesov subsequently attacked Bukhara, but was repulsed with serious losses. However, Bukhara had no other potential allies who might have helped take the battle to Tashkent.

The political environment Historians debate the background of those who advocated moving the focus of their struggle to Kokand to gain recognition and political rights for Turkestani Muslims. Soviet historians generally describe them as a combination of national 31

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bourgeoisie, the clergy and Russian anti-Soviet forces: the bourgeoisie, Mensheviks, Eseri (Socialist Revolutionaries). In so far as Soviet classifications are relevant, this assessment is fairly accurate, but limited in clarifying the situation that produced such a political coalition. Many of those involved saw themselves as Jaddidists: they were the heirs of the nineteenth-century Islamic revivalist Jamal ud Din al-Afghani, the followers of the pan-Turkic teachings of the Tatar founder of the Jaddidist movement, Ismail Gaspirali, and the more specifically Central Asian, indeed Bukharacentric, teaching of Ahmad Danish. They had participated in the political, educational and literary reforms centred in successive Dumas after the Revolution of 1905. Muhammadjan Tinishbay, a Kazakh of aristocratic background, and subsequently first president of the Kokand Autonomy (also, incidentally, a member of the Alash Orda government in the Steppe), had been a deputy for Turkestan in the Second Duma. Mustafa Chokaev, another Kazakh, graduate of St Petersburg Law Faculty and the second president of the Kokand Autonomy, had worked in the office of the Muslim faction of the Fourth Duma. After its dissolution in 1907, Turkestani representation was abolished on the grounds that the area was in a state of war. Thereafter, as reformist newspapers were closed down, reformist activity gradually became increasingly circumscribed. Nonetheless, some political and intellectual activity continued. The reformists’ political thinking had been strongly marked by the 1916 uprising, sparked by the 25 June 1916 decree of the central government in St Petersburg, which demanded the mobilisation of Central Asians for service in workers’ battalions. A meeting was held at the house of the reformist writer Mahmud Hoja Behbudi in Samarkand to agree an appropriate Muslim reaction to the central government’s decree. It was attended by Munavvar Qari, journalist, educationalist and leader of Central Asia’s reform movement; Pahlavan Niyaz, later president of the People’s Republic of Khorezm; Usman Hoja, later president of the People’s Republic of Bukhara; and Abijan Mahmud, later a minister in the Kokand Autonomy. The reformists were a small, closely knit group. The February 1917 Revolution gave new impetus to Muslim political activity in the Governorates General of the Steppe and Turkestan, and the reformists found themselves to be acting on several, largely unfamiliar, levels.

The all-Russian level From 28–30 March 1917, a conference of Muslim deputies to the Fourth Duma was held in St Petersburg. In the absence of any Central Asian deputies, Mustafa Chokaev attended as an unofficial observer. The conference decided to call the First Muslim Congress in Moscow from 14–24 May 1917. Here, debate centred on the fundamental question of whether Russia’s Muslims should strive for cultural autonomy within a unified Russian state, as advocated by Ahmad Salihati, or for geographical autonomy within a loosely federated Russia, as advocated by the Azerbaijani leader Mehmet Emin Resulzadeh. Ubaidullah 32

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Hoja, a Tashkent-born lawyer who had defended several of the 1916 rebels in court and was editor of the newspaper Seda ye Turkestan, was among the notable figures attending the conference. He was later to become Minister for Defence and National Security in the Kokand Autonomy. Ubaidullah voted with the majority for the concept of geographical autonomy, which was accepted with 460 votes to 271. This conference also created the so-called Milli Markazi Shurasi (Central Muslim Council) ‘to direct the activity of the Muslims of Russia until the convocation of a constituent assembly’. Following this, some representatives of the council unsuccessfully approached Kerensky and Prince Lvov with a proposal for a coalition government including all the Muslims of the empire. The All-Russian movement petered out when many of the delegates were unable to reach the Second Congress, called in Kazan, which thus degenerated into a largely Tatar affair.

The international level Outside Russia, various bodies formed to agitate for Muslim rights in Russia: among them were the League of Minorities of Russia and the Committee for the Protection of the Rights of the Turk-Tatar Peoples of Russia. The Third Congress of the Union of Nationalities in Geneva had been attended by Muqim ud Din Begjan, who spoke eloquently on behalf of the ‘Chagatay nation’, which he took to include the Governorate General of Turkestan, as well as Bukhara and Khiva. Begjan was later to become Minister of Education in the People’s Republic of Khorezem. Beyond giving Russia’s Muslims a chance to put their case before an international forum, these conferences achieved little.

Turkestan After the February Revolution, Kerensky’s government established a Turkestan Provisional Government Committee in Tashkent presided over by Nikolai Shchepkin, a former Constitutional Democrat delegate to the Duma. The committee included four Muslims, amongst them Teneshbay and Sadri Maqsudi, a Cadet Party member. Running in tandem, the Provisional Government’s socialist opponents established the Soviet of Workers, Peasants, and Soldier’s Deputies. During the ten months leading up to the Bolshevik coup, this latter group – much the more dynamic organisation of the two – decisively established its ascendancy over the committee’s leaders, first Shchepkin, and subsequently the respected, but ageing, Orientalist and Social Democrat, V. P. Nalivkin. In September 1917, the Soviet forces attempted a coup d’état in Tashkent. General Korovnichenko, who had been sent by Kerensky post haste to deal with the situation, successfully repressed the uprising. However, Korovnichenko’s victory was short-lived: he merely postponed the Bolshevik takeover for a month. In April 1917, as a reaction to these two Russian-dominated bodies, the Muslims organised their own First Congress of Central Asian Muslims of 33

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Turkestan, which was attended by 440 delegates, of whom 93 were non-Muslim, mainly Russian. Their inclusion was markedly more democratic than the approach adopted by any of the Russian bodies. Indeed, one delegate, Nikora, represented the prevailing Russian attitude by claiming that the Russians had brought about the Revolution, and that the Muslims should accept what was offered to them. Despite this, the congress confirmed the resolutions of the Moscow Congress: to put their trust in the Russian Revolution and ask for geographical autonomy for the area of the Governorate General within a federal democratic Russian state. On a practical level, the congress established a new organisation at the suggestion of Ubaidullah Hoja, the Turkistan Milli Markazi Shurasi (commonly known thereafter as the Milli Markaz, or ‘National Centre’) with a permanent executive committee to represent Turkestani interests vis-à-vis the Soviet, and the Provisional Government’s Turkestan Committee. Mustafa Chokaev chaired this National Centre, and its membership included many who were subsequently to play leading roles in the Kokand Autonomy: Ubaidullah Hoja; Abijan Mahmud, a Kokand-born landowner and later Minister of Supply in the autonomous government; Mir Adil, Tashkent-born, who had participated in the 1916 uprising in Yeti Su and became Kokand’s Minister of Health; Shahahmad Shahislam, a Bashkir lawyer and Kokand’s vice-president; and Mahmud Hoja Behbudi, the prominent writer and Samarkand-based reformist. Nasir Khan Hoja, a leading reformist Namangan cleric and subsequently Minister of Education in Khokand, was the Centre’s Ferghana representative. The National Centre set up offices throughout Turkestan. A Bashkir, Zeki Velidi Togan, editor of the Tashkent-based paper Ulug Turkestan, also acted as the Centre’s secretary. The membership of the National Centre accentuates the close relationship it had with the Kokand government. Those involved came largely from the educated middle class: there were five lawyers amongst the ministers of the Autonomy. The Islamic clergy were represented, albeit weakly. Although some of the leaders had experience of political life outside Turkestan – and despite Teneshbay’s role in the Kazakh Alash Orda – the political vision of those involved was generally very narrow. Owing to the predominance of National Centre members in the Autonomy government, the absence of two of the most important reformists of the day – Munavvar Qari and Mahmud Hoja Behbudi – is significant. Munavvar Qari, whose standing in the reformist Jaddidist movement in Tashkent was extremely high, had set up the Shura ye Islam organisation shortly after the February Revolution, not only to promote educational reform but also to lobby for an independent legislative body for Turkestan. It was the Shura ye Islam which had contested the elections to the Tashkent City Council in the summer of 1917 and had lost to Sher Ali Lapin’s coalition with Russian conservatives. The fact that several of the National Centre’s leaders – including Ubaidullah Hoja and the Azeri Hidayat Yurgul Aga, later Minister for 34

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Agriculture in the Autonomy – were also members of the Shura ye Islam suggests that Munavvar Quari had no quarrel, at least, with the aims of the National Centre. Moreover, he was busy negotiating with Kolesov and Uspenskyi in the run-up to the demonstrations on 13 December in Tashkent to mark the Prophet’s birthday and the foundation of the Kokand Autonomy. Indeed, after the demonstration had been broken up by the Soviet’s troops at a cost of 10 dead and 100 wounded, Munavvar wrote: ‘On this day began the open and bloody struggle between us Turkestanis and the Russian Bolsheviks.’ These were hardly the words of someone who was preparing to accommodate the communist regime. Indeed, one authority describes him as a supporter of the Basmachestvo.3 Why, then, did he keep his distance from Kokand and, before long, throw in his lot with the Soviets and serve as a commissar in the Turkestan government in 1922? Whatever the reasons, he seems to have become disillusioned – possibly on finding the implementation of his educational reforms in Tashkent problematic – and moved to the People’s Republic of Bukhara.4 One authority says Munavvar Qari spent the last nine years of his life in prison before being shot in 1933.5 (A final judgement as to the motivation behind the behaviour of this key figure must await further research into his life and work.6) Like Munavvar Qari, Mahmud Hoja Behbudi had made his name as a writer before the war and the 1916 uprising. After the February Revolution, he worked with Munavvar on the latter’s newspaper, Nejat, and, subsequently, with Abdulrauf Fitrat on the Samarkand-based newspaper Hurriyet. Behbudi was the National Centre’s representative in Samarkand. Though he attended the Fourth Conference of Muslims of Turkestan in Kokand, it would seem that he preferred not to become involved in the government itself. He was hanged by order of the Emir of Bukhara in 1919.7

Other centres of Turkestani political activity The conservative Ulema Jamiati, under the leadership of the cleric Sher Ali Lapin, followed a different policy. Its main aim was to promote and protect the Islamic faith, which was, in some ways, threatened more by the reformists than by the Russians. The latter had left Islam well alone, in the main, during the Tsarist period. In April 1917, the Ulema Jamiati had unsuccessfully proposed to the Kerensky government the formation of a so-called Mahkama ye Shariah to vet all legislation emanating from St Petersburg for its compatibility with Islamic Law. Their principal field of activity was the Tashkent City Council, where Sher Ali Lapin forged an alliance with the Russians to defeat the reformists led by Munavvar Qari and the Shura ye Islam. Lapin earned especial opprobrium from the reformers by supporting the candidature of the former Russian monarchist Marko, and of General Likushin, who had been responsible for the Jizzakh massacre of Turkestani rebels in the 1916 uprising. However, Lapin’s tactics bore fruit: 36 Muslims were elected to the City Council along with 18 non-Muslim Russians. 35

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Having declared at the Third Regional Congress of Central Asian Muslims in November 1917 that the way forward could only be found through the Koran and shariah, it was a measure of Ali Sher Lapin’s naïveté that he expected the Bolshevik leader, Kolesov, to contemplate a coalition. Subsequent Soviet accounts emphasise that this aspect of his programme put him quite beyond the pale. Kolesov’s rebuff drove Lapin to join the reformists in Khokand. There, as chairman of the National Council, he presided over the election of a government consisting almost entirely of his old rivals from the National Centre. One further group warrants attention: the large section of Muslim workers from the Soviet of Workers, Peasants and Soldiers. Under the leadership of the Kazakh Sanjar Asfandiyar and Sultan Khojan, they opted to transfer their loyalty to the Kokand government. They moved to Ferghana to be close to Kokand, and set up the Organisation of Muslim Workers and Peasants.

Reasons for leaving Tashkent and moving to Kokand The decision to leave Tashkent reflected the Muslims’ extreme disillusionment with the failure of all their efforts to achieve an understanding with either the Provisional or the Bolshevik government. The Provisional Committee had been condescending and paternalistic, and Kerensky himself had brutally rejected them. On being approached in St Petersburg by a group of Turkestani reformists in August 1917, Kerensky warned that he would take the most far-reaching measures of coercion in the event of any disturbances against Russian rule. Despite Lenin’s official statements promoting self-determination for the nonRussian peoples of the empire, they faced more or less blatant racist attitudes amongst members of the Soviet – staffed overwhelmingly by Russian workers from the railway, post and telegraph industries – who even advocated sending separate delegations to the Constituent Assembly in St Petersburg. Massacres in Ak Mechet and Yeti Su in July, and the depredations of the Soviet’s largely Russian, Armenian and Austro-German soldiery in the countryside throughout the period, confirmed for the Muslims that they could expect consideration from neither side in the standoff between the Provisional Government and the Bolsheviks. Deteriorating food supply, the increasing weakness of the Provisional Government in the face of the extremist demands of the Soviet, disillusionment with the ineffectual Nalivkin after his appointment as governor, and the failure of General Korovnichenko to follow through his success in suppressing the failed Bolshevik coup of September 1917, all combined to persuade the Muslims that they should continue the struggle from firmer ground. Such circumstances motivated the move to Kokand: It was not by chance that Kokand became a centre of reaction and counter-revolution. Kokand was one of the most important financial and commercial-industrial centres of Central Asia, a unique citadel of the greater bourgeoisie and Islamic clergy. Be it sufficient to say that, 36

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against an overall population of 50,000, there were 11 banks (which had British, German and American clients), 382 mosques, 40 madra’sas, and 6,000 priests.8 Soviet sources focus on the proximity of Kokand to the British Consulate in Kashgar, asserting that Kokand was flooded with spies. The British Consul, Thomas Etherton, who did not reach Kashgar until June 1918 – four months after the collapse of the Autonomy – claims to have been kept well informed of the activities of all the Basmachi groups that sprang up as a result of the sack of Kokand. He maintains, however, that he rejected their requests for finance as he considered their disorganised and divided approach to be doomed to failure.9 In addition, he mentions the destruction of the city by the Soviets, and the ensuing massacre, but does not hint at any official British support for the Kokand Autonomy. It seems the move to Kokand was not driven by foreign involvement. The Soviet view was simple: ‘If for the Jaddidists, the main centre was Kokand, i.e. the area of the greatest development of capitalism, for the panIslamists the main centre was Bukhara.’10 Apart from Kokand’s social and economic advantages, identified by the Soviet historians, perhaps the most significant reason for moving there was the relative weakness of the Soviet political and military presence – although it was strong enough for the Revkom guards in the fortress to resist the attacks of the poorly armed autonomists when fighting started in February 1918. Despite some drawbacks, Kokand was chosen over Samarkand. The latter’s bad communications, and the expectation that Red troops might pass through the city on their way back from Persia and the Caucasus, were the explanations offered by Soviet historians.11 Neither of these reasons appears very convincing. Communications in Samarkand cannot have been much worse than those in Kokand, and troops returning from the front were as likely to be fighting with Colonel Zaitsev on Ataman Dutov’s side, as they were for the Soviets. Perhaps the presence of an autonomous government in Samarkand would have promoted the successes of Colonel Zaitsev’s Cossack troops, who briefly occupied the city in January 1918, or perhaps the inherent differences between the aims of the two groups would have led to a violent schism.

The Kokand Autonomy’s programme: successes The basic principles of the Kokand Autonomy were largely inherited from the Jaddidist-inspired educational, cultural and nationalist ideals of the National Centre. Hayit traces the development of the pre-1916 uprising concept of azadliq (freedom) through the idea of mukhtariyat (autonomy) as proclaimed in Kokand, to the development of the goal of istiqlal (independence) pursued by the Basmachestvo movement.12 However, as Hayit himself admits, whatever title the politicians gave their goal, their most heartfelt aim was to free their administration from the control of ‘unbelievers’. 37

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In February 1918, during his last-minute negotiations with the representative of the Soviet revolutionary committee, Sazonov, Mustafa Chokaev defined the aims of the Autonomy government: We are not against freedom, nor in favour of the monarchy. But your way of behaving does not suit us. Even your own cultural legacy, which is stronger than ours, is creaking under the pressure (of your revolution); ours is positively groaning. … [We want] shariah courts; our system of land tenure to be inviolate; our women to remain veiled and subordinate to men; as for the European population, only the specialists should remain, e.g. railway workers, and telegraph officials; they would be paid well.13 In political terms this meant aiming for local autonomy within a democratic Russian federation. By ‘autonomy’, the Kokand leaders understood freedom to organise their own parliament and executive, and independence in local financial and economic matters, as well as in legal, cultural, educational and religious affairs. A solution to the land problem that had been exacerbated by Russian settlement was urgently sought, as was the withdrawal of Russian troops from the region. The basic targets were identified in the agenda of the Fourth Conference of Central Asian Muslims. Much of the debate focused on the development of the political structures of the new entity. Initially, the Kokand Autonomy wanted to impress upon the world, and the Tashkent Russians in particular, that while they regarded themselves entitled to form the government by popular support, they did not wish to cut loose from Russia. Moreover, their legislature would include a generous proportion of non-Muslims (18 out of 54 on the People’s Council). The ethnic composition of the executive committee also illustrated that the government was not following any particular nationalist programme. The ten ministers included two Kazakhs, two Azeris, one Bashkir, four Turkestanis (either Uzbeks or Tajiks) and one Austrian Jew (see Appendix). Although the Kokand Autonomy had cut itself off from Tashkent and was determined to establish itself as the legitimate government of the whole of Turkestan, the leaders maintained contact with the new Soviet government in the hope of persuading them to accept their proposals. Mustafa Chokaev travelled to Samarkand in late November 1917 to negotiate with Poltoratskiy, the representative of Kolesov and the Soviet, who offered him the post of chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars (Sovnarkom), which Chokaev did not accept. The Kokand government also proposed to Tashkent that if they could postpone the Fourth Congress of Regional Soviets until 25 January 1918, the Autonomy might send representatives. I. O. Toblin, Kolesov’s deputy, rejected this suggestion on the grounds that the Kokand government was, at that moment, negotiating with the Cossacks, the main opponents of the Soviet state. It has been suggested that this proposal, and its rejection, might have been prompted by the terms of the Brest-Litovsk treaty with Germany – of which the 38

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autonomists were presumably aware. In the treaty, the Soviet Union undertook to grant all minorities the right to self-determination by means of referendum, and also to withdraw its forces from all territories that might be regarded as ‘colonial’.14 Teneshbay, the Kokand president, may have influenced this conciliatory approach to the Soviet, if such it was. He was also anxious not to offend Tashkent to such a degree that, when the People’s Council decided to seize the contents of the city’s account in the Central Bank, he resigned as president and left Kokand. He subsequently became Minister of the Interior in the Alash Orda government in the Steppe. Mustafa Chokaev, another relative, took his place. Only at the very end, when the Red forces were at the gates, did the line change. Chokaev, the president, found himself overruled by the fanatical Yusuf Davidov when he tried to negotiate with the enemy. Davidov broke off the talks with a threat to wage a civil war since, as he put it to the Soviet representatives: ‘Our working class is not with you.’15 The Kokand government split between the moderate wing, formed of local workers (mainly Afrasyab’s Organisation of Muslim Workers and Soldiers), landowners and intelligentsia, who wanted to avoid a bloodbath, and the clerics and extreme nationalist faction, who called for cessation of all contacts with the Kokand Revkom and the beginning of military operations. Chokaev and his cabinet were overthrown in a coup on the eve of the city’s sack and power passed into the hands of the paramilitary leader Ergash and his armed bands. With this transition, the Kokand Autonomy ceased to exist, in effect, and the Basmachestvo movement began.16 The Kokand Autonomy achieved some successes during its brief existence. The Minister of Education and Culture, Nasir Khan Hoja, persuaded the clerical faction to approve the introduction of new-method (Jaddidist) schools in Turkestan and claimed to have had 500,000 copies of Munavvar Qari’s Adab e Avval printed for distribution to schools. The Minister for Agriculture, Hidayat Yurgul Aga, drafted a law providing for the return of land that had been confiscated by the Russians, and for the distribution of waqf land to landless peasants. Significantly, this measure was subsequently adopted by the Soviets. Perhaps the greatest practical success was the raising of a 30 million rouble loan through popular subscription for the financing of government activities, including the purchase of arms. None of these measures were successfully completed, however, before the Red Guards attacked Kokand and put an end to the autonomous government.

The Kokand Autonomy’s programme: failures Perhaps the most significant obstacle facing the Autonomy was its failure, time and again, to form alliances and to gain outside recognition. In accordance with the agenda of the Fourth Congress of Central Asian Muslims, Ubaidullah Hoja travelled to Orenburg to explore the possibility of 39

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joining Ataman Dutov’s South East Union. As already indicated, Hoja concluded that Dutov’s aims were incompatible with those of Kokand, and on his return the project was completely abandoned. Despite this, Soviet accounts mention Mustafa Chokaev negotiating with Dutov’s lieutenant, Zaitsev, in Samarkand in January 1918, for the launch of a British plan for the coordination of their attacks on Tashkent.17 By then, however, the lifting of Dutov’s blockade of Orenburg had significantly weakened Zaitsev’s position. Talks were held in Turkestan (the town) with the Alash Orda government in the Steppe, but the latter decided against a union until the All-Russian Constituent Assembly could clarify the relationship of the non-Russian peoples with the centre. The Organisation of Muslim Workers and Peasants in Ferghana then turned to St Petersburg itself for help in persuading the Tashkent Soviet to recognise Kokand’s authority. Stalin’s cynical reply is now famous: ‘The Soviets are autonomous in their internal affairs. The workers of Turkestan should not turn to Petersburg with their request that the Soviet Commissariat in Tashkent be dissolved, but should disperse it by force, assuming they have the necessary power.’ Khasanov points out that Vadim Chaikin, a prominent Socialist Revolutionary who had made common cause with the Kokand Autonomy, signed the telegram from Ferghana. He argues that Stalin could have sent no other reply to someone he regarded as a dangerous political opponent.18 Whether Stalin would have replied differently had the request been signed by a less tainted hand remains open to debate. Finally, Kokand sent Ubaidullah Hoja to seek assistance from the Emir of Bukhara. Suspicious of a regime which he rightly saw as the spiritual ally of the Jaddidists, with whom he was at that time locked in confrontation, and probably anxious to avoid attracting unwanted attention from Tashkent, the Emir refused even to see him. It was not for nothing that Mahmud Behbudi had told the president of the Muslim faction of the Fourth Duma in 1916, Kutlug Muhammad Tevkelev, that the best thing for the development of Turkestan and the Jaddidist movement would be the absorption of the Emirate of Bukhara into the Turkestan Governorate General.19 No doubt, Bukhara’s traditional rivalry with Kokand also played a role, as there was a repetition of the debilitating strife between emirate and khanate of the mid-nineteenth century, which had enabled Tsarist Russia to play off one power-base against another and, in due course, to absorb the whole area. Paradoxically, it was the Young Bukhara movement under Faizullah Hoja – negotiating in December with the arch-enemies of his fellow Jaddidists in Kokand – which encouraged Kolesov and the Tashkent Soviet to embark on the disastrous expedition against Bukhara. Kolesov only narrowly avoided the total destruction of his force and was obliged to recognise Bukharan independence at the Treaty of Kyzyl Teppe in March 1918, only a month after the capture of Kokand. Perhaps another reason for the Autonomy’s failure was the absence of help from the only significant foreign power in the area – Great Britain. Soviet histo40

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rians paint a picture of Anglo-French armies massing in Xinjiang or across the frontier in Khorasan, ready to rush into the Ferghana Valley in support of Kokand, while British – and, in later Soviet works, American – spies poured weapons and money into the city.20 For example, quoting the newspaper Hurriyet for 22 April 1918, Inoyatov claims that Britain had sent 500,000 roubles to Kokand via Iran.21 Colonel Zaitsev and Ataman Dutov are also described as working to a grand British design whereby a joint attack would be launched against Tashkent with the aim of creating a Cossack state tied to Britain in similar fashion to the Orange Free State and Transvaal. It is certainly well attested that, by the summer of 1918, once General Malleson had been dispatched to Transcaspia, Britain was anxious to mobilise Ashkabad (where the temporary head of the anti-Soviet government, Oraz Sardar, had been the National Centre’s representative in Transcaspia) and Bukhara against the Soviets. But, for the winter of 1917–18 there is no available evidence suggesting that the consulates in Meshhed or Kashgar had more than a sketchy idea of what was happening in Kokand. In the final analysis, it was the Bolsheviks’ military superiority which secured their victory over Kokand, just as it had over Colonel Zaitsev at Rostovtsevo Station, and, indeed, General Korovnichenko in October 1917. Once Dutov’s blockade of Orenburg had been lifted in January 1918 and reinforcements and arms had started to reach Tashkent, the imbalance between the Soviet and the ill-equipped Kokand force became ineluctable. An attempt in January to buy 20,000 rifles from Cossacks passing through Samarkand on their way back from Iran and the Caucasus was pre-empted by Kolesov, who persuaded the Cossacks that they should not help a pan-Islamic army. The Kokand armed forces were limited to sixty men undergoing training by a small group of Tsarist Russian officers and the disorganised gangs of Ergash. Of all the possible reasons for the collapse of Kokand, the one that can be discounted decisively is the explanation given by the majority of official Soviet historians, namely that the autonomous government did not enjoy the support of the local working class. In the whole of Turkestan, an industrial proletariat was almost entirely lacking and what did exist was almost exclusively Russian. The Russians, of course, opposed the concept of self-determination for the Muslims. However, all evidence points to support for the Autonomy from the native population, not only of the Ferghana Valley but also of Tashkent. Even Soviet accounts estimate the numbers taking part in the ill-fated pro-Kokand demonstrations in Tashkent on 13 December 1917 at around 10,000, and reluctantly admit that, though the majority were nationalist-bourgeois elements and clerics, a section of the working class was also led astray. The massacres of the 1916 uprising had left the populace with a deep Russophobia. The Basmachi movement that grew from the ashes of Kokand, and was not finally suppressed for more than a decade, bears eloquent testimony to the degree of frustrated and embittered popular feeling generated by the sacking of Kokand. 41

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Conclusion Numerous factors contributed to the failure of the Kokand Autonomy, predominantly its military weakness – even at a time when the Russians in Turkestan were isolated and divided – and the governmental schisms and inexperience of its leaders. But perhaps the fatal weakness lay in the government’s failure to persuade the Emir of Bukhara that theirs was a cause worth supporting. Given the latter’s suspicions of the Jaddidists, his support probably could have been secured only by an unequivocal declaration placing Turkestan under his absolute sovereignty – hardly a welcome prospect to those who had direct experience of his arbitrary rule. United, or at least in alliance, Kokand and Bukhara might have been able to follow the defeat of Kolesov in February 1918 with further successes, and to hold off Soviet retribution long enough to forge an effective alliance with Malleson and the British government. Such an alliance would have involved the abandonment of all the political principles the autonomists held most dear, however, and afforded the Emir an opportunity to become even less accommodating once successful. In such circumstances, given their disappointment in the Bolsheviks’ performance, the wild gamble of the Kokand Autonomy must have seemed the only acceptable course.

Appendix: Members of the executive committee of the Kokand government Mir ADIL Born in Tashkent. Deputy Chairman of the city council of Kokand. Participated in the 1916 uprising in Yedi Su. Minister for Welfare and Health. Imprisoned 1920–2. Thereafter lived in obscurity in Tashkent until his death in 1935. Mustafa CHOKAEV Kazakh. Educated in Tashkent. Graduate from the St Petersburg law faculty. Formerly an activist in the office of the Muslim faction of the Fourth Duma. Chairman of the Turkestan National Centre. Foreign Minister and subsequently second president. After the fall of Kokand, joined Dutov and Zeki Velidi Togan in Orenburg, from where he made his way to Turkey and Europe. Published the journal Yash Turkestan in Paris in 1929–39. One of the founders of the Prometheus organisation. Died of typhoid in Berlin in 1941. Salomon HERZFELD Austrian Jew. Lawyer. Active in anti-Russian movements since 1916. Ubaidullah Hoja Asadullah HOJA Born in Tashkent. Lawyer, who defended the rebels of the 1916 uprising. Editor of the newspaper Seda ye Turkestan. Member of the Shura ye Islam. Minister for Defence and National Security. Fled to Orenburg, where he fought the

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Bolsheviks until his capture in 1919. After two years under police supervision in Moscow, he was sent to Siberia in 1922, where he died in prison in 1937. Shir Ali LAPIN Born in Ak Mechet (now Kazakhstan). Following the February 1917 Revolution he became chairman of the Ak Mechet Council of People’s Representatives. Subsequently chairman of the Ulema Jamiati in Tashkent. After the collapse of the Kokand Autonomy, fled to Istanbul, where he agitated on behalf of an independent Turkestan. Also visited Kaiser Wilhelm II in Berlin in October 1918. Returned to Tashkent at the end of 1919 and died shortly afterwards. Chairman of the People’s Council of the Kokand Autonomy. Abijan MAHMUD Born in Kokand. Landowner and mayor of Kokand. Minister for Supply. Abdulrahman ORAZAY Lawyer. Azeri. Chief of the Chancellery and Deputy Minister of the Interior. Shahahmad SHAHISLAM Bashkir. Lawyer. Official spokesman of the Turkestan National Centre during the Kerensky regime. Vice-President. Fled after Kokand’s capture to Afghanistan, lived 1920–2 in India, from where he moved to Manchuria, where he is thought to have died in 1924. Muhammadjan TINISHBAY Kazakh. Engineer. Deputy in the Second Duma. Member of the Kerensky government’s Provisional Turkestan Committee. President and Minister of the Interior. (Simultaneously he was Minister of the Interior in the Alash Orda Government.) Nasir Kham TORA Representative of the Namangan ulema. Progressive Muslim cleric educated in Bukhara, Baghdad, Delhi and Cairo. Led the 1916 uprising in Ozgen. An Islamic judge by profession who also taught history. Minister for Culture and Education. Imprisoned from 1919 to 1928. Released but rearrested in July 1938 and died in the same month in prison in Andijan. Hedayat YURGUL AGA Azeri. Agronomist. Member of the Shura ye Islam and the Turk Madaniyet Firqasi. Minister of Agriculture. Note: The main source for the appendix was Baymirza Hayit’s Die Nationalen Regierungen von Khokand und der Alasch Orda (Ph.D. thesis for Munster University, Munich, 1950), though other texts cited in the Bibliography were also used. 43

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Notes 1 R. Aripov and N. Mil’shtein, Iz Istorii organov gosbezopasnosti Uzbekistana (Uzbeikstan, Tashkent, 1967), p. 30. 2 P. T. Etherton, In the Heart of Asia (London: Constable, 1925), p. 154. Incidentally, the British intelligence estimate is misquoted by one late Soviet writer as 3,000 (see Khasanov, Alternativa iz Istorii Kokandshkoi Avtonomii, dissertation for Tashkent State University, undated, p. 32). 3 Baymirza Hayit, Die Nationalen Regierungen von Kokand und der Alasch Orda (Ph.D. thesis for Munster University, Munich, 1950) p. 47, n. 177. 4 According to A. Z. V. Togan, Bugunku Turkili (Turkistan) ve yakin Tarihi, Vol. 1 (Istanbul, 1942), p. 406. 5 Hayit, op. cit., p. 46. 6 The Uzbek-language historical journal Turan published some of Munavvar Qari’s memoirs in 1993–4, but those covering the period of the Revolution are yet to emerge. 7 Ibid., p. 53, n. 208. 8 Aripov and Mil’shtein, op. cit., p. 27. 9 Etherton, op. cit., p. 230. 10 P. G. Galuzo, Turkestan-Koloniya (Society for Central Asian Studies, Oxford; reprint no. 9 of the original edition published by The I. V. Stalin University of the Toilers of the East, 1929). 11 Hayit, op. cit., p. 58. 12 Ibid., pp. 48–9. 13 Khasanov, op. cit., p. 24. 14 Ibid., p. 16. 15 Ibid., p. 24. 16 Ibid., p. 30. 17 Aripov and Mil’shtein, op. cit., p. 30. 18 Khasanov, op. cit., p. 20. 19 Reiner Olzscha and George Cleinow, Turkestan (Leipzig: Kochler v. Amelung, 1942), p. 370. 20 Kh. Sh. Inoyatov, Narody Srednei Azii v Bor’be protiv Interventov I Vnutrennei Kontrrevolutsii (Moscow, 1984), p. 31. 21 Ibid., p. 23.

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3 ETHNO-TERRITORIAL CLAIMS IN THE FERGHANA VALLEY DURING THE PROCESS OF NATIONAL DELIMITATION, 1924–7 Arslan Koichiev Ferghana before 1924: administrative-territorial division and ethnic distribution With the defeat of the poly-ethnic Kokand khanate in 1876, its heartland, the Ferghana Valley, became totally subjugated to a colonial regime. Long before this, Russian forces had conquered the western region of the valley, the presentday Hodjent oblast of the Tajik Republic. It became an administrative sub-region, or uyezd, of the Samarkand oblast, under the authority of the Syr Darya governor-general. The Ferghana Valley’s colonial era was marked by the introduction of a new system of administrative-territorial management, based on a vertical structure, through which the governor-general of Turkestan, directly appointed by the Tsar, administered newly conquered lands. The Ferghana Valley was declared an oblast and comprised several uyezd-level administrative territories. These were ruled through volost-level administrations. In the main, neither volost nor uyezd boundaries matched the dispersion of different ethnic indigenous groups. In most cases, the volost – the lowest tier in the structure of colonial management – comprised multi-ethnic entities. The Ferghana Valley was home to both sedentary and nomadic populations, and this co-existence affected the formation of colonial administrative borders. Nomadic, semi-nomadic and sedentary people were all to be found in each of the administrative units. The Ferghana oblast was made up of five uyezds during the Tsarist period: Andijan, Namangan, Kokand, Ferghana (formerly Skobelev) and Osh. This structure was unchanged during the early years of the Soviet period, and the various sub-levels served as administrative units when the political map of the valley was subsequently defined. The Andijan uyezd included 22 volosts, Namangan uyezd 28 volosts, Kokand 23 volosts, Ferghana 19 volosts, and Osh 15 volosts. The proportions of nomadic and semi-nomadic peoples varied greatly between uyezds (see Table 3.1). 45

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Table 3.1 Uyezd

Land owned by sedentary population (%)

Land owned by nomadic and semi-nomadic population (%)

Total area of land (square verst)

Andijan Osh Feghana Namangam Kokand

40.76 11.82 34.18 32.14 20.56

44.18 88.18 54.51 45.61 68.30


13,000 23,357 13,239 23,423 13,237

The population of Ferghana was also marked by extreme ethnic diversity. While the different ethnic groups had much in common, in cultural terms they had developed strong identities that allowed one group to be clearly distinct from another. Local, or pre-Russian, traditions of defining the population’s ethnic structure – using oral sources and historiographical, genealogical and literary texts – identified the existence of the following peoples: Sarts, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Kyrgyz, Kipchaks, Turks, Kara-Kalpaks and Kurama. With the exception of Persianspeaking Tajiks, all were Turkic-speakers. While the forms of evidence do not indicate the numbers of each of these groups, it does hint at their ethnic territories. At the time of the Russian arrival, only the Sarts and Tajiks – and to a limited degree the Uzbeks – were sedentary people, and they controlled most of the valley floor. Some Uzbek tribes continued to enjoy a nomadic way of life, while others were at the embryonic stage of their transition to permanent settlement. As the results of the first all-Russian official census in 1897 show, the Sarts were the most numerous (788,989). At this time, 221,817 of them lived in Andijan uyezd, 220,170 in Namangan uyezd, 202,730 in Margelan uyezd (later renamed Ferghana) and 143,701 in Kokand uyezd. However, in Osh uyezd, very few Sarts were registered: only 571 in a total population of 158,883. After the Sarts, the second largest group was the Kyrgyz, totalling 201,579. The true number was probably much higher, as some Kyrgyz tribes of the Osh uyezd were wrongly registered in the list of so-called ‘Turkic-Tatar people’. The official statistics of 1897 registered 123,382 Kyrgyz in Andijan uyezd, 43,717 in Margelan uyezd, 20,700 in Namangan and 12,039 in Kokand. But these statistics were to be radically adjusted later. Under the Tsar’s orders, Count K. Pahlen later had the governor-generalship of Turkestan produce revised figures to indicate that the Kyrgyz constituted 29.65 per cent of the Margelan population, 39.66 per cent of the Andijan population, 25.73 per cent of the Namangan population and 6.05 per cent of the Kokand population. While the 1897 census registered only 1,741 Kyrgyz in Osh (out of a total population of 161,640), Pahlen’s commission of 1911 dramatically altered this figure, suggesting that 98.65 per cent of the population were Kyrgyz. The Uzbeks formed one of the largest ethnic communities in the Ferghana Valley: in 1897, their number reached 153,780. However, they were concentrated in the Kokand uyezd – 144,949 of them lived there – and had an 46

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insignificant presence elsewhere: 8,355 were recorded in the Margelan uyezd, and their numbers dwindled to 453 in Namangan and to a mere six in Andijan. The most likely cause for the small size of the Uzbek communities beyond Kokand is the speed and ease with which they were absorbed into the Sart majority. The Tajiks were also affected by assimilation, despite being the dominant Persian-speaking group in the Ferghana oblast, where they numbered 114,081. Centuries-long Turkic domination had scattered them throughout the region. The Namangan uyezd, although relatively remote from the main Tajik areas such as Hojent, was home to 58,885 Tajiks. The remainder were well dispersed: 37,930 in Kokand uyezd; 15,189 in Margelan uyezd; 1,970 in Andijan uyezd; and 107 in Osh. Some suggest the ethnic Turks (or ‘Ferghana Turks’) must be considered the second largest Turkic-speaking people in the region. Indeed, Russian statistics separately registered some 261,234 people under the ethnic name ‘Turko-Tatar’. To claim that this figure relates only to the Ferghana Turks is doubtful, for several reasons. Firstly, as Pahlen stressed, considerable numbers of Kyrgyz and Tajiks were included on this list: Kyrgyz due to imperfections in the census rules, and Tajiks because of their apparent ‘Sartisation’. It is probable that some Uzbeks also fell into this category. Additionally, according to T. A. Jdanko, the list of ‘Turko-Tatar people’ included a number of Turkic-speaking minorities such as Tatars, Taranci, Kashgarlik (after 1921, the common name ‘Uighur’ was introduced for the latter two groups), and even immigrants from the Caucasus. Significantly, the more accurate census of 1917 and 1926 revealed an otherwise inexplicably sharp drop in the number of Turk people – 7,000, then 25,196, (according to V. R. Vinnikov, 24,279), respectively. These latter figures must be understood as a more accurate reflection of the situation. Immediately before Soviet national-territorial delimitation, the Turk people were concentrated mainly in Ferghana and Osh uyezd. Contiguously settling during Russian rule, the Turks formed single local communities with Kyrgyz (in the Bulak-Bashi, Marhamat and Kulu volosts), Tajiks (in Marhamat), and Uzbeks and Sarts (in the Aravan and Kulu volosts). The 1897 census registered only 7,584 Kipchaks in the Ferghana Valley, most of whom lived in Kokand uyezd, while records of another traditional area, Andijan, strangely suggest their ‘disappearance’. Perhaps by that time they had not recovered from the persecution of settled people, organised with the permission of the Kokand rulers, which culminated with a massacre of Kipchak people. Nonetheless, under Russian rule their numbers gradually recovered, and the 1917 census recorded 42,449 Kipchaks. In comparison, the two decades between 1897 and 1917 showed a slight decline in the number of the KaraKalpak people, from 11,056 to 10,735. Their traditional place of settlement was on the banks of Ferghana’s main river, the Syr Darya, which is also known as the ‘Kara-Kalpak steppe’. In the 1897 census, they were registered mainly in the Kokand uyezd (11,054), and in 1917, they were concentrated in the Andijan (7,764) and Namangan (1,969) uyezds. 47

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Although a Turkic-speaking minority, the Kurama were not mentioned in the lists of indigenous ethnic groups during the first all-Russian census, yet in 1917 and 1926 they were registered as a separate nation. According to Vinnikov, this status ‘lasted during the following five–ten years’. In fact, the Tashkent area was their principal homeland, but in the Ferghana Valley they were concentrated in the Andijan and Namangan uyezds.

The Soviet concept of national-territorial delimitation in Central Asia One of the early declarations made by the Soviet government guaranteed the freedom of national development and the right to self-determination for all peoples and ethnographic groups. This created the impression that all ethnic groups would participate on equal terms in the determination of their fate, and in the process of state building. Furthermore, it suggested that the interests of every group, regardless of size, would be taken into account. During the early years of Soviet rule, the Moscow leadership had a perfunctory knowledge of the ethnic composition of Turkestan, Bukhara and Khiva; although they were Soviet republics, they were little more than puppet states on an ill-drawn map of Central Asia. The first official Soviet documents classified the national question in Central Asia as ‘a Muslim/Turkic question’. As for the region’s ethnic composition, the Soviet leadership was aware of little beyond the existence of the Sarts and Kyrgyz, who were regarded as potential allies in Russian Central Asia. In one of his appeals to the workers of the East, for example, Lenin mentions only the ‘Sarts and Kyrgyz of Turkestan and Siberia’. A turning point in national policy came in 1920. Having familiarised himself with the situation in Turkestan, Lenin was convinced of the need for national delimitation. He recommended: ‘(1) To instruct on drawing a map (ethnographic) of Turkestan, separated into Uzbekiya, Kyrgyziya and Turkmeniya. (2) To elucidate in detailed terms the joining or separation of these three parts.’ By failing to mention their names, Lenin deprived other groups of the right to any form of Soviet-style statehood – republic, autonomous republic, autonomous oblast or okrug – and many faced the real threat of being absorbed into larger ethnic groups. It is still unknown why Lenin and his advisers, who until this point had defended the right to self-determination of every ethnic group whatever its size, failed to mention the Tajiks, Kara-Kalpak or Turks. Perhaps the intention was that only Turkmenistan would become ethnically homogenous, uniting all the Turkmen tribes, and that Uzbekistan was to consist of Uzbeks, Sarts, Tajiks, Turks, Karluks, Kipchaks and possibly Kyrgyz and others, under the common name ‘Uzbek’. The same approach may have been applied to Kyrgyzya, in which the Kazakhs (or Kyrgyz-Kaysak) themselves were to be united, along with the Kyrgyz, Kara-Kalpak, Kurama and Kipchak peoples. In the ensuing uneasy development only the Kyrgyz, Tajiks and KaraKalpaks of the sub-Aral region managed to claim some form of autonomy. 48

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Debate raged over which ethnic groups should be attached to each new territorial formation: the Kurama people were caught between Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan; the Sarts and the Turks between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan; and the Turks, Kipchaks and Kara-Kalpak between Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. During the first ten months of 1924, the Central Asian Bureau of the Russian Communist Party (RKP) carried out major work on delimitation and decided to form five administrative units: the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR), the Turkmen SSR, the Tajik Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR) and the Kyrgyz and Kara-Kalpak ASSRs. Subsequently, it was decided to join Kazakh settled areas to the Kyrgyz ASSR. Criteria were established for the process of delimitation: • •

Ethnic: to unify the members of a given group within a single ‘national unit’. Economic: to produce rational and economically coherent units.

Border delimitation between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan in the eastern and southern Ferghana In September 1924, approximately one month before the official declaration, the national-territorial delimitation commission prepared a paper describing the proposed border between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. For the southern and eastern sections, the border-line then reaches the borders of the Ferghana uyezd. … on northern borders of the Yaou-Kesek-Boston volost to Khalmion, further towards the foothills of Mount Ghuzam, on south-western borders of the Aravan volost, further the border goes, by-passing Maniyak volost and Bulak-Bashi volost, which are withdrawn to Uzbekistan. … it reaches the uyezd borders allotment of Vuadil and further on the foothills of the mount to the Naiman volost and Auval volost, then goes between Ichkilik volost and Kuvali volost reaching between Andijan and Osh uyezds, on which follows to the eastern borders of Kashgar-Kishlak uyezds and on southern borders of the uyezds Jalal-Abad, by-passing Khanabad volost which withdraws to Uzbekistan borders, Ayim, Bazaar-Korgon, Massi, Naukat … . Once approval had been obtained from the Central Executive Committee (CEC) of the USSR, this draft laid the basis of the official border demarcation between the two states. Despite Moscow’s attempts at mediation, and the protracted nature of the process, the final demarcation line satisfied neither Uzbekistan nor Kyrgyzstan. The underlying reason for this failure was that the main task of the delimitation process – to ensure ethnic unification – had not been achieved. As the content of the document illustrates, along most of the border the old administrative volost borders were preserved. These administrative 49

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units had never corresponded to ethnic territories and their use as building blocks for the new states fundamentally undermined the possibility of the new states being constructed along ethnic lines. The commission’s decisions regarding the ethnic composition of the volosts were based largely on the results of the 1917 census, as no thorough demographic or ethnographic studies had been conducted since that time. In many cases, the issue was, in fact, settled by the votes of volost members. Uzbekistan laid claim to the city of Osh, and the volost of the same name, as well as the Aravan and Bazaar-Kurgan volosts, and to the southern part of Ayim volost – or left bank of the Kara-Darya river – and also to several settlements in the JalalAbad volost. According to the 1917 census, the Aravan volost was home to 8,945 Uzbeks, 6,073 Kyrgyz, 1,290 Turks and 733 Kashgarliks. The Uzbeks had formed ten settlements, the Kyrgyz fifteen, and the Turks and Kashgarliks had two and one, respectively. Bazaar-Korgon volost contained 2,711 Uzbeks (three settlements), 3,556 Sarts (six settlements) and more than 8,000 Kyrgyz (thirteen settlements). In addition, a large number of Slavs (mainly Russian and Ukrainian) had also settled. Uzbekistan’s claims to the left bank of the Ayim volost were supported by the area’s ethnic composition. Here the Uzbeks had nine settlements, and a population of 9,748, while 6,783 Kyrgyz were based in sixteen settlements. For the city of Osh there are no precise demographic figures for the period 1917–24, as the 1917 census did not extend into the city. In the 1897 census, the bulk of the population was registered as Turkic-Tatar (32,432 people), while Sarts and Kyrgyz made up small minorities. By 1908–9, the surrounding areas, called Osh volost, contained two Uzbek and ten Sart settlements. Two village communities (Suzak-1 and Suzak-2) in the Jalal-Abad volost comprised dozens of localities that also became subject to claims by Uzbekistan. Suzak-1 village community unified five Kyrgyz and eight Uzbek settlements, while Suzak-2 village community consisted of one Sart, five Uzbek and eight Kyrgyz settlements. The leadership of the Kyrgyz (Kara-Kyrgyz) autonomous oblast laid claim to the following areas at the eastern and southern perimeter of the valley: Khanabad, Chimion, Maniyak, Korgon-Tobe, Harin, Markhamat, Kulu, JalalKuduk (eastern Ferghana) and Bulak-Bashi volosts, and Vuadil and Uch-Kurgon settlements. It is reported that, as the details of the national territories division were drawn up in Tashkent in August 1924, the Kyrgyz commission also claimed the city of Andijan, in the hope of making it their capital. Ultimately, that plan was abandoned. In November 1925, the Kyrgyz commission formally protested against the designated divisions. With regard to the east section of the border it suggested an alternative: From Kizil-Ayak along the Ayim and Kurgan-Tobe volosts separating from the latter into Uzbekistan village communities, Kosh-Tobe, 50

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Kurgan-Tobe and Buinak; further including Chek-Tore, and PaskiKarasuu village communities of the Kara-Suu volost into Russian Federation follows along the borders Jalal-Abad, Kashgar-Kishlak, Osh volosts, including into Russian Federation Kuyuk-Mazar and Ardai village communities of the Maniyak volost. Then border-line follows along the borders of Aravan, Bulak-Bashi volosts, separating from the latter in favour of Uzbekistan village communities, Bulak-Bashi, KhojoAbad and Chakar goes along the borders of the Kulu volost, separating from the latter village communities Kulu, Akhtachi, Said-Abad, then follows along the borders of Markhamat volost, leaving the latter under the jurisdiction of the Russian Federation and descending to the south of the terrain Takhta. Kyrgyzstan’s claims for volost units located in the eastern part of the Ferghana Valley were based mainly on ethnic grounds. However, the issue of sizeable ethnic minorities, such as Turks, Kipchaks and Kara-Kalpaks, and their relevance to the process of delimitation was extremely sensitive. Kyrgyzstan tended to reject the underlying ‘ethnic indicator’ principle when Uzbekistan was the beneficiary of the presence of significant minority groups, such as Tajiks or Kashgarliks. The case of the Kurgan-Tobe volost is a useful example to which Kyrgyzstan laid claim, on the basis that the Kyrgyz presence – comprising 5,171 people in sixteen settlements – was boosted by a significant Kipchak population. ‘Kipchaks had 283 households [approximately ten settlements] with a total population of 1,559. [Kipchaks] are related people of the Kyrgyz,’ reads a document prepared by Kyrgyz officials including Divnogorskiy and Defiye. They maintained that the presence of Kipchaks enhanced the claim of Kyrgyzstan. In this part of the volost, there were some 1,468 Uzbeks in four settlements. The Kyrgyz proposed that the remainder of the volost, containing four Uzbek settlements, two Kyrgyz and one Kashgarlick settlement, should be passed to Uzbekistan. The complete secession of the Kara-Suu volost to Uzbekistan also provoked opposition from Kyrgyzstan. The Chek-Tore community was made up of one Uzbek and seven Kyrgyz settlements, as was another, Paski-Karasuu. The fate of the eastern corner of the Ferghana Valley also provoked fierce disagreement. In 1923, the three village communities of the Jalal-Abad volost had been organised into the new Khanabad volost, which contained three Uzbek and eight Kyrgyz settlements in total – a fact accentuated in the formal protest lodged by the Kyrgyz. This also asked Moscow to facilitate an enduring ‘national unification’ in the Maniyak volost area by joining two of its village communities to Kyrgyzstan. One of the disputed village communities, Kuyuk-Mazar, contained five Kyrgyz settlements, while the second consisted of one Sart settlement, with 610 inhabitants, and 1,907 Kyrgyz in a single settlement. The ‘very close proximity’ of the two communities ‘to the current borders of the Kyrgyz Autonomous Oblast’ further compelled the Kyrgyz authorities to raise questions over their fate. 51

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The presence of sizeable Turk populations in the Bulak-Bashi, Markhamat and Kulu volosts cast a shadow over the national delimitation process. The Uzbekistan leadership insisted that they were Uzbeks, and in some instances registered them as such. However, Kyrgyzstan disagreed with this approach, claiming: ‘Turks are related to Kyrgyz by their mode of life and have nothing in common with Uzbeks.’ Moreover, in many cases they had formed village communities with the Kyrgyz and ‘used the same pastures for their cattlebreeding activity’. Kyrgyzstan complained the process of ceding Turk areas to Uzbekistan by obligatory order was totally unacceptable and in opposition to Kyrgyz interests. The evidence supporting their claims was compelling. In 1908–9, Turks were found in five settlements of the Bulak-Bashi volost, Kyrgyz in seven settlements and Sarts in five settlements. In most cases – four out of five – Turk and Kyrgyz settlements combined to form village communities, the next level down in the administrative hierarchy. ‘Of course, three of its village communities settled by Uzbeks have to withdraw to Uzbekistan,’ the text of the Kyrgyz protest stated. In the Markhamat volost, the Kyrgyz demanded that the territory be fully withdrawn from Uzbekistan, as ‘Uzbeks constituted an insignificant number’ in comparison to Kyrgyz, Turks and Kipchaks. The 1917 census registered one Uzbek settlement (404 people), three Sart (1,944 people), two Tajik (1,795 people), one Kipchak (4,183 people), five Turk (4,403 people), six Kyrgyz (3,727 people) and one Russian (1,246 people). The situation was similar in Kulu volost, where Kyrgyzstan called for the return of three out of six of its village communities. The 1917 census stated that the volost contained 3,260 Uzbeks (in three settlements), 1,388 Kyrgyz (five settlements), with Turks constituting the vast majority with 8,341 people (five settlements). Claims by Kyrgyzstan on Uch-Kurgan, Vuadil and Chimion (which are found on the southern border) prevailed for economic reasons. Being primary trading hubs located at the heart of Turk, Kyrgyz and Kipchak areas, these settlements were, by themselves, organised economic centres for the surrounding territories. In 1926, the CEC of the USSR set up a commission responsible for settling ethno-territorial claims between the Central Asian administrative units. At this stage, Uzbekistan had successfully claimed the Aravan volost and the left bank of the Ayim volost, but its claims to the village communities in Suzak had been withdrawn. The parity commission, working under the chairmanship of Petrovskiy, rejected the claims of Uzbekistan to Osh. A document drawn up at the commission’s first session in Samarkand on 20 March 1926 gave the reasons: (a) the town is the only trade and administrative centre for south Ferghana, which was receded to Kyrgyzstan, (b) in terms of irrigation, it was tightly bounded with Kyrgyz territories, (c) primary centre, leading to Kyrgyz areas of the south part of the uyezd with the same name and Alai valley, (d) secession of it to Uzbekistan would deprive the Kyrgyz people of their only organising centre, (e) the lands of the 52

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Osh volost [which surrounds the town] were inevitably bound with the town’s territory. Uzbekistan initially wanted to reiterate its claim; with the unity of the commission at stake, however, it eventually chose not to. Not only were some Uzbekistan hopes dashed, but at its first session the parity commission rejected Kyrgyzstan’s claims on Vuadil, Chimion and Uch-Kurgan. Addressing the fate of the volost units in eastern Ferghana, the commission recommended ‘taking into account the necessity to preserve the unity of its economical base, in terms of irrigation capacity for the rest part of the Ferghana oblast, and to preserve the unity of its territory and management’. Henceforth, the working group regarded the territory between the Kara-Darya river and Sharikhan channel as an area in both cultural and economic terms, despite the fact that, in 1917, 34,773 Uzbeks, 24,789 Kyrgyz and 5,339 Kipchaks populated it. This policy deprived Kyrgyzstan of the opportunity to advance its claims on Kyrgyz and Kipchak areas of the Kara-Suu, Chimion, Korgon-Tobe and JalalKuduk volosts. Petrovskiy’s commission did conduct some fine-tuning of the delimitation process. Although it referred to the ‘impossibility’ of detaching the remaining Kyrgyz settlements from their Uzbek surroundings, the commission did allow the separation of the Arday village community (Maniyak volost) from Uzbekistan. With regard to the Bulak-Bashi and Markhamat strips, Kyrgyzstan’s arguments over the communities’ ethnic composition were rejected and the commission decided in favour of Uzbekistan, saying that the ‘Uzbeks constituted the majority’. However, it also decreed that the Tuya-Moyun village community (Markhamat volost) be separated from Uzbekistan. As for the Khanabad volost, the parity commission pointed out that this area contained the watershed of the Kara-Darya river, which was vital for the irrigation of eastern Ferghana, and considered it necessary to leave the volost unit, except the Bekabad village community, in Uzbekistan, (Khanabad volost). Kyrgyzstan managed to gain the strategically important village of Kara-Suu, however, which had railway connections with the rest of the Ferghana Valley. The decisions of the Petrovskiy commission were confirmed by the decree issued from Moscow by the CEC on 10 September 1926. But intervention by the Moscow authorities did not quell the pretensions of either Uzbekistan or Kyrgyzstan: both remained discontented. Even Kyrgyzstan asked Moscow to refrain from conducting territorial delimitation in the eastern part of Ferghana (south Ayim, Chimion, Kara-Suu, Kurgan-Tobe, Jalal-Kuduk, Maniyak, BulakBashi, Aravan and Markhamat) until a new census was held and the demography of the region established. Kyrgyzstan continued to make claims on Khanabad volosts, asserting that its appropriation would not undermine Uzbekistan’s control of water management, as well as on the economic centres of the Ferghana Valley’s southern rim. Moreover, the Kyrgyz protested against the ceding of the Aravan and south Ayim strips. 53

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In December 1926, the CEC of the USSR formed a second parity commission specifically to settle rival Uzbek and Kyrgyz claims. Attention was focused on the disputed volost units of Aravan, south Ayim and the southern economic centres of Vuadil, Chimion and Uch-Korgon. The commission rejected Kyrgyzstan demands that the south Ayim strip should be left within its borders, claiming that: ‘(1) Uzbeks constitute 60 per cent of the population and, (2) economically it gravitates towards Andijan [which was in Uzbekistan]’. However, when deciding the fate of the Aravan volost, the commission took the unprecedented step of considering the Turk presence as a boost to the Kyrgyz claim. On 23 January 1927 the parity commission concluded: [This sector] gravitates to Osh and the number of Kyrgyz together with Turks and Uighurs is equal to Uzbeks. … the latter two are neutral in the question of whether they belong to Uzbekistan or Kyrgyzstan. … Leave the Aravan volost within Kyrgyzstan. As in earlier cases, Kyrgyz claims on Vuadil and Chimion were rejected, but the large Tajik village of Uch-Korgon became part of Kyrgyzstan. The fate of the Kara-Kalpak minority was also shrouded in controversy, as has been illustrated by the recently published recollections of Sabirov, a Communist Party official at the time. He describes a reception hosted in 1927 by L. Kaganovich, secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. Yusup Abdrakhmanov, the chairman of the Kyrgyz government, who persistently proposed the creation of a single autonomous union of Kyrgyz and Kara-Kalpaks within the Russian Federation, attended the reception and aired his proposal. ‘When the idea was not accepted, the Kyrgyz government chairman became deeply distressed and complained that L. Kaganovich did not understand the gist of his proposal,’ recalled Sabirov. Unfortunately, this sketchy recollection does not contain any details of which groups of Kara-Kalpaks were under discussion. It is unlikely that the Kara-Kalpak autonomous oblast was at the heart of the debate that evening. A considerable distance separates Kyrgyz territory and the homelands of the Kara-Kalpaks in the Aral region. With this in mind, it seems improbable that Abdrakhmanov could have been promoting their unification: such a plan would have contravened all the established rules of the delimitation and state-building process. In addition, Kara-Kalpakstan was already part of Kazakhstan, and any Kyrgyz claim would have threatened the territorial integrity of its northern neighbour at a time when the Kyrgyz were dependent on Kazakh support in its disputes with Uzbekistan. It is more likely that another group of Kara-Kalpaks, namely those in the Ferghana Valley, were under discussion at Kaganovich’s reception. These lands, known as the ‘Kara-Kalpak steppe’, lie by the River Narin, near the proposed border with Kyrgyzstan. In the context of Kyrgyzstan’s claim on Turk, Kipchak, Tajik and Kashgarlik areas, 54

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the proposal can be seen as yet another attempt by the Kyrgyz to expand into the Ferghana Valley. Nonetheless, the parity commissions charged with settling ethno-territorial claims tried to preserve the eastern and southern perimeters of the Ferghana Valley, as they had been demarcated in 1924. Initiatives defined in the official directives aimed at increasing cotton-producing capacity drove this policy. But it is significant that the parity commission of 1927, while rejecting most of Kyrgyzstan’s territorial claims on Uzbekistan, repeatedly moved for the return of two volost units, Isfara and Sokh, in western Ferghana, populated mostly by Tajiks. It can be assumed that Moscow’s mediators were concerned that, if no concessions were made with regard to Kyrgyzstan’s key demands, a long-running dispute may have ensued. On 3 May 1927, the CEC of the USSR, after considering the decisions of the parity commissions reached during the first quarter of 1927, confirmed them largely unchanged. The only exception was the passing of Sokh, Isfara (western Ferghana) and Uch-Korgon to Kyrgyzstan. This move was welcomed by the Kyrgyz leadership, but met with fierce opposition from Uzbekistan. As some modern historians have stated, the CEC’s 3 May decree ‘lived only one day’, and some forces worked hard to achieve its nullification. On the following day, Isfara and Sokh were returned to Uzbekistan, while the return of the Aravan volost and passing of Uch-Kurgan to Kyrgyzstan was confirmed. In order to avoid further complications, or any subsequent revival of territorial claims, the CEC decreed ‘mutual territorial claims between Uzbek SSR and Russian Federation (in the area of the Kyrgyz Autonomous SSR) should be considered totally settled’. Moreover, for the three years the Presidium CEC banned any attempt even to raise the question of redrawing the borders between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. As a result of this, about 50 Uzbek, 14 Sart, two Turk and several Tajik and Kashgarlik settlements were left on the Kyrgyz side of the disputed areas in the east and south of Ferghana. As for the Uzbekistan section, approximately 100 Kyrgyz, 28 Kipchak, 17 Turk and dozens of Kashgarlik, Tajik, Kurama and Kara-Kalpak settlements remained. If the proportion of the latter’s nomadic area of settlement (konush) is taken into account, the total number of settlements (with the exception of Kashgarliks) must be much higher. Overall, as the census of 1926 indicates, about 109,000 Uzbeks, 2,667 Tajiks and 3,631 Turks were left in Kyrgyzstan, with the main concentration in its Ferghana territory; some 90,743 Kyrgyz, 21,565 Turks and 32,784 Kipchak were left in Uzbekistan. Despite Moscow’s ban, Kyrgyzstan persistently demanded reconsideration of the delimitation process. Uzbekistan reminded its neighbour of the illegal nature of its moves and threatened to renew its own claims. Moscow was not prepared to tolerate any lingering dispute. But there were other problems: full enforcement of the stipulated land allocations had yet to be achieved. Kyrgyzstan pointed out the illegal existence of the Shakhimardan enclave within its territory. The description of the border-line of this area read: 55

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It reaches the Shakhimardan river above the [village] Vuadil, [then] going along the river bends at the height 2,820 metres, [then] goes between the villages Tash-Tobe (withdraws to Uzbekistan) and Khalmion (withdraws to Russian Federation), then leaving the villages Kurghancha, Mindan and Chimion to Uzbekistan goes along the road to the Sarikamish ravine. This delimitation did not allow for the creation of any enclaves within the territory of Kyrgyzstan in the Shakhimardan area. Immediately after the declaration of national delimitation, however, the Uzbek authorities took control of two villages (Shakhimardan and Iordan) and established administrative structures subordinate to Tashkent. On 15 March 1927, the Presidium of the CEC of the Kyrgyz Autonomous SSR instructed the administrative organs of the Osh region to liquidate the enclave, and, in case of resistance from Tashkent, to act through the CEC of the USSR. However, the question of the Shahimardan enclave was quashed in the corridors of Moscow. The issue remains unresolved to this day as Stalin’s great purge during the 1930s dissuaded local officials from bringing the matter to the attention of the authorities in Moscow. The implementation of the Soviet national-territorial delimitation plan in the Ferghana Valley, particularly in its eastern and southern sector, was the most difficult task in the entire process. Both Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan disputed the final settlement, and both, with Kyrgyzstan at the fore, demanded that the process be reconsidered. Mutual claims were fuelled by the fact that some indigenous people had not been granted any form of autonomy. When the first signs of the collapse of the USSR became visible, a number of analysts predicted a revival of regional territorial disputes suspended since the late 1920s. They warned that claims and counter-claims could prove to be a source of conflict in Central Asia. So far they have been wrong; but the underlying disputes are yet to be resolved.

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4 LAND AND WATER ‘REFORM’ IN THE 1920S Agrarian revolution or social engineering? Gerard O’Neill Overview During the two decades following the October Revolution of 1917, Central Asia was subjected to a Bolshevik campaign against every aspect of traditional life. Taking advantage of the power vacuum that followed the Revolution, the Russian Bolsheviks of the Tashkent Soviet (the engine of the Revolution in Central Asia) seized the initiative. They destroyed the fledgeling autonomous government of Kokand during February 1918, quashing what little organised and native political cohesion there was in Turkestan. By 1920, the rulers of the two khanates – Bukhara and Khiva – had also been removed. Very soon, only two routes for discourse were available to the politically conscious among the native population: the Communist Party and the Basmachi, whose star was to wane throughout the 1920s. Traditional sources of authority were undermined and their bases of power suppressed. Traditional attitudes, especially with regard to familial relations and the relative virtues of the new socialist order, were the targets of a relentless propaganda bombardment. The Moscow government undertook the integration into the Soviet state of what previously had been regarded as ‘borderlands’. Concomitant with this integration was the removal of all traces of the pre-Soviet political configuration of Central Asia. This involved erasing from the map not only the two historic khanates of Khiva and Bukhara, but also the Tsarist territorial administrative units known as the Turkestan Governate in the south and the Steppe Region in the north. Closely following this redistribution of territory, in late 1925, the new republican governments of the region embarked on a wholesale programme of land redistribution with the intention of sweeping away the traditional patterns of land tenure. Land redistribution was not a corollary of territorial change; rather, it accompanied and even preceded the ultimate nationalisation and collectivisation that were clearly outlined as Bolshevik policies, even while so-called ‘national selfdetermination’, which was to form the basis for the 1924 ‘national delimitation’ of Central Asia, was suffering a tortuous and illegitimate birth.1 In Aminova’s 57

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words, the seventh All-Russia Party Conference in April 1918 ‘pointed to ... two forms of large-scale socialist economy in the countryside: 1: farms run at public expense under the guidance of soviets, and 2: collective peasant farms’.2 The long-held desire for socialised agriculture took shape during the early 1930s, and in much the same form as envisaged at the seventh conference: the ‘state farm’ and the ‘collective farm’. Thus, the land ‘reform’ which was pushed through from 1925 can only be seen as a precursor to full collectivisation. Some writers appear to take the events of 1925–6 at face value, and not in the context of either the previous sixty years of Tsarist history, or the subsequent sixty years of Soviet history, or both. They suggest that there was a ‘reform’ of the land tenure system, which is worthy of consideration on its own merits, and that collectivisation was a result of land reform. Arguably the reverse is true. The blueprint for collectivisation had already been extant for several years before 1925, and land reform was merely the mechanism to help induce it. Moreover, the process of collectivising lands which had been redistributed to individual peasants in Russia itself in 1917 had been initiated in 1919,3 when ‘a government decree brought the millions of peasant allotments under State control and carried out a policy of requisitioning all produce surplus to the needs of subsistence’.4 For a number of reasons, temporary measures prevailed in Central Asia. This delay meant that when land reform did come, it was on the crest of a wave of agitprop (the dissemination of communist political propaganda). The intention was to awaken an awareness of injustice, and to destroy the ‘exploiter elements’ in the most disadvantaged groups of Central Asian society: the land-hungry, the sharecroppers and the landless. Those who were to be deemed responsible were the rich peasants and merchants. For the Bolsheviks, the polemic had to be unequivocal, as they had no time, and indeed no reason, to be concerned with understanding the intricacies of Central Asia’s agrarian society. Adopting the umbrella term ‘survivals’ to condemn as anachronistic anything that came before them, they seized upon the injustices of the sharecropper/landowner relationship as representative of the exploitation and oppression of all aspects of rural life. However, the evolution of the agrarian structure that the Bolsheviks encountered in 1917 was not quite so simple.

Pre-Tsarist traditional land tenure No two sources agree on the traditional systems of land tenure and water distribution in Central Asia. Nor is there any significant correlation between the respective accounts of the two main groups of chroniclers whom the latter-day (and non-Russian-speaking) historian has to use for reference. These comprise nineteenth-century observers – mainly Western travellers, but also some Russian officials – and twentieth-century historians. The latter produce works that read as syntheses of nineteenth-century accounts, Russian (mainly Soviet-era) sources and Islamic theory. Most conspicuously absent from the bibliographies of the 58

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two groups are works written during the pre-Russian or pre-Soviet periods by Central Asians themselves, in any language (be it Turkic, Persian, Arabic or, indeed, Russian), when traditional systems of land tenure and water distribution were still in operation. Given the dearth of contemporaneous Central Asian native accounts, and the apparent recycling of the ‘facts’ relating to land and water (many of which carry the further stigma of having been strained through a Soviet historiographical sieve decidedly unsympathetic to anything pre-Soviet), any attempt to establish a definitive and exhaustive picture of the traditional practices would be futile. In such circumstances, any efforts to seek a path through the terminological minefield that has developed with the passing of time – (mis)translation, ideological diktat and simple misunderstanding – should be guided by source-critical analysis of all available data. Such examination may reveal only how complex the situation actually was, however, and how far ‘practice’ (what observers actually saw), and the terminology they used, diverged from ‘theory’. The irrigated lands were, and continue to be, the most cultivated parts of the settled agricultural areas of Russian Turkestan. During the 1870s, in Russian Turkestan (provinces of Syr Darya, Semirechiye, Ferghana, together with the Zerafshan district and the Amu Darya section), cultivated areas comprised no more than 2 per cent of all land. Kostenko documents just over 2 million desyatina5 ‘under cultivation’, as opposed to 41 million desyatina of nomad pasturelands, and over 54 million of ‘sterile tracts’. He does not give figures indicative of how much of the cultivated land was irrigated; a rough estimate would be 75 per cent.6 Though these cultivated areas were only a tiny proportion of the total land, they were the most densely populated. In Amu Darya, for example, while there were 159 desyatina of pasture ‘per nomad tent’ (see notes 53 and 54), there were only three desyatina of cultivated land per settled household.7 The practices and developments within the Ferghana Valley of the Syr Darya, the Zerafshan Valley and Semirechiye appear to have been better documented than those of other regions. Other information, some of which appears in only one source and therefore cannot be substantiated, is worthy of consideration nonetheless, even if it is not securely placed in a geographical context. In the case of Bukhara and Khiva, it could be argued that this ‘traditional era’ continued into the Soviet period. It even survived, albeit briefly, the absorption of the khanates into the new Soviet republics. In the case of Russian-ruled Turkestan, the traditional era could be said to have lasted well into Tsarist times. Although traditional land tenure was rationalised, at least in theory, following the Russian conquest of the 1860s, Tsarist rule in Central Asia did not bring an overnight transformation, but was, rather, the start of a gradual period of change. Some traditional practices (those relating to water, for example) were hardly touched by the new administration. Others were subject to new stresses, as occurred with the arrival of Russian settlers towards the end of the century, and the rapid spread of cotton cultivation during the 1880s. 59

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Mulk8 Arminius Vambery, writing in the mid-nineteenth century, gives the earliest Western description of land tenure in Khiva and Kokand. Vambery sets the scene well for the confusion that is to follow. His particular configuration is not repeated by subsequent sources, and his terminology reappears only briefly. He speaks of a threefold division, designated by the terms mulk–khanlik–yarimdji. Mulk, according to Vambery’s succinct definition, is ‘freehold property, which is subject to the payment of taxes’. It is opposed to khanlik, which he defines as ‘arrear estates’. This is land reclaimed by the government, or which has ‘devolved on it by confiscation and conquest’ under the control of mushurubs, ‘who at the same time collect the taxes’. Yarimdji (from the Turkic yarim, half) is defined, somewhat cryptically, as ‘all land … formerly let on the system of half profit … that belongs to the madra’sa, mosque or religious institution’, administered by a mutevali.9 Unfortunately, Vambery does not elaborate, but there is no reason to doubt the veracity of his description. Indeed, given that he would not have gained knowledge of such plainly Turkic terms as khanlik and yarimdji from the Koran – the theoretical basis of all Islamic land tenure – his account may be regarded as relatively unsullied by theory, and therefore a record of the terminology he actually heard in circulation. Such a statement cannot be made with any degree of certainty on the subject of subsequent sources. The description provided by Schuyler less than a decade later is more expansive. Schuyler does not content himself with a solely empirical approach. Rather, he chooses to preface his observations with a brief description of the five types of land ‘by general principle of Muslim law’.10 He defines milk as ‘the property in the most absolute manner of private persons’. Then he elaborates the (plainly theoretical) subdivisions of milk as milk-i ushri, or ‘tithe lands’ that were divided among the conquerors of an infidel country. These are distinct from milk-i kharaji, lands left in the ‘possession’ of non-Muslims during conquest, and which were ‘subject to an impost always more than the ushri, and varying from one-seventh to one-half of the harvest’.11 Nonetheless, Schuyler claims that, ‘strictly speaking, land owned by private persons in Central Asia is all milk-i kharaji’, and that there is no such thing as milk-i ushri, ‘this being a mistake on the part of the Russians’. Almost as an afterthought, he describes hur-i halis as a category of milk land freed from taxes, ‘they having been commuted at the time of its creation’. For this category, he also offers the alternative term zar-khariti. Unfortunately, he does not touch upon the significance of the translation he offers for the term ‘exchanged for gold’.12 Kostenko, writing at the same time as Schuyler, does not follow his classification of five land types. Instead, he asserts that the shariah simply divides land into two main ‘types’ – cultivatable or barren. Although he does not initially mention mulk, Kostenko defines two of his three categories of cultivatable land as ushri and kharaj (the other being ‘amlak or mamlakat’). Kostenko describes ushri (albeit briefly) in a manner almost identical to Schuyler’s milk-i ushri. Being Russian, he presumably does not regard ushri as a Russian misconception. However, he defines kharaj as land left in the hands of conquered races,13 a 60

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distinction that is most significant as it illustrates his understanding of the jurisdictional complexities of Islamic land tenure. Writing in 1899, Skrine and Ross take the estates of Bukhara as their base. They put forward four categories of land tenure. One is mulk-i kharaj, the land remaining in the hands of the original inhabitants at the time of conquest (which is how Schuyler and Kostenko describe it). This is subject to a land tax14 of onefifth of the gross product on irrigated land, and one-tenth on dry land. Missing from their account is any mention of ushri. They offer mulk as a category in its own right, however, as denoting lands ‘free of rent, because they were originally bestowed by the sovereign in fee simple on successful generals’.15 Post-1917 sources have to be treated with caution. Several of them seem to be deceptively simple and offer apparently clear-cut delineations of the various land categories. Such classifications, however, often take little account of the geographical idiosyncrasies, or indeed the evolution of the institutions they purport to define. It comes as no surprise that Pierce cites a fourfold system of tenure that does not conform to the systems detailed in any of the preceding sources. Pierce’s study includes miriie as a separate classification, in addition to the expected amlak, mulk and waqf. However, the three subdivisions of mulk land – which he identifies as ‘tax-free’ land held by the ‘indigenous population’ on the payment of a kharaj tax; and ‘land originally divided among the Arab conquerors of the region’ – do not differ radically from those of his predecessors. It is worth noting that Pierce’s understanding of mulk seems to derive from theory rather than from firsthand experience. He describes the holders of mulk-i kharaj lands as simply the ‘indigenous population’ at time of conquest, as opposed to Schuyler’s ‘non-Muslims’ and Kostenko’s ‘races’.16 Hélène Carrère d’Encausse argues sensibly that ‘mulk’ is ‘very complicated’, and inclines even more toward the theoretical. She divides the category into mulk-i kharaj; mulk-i ushr,‘[lands] which the Muslim invader conquered and ceded back to the population that had voluntarily rallied to him and the Islamic faith’; and mulk-i hurr-i halis. She further offers two subdivisions of milk-i kharaj that are notably absent from other sources: nim-i kharaj land, on which half the normal kharaj tax was levied; and kharaj-i sulhi, where the land was freed from ‘classical impositions’ and subject to a fixed annual tax.17 Amlak18 The real confusion arises when attempting to define exactly what amlak lands are, and how this category is to be distinguished from mulk. Vambery, Skrine and Ross do not mention amlak. For Schuyler, amlak lands were those areas of a province of a khanate that submitted tax to the tax collector (amlakdar) of the khan himself, rather than to the provincial beks, who, holding a ‘loose feudal position’ (that is, subordinate to the Khan), collected taxes for their own treasuries from other lands.19 (Compare this with Carrère d’Encausse’s tankhvah, below.) By contrast, Schuyler posits miriie as ‘public domain, or the property of the state’.20 61

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Kostenko calls ‘mamlikat or amlak’ those lands placed at the ‘disposal of private individuals’ who pay either kharaj, a fixed tax calculated on the crop, or tanap, a cash payment for a lease.21 Pierce defines amlak as previously dead land, ‘reclaimed from the desert and becoming, under shariah, the property of whoever irrigated and planted it’. Unlike mulk, it could not be transferred, and was subject to a tax ‘larger than the kharaj’.22 For Carrère d’Encausse, amlak (at least in Bukhara) simply meant state holdings. She adds that amlak included all dead lands that ‘the emir could recuperate and bestow on private individuals who had the right to use and bequeath them’ in return for the payment of the amlakana tax. From the amlak ‘pool’, the khan could also grant tankhvah lands to his beks. In return for providing troops, these lands were placed at the beks’ disposal for a specified time, and the peasants paid an unnamed tax to a tankhvahdar.23 In essence, when a bek had tankhvah lands, he became a tankhvahdar. As is clear, there is enough confusion and contradiction between even these few, brief explanations to frustrate any attempt at an inclusive definition of amlak. Much of the confusion can be attributed to varying interpretations of Islamic law. Both Schuyler and Pierce detail how some jurists regarded amlak lands as being amlak only in the sense that tax from them went to the khan and not to the bek. In brief, whatever the theory, land could simultaneously be both amlak and mulk. As MacGahan summarises: … the land is supposed to belong to the state, or rather the Muslim religion, and is not held as freehold … [however,]… reclamation of wild lands is … of such importance in Central Asia to the general weal [sic] that a freehold may be acquired by irrigating any uncultivated … ground and planting it with trees.24 Schuyler adds that, ‘whatever the theory, in practice these lands are the property of the persons cultivating them, for they can be sold, given away, bequeathed and turned into waqf as freely as other lands’.25 Togan, referring to practices in ‘Turkmenistan’, further blurs the line between the two categories. He defines amlak as ‘each farmer’s hereditary mulk’, and sanashik as ‘plots allocated each year’.26 This term is not mentioned in any other sources. Writing with the benefit of hindsight, Poliakov adds another variable: ‘In the oases amlak lands were regarded as state-owned, but were often in private use, while in daily economic practice they were subject to communal regulations.’27 In short, the laws of customary ownership, which were a consequence of the total dependence on irrigation of most cultivatable areas of the region, complicated Islamic land tenure theory. In practice, hereditary ‘ownership’ of land that was accepted as mulk by local custom depended on the individual maintenance of cultivation of a given area. However, the irrigation would be carried out communally. According to Pahlen, whosoever ‘brought the land to life’ would be regarded as a hereditary user, and would have to pay the owner a tithe.28 62

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Moreover, mulk lands were not necessarily fixed plots, but whichever lands the peasant was able to cultivate, while they were kept under cultivation. A three-year lapse in cultivation rendered the land ‘officially’ barren and free for cultivation by someone else.29 A peasant would be allotted as much land as he could plough with his kosh (pair of oxen), and would be obliged to supply a kosh for communal use. This was in return for his share of water, and the right to establish on his allotment (chak; but see also sanashik, above) a walled-off house and garden area that would ‘pass into (his) permanent possession’. This walled-off area would be known as a hayat (courtyard) to differentiate it from dashti land (the open plots).30 Waqf The definition of the term waqf is somewhat clearer than for mulk/milk and amlak. Still, nothing like consensus exists for this category. As previously seen, Vambery does not even use the term, though what he describes as yarimdji is plainly a type of waqf. Schuyler describes two types of waqf or mevkufe: those used for ‘purely religious/charitable purposes’, and those ‘to benefit children, who become guardians’.31 He talks of proposals to reform the waqf, as they are a ‘burden on the inhabitants’, and to maintain ‘a large and fanatical clerical class which is dangerous to the peace and well-being of the state’.32 Most intriguingly, Schuyler wrote this nearly half a century before such a fate befell the waqf. Kostenko, who mentions waqf lands only in passing, claims that they belong to the category of mamlikat or amlak land.33 Skrine and Ross describe waqf simply as ‘an endowment wholly for religious use’. They have a separate category for dash yak, which is ‘so styled because one tenth of the produce is set apart for the support of the mosque’.34 Pierce’s understanding of the concept of waqf is less exclusive. He details no less than four types, at least two of which could correspond to Vambery’s yarimdji or the dash yak of Skrine and Ross. These are defined as: ‘pure’, those free from taxes and obligations; ‘conditional’, where the state sets a limited income at the time of its conferral of the waqf; ‘hereditary’, where the actual property remains in the hands of the founder and his heirs; and ‘fictional’, where an institution agrees to be holder of the waqf for an agreed sum from a landowner.35 In addition to these legal and customary categories of land and land tenure, a corpus of terms relating to the categories of land use as determined by particular geographical and/or climatological conditions of Central Asia also existed. For example, Kostenko distinguished between irrigated land, which he claimed was known as abi (from the Persian ab, water) or tar in Zerafshan, and land which is watered solely by precipitation, known as liyali, or buhari in Zerafshan.36 Confusingly, he later claims that such rain lands are known as lalmi.37

Tsarist land reform Accounts of the agrarian policies adopted by the Russian administration of Turkestan during the second half of the nineteenth century are confused and 63

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contradictory. What sources do agree on, at least, is the basic chronology of the nationalisation of land, which was followed by a rationalisation of the tax/tithe system, and the consequent emergence of a sub-class of landowning peasants increasingly freed from their traditional obligations. All land was declared crown property. Pierce states that this was ‘in conformity with existing practice’ in Central Asia, namely the confused ‘parallel ownership’ of amlak and mulk. At the same time, all lands ‘occupied by buildings and orchards’ were recognised as hereditary private property, which could be bought and sold. In an attempt to rationalise the legal bases of existing irrigation practices, water was also nationalised. Nonetheless, Tsarist authorities did not realise how crucial water, and, more importantly, access to water, was to agrarian society in Central Asia. Initially, they did nothing to bring about practical change in this area. Only after 1905, following demands from European settlers for equal access to water, were studies conducted which concluded that ‘rights to water and land were inseparable in Turkestan’.38 Knowledge of this relationship formed the basis of the water policy that the Bolsheviks implemented with devastating effect two decades later. In 1870, land tax was rationalised with the introduction of a simplified single land tax in place of the various forms of kharaj and tanap. A kibitka (tent) tax per household was introduced for the nomads, and the zekat, a tax on livestock, was abolished.39 Waqf were officially recognised, but largely left alone.40 The desire for a more simplified taxation system may have been the main factor behind this change. Yet such an effective transfer of land to those who actually worked it had the added effect of eradicating traditional tenure patterns in Kokand and the captured areas of Bukhara.41 Pierce (who appears to agree with Aminova) states that this ‘took a major step towards neutralizing the mass of natives in the event of any rebellion that the former privileged classes of the pre-conquest era might seek to arouse’.42 Pierce, as does Rywkin, attributes this first Russian alteration of the system to the Turkestan Governor, General von Kaufman,43 which presumably sets it during his term of office, 1867–82.44 Ivanov cites further statutes of 1886 and 1900 that abolished ‘military-feudal’ landownership, and transferred ‘the lands of the feudal élite to their actual cultivators on the basis of hereditary land tenure’. Henceforth the peasants had the right to sell and mortgage their land.45 The reforms mentioned by Pierce and Ivanov may seem to be the same, yet quite plainly they cannot be, given the chronology. Ivanov overlooked or ignored the earlier changes, precluding any attempt to ascertain how and why the 1886 and 1900 statutes succeeded the earlier reforms. He also fails to question what effect these statutes may have had on the changes already wrought by cotton cultivation and immigration. Immigration Between 1896 and 1916, almost 1.5 million Russians migrated to Central Asia, of whom approximately two-thirds stayed in the area. Most settled in the Steppe 64

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region, an area which corresponds roughly to modern Kazakhstan. Civilian colonisation along the borders of this ill-defined region began in AkmolinskSemipalatinsk in 1875 and Turgai Uralsk during the 1880s.46 The Resettlement Act of 1889 allotted land and made tax concessions to those travelling ‘officially’. A further law of 1904 removed restrictions on migration to the Steppe region and Siberia.47 Additionally, Togan cites ‘articles 119 and 120’ of a law of 1891 (not elaborated) as a result of which he claims ‘land in Kazakhstan [sic] had been taken from the local population’.48 Immigration into the Semirechiye oblast of Turkestan had begun as early as 1868, over half a century before what has become known as the ‘1921–2 Land Reform’. This decree allowed for land expropriated from Russian settlers to be transferred to local Kyrgyz tribes. The incompatibility of the respective immigrant Russian and native Central Asian concepts of land ‘ownership’ (this term is used tentatively) was played out while the Russian state was landlord. This soon led to the imposition upon the indigenous nomadic and indeed semi-nomadic populations of European (or at least Russian) norms that regulated boundaries and determined exclusive ownership (or right of use) of land in demarcated areas. The imposition of such practices started ‘exclusively’ as an attempt to enclose given areas of land for the specific use of a settler (that is, Russian/Slav) farmer. Soon, it was extended to the indigenous, nomadic peoples, at least as far as norms were drawn up specifying how much land they ‘required’. Kostenko’s work assesses Central Asia’s suitability for future Russian settlement. He even goes so far as to supply figures for what he believes to be the optimum amount of land needed to support a sedentary landholding, and a nomad kibitka.49 During the late 1870s, he deems 100 desyatina50 of land per kibitka as ‘affording a sufficiency’ for a nomad household. He reasons that, of the 41 million desyatina of ‘nomad pasture land’ in Turkestan,51 a quarter (10 million desyatina) could be ‘brought under cultivation without interfering with the rural economy, or, at least without curtailing its present dimensions’.52 For reference, Kostenko calculates existing desyatina of land-per-kibitka ratios as averaging 111 in Semirechiye, 146 in Syr Darya, 161 in Ferghana (oblasts) and 159 in the Amu Darya region. Given his 100-desyatina estimate, Kostenko clearly believes much land in these areas to be ‘surplus’. By contrast, the figures he gives for the average desyatina per ‘settled’53 unit are: twenty-seven in Semirechiye, two in Syr Darya, five in Ferghana oblasts, and three in both Zerafshan (no kibitka figures available) and Amu Darya.54 While few figures relating to Russian settlement in Central Asia towards the end of the century are available, one particular trend is marked. Net immigration quadrupled from 206,000 during the decade 1896–1905, to 834,000 during the decade 1906–16.55 The Stolypin reforms, initiated in response to the 1905 Revolution and the general fear of rural unrest in Russia, ‘freed’ countless thousands of peasants from the control of their communes (which Stolypin had undertaken to dissolve) and, for the first time, gave them the right to hold passports.56 Central Asia was to serve as the safety valve for those victims of what 65

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Volin calls Stolypin’s ‘wager on the strong’.57 An attempt was made to create a class of richer, landed peasantry, thus dividing the rural population of Russia and hopefully forestalling any political rural revolution. As Kochan argues: ‘The more able peasants would then emerge as small landed proprietors with a strong stake in the existing order; and they would hold in check the less able, who were destined to dwindle into a landless rural proletariat.’58 Some of those who were ‘destined to dwindle’ – labelled ‘the feeble and the drunk’ by Stolypin59 – were, in all probability, among the ‘100,000 worthless tramps’ encountered in Semirechiye in 1908–9 by Count Pahlen. He bemoans the colonisation authorities’ act of turning Cossack stanitsas into ‘common peasant villages’.60 Such was the urgency to find land for the new settlers that specifications for nomads’ land needs were lowered, thereby increasing by some 70 per cent the amount of land adjudged ‘surplus’ and therefore available for settlement by Russians. Caroe details contemporaneous developments on the ‘Kazakh’ steppe. He talks of 14 million hectares being ‘confiscated by decree’, and made available to 2 million Russians on the basis of ‘scientific investigations’ by Scherbina and Kuznetzev into the nomads’ needs for ‘minimum subsistence’.61 In 1910, the ‘core’ oblasts of Turkestan – Syr Darya, Ferghana and Samarkand – were also officially opened for immigration. However, there do not seem to be any figures to indicate the level of settlement.62 By way of comparison, the Russian population of Bukhara – where Russian immigration was officially prohibited, as in Khiva – rose from some 12,150 at the time of the 1897 Russian census, to an estimated 27,000 in 1910, and 50,000 in 1914, ‘at least two percent of the population’.63 Cotton In 1870, Russia imported over 2.5 million pud 64 of cotton, and produced less than 200,000. By 1908, Turkestan65 alone was producing over 10 million pud, and by 1916 a total of 24 million.66 However, the intervening years had witnessed the Russians’ perception of the role of Turkestan change from an ‘economic colony’ (into which, Togan states, ‘no money should be invested’ lest the ‘level of political awareness rise … and the area break away’67) to an area increasingly integrated both economically and socially with Russia proper. As previously seen, the Semirechiye oblast of Turkestan was fast becoming a settler colony. There was a considerable amount of investment, not least in the field of communications. The Caspian–Kizil Arvat railway reached Bukhara in 1885,68 Samarkand in 188869 and Tashkent a decade later. In 1905–6, the line from Orenburg to Tashkent was completed, directly connecting Central Asia to the main Russian rail network.70 The watershed year for cotton was 1884. Experiments with upland American cotton proved a great success, and the new strain began to be planted on a commercial basis. The suitability of Central Asia for the new cotton, and its superiority to the native strains, was considerable. In Turkestan, the area sown 66

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increased from 450 desyatina in 1884 to 12,000 in 1886, to 68,000 in 1888, and 401,000 by 1913. This encompassed one-fifth of the total irrigated area of Syr Darya, Ferghana, Samarkand and Transcaspia (2,105,000 desyatina).71 By the early 1890s, Central Asia72 was producing 3.5 million pud, or 25 per cent of all Russia’s cotton, and a 10 per cent increase over the decade. Over the next twenty years, production rose to 11 million pud, meeting half of all Russia’s cotton needs.73 In 1887, emboldened by the success of the new American cotton and determined to encourage ‘native’ cotton production, the Russian government increased the tariff on foreign cotton imports,74 thus presaging Central Asia’s total economic dependence on Russia. In 1893, a cheap freight rate for wheat shipped from European Russia was introduced. The consequent fall in the wheat price forced yet more people into cotton production.75 Areas such as Ferghana and Syr Darya were increasingly cultivated with cotton. At the beginning of the First World War, an average of 20 per cent of cultivatable land in Turkestan (excluding Semirechiye) was dedicated to the production of cotton, rising to 36–38 per cent in Ferghana.76 In Bukhara, at the same time, no more than 5 per cent of cultivatable land was dedicated to cotton.77 The people of the cotton areas paid a high human price for switching to the new crop. The effective arrival of the world market in the village had wrought an economic realignment of the relationship between village peasant, middleman and distant merchant. This coincided with the peasant’s assumption of ownership of the land he worked, and his release from the traditional taxes and tithes. Now he was not only vulnerable to market forces as never before, but also liable to lose more than he had ever owned. Merchants made loans against future harvests to middlemen at 10 per cent. These were passed on to the peasant at 60 per cent. The latter, when unable to meet repayments, was compelled to sell his land, or risk having it seized.78 Increasing numbers of small producers fell victim to fluctuations in world prices. By 1912, approximately 30 per cent of the peasants in Ferghana and the Ashkabad uezd in Transcaspia were landless.79 The peculiarities of both irrigation agriculture and cotton cultivation meant, however, that many landless peasants stayed on their ‘own’ land as sharecroppers. Togan relates how a new landlord would not personally farm more than could be worked by his family plus a few labourers, because ‘such were the conditions of irrigation agriculture, the land would produce only when it was worked lovingly by someone with an interest (menfaat) in it’.80 Although a class of landlords and absentee magnates did come into existence, ‘large working estates’ on the Russian scale did not. Usually, the peasants remained on their own land. The subtle yet crucial difference was that they were now virtually enslaved and tied to the land much as they had been under the ‘traditional’ system. Cotton might not necessarily require more irrigation, but still it did demand irrigation, and consequently frequent periods of intensive labour. This increased the reliance by farmers with as little as 1.5–2 desyatina on hired day labourers (merdikar).81 Ivanov details how 63 per cent of the farms in 67

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Ferghana, cultivating an average of 1.75 desyatina82 (these constituted 86 per cent of all farms in the area), had to hire labour at harvest time.83 This both put a further strain on already stretched budgets and exposed even small landowning peasants to subsequent Bolshevik accusations of being ‘exploiter elements’, and their denunciation as landlords.

Bolshevik land and water policy: the politics of land distribution The main thing is to liberate land from captivity and give it to land owners. Free! Forever! Why should the great gift of God, which belongs to nobody, be an instrument of politicians who intend to transform it into an instrument of blackmail and neo-serfdom? ( Journalist Suniat Bakenov in Kazakhstanskaia Pravda, 18 April 1992)84

The precedents for Bolshevik land policy may be found in recent Russian history, starting with the emancipation of the serfs in 1861, and the dissolution of the commune as the regulator of Russian rural life following Stolypin’s post-1905 reforms. The origins of an exclusively Russian Marxist theory of rural development can be dated to the 1880s, when Marxist writers began to notice the emergence of a class of better-off peasants who were able to assume leadership in the villages, and exploit the poorer masses with ‘usurious loans’. Volin identifies a split at this point between populist and Marxist thinking on such rural class stratification; and the crystallisation of the Marxist precept that such polarisation in the villages ‘proved’ the ‘inevitability of … Russia’s passing through a capitalist stage’,85 and vindicated the Marxist evolutionary theory of development. For Lenin, in Park’s words, ‘the idea of bypassing capitalism was an “idle and reactionary” dream of “petit-bourgeois parties” ’.86 The route to the ultimate destination of fully socialised agriculture was less than clear. Yet events were to overtake the implementation of theory. In Russia, peasant ‘black distribution’ or total partition (chernyi perdel) of the land during the Revolution presented the Bolsheviks with a fait accompli. This solved their dilemma over whether the large estates should be broken up and redistributed to win peasant support, or kept intact to facilitate the realisation of what Volin calls ‘the classic Marxist dogma of the superiority of large-scale methods of production’.87 Though such a ‘demand’ for land partition was ‘anti-Marxist’, the intensity of the peasants’ action forced the Bolsheviks to temporise, a delay which meant that they would have to wait for the peasants ‘to see from their own experience that it was impossible to end poverty and ruination through equal land tenure’.88 In the meantime, the Bolsheviks continued the job of laying the legal foundations for collectivisation with a series of decrees in 1918 and 1919.89 For various reasons, however, its full-scale implementation, even in Russia itself, was put off for another decade. 68

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Unlike their Russian counterparts, the peasants of Central Asia were not stirred by the Revolution to seize and divide the land. Instead of the classconsciousness of the Russian peasants – distilled from the festering resentment and attrition of the past sixty years – Central Asian peasants seemed to have remained in thrall to their patriarchal and tribal agrarian society. Despite the limited extent of sources which recorded the actual ‘voices’ of those whose lives were moulded by the ideologues and policy makers, there were different ‘classes’ of peasant in Central Asia during the early 1900s, though there is nothing to suggest that here ‘class’ meant much more than ‘category’. Togan sees the emergence of peasants classifiable as ‘rich’, ‘middle’, ‘poor’, and ‘those who own nothing’, in Ferghana and Syr Darya in 1906,90 and Ivanov classifies three definable types of sharecropper (chairiker).91 What neither Togan nor Ivanov, nor any other commentator, explains is the extent of any ‘class-consciousness’ among the Central Asian peasantry, or, if such a consciousness did exist, the effect it was starting to have on traditional communal dynamics. It can only be assumed that, given the apparent inaction on the part of the indigenous Central Asian peasantry in 1917, there was no such class awareness. Whatever the intricacies of Marxist-Leninist evolutionary theory regarding the ‘necessary evil’ of the development of capitalism, the Bolsheviks realised that to implement full socialisation of agriculture they would have to destroy totally the ‘feudal’ – and, indeed, what in the cotton-growing areas of Turkestan could be called the neo-feudal – structure of the village. From the Leninist perspective, sharecropping or labour service was the economic essence of the serf system. In capitalist society, a man who has no means has to sell his labour-power in order to buy the means of subsistence. In feudal society, a man who has no means has to perform labour services in return for the means of subsistence he receives from his lord.92 Quite which word Lenin would have used to express the concept of ‘lord’, and to what extent a peasant leasing land to, or employing, other peasants could be regarded as a ‘lord’ is uncertain. What is clear is that the term bay (and its variants) came to be applied without distinction to all landowning farmers, from the richest to the poorest peasants. Since there was little peasant unrest to exploit, ‘exploiters’ and ‘exploited’ would have to be delineated all the more clearly. To bring about ‘the political stratification of the village’, Ivanov writes, ‘the masses themselves had to lose their implicit trust in their exploiters and see by their own experience that the exploiters were their enemies’.93 This ‘experience’ was to be provided by the Soviet state. In order to inculcate in ‘the masses’ a sense of injustice such as might encourage their deployment as a weapon to destroy their own society, a mass campaign of propaganda and indoctrination, spearheaded by the Koshchi (Ploughman) Union, began. 69

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The Bolsheviks set out to remove from Central Asian society any form of ‘collectivity’ other than that which they wished to impose. By ‘atomising’ the Central Asian rural unit (reducing it to its smallest constituent parts, the individual peasant farmers), they were free subsequently to reconstruct a model to their own design from the components. This model was to be large-scale, industrialised, collectivised agriculture. Moreover, it was hoped that the traditional ‘lateral’ ties of the peasant (to his neighbours, village, clan, tribal chief), once destroyed, could be replaced by ‘vertical’ ties to the state. In this respect, Lenin’s 1912 analysis of the Stolypin-inspired break-up of the commune in Russia as needing to be ‘more consistent and decisive’ is particularly instructive.94 Aminova, among others, analyses the need for ‘bourgeois-democratic revolution’ that would ‘unite all the peasants’:95 Lenin’s argument that the abolition of private property would ‘facilitate the rise of the class struggle’ was, in fact, irrelevant.96 It could be argued that what the Bolsheviks wanted was for the peasants to do as they were told, and, ideally, to want what they were supposed to want. An alternative view is provided by Togan. He sees the long-term rationale behind the reorganisation of land tenure as ‘an aim to replace wheat [on irrigated soil] totally with cotton by 1936’,97 and a desire by the Bolsheviks to create land for Russian settlement. Togan claims that ‘tens of thousands’ of Russian settlers were brought in, even while the 1921 redistribution of land to the ‘Kyrgyz’ was in progress. He also cites an article in Izvestiya that year by Piatkov, ‘one of the leading Bolsheviks’, which detailed plans for 1.5 million Russians to be sent to ‘take over the homes left unoccupied by the destruction of two million [owners]’.98 According to Togan, owing to the continuation of the Basmachi resistance in the countryside, Russian settlers were initially settled in the cities, even in the Muslim Mahalla quarters. Following the gradual suppression of the Basmachi, and decrees nationalising land and water in 1924–5, they were able to ‘seize the land under the pretence of the land reform’.99 Togan says that in the five years following the October Revolution, the Bolsheviks brought into Turkestan ‘as many settlers as the Tsars brought in in fifty’.100 Though Chokaev talks of ‘a considerable portion of … confiscated lands’ going to Russian soldiers,101 and Park of land grants to ‘families of Red Army men, elected officials and teachers’102 (none necessarily Russian), nowhere is the sheer scale of Togan’s allegation substantiated. Legislation and implementation Land and water legislation in Central Asia falls, broadly speaking, into two stages. First, there was the ‘aspirational’ phase up to 1924, when implementation of legislation was either abandoned for various reasons, or met with little success. Second, there was the post-1929 phase, which could be called ‘intensification’, when legislation was re-enacted and fully implemented as one element of a comprehensive assault on every aspect of traditional Central Asian life. The grassroots activities of the Koshchi and their programmes of direct action complemented measures relating to land and water reform. 70

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As soon as they seized power – on ‘the second day of the October Revolution’, as Aminova puts it – the Bolsheviks implemented legislation on land. On 26 October 1917, the second All-Russia Congress of Soviets enforced the ‘land decree’ by Lenin.103 This had been adopted as the basis of the party’s agrarian policy at its second congress in April of that year, and envisaged the nationalisation of land and the ‘conversion of landed estates into model farms’. On 27 January (9 February) 1918, the All-Russia Central Executive Committee (TsIK) passed a ‘basic law on the socialisation of land’, outlining the mechanics of the redistribution.104 In Turkestan, this legal groundwork prompted the establishment of committees to make inventories of land and water resources on 2 December 1918.105 Consequently, an injunction of the People’s Commissariat for agriculture of the Turkestan territory on 9 December 1917106 prohibited the sale and purchase of land, but permitted the temporary lease of lands with Soviet permission. As Ivanov points out, the decree ‘was not, as a rule, observed’.107 Aminova, however, claims that under the All-Russia TsIK law of 27 January 1918, some 100,000 desyatina of lands from farms that had ‘used hired labour’ were redistributed. She does not offer a chronology for this action – apparently the first act of redistribution – and it is not mentioned in any other of the sources.108 The concluding stage of this initial period of legislation was the establishment of poor peasants’ committees on the orders of the Fifth Congress of Turkestan Soviets in October 1918, which became the foundations of the Koshchi Union, also known as the ‘Union of Poor Workers’.109 The first large-scale redistribution of land in Central Asia among the sharecroppers left native-held lands largely unaffected.110 Rather, those areas of Semirechiye which had been settled by kulak (rich peasant) settlers from central Russia were handed back en bloc to ‘Kyrgyz’ tribal chiefs.111 A decree of 4 March 1920 by the Turkestan government returned the lands to the indigenous population, and was followed on 29 June by a party resolution ‘putting the government decision into immediate effect’.112 Data for this redistribution vary widely. Carrère d’Encausse provides figures of 285,000 hectares being given to some 13,000 families ‘a few months later’.113 Bacon claims that in the ‘1921–22 reforms’ 1,161,370 acres (470,000 hectares) were distributed among poor Kazakhs in Semirechiye and Syr Darya.114 Ivanov gives a similar number of beneficiary families to Carrère d’Encausse’s 12,800, but claims that 232,000 desyatina were redistributed. He adds that 8,084 ‘kulak families’ were evicted.115 The actual implementation of the legislation seems to have proceeded slowly (hence the vague dating of ‘1921–22’). Despite the reluctance of the recipients of the land to settle on it,116 Carrère D’Encausse claims that the redistribution alleviated the ‘sense of anti-Russian frustration’ among the indigenous population.117 Characteristically, Togan dismisses it as having been executed with ‘much fanfare’ for ‘propaganda’.118 The Semirechiye episode was exceptional. Though preparatory work for the ‘main event’ continued, circumstances conspired to place land and water reform 71

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low on the list of priorities. Of more immediate concern was the agricultural collapse and consequent famine afflicting Russia and Central Asia alike after years of war. In Central Asia, the ongoing Basmachi resistance compounded the situation. In Turkestan between 1915 and 1922, the area of irrigated land had halved. Livestock numbers decreased from nearly 19 million to 6.5 million between 1917 and 1923.119 By 1921, that cotton that had covered 1,058,000 acres in 1913 now covered only 200,000 acres. This drastic decrease was partly attributable to the switch to growing wheat in response to its limited supply to Central Asia during the war.120 The only option the Bolsheviks had was strategic retreat. The New Economic Policy (NEP) introduced across Russia from late 1920 halted the appropriation of surpluses from the peasants, and introduced a ‘tax in kind’ to encourage increased yields. In Central Asia, this was accompanied by a policy of accommodation towards Islam, and attempts to ‘pull the rug’ from under the Basmachi.121 The Law on Water Monopoly, passed on 24 May 1924, signalled the beginning of the intensification of the revolution in the countryside. Water had already been declared state property in August 1922,122 though theoretically it had always belonged to the ‘state’. The new law restricted water to ‘labour use’, and annulled rights of waqf, ‘large property owners’ and, intriguingly, holders of mulk. This finally clarified the previously nebulous concept of ‘class’. According to Park, although the law was not fully implemented in Turkestan before 1924, subsequent republican governments applied it ‘drastically’.123 This is an extremely rare specific example of change brought about by national delimitation. Unlike Tsarist water policy, which, Togan claims, ‘the government struggled with for years but refrained from implementing’, the new act was ‘enforced in a revolutionary way’. For Togan, it was the ‘main weapon’ used in the break-up of the traditional tenure system and the subsequent seizure of lands by Russian immigrants.124 With the village-level ‘water authorities’ – the aksakal and mirab – now subject to official approval, the government for the first time gained a direct hand in village affairs. Using the threat of withheld water supplies as a sanction, they were able to force compliance with what was becoming a ‘command’ agricultural policy.125 The Bolsheviks intended to eradicate ‘class’: in effect, only one ‘class’, the rural ‘non-owning poor’, would survive. This took precedence over any notion of agricultural advancement or equitable land tenure, and is supported most persuasively by the change in direction of the Koshchi after 1923. Generally described as a ‘trade union’, and given its name by the Turkestan Communist Party TsIK in November 1920, the Koshchi was, in effect, an umbrella organisation for the committees of sharecroppers and poor peasants, often formed at the instigation of activists brought in by the Bolsheviks from outside Central Asia. However, from 1923 onwards, after a purge, anyone who had used hired labour (even peasants with as little as 1.5 desyatina) was excluded from membership. 126 In the words of Medlin, Carpenter and Cave, the authorities used the Koshchi, along with the Forestry Workers’ Union, the Rabzemles, ‘not so much as profes72

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sional bodies as instruments for gaining mass support for the regime’s political and economic programme’.127 They saw the Koshchi as a conduit for instructions to be transmitted to the grassroots, but not a channel of communication. As the physical instrument of land redistribution, the Koshchi coordinated squatting, land seizure and expulsions. Consequently, it was of little use after the redistribution had been accomplished. It was purged again for acting ‘autonomously of the state’ in March–July 1926,128 but still had some 354,763 members in Uzbekistan in late 1926.129 Its membership in Turkestan in the summer of 1921 had been 90,000.130 Although its activities in Uzbekistan were subsequently curtailed, in Tajikistan, where it was known as Joftgaran,131 the organisation seems to have had a longer lease of life. Rakowska-Harmstone describes it as ‘a mass organization designed to foster collectivization’. Between a purge in 1929 and its demise in 1931, it was renamed Ittifaki (Kambagalan in Uzbek) or ‘Union of Poor Workers’.132 The push for change culminated in decrees in Turkmenistan (24 September 1925), Uzbekistan (2 December 1925)133 and Tajikistan (December 1926).134 These ‘reaffirmed’ the original nationalisation legislation,135 and established a ‘land fund’ to be created from state and newly irrigated lands, waqf and lands confiscated totally, or as ‘surplus’ from ‘non-toiling elements’. In the Ferghana oblast of Uzbekistan, ‘confiscation thresholds’ demanded total confiscation of farms of over 110 acres, and partial confiscation of those between 20 and 110 acres (the figures were 135 and 27 acres, respectively, in Tashkent and Samarkand).136 At the same time, quotas for land reallocation were set at 7, 10 and 12 desyatina (approximately 20, 28 and 33 acres, respectively) of irrigated land in Ferghana, Samarkand and Tashkent, and Mirzachol, respectively.137 Implementation proceeded slowly until 1924 in those areas that had been the territory of the khanates. However, in the core oblasts of Uzbekistan (Ferghana, Tashkent, Samarkand), the two ‘threads’ of the reform, namely republic-level codification and village-level political propaganda, had fused. In Ferghana, where the expropriation of land began in December 1925, the process was completed by February 1926. A land fund of some 770,000 tanap138 (of which 16.6 per cent was formed from ‘landlord estates’, 25.4 per cent from ‘trader estates’, and 26.9 per cent from lands with absentee landlords) was distributed among 36,920 farmers, two-thirds of whom were sharecroppers, with the remainder being labourers and landless peasants.139 Across the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR), some 580,000 acres of land were redistributed to 66,000 households, ‘adversely affecting’ 25,216 households.140 A further 13,000 households received land in 1929, by which time a total of 317,400 hectares had been redistributed.141

Legacy of change It soon became apparent that land hunger in many areas of Central Asia was so acute that quotas would have to be reduced to cope with demand. In 73

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Uzbekistan, this resulted in some peasants being allotted as little as 1.25 acres.142 Ivanov states that, although 135,000 households in unspecified locations received land, ‘the agrarian transformations fell short of providing all rural toilers with land … almost half of the labourers did not get any land’.143 While 47 per cent of farms in Uzbekistan were larger than 12 tanap, 14 per cent had less than six. Aminova writes that ‘3.9 per cent of the total population’ of Uzbekistan ‘adversely affected’ by the changes previously owned 22.5 per cent of the land, and afterwards owned 12 per cent.144 According to Park, and Khan and Gha’i, and in stark contrast to Ivanov’s figures, sharecropping was almost wiped out. Park gives figures for the percentage of households renting lands in the core oblasts of the Uzbek SSR dropping from 42.5 per cent to 5.6 per cent after the changes.145 Khan and Gha’i have calculated that for (ex-)sharecroppers the proportion of rented land to total landholding dropped from 67 per cent to 0.03 per cent.146 The consequences of Central Asian land and water reform are presented by many writers in terms of the ‘fairness’ of the new land tenure system, or the viability of the newly divided plots, implying that such considerations were paramount in the minds of the planners. The extension of this argument is that, following the realisation that small-scale agriculture was not going to produce satisfactory yields, collectivisation was seized upon as a panacea. As stated before, this was not the case. Socialised agriculture was the ultimate, and enduring, goal. By 1931, 68.2 per cent of rural households in Uzbekistan had been collectivised, more than the average for the USSR as a whole.147 It is difficult to ascertain quite what aspect of the reform could be considered ‘agrarian’. Land reform was only ‘agrarian’ in so far as it prepared the ground for the subsequent revolution of collectivisation, and fully socialised agriculture. This ‘preparation’, however, amounted to nothing less than the destruction of the existing agricultural base at incalculable human cost. It was ‘reformist’ only in the sense that it changed the lot of the sharecroppers, though not necessarily for the better. Many now ‘owned’ land, but few were able to survive on the small plots they had been given in the redistribution. Nowhere is the fate of those who received nothing recorded. In the heat of dispossessing their landlords, many sharecroppers had sealed their own fate by smashing machinery, destroying seed, and killing or driving away the former, thereby depriving themselves of the equipment, capital and expertise they would soon need as owner farmers. The result was widespread famine, and a population in no position to resist when their newly bestowed lands were collectivised a few years later. Even this granting of lands to the landless was motivated not so much by a genuine – though misplaced – concern for the sharecroppers, as by the Bolsheviks’ desire to destroy the sharecroppers’ overlords. By urging the poorest of the poor in Central Asia to dispossess those who had slightly more than they did, the Bolsheviks gained an effective base in the villages. The Bolsheviks’ actions were appealing to those with the fewest vested interests in the prevailing tenure system, and those nursing grudges and feuds that could be carefully 74

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distilled into something approaching class struggle. It is difficult to comprehend how the deliberate undermining of successful farmers and their replacement with inexperienced farmhands could be regarded as being beneficial to Central Asia’s agriculture, or, indeed, how such measures could be motivated by any agrarian considerations at all. Beyond the complete absence of a plan, the only probable motivation was the imminent and inexorable collectivisation programme, to which the years after 1925, and the peasants of Central Asia, were to be sacrificed. Clearly there is much light still to be shed on many aspects of the impact of Bolshevism on Central Asia. Perhaps it is fitting, and ironic, that this so-called ‘agrarian’ revolution should be judged on its ability to provide bread. The last word should go to the Basmachi leader Ibrahim Bek, one of the very few contemporary, and notably pithy, native voices on record: The new government confiscated the land from the rightful owners; obliged many dehqans148 to plant cotton and forbade them to plant corn with the result that in many districts there was no bread to be had, even for as much as three roubles a pound.149

Notes 1 See, for example, Y. M. Ivanov, The October Revolution and the East (Moscow: Nauka, 1987), p. 109. 2 R. Aminova, Changes in Uzbekistan’s Agriculture (Moscow: Nauka, 1974), p. 11. 3 This does not mean to imply that collectivisation proceeded with any speed even in Russia itself until some time after the New Economic Policy. 4 L. Kochan, The Making of Modern Russia (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1963), p. 268. 5 One desyatina equals 2.86 acres (Col. L.P. Kostenko, The Turkistan Region [St Petersburg 1880; translation by Q. M. General’s Office, India. Simla: Government Central Branch, 1882–4], p. 1); 1.092 hectares (A. Z. V. Togan, Bugunku Turkili (Turkistan) ve yakin Tarihi, Vol. 1 [Istanbul, 1942], p. 276); and 1.1 hectares (Ivanov, op. cit., p. 12). 6 2,015,119 desyatina equals approximately 5,763,240 acres. Park provides figures for the cultivated area of Turkestan in 1917 and 1919 as 8,878,494 and 3,186,186 acres, respectively. He provides figures for the area of irrigated land in Turkestan in 1915 and 1922 as 6,523,400 and 3,212,300 acres. He also cites 1910 figures from Vestnik Irrigatsi, V, no. 10 (1927), giving 12,846,600 acres of irrigated land in Central Asia, of which 7,581,600 were in Turkestan, and 4,326,000 in Bukhara. A. Park, Bolshevism in Turkestan 1917–1927 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1957), pp. 298–9. 7 Kostenko, op. cit., p. 6. 8 Also milk. Both versions are found in contemporary sources. 9 Arminius Vambery, Sketches of Central Asia (London: John Murray, 1868), p. 237. 10 Schuyler’s five categories are mulk; miriie, ‘public domains’; mevqufe, ‘lands in mortmain’; metruke, ‘abandoned’ land; mevat, ‘dead/waste lands’. E. Schuyler,Turkistan: Notes of a Journey in Russian Turkistan, Khokand, Bukhara and Kulja (London, 1868). 11 Ibid., p. 298. 12 Ibid., p. 299. 13 From kharaj lands a land tax in the form of either kharaj mavazi, ‘fixed and constant’, or kharaj menasim, ‘dependent on the harvest and proportionate thereto’, would be levied. Kostenko, op. cit., p. 7.

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14 They do not explain to whom this was paid. 15 The full categorisation is mulk, mulk-i kharaj, dash yak and waqf; F.H. Skrine and E.D. Ross, The Heart of Asia (London: Methuen, 1899), p. 380. 16 R. Pierce, Russian Central Asia 1867–1917 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press/Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), p. 142. 17 Hélène Carrère d’Encausse, Islam and the Russian Empire (London: Tauris, 1988), pp. 11–12. 18 Also milk. 19 Schuyler, op. cit., p. 300. 20 Ibid., p. 298. 21 Kostenko, op. cit., p. 7. 22 Pierce, op. cit., p. 143. 23 Carrère d’Encausse, Islam and the Russian Empire, op. cit., pp. 9–10. 24 J. A. MacGahan, Campaigning on the Oxus and the Fall of Khiva (London: Sampson Low, Marston, Low and Searle, 1874), p. 282. 25 Schuyler, op. cit., p. 300; Pierce, op. cit., p. 143. 26 Togan, op. cit., p. 382. 27 S. Poliakov, ‘Modern Soviet Central Asian Countryside’, in Vitaly V. Naumkin (ed.), State, Religion and Society in Central Asia (Reading: Ithaca Press,1993), p. 132. 28 Count K. K. Pahlen, Mission to Turkistan: being the memoirs of Count K. K. Pahlen (London: Oxford University Press, 1964), p. 190. 29 Kostenko, op. cit., p. 7. 30 Ibid., p. 10. 31 Schuyler, op. cit., p. 298. 32 Ibid., p. 301. 33 Kostenko, op. cit., p. 7. 34 Skrine and Ross, op. cit., p. 380. 35 Pierce, op. cit., pp. 143–4. 36 Kostenko, op. cit., p. 2; Togan, talking of the move to free Central Asia’s irrigated lands from wheat cultivation, calls the rain lands, to which it is hoped that wheat cultivation will henceforth be restricted, bahari. Togan, op. cit., p. 385. 37 Kostenko,op. cit., p. 11. 38 Pierce, op. cit., p. 152. 39 Geoffrey Wheeler, The Modern History of Soviet Central Asia (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964), p. 73. 40 Pierce, op. cit., p. 150. 41 Ibid., p. 147. 42 Pierce believes that this ‘was one of the most progressive steps taken by the colonial regime’, and, seeing in it parallels with similar measures taken by Russia in Poland, believes that the Polish measures were the telling influence on Governor Kaufman. Pierce, op. cit., p. 148. 43 Rywkin merely calls it ‘von Kaufman’s land reform’. Michael Rywkin, Russian Colonial Expansion to 1917 (London: Mansell, 1988), p. 243. 44 S. Becker, Russia’s Protectorates in Central Asia: Bokhara and Khiva 1865–1924 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1964), p. 24. 45 Ivanov, op. cit., p. 13. 46 Rywkin, op. cit., p. 245. 47 Ibid., p. 246. 48 Togan, op. cit., p. 381. 49 A nomad dwelling, and, by extension, a family unit. 50 See note 5 above. 51 Kostenko, op. cit., p. 6. 52 Ibid., p. 7.

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53 I am sure Kostenko meant ‘settled’ as in sedentary, rather than in the sense of recently taken over by ‘settlers’. 54 To clarify: Kostenko’s figures purport to show relative population densities of the pasture lands and cultivated areas, and do not – at least in the case of the nomads – imply that each nomadic household ‘owned’ a certain amount of land. It has to be said, however, that such figures were subsequently used as the basis for calculations as to how much land a nomadic family unit ‘needed’. Kostenko, op. cit., p. 6. 55 Rywkin, op. cit., p. 247. 56 Kochan, op. cit., p. 232; J. D. Clarkson, A History of Russia from the Ninth Century (London: Longman, 1962), p. 461. 57 L. Volin, ‘The Russian Peasant’, in C. E. Black (ed.), The Transformation of Russian Society (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960), p. 302. 58 Kochan, op. cit., p. 232. 59 Ibid. 60 Pahlen, op. cit., p. 220. 61 Olaf Caroe, Soviet Empire (London: Macmillan, 1967), p. 84. 62 Rywkin, op. cit., p. 246. 63 Becker, op. cit., p. 193. 64 1 pud= 16.380 kg. Togan, op. cit., p. 276. 65 It is not clear whether or not Togan includes the khanates in this definition of Turkistan. 66 And in 1912 14 million pud. Togan, op. cit., p. 278. 67 Ibid., p. 279. 68 Becker, op. cit.,p. 193. 69 Caroe, op. cit., p. 86. 70 Rywkin, op. cit., p. 240; Caroe, op. cit., p. 86. 71 Pierce, op. cit., p. 165; Togan’s figures for ‘South Turkestan’ are: 1884 – 300 desyatina; 1886 – 12,000; 1890 – 59,000. Togan, op. cit., p. 280. 72 Unfortunately, he does not qualify what he means here. Becker, op. cit., p. 181. 73 Ibid. 74 Ibid. and Rywkin, op. cit., p. 241. 75 Pierce, op. cit., p. 167. 76 Ibid. and Rywkin, op. cit., p. 241. 77 Becker, op. cit., p. 183. 78 Togan, op. cit., p. 282. 79 Pierce, op. cit., p. 170. 80 Togan, op. cit., p. 282. 81 Ibid., p. 280. 82 Ivanov gives a conversion rate of 1 desyatina= 1.1 hectares. Ivanov, op. cit., p. 12. 83 Ibid. 84 C. A. Werner, ‘A Preliminary Assessment of Attitudes Toward the Privatisation of Agriculture in Contemporary Kazakhstan’, in Central Asia Survey, Vol. 13 (7), 1994, p. 297. 85 Volin, op. cit., p. 299. 86 Park, op. cit., p. 294. 87 Volin, op. cit., p. 305. 88 Aminova, op. cit., p. 19. 89 Park, op. cit., p. 297. 90 Togan’s categories are: (1) the rich peasant, who has more than 10 desyatina, 4–6 oxen, 3–4 horses, 6–8 cattle and 3–4 workers sowing 100 pud of wheat and 100 of cotton; (2) the middle peasant, with 6 desyatina, 1–3 oxen, 2 horses, 20–30 pud of cotton, 60 of wheat, ‘and who would work in the town to make ends meet’; (3) the poor peasant, with 2.5 desyatina, 1–2 oxen, 20–30 pud wheat and 10 of cotton – as his own land

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could not support him, he would be forced to work as a sharecropper (cayrikarlik); and (4) ‘those who owned nothing’. Togan, op. cit., p. 283. 91 Ivanov, op. cit., p. 11. 92 Ibid. 93 Ibid. 94 Volin, op. cit., p. 303. 95 Aminova, op. cit., p. 8. 96 Park, op. cit., p. 295. 97 Togan, in 1928, writes that wheat will be (1) transported from Russia and (2) grown (in Central Asia) on bahari ziraat, ‘rain lands’. Togan, op. cit., p. 385. 98 Ibid., p. 383. 99 Ibid., p. 384. 100 Togan gives the Russian population of the five vilayets of the ‘Turkistan Governate General’ in 1923 as 787,133 – 10.3 per cent of the total population . In 1897 Russians were 3 per cent, and in 1917 ‘about 5 per cent’. Ibid. 101 M. Chokaev, ‘Turkestan and the Soviet Regime’, Journal of the Royal Central Asian Society, XVIII, 1931, p. 415. 102 Park, op. cit., p. 339. 103 Aminova, op. cit., p. 27. 104 Ibid., p. 10. 105 Ibid., p. 28. 106 Ibid. 107 Ivanov, op. cit., p. 98. 108 Aminova, op. cit., p. 29. 109 Ibid., p. 31. 110 See ibid., pp. 49, 54, 55, 59. 111 Ibid., p. 47. 112 Carrère d’Encausse details how Lenin, apparently angered at the delay in implementing the March legislation, considered ‘destroying’ the ‘Kulak colonists’, and demanded that ‘former Tsarist functionaries be sent to concentration camps’. The Great Challenge (New York: Holmes and Meier, 1992), p. 202. 113 Ibid. 114 E. Bacon, Central Asians Under Russian Rule (New York: Ithaca Press, 1966), p. 118. 115 Ivanov, op. cit., p. 108. 116 Park, op. cit., p. 310. 117 Carrère d’Encausse (1992), p. 202. 118 Togan, op. cit., p. 383. 119 Park, op. cit., p. 299. 120 I. M. Matley, ‘Agricultural Development’, in Allworth, Edward (ed.), Central Asia: 120 Years of Russian Rule (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964), p. 286. 121 Park, op. cit., pp. 53, 167, 214; Aminova, op. cit., pp. 37, 40. 122 Carrère d’Encausse, The Great Challenge, op. cit., p. 205. 123 Park, op. cit., pp. 305–6. 124 Togan, op. cit., p. 384. 125 Caroe, op. cit., p. 152. 126 Wheeler, op. cit., p. 134. 127 W. K. Medlin, F. Carpenter and W. M. Cave, Education and Development in Central Asia (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1971), p. 60. 128 Carrère d’Encausse, The Great Challenge, op. cit., p. 203. 129 Aminova, op. cit., p. 128. 130 Ibid., p. 111. 131 Joftgar is the Persian/Tajik form of the more commonly used Turkic Koshchi.

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132 Teresa Rakowska-Harmstone, Russia and Nationalism in Central Asia (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1970), p. 38. 133 Aminova, op. cit., p. 78. 134 Rakowska-Harmstone dates this as following the official declaration of the Tajik ASSR at the founding Anjoman of soviets of the Tajik ASSR, which opened 1 December 1926. Rakowska-Harmstone, op. cit., p. 31. 135 In particular Lenin’s land decree of 26 October 1917, and the ‘decision of the TsIK and Sovnarkom of TASSR on land tenure and land management in the Turkestan Republic’ of 17 November 1920. Aminova, op. cit., p. 65. 136 Park, op. cit., p. 338. 137 Aminova, op. cit., p. 79. 138 Aminova gives 4 tanap to 1 desyatina. Ibid., op. cit., p. 87. 139 Ibid. 140 Park, op. cit., pp. 344–5. 141 Carrère d’Encausse, The Great Challenge, op. cit., p. 207; Park, op. cit., p. 345. 142 Park, op. cit., p. 351. 143 Ivanov, op. cit., p. 112. 144 Aminova, op. cit., p. 87. 145 Park, op. cit., p. 351. 146 A. Khan and D. Gha’i, Collective Agriculture and Rural Development in Soviet Central Asia (New York: Macmillan, 1979), p. 39. 147 Ibid., p. 40. 148 Peasant/small farmer. 149 Proclamation of Ibrahim Beg 1931 (taken from Egon E. Kisch Changing Asia (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1933) reproduced in Rakowska-Harmstone, op. cit., p. 295.

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5 NATION BUILDING IN TURKEY AND UZBEKISTAN The use of language and history in the creation of national identity Andrew Segars Turkish state – Turkish nation? According to Bernard Lewis, ‘the national revival of the Turks in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has long been recognised as one of the most significant developments in the modern history of Islam’.1 While few would dispute the central argument, namely that the emergence of ‘national’ identity among the Turks (of Turkey) represented a profound transformation, Lewis’s preferred terminology might be misleading. Indeed, how can one speak of the national revival of the Turks when the vast majority had never before exhibited a significant awareness of, or an affinity to, their nationality?2 Turkish national identity had not been lost at some point in the past, only to be revived during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; it had, quite simply, never existed, at least not for the majority of the population. The virtual absence of national identity among the Turks was not a cause of concern at the height of the Ottoman era. During the period of its gradual disintegration, however, and the subsequent transition from empire to republic, the issue of identity became vitally important. In 1923, the question of identity – a subject of intellectual discourse amongst the Young Ottomans, and later the Young Turks – became a priority with the establishment of the Turkish Republic in 1923. Owing much to the attempts of earlier reformers, the pragmatic Mustafa Kemal believed that national identity was the basis for political unity in the modern world. As the new Turkish Republic was not built upon the ideological foundations of a nation, however, the Kemalists were obliged to develop a national identity by whatever means were available to them. The prospect was daunting. Bound as they were to their religion, their families, regions, and even to the Ottoman dynasty, the vast majority of Turks did not perceive themselves to be citizens of the new Turkish state, let alone as members of an imaginary Turkish nation. Consequently, Mustafa Kemal strove ‘to wean his people away from their old sense of identity … and to create for them a new alliance’.3 80

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The Uzbek parallel At almost the same time as the establishment of the Turkish Republic, Soviet Uzbekistan was experiencing a similar situation. The Soviets, not unlike the Kemalists, had inherited significant problems from the empire they had replaced. As in Turkey, one of the most pressing concerns for the Soviets in Uzbekistan, as throughout Central Asia, was the lack of unity among the population.4 While there were various manifestations of collective consciousness among the Uzbeks – stemming from religious, regional and dynastic affiliations – there was a lack of national identification. The absence of national consciousness, although certainly conducive to the Soviet (and earlier Tsarist) take-over of the region, subsequently became a cause of concern, first, for the reformminded Jaddidist (modernist) intellectuals, and later for the Bolsheviks, as they sought to incorporate Uzbekistan, and the other newly created republics, as ‘equal’ members into the Soviet Union. As it was for the Kemalists in Turkey, so was the root of the problem for the Soviets that the national-state demarcation of Soviet Central Asia in 1924 had created an Uzbek state, but not an Uzbek nation.5 In response, the Soviets implemented nation-building projects throughout Central Asia. These projects were designed to create the national consciousness understood as necessary to combat the perceived ‘economic and cultural backwardness of the region’ and to hasten the republics’ ‘consolidation as socialist nations’.6 In line with the principles of the so-called ‘nationalities policy’, implemented throughout the entire Soviet Union, the creation of an Uzbek nation became of primary importance during the early years of Soviet power. Uzbekistan, much like Turkey, was forced to experience a profound transformation.

Turkey and Uzbekistan: a realistic comparison? Not only did the two nation-building projects take place almost simultaneously, but also many of the problems faced – and the solutions proposed – were remarkably similar, even if the results were not. Both programmes were dependent on the use of two tools: history and language. While both are essential ingredients in the formation of any group consciousness, their use in the Turkish and Uzbek cases is interesting, as each had to be manipulated, reconstructed even, to meet the demands of the reformers who wielded them. There are several other similarities: primarily, the question of who was responsible for creating national identity in Turkey and Uzbekistan. In each case, the official state reformers drew heavily upon the work of earlier reformers. Not only did the ideas posited by the Young Ottomans and Young Turks play a significant role in the eventual development of the Kemalist ideal of national identity in Turkey, but many of the Young Turks themselves were incorporated into the growing ranks of Kemalists. In Uzbekistan, the Soviets successfully subsumed many of the Jaddidists to the cause of revolutionary socialism. 81

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The differences are also significant. Perhaps the most important was the fact that the Kemalists and the Soviets had very different goals regarding nation building. Where the Kemalists endeavoured to create a modern, independent nation based on Western models, the Soviets’ primary concern was to create socialist nations, which could then be assimilated into the Soviet Union. Beyond this, the state- and nation-building projects in Kemalist Turkey were inexorably linked, while in the Soviet case, nations were only important in so far as they helped to consolidate the Soviet state itself. One final difference was the prominent role of Russians and the Russian language in the development of Central Asia, for which there is no parallel in the Turkish case. Despite their shared origins, by the end of the 1930s, the type of national identity that had been created in Uzbekistan had a different nature to that in Turkey.7 The common ground is illuminating, however, and can be divided into four main issues: the general status of the Turks and the Uzbeks prior to the respective nation-building projects; the objectives of the Kemalists and the Soviets with regards to the issue of national identity; how national identity was created in each case, and by whom; and the varying successes of each project.

The search for Turkish national identity Pre-Kemalist identity among the Turks The ‘ethnic confusion of the Ottoman Empire’,8 coupled with the growth of European-style nationalism, both within the empire and on its periphery, created an atmosphere in which national identity became an increasingly important issue for the Turks during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. While various peoples throughout the Ottoman Empire had come to identify themselves along national lines, the Turks were comparatively slow to establish their own national identity. Even during the Young Turk period, the Turks showed little signs of modern national consciousness, as noted by Webster: When Vambéry, the noted Hungarian orientalist, visited Constantinople [in the early twentieth century], he found that the word ‘Turk’ conveyed to the educated Turks and the dignitaries of the Empire a meaning akin to barbarism and rudeness. He tried to interest those Turks in the question of their racial and cultural affinity with the Turks in Central Asia. They all felt insulted at this suggested relationship to a nomad people. They thought of themselves as Mohammedans and Ottomans, and used the term ‘Turk’ only in connection with lowclass people, particularly peasants.9 Poignant as this account may be on the question of identity among the Ottoman élite, it is not representative of the entire Ottoman population. The majority of the population outside the Ottoman capital, for instance, identified 82

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more closely with their families, clans and regions than they did with the Ottoman dynasty itself.10 While these differences represented an awkward schism between the cosmopolitan élite, with whom Vambéry was in contact in Istanbul, and the Turks of the countryside, one common link held them together – Islam. While Islam certainly did not provide an inviolable bond among all Ottoman Turks, it did – rather than any form of Turkish identity – provide the basis for unity among the Ottoman Turkish population. As Lewis notes: ‘among the different peoples who embraced Islam none went farther in sinking their separate identity in the Islamic community than the Turks’.11 The rise of Turkish identity Faced with the question of how best to preserve what was left of a faltering empire, the Ottoman leaders, both political and intellectual, devised a policy of Ottomanism that was intended to counteract the growing tide of disaffection within the empire by introducing the idea of equality among all Ottoman ‘citizens’. The appeal to dynastic identification, however, was unsuccessful, as nationalist sentiments had already gained significant strength in the Balkans, the Arab provinces and even among various populations within Anatolia, such as the Kurds and the Armenians.12 The Ottomanist ideal began to crumble under increasing pressure from irredentist demands. The élite was compelled to rethink its options. The leaders, like the Ottoman state itself, wavered ‘between the three trends of Islamism, Turkism and Westernism’.13 Although none of the three trends ever won completely, it was Turkism that eventually became dominant. Foremost among those who championed the Turkist cause was Ziya Gökalp, ‘the spiritual father of Turkish nationalism’.14 Originally a confirmed Ottomanist, Gökalp became convinced that the three trends could be compatible, even complementary. The recurrent theme in his writings was the question of how the Turks should adopt Western civilisation, and how this should be harmonised with their Turkish and Islamic traditions.15 The conclusion Gökalp reached was that the modern nation would provide the necessary framework within which the three trends could be reconciled. Thus, he endeavored to create the basis upon which the Turkish nation could be built – a distinct Turkish national identity. According to Gökalp’s concept of nationality, every individual belongs to a particular nation by virtue of his feelings. This nation is the society in which the individual lives or has obtained his education, for the individual has absorbed through education all the sentiments of the society in which he lives and he is a reflection of that society.16 With this liberal concept of nationality (one that put no emphasis on race), Gökalp raised the concept of Turkishness to new levels. While the idea of 83

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Turkish nationality was certainly not new, especially among a growing number of intellectuals, it was Gökalp who awakened the Turks of Anatolia to their own linguistic, cultural and historical heritage.17 More significant was his influence on the intellectual development of Turkism. Subsequent nationalists, most notably Mustafa Kemal, were to draw heavily upon Gökalp’s ideas, which eventually formed the very basis of Kemalist ideology.18 Kemalism Gökalp, the social philosopher, was an architectural artist; Atatürk, the man of action, [was] the architectural engineer and builder of the New Turkey. (Donald Webster, The Turkey of Atatürk)19

The Turkish Republic was built from the rubble of the Ottoman Empire. Mustafa Kemal and his followers set out to reform and modernise a society that had been mired in the past, stifled by the conservative Ottoman élite, exploited by foreign interests and, most recently, reduced by war. The resulting reform programme, known as Kemalism (or Atatürkism), profoundly altered the course of Turkish history. Although it is ‘very difficult to accept any unequivocal definition of what Kemalism is’,20 any definition must begin with the six principles – or ‘arrows’, as they later became known – of republicanism, secularism, populism, étatism, revolutionism/reformism and nationalism. Although each of the six Kemalist tenets played a significant role in the Büyük Türk Devrimi (Great Turkish Reformation), it was nationalism that became the ideological basis for the new Turkish state, and the fuel that fired the entire reform programme.21 Turkish political nationalism Tachau argues that ‘one of the striking features of the very early days of the Kemalist regime [was] the lack of any clear definition of Turkish nationality’.22 In fact, it was not until the 1930s that an official definition of Turkish national identity emerged and the government began to pursue a nation-building policy with a clear scope and direction. The Kemalist definition of the nation as ‘a social and political formation comprising citizens linked together by the community of language, culture and ideal’23 was a departure from earlier conceptions. Similar in manner to Gökalp’s thinking, and even to some extent reminiscent of earlier Ottomanist and Islamist ideals regarding unity, the Kemalist definition did not depend exclusively on race and religion. In effect, therefore, anyone who had been educated as a Turk, and was committed to the Turkish ideal espoused by Mustafa Kemal and his supporters, was considered to be Turkish, regardless of race or religion.24 According to Tachau, the reason such a liberal definition 84

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was necessary derived from the fact that ‘what was needed was a criterion for national identification that would appeal to the emotions of the Turkish majority while neither over-emphasizing the cultural kinship with the Turks of Central Asia and elsewhere nor alienating the non-Turkish groups within the new body politic’.25 This assertion also accentuates another important factor in which the Kemalist idea of Turkish nationality differed from previous definitions: the new Turkish state, and nation, was geographically fixed. Kemal accepted the territorial limitations imposed by the Ottoman defeat in the First World War and sought to forestall any notion of wider aspirations. Aspirations within the Turkish borders, however, were far from limited. Kemal desired no less than the complete assimilation of the population within the republic. By emphasising culture and language over race, and religion as the basis for the Turkish nation, he believed it would be possible to assimilate the various ethnic and religious minorities through a process of Turkification.26 This strategy had two strands: first, the Kemalists sought to ‘Turkify’ the population through an extensive programme of indoctrination; second, they mobilised the very heart of the nation – its history and language – in order to provide a ‘pure’ basis for the new republic. Language as a tool of nation building in Turkey Pre-Kemalist history of the Turkish language Poor Turkish language! Smothered under a mass of foreign words, its powers of terse and vivid expression and its wonderfully copious methods of word-formation have been deliberately stunted and neglected and nothing developed except its capacities for being long-winded and obscure. (Attributed to Sir Charles Eliot)27

As they had been influenced by Arab-Persian culture ever since their acceptance of Islam, ‘the Ottomans … inherited a hybrid language consisting of Turkish with a high proportion of Persian and Arabic borrowings’.28 Over the next six centuries, the Ottoman Turkish amalgamation became increasingly removed from the language of the masses, causing great difficulties, even for welleducated Turks, as it was often difficult to function in the official language without a cursory knowledge of Arabic and Persian at least. In effect, the Ottoman Turkish language had become increasingly incomprehensible to the average Turk, and the situation was confused further by the widespread use of both Arabic and Persian.29 During the Tanzimat era (1839–76), attention was increasingly given to the adaptability of the Ottoman language to modern needs.30 Ziya Pasha was one of the figures behind the drafting of the 1876 constitution, and is representative of the early proponents of reform. In an article entitled ‘Poetry and Prose’, first 85

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published in 1868, he deplores the aloofness of Ottoman literature and is concerned particularly with the inability of the people to understand the official bureaucratic language.31 Ottoman Turkish language needed to be simplified, according to the reformers, so that it might approximate the language spoken by the majority of the population. As the century came to a close, the debate over language became even more intense. Having allowed Arabic and Persian to dominate various aspects of both written and spoken Turkish, the only recourse, according to a growing group of reformers, was to purify, or ‘Turkify’, the language of the Ottomans; simplification was not enough. Foremost among the proponents of this approach was the noted scholar and writer Cemseddin Sami.32 Sami was one of the first to address many of the issues that would later become central to Kemalist linguistic principles, such as the affinity of all Turkic languages, and the need to replace Arabic and Persian loanwords with ‘old Turkic’ synonyms. Although issues such as vocabulary and orthography received some attention from early proponents of reform, perhaps the most pressing problem was the intrusion of Arabic and Persian grammatical structures. Although some steps toward simplification were taken, ‘the written language remained remote from the speech of the people, and largely unintelligible to the man on the street’.33 It was not until the pragmatic reforms of the Kemalists that substantive changes took place. Kemalist language reform Kemal was well aware of the centrality of language in the nation-building process. His aim was to create a truly national language to ease the birth of the young nation, and on which all subsequent Turkish generations could depend. His vision was ambitious: ‘We shall conquer Ottoman. The Turkish language will be free and independent, like the Turkish nation, and with it we shall enter the civilized world, at once and totally.’34 By the time of the establishment of the Turkish Republic in 1923, however, the Ottoman Turkish language resembled little of the spoken language of the masses. Although the Kemalists advanced the work of earlier reformers, it was Kemal himself who would accept no less than the full purification of the language of the Turks. As with so much of what he attempted, Mustafa Kemal was not content with half-hearted reform; for him, the language would have to be purged of all its foreign elements. The subsequent Turkification process went further than even the most radical reformers of the Ottoman era would have dreamed possible, both in transforming the Turkish language and in uniting the Turkish people. The first task was the development of a new alphabet: the Arabic script was considered to be ‘inadequate as a medium of modern education and as a vehicle of modern knowledge and ideas’.35 A language commission had been created under the auspices of the Ministry of Education and, barely six months later, on 86

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1 January 1929, the Arabic script was formally abandoned and replaced by the new Latinised ‘Turkish’ alphabet. Regardless of whether or not ‘the new Turkish alphabet … is immeasurably superior to any other form of writing that has been applied to Turkish’,36 as some have argued, the script change served other important purposes. As Erik Zürcher has noted: While there were good rational arguments for the change, the reason it was pushed through so energetically by Mustafa Kemal and his followers was undoubtedly ideological: it was yet another way to cut off Turkish society from its Ottoman and Middle Eastern Islamic traditions and to re-orientate it towards the West.37 The newly created Türk Dil Kurumu (Turkish Linguistic Society) was given responsibility for all aspects of language reform, ranging from linguistics, etymology and grammar to vocabulary and lexicography. Particularly influential to the wider nation-building campaign was the drive to Turkify the vocabulary, in which the entire nation was urged to take part by finding Turkish synonyms to replace Arabic and Persian loanwords.38 Öz türkçe, pure Turkish, was the ideal. When acceptable Turkic equivalents could not be found, entirely new words were created using patterns of analogy. A synthetic language soon developed as a result of this process, inundated with neologisms, and unintelligible to all but Kemal and a small number of associates.39 However, an ambitious drive to increase literacy among the Turkish population followed, with Mustafa Kemal himself often taking the lead in touring the countryside to introduce the ‘new’ Turkish language to the people. The Sun-Language Theory In 1935, finding it impossible to purge the Turkish language completely of all its foreign elements, Mustafa Kemal propagated the Güneș-Dil Teorisi, the SunLanguage Theory, by means of the Turkish Linguistic Society. The theory was the product of an unpublished paper, ‘La Psychologie de quelques éléments des langues torques’, by a little-known Viennese linguist, Dr Hermann F. Kvergi. In the paper, sent to Mustafa Kemal some time in early 1935, Kvergi argued that man first realised his own identity when he was able to assign significance to surrounding objects. Language originally consisted of gestures, to which some significant sounds were then added.40 While attempts had been made to link these first ‘utterings’ to Semitic and Indo-European languages, no relationship had been established. According to Kvergi, the necessary links could be found in the Turkish language.41 Expanding on Kvergi’s ideas, Kemal himself proposed the Güneș-Dil Teorisi,42 which held that the birth of language resulted when ancient man first looked up at the sun, and uttered the sound ‘Ah’, followed by related sounds corresponding to fire, heat, and so on. The Sun-Language Theory contended that the missing 87

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links could be found in the primitive Turkish language, thus making modern Turkish ‘the closest equivalent to the first language spoken by man’.43 The conclusion, therefore, was that all man’s languages had evolved from Turkish. Not only did this theory fit neatly within the Turkish History Thesis (see below), helping to elevate the pride with which Turks could view their language, but the exaggerated efforts to purify the Turkish language could now be forgotten as all languages were claimed to be descendants of Turkish. History as a tool of nation building in Turkey Ottoman historiography Up until the mid-nineteenth century, Ottoman historians were concerned with one of two themes: Islamic civilisation and Ottoman dynastic history.44 Specifically Turkish history was virtually ignored. Just as occurred with problems regarding language, it was not until the Tanzimat era that meaningful changes were brought about. Even after ‘the liberal and westernizing reforms of the nineteenth century brought important changes in the writing of history’,45 Ottoman historians did not normally discuss the history of the Turks outside the context of Islam or the Ottoman dynasty. With the scholarship of Ali Suvai, a Young Ottoman, the trend was to change, and, in 1887, Ahmed Midhat made a definitive argument for the Turkish origin of the Ottomans.46 The turn of the century heralded the apex of modern Ottoman historiography when scholars and writers focused on the various phases of Turkish history, in contrast to their predecessors. This vogue was to continue during the Young Turk era, and also under the Kemalists. The new breed of Turkish historians argued that the cause of ignorance and misinterpretation of Turkish history was twofold: first, European scholarship was to blame for its own bias;47 second, the Turks themselves had not shown enough concern for the factual circumstances of their own history as it was distinct from Islamic and Ottoman history.48 Under the influence of Ziya Gökalp, Faud Koprülü and others, Turkish historiography sought to tackle these twin issues directly. History was employed for the first time as an instrument for the separation of Turkish identity from Ottoman consciousness.49 Kemalist historiography As was the case with language reform, historiography was fundamental to the Kemalists’ intentions for the Turkish nation. ‘Mustafa Kemal Atatürk … was very interested in history and he realized that pride in one’s country could be used as a positive and constructive force to inspire enthusiasm for the successful accomplishment of his program of reforms.’50 Since Turkish history, not unlike language, had been distorted by foreign influences, the Turkification process, 88

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which sought to purge the Turkish language of its non-Turkish elements, was complemented by an attempt to purge Turkish history of its traditional bias.51 The arduous task of history reform was given to the Türk Tarih Kurumu (Turkish Historical Society). The immediate goal of the Kemalist historians was to foster pride in being Turkish by attempting to ‘right the wrongs’ of previous generations. The fact that ‘traditional Ottoman histories dealt only briefly with the history of the Ottomans prior to the establishment of the dynasty in Anatolia, and generally ignored the history of the Turks before their adoption of Islam’,52 presented a significant problem for Kemalist historians. In effect, the Turkish nation ‘had to undergo the strains of a radical transformation in its historical consciousness. The nation’s historical existence had to be reviewed and its future course had to be set in terms of the requirements of the modern world.’53 At the behest of Kemal, the historians of the Türk Tarih Kurumu were charged with writing Turkish history that showed that the Turks were an ancient people, who had contributed significantly to the evolution of world civilisation. The Tarih and the Turkish History Thesis One of the first objectives of the Türk Tarih Kurumu was to prepare a comprehensive historical account of the Turkish people. In 1931, the society, then known as the Türk Tarihi Tetkik Heyeti (Research Board of Turkish History), published a paper entitled ‘Türk Tarihinin Ana Hatlari’, which set forth the basic outline of Turkish history.54 From 1932, the Turkish Historical Society held annual congresses, with the express intent of providing material to support the presentation of the Turkish History Thesis. In the words of Bernard Lewis: The theory propounded by Atatürk and his disciples was, briefly, that the Turks were a white, Aryan people, originating in Central Asia, the cradle of all human civilization. Owing to the progressive desiccation of this area, the Turks had migrated in waves to various parts of Asia and Africa, carrying the arts of civilization with them. Chinese, Indian, and Middle Eastern civilizations had all been founded in this way, the pioneers in the last-named being the Sumerians and Hittites, who were both Turkish peoples. Anatolia had thus been a Turkish land since antiquity.55 Predictably, the theory provoked controversy. According to Niyazi Berkes, ‘the Kemalist thesis concerning the history of the Turks, distorted at home and misunderstood abroad, contained a number of historical observations that were reactions against the earlier Islamist, Ottoman, and Western views of Turkish history’.56 Whether or not the Kemalists sought to provide an historically sound account of the Turkish people is questionable, but the thesis did serve a number of purposes, principally the development of national pride. The Turkish History Thesis also sought to provide a clear distinction between the Turks of Anatolia 89

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and Turks elsewhere, in an attempt to forestall the growth of pan-Turkic sentiment. Kemal desired to unite only the ‘Turks’ within the new republic’s border, not the various Turkic peoples. The core text of Kemalist historiography was the Tarih, which sought to provide a view of the past that corresponded to the nationalist view of the present, and the future of the Turkish Republic.57 Presented in four volumes, and intended for consumption by secondary and university students, the Tarih became the official textbook of the Kemalist regime. The first volume, published in 1932, covered world history from the beginnings of recorded time to the Roman era; the second dealt with the era of the Huns up until the establishment of the Ottoman Empire; the third related the Kemalist view of Ottoman times; and the final volume covered the period following the First World War. The Turkish History Thesis, the Tarih and other related works illustrate the Kemalist desire to show that the Turks were not simply a peripheral segment of humanity who had only recently joined other races in the civilised world. They aimed to establish that the Turks had a rich and ancient tradition that had contributed significantly to the evolution of world civilisation. Indeed, the Turk was taught that he was no longer the ‘terrible Turk’. He was the purveyor of a great pre-Islamic civilization in Central Asia and, later, a great Islamic civilization in the Middle East which far surpassed the contemporary West in power and in the arts.58

The search for Uzbek national identity Pre-Russian identity among the Uzbeks It is imprecise to speak of an ‘Uzbek’ nation prior to Soviet rule: ‘Uzbekistan’ had never existed before contact with Russia, and neither had a purely Uzbek identity.59 National consciousness might have been evident among some Central Asian peoples, but identity in pre-Russian ‘Uzbekistan’ was much more diverse, and therefore more complex.60 Identity was constructed through an amalgamation of more traditional elements: membership of the Islamic community (‘umma), dynastic loyalty to one of the local khanates (Bukhara, Khiva or Kokand, for example), geographic affinity (to a city for the sedentary population, or to a region for the nomadic population) and a sense of kinship. As in Ottoman Turkey, the traditional concept of nationality was largely absent in Uzbekistan prior to extended contact with the Western world.61 Even ethno-linguistic distinctions, so important to the birth of the nation in the West, mattered remarkably little in Uzbekistan. According to Bennigsen and Quelquejay, ‘traditional and conservative Islam still ruled there and acted as a leveler of ethnic and linguistic differences’.62 While the religious community certainly played a role, there seem to have been other factors at work, and ‘there 90

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was a high degree of physical and cultural assimilation’63 throughout most of Uzbekistan. These levels of assimilation, and the corresponding tolerance, were such that identity among the Uzbeks had become a fluid concept. In fact, across much of Uzbekistan a well-mixed, bilingual Turkish-Iranian culture had evolved, making traditional distinctions – even between Turks and Iranians – of little use. The tenuous distinction between ‘Uzbek’ and ‘Tajik’ illustrates the problematic nature of identity throughout Central Asia. While there had been animosity between some segments of the two populations ever since the arrival of the ‘Uzbek’ tribes in the early sixteenth century, the majority had co-existed for centuries. Some Uzbek and Tajik groups retained their distinct ethnicity and culture, but many embraced a more Eastern concept of identity, adopting a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multilingual way of life.64 An example of this synthesis of peoples and loyalties was the gradual creation of a distinct group known as the ‘Sarts’. Through extensive intermarriage, cultural assimilation and linguistic adaptation, the Sarts’ ethnicity had become less and less important as a form of identification. The Sart population, although highly Turkicised by the nineteenth century, had lost much of its ethnic distinctiveness, relying instead on affinity to a certain city or dynasty as the major tool for identity construction. When asked to identify himself, a native of Bukhara would more commonly reply that he was a Bukharan, rather than asserting that he was an Uzbek or a Tajik. On the other hand, if a non-Muslim asked the same native of Bukhara to identity himself, the Bukharan would be likely to reply that he was a Muslim, again drawing no ethnic or national distinction. Early Uzbeks displayed feelings of group consciousness in a variety of forms, but never, it would seem, on a national level. As with the Turks, identity building on the basis of nationality was not an option for a people who had no real concept of themselves as members of some imaginary grouping known as a ‘nation’. It was not until prolonged contact was made with the Russians – a people who had a well-developed sense of nation – that the issue of national identity slowly gained importance in Central Asia, and then only among a small group of Jaddidist reformers. The Tsarists and the rise of Uzbek identity The Russian migration into Uzbek lands during the nineteenth century heralded a new era for the area. Aside from the fact that the Russians brought with them ‘a world of ideas and technological advances from which the Central Asians had previously been excluded’,65 the issue of identity took on a fresh significance. As had been the case in the Ottoman Empire, Central Asian reformers found themselves ill prepared to embrace the modern concept of national identity. Those at the forefront of the early reform movement were the Jaddidists, modernists who had much in common with Ottoman reformers. While others had laid the foundation for reform, the Crimean Tatar, Ismail Bey Gasprinskii, was the leading advocate of a ‘new order’ for the Muslim population until his 91

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death in 1914. An entire generation of reformers throughout the Caucasus, Central Asia and, to some extent, the Ottoman Empire looked to the ideas of Gasprinskii, who promoted a ‘modern’ alternative to a blind, anachronistic return to the Islamic past. He articulated five main goals for Jaddidism: to redefine Muslim history; to refocus cultural Islam; to restructure education; to empower women; and to strengthen the economic structure.66 Gaprinskii argued that ethnic and linguistic affinity should complement more traditional feelings of Islamic community. In Central Asia, the Jaddidists were the first to develop a ‘modern’ response to the social, cultural and linguistic issues introduced with the arrival of the Russians. Their strategy was embryonic, however, and, as with the Young Ottomans and Young Turks, they were largely reactive. The first real stirring of national feeling in Central Asia was a response to external pressures, rather than a spontaneous, internal awakening. In fact, the development of national identity in Uzbekistan would not have progressed as it did without the marked influence, and impetus, of the Russians. While the Russians generally referred to all Turkic-speaking Central Asians as ‘Turks’, the term used by the Central Asians to distinguish themselves from the Russian settlers is particularly noteworthy. The Uzbeks, as most other Central Asians, referred to themselves, their language, their culture – in short, anything that was not foreign – as Muslim, not Uzbek, or Tajik, or Turkish, or Iranian.67 As a result of contact with Russians, communal Islamic identity became more pronounced and feelings of local identification and larger pan-Turkic sentiments were intensified, especially among the Jaddidist reformers.68 As the Uzbeks sought to distinguish themselves from the Russian population, the growth of local identification came to overshadow pan-Turkic ideas. Support for a wider pan-Islamic identity was conspicuously absent too, as the strong Islamic consciousness apparent among the Uzbeks was largely local in character.69 The Tsarists had succeeded in facilitating, perhaps even necessitating, the evolution of an Uzbek identity, and the Soviets would accelerate that process. The Soviets and the rise of Uzbek national identity Even before the official establishment of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) in July 1918, the Soviet leadership was keenly aware that it would encounter a variety of problems in Central Asia. In an attempt to solidify their control, the Soviets felt it necessary to introduce a new organisational structure. The first administrative units created by the Soviets, the Turkestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (1918), the Kazakh Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (1920), the Bukhara People’s Soviet Republic (1920) and the Khorezm People’s Soviet Republic (1920), were largely continuations of Tsarist administrative groupings.70 Despite sporadic resistance from the Basmachi, a term used collectively to describe various resistance efforts, Central Asia was under Soviet control by 92

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1924, when the last enclave against communist rule, the protectorate of Khiva, was incorporated into the Soviet Union. Once their grip on Central Asia was firm, the Soviets embarked upon an aggressive set of development policies that would alter radically the evolution of Central Asia and its people. Just as in Kemalist Turkey, the issue of identity became of primary importance to the Soviets during the first decades of power. Not only did they believe that the creation of national identity would aid in the modernisation of the area, but they also hoped that the delimitation of Central Asia along national lines would serve to make the area easier to administer. Even more so than in Turkey, however, the Central Asians lacked a strong base upon which to build national identity, making the Soviets’ task both more difficult and more artificial. The nationalities policy71 Perhaps the most apparent manifestation of the Soviet nationalities policy was the national-state demarcation of 1924, which eventually gave rise to five Soviet Socialist Republics (SSRs). The Turkmen and Uzbek SSRs were created in 1924, Tajikistan was given SSR status in 1929, and the Kirgiz and Kazakh SSRs were created in 1936. While many have argued that the division of Central Asia was nothing more than a ‘divide-and-rule’ tactic, others have noted that, ‘whatever the political motivation for the delimitation, the scholarly preparation was thorough’.72 Indeed, in many cases it was not the central authorities, but the Central Asians themselves, many of whom were former Jaddidist reformers, who argued for or against particular administrative units. While the division of Central Asia was unnatural and arbitrary, the ‘territorial divisions... did bear a rough correspondence to the traditional ethnic, linguistic, and anthropological contours of [the] sprawling region’.73 Regardless of the reasons for the national demarcation, the policy was successful in creating clearly defined borders between the various Central Asian peoples and in providing for a more workable administration. As the Kemalists had done in Turkey, the Soviets created ‘states’ without corresponding nations. In contrast, attempts to forge national identity proved more problematic. Nonetheless, the desire to build nations was foremost in the minds of the early Soviet leadership, as it was held that the Soviets were ‘responding to the people’s movement for the creation of national republics’.74 Unlike the Kemalists, however, the Soviets’ goal was to create states that were national in theory, but socialist in practice. According to Stalin, who had been placed in charge of the nationalities question well before Lenin’s death, there were four requirements for the existence of a modern nation: territorial unity, economic unity, cultural (spiritual) unity and linguistic unity.75 While national delimitation had served to provide some semblance of territorial unity, cultural and linguistic unity proved to be more difficult to achieve. (The issue of economic unity is beyond the scope of this study.) To aid the process of integration, the Soviets attempted to build national 93

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identity. It is significant that, as there was no need for such integration in Turkey, the situation faced by Mustafa Kemal was much less demanding. Like the Kemalists, however, the Soviets argued that linguistic unity could be achieved through a determined policy of language planning, while history writing was a necessary means to help foster cultural unity. Language as a tool of nation building in Uzbekistan Pre-Soviet history of the Central Asian Turkic languages Prior to Russian colonisation, the spread and use of languages in Central Asia had been marked by two trends – acceptance and assimilation. Both the nomadic peoples of the Steppe and the more sedentary populations of the various khanates had come into contact with a variety of cultures, languages and religions, all of which had influenced the evolution of their spoken and written languages. The most acute transformation in Central Asian Turkic language and literature came with the introduction of Islam in the seventh century, and the resultant incorporation of Central Asia into the Arab-Persian sphere of influence. Not unlike the hybrid language which evolved in Ottoman Turkey, language in Central Asia was profoundly influenced by both the Arabic and Persian traditions. As with Ottoman Turkish, the most visible change was the adoption of the Arabic script as the standard alphabet. Arabic grammatical structures, literary forms and vocabulary prevailed; the Arabic and Persian languages themselves became of primary importance.76 Although not the only Turkic literary language in Central Asia, Chagatay Turkish was certainly the most widespread up to the time of the Russian era. Having evolved from the Uygur dialect, Chagatay was the dominant literary language in Central Asia from the eleventh to the nineteenth century. As was the case with Ottoman Turkish, however, Chagatay was far removed from the numerous local dialects spoken by the bulk of the indigenous population.77 Bearing remarkable similarity to the gradual ‘distortion’ of Ottoman Turkish, Chagatay had lost many of its ‘pure’ Turkic qualities, such as vowel harmony, as a result of the assimilation of Arabic and Persian grammar, vocabulary and literary styles. By the mid-nineteenth century, however, Chagatay’s dominance was slowly being eroded by a number of other literary languages that had emerged from local Turkic dialects. A new phase in the evolution of Central Asian languages began with the arrival of Russian immigrants during the nineteenth century. One of the most important consequences of the Russian expansion into Central Asia was the introduction of language as a criterion of shared consciousness. For the Uzbeks in pre-Russian times, language was not imbued with any particular significance, but was merely a method of practical communication. Prior to this, bilingualism, or even multilingualism, had been the rule. Only gradually did language come to be understood as a marker of identity. 94

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Although some refer to Chagatay as ‘Old Uzbek’, this classification is misleading. Literary Uzbek, while certainly related to Chagatay, was clearly not a direct descendant. In fact, it was not until the late fifteenth century that the first distinctly Uzbek literary language emerged under the influence of Mir Alisher Navai.78 While some semblance of unity was achieved with the development of written Uzbek, spoken Uzbek remained divided, with widely diverging dialects spoken by the sedentary and nomadic populations.79 At the beginning of the twentieth century, there was nothing that could be described unequivocally as a standard Uzbek language. As occurred elsewhere in Central Asia, therefore, the language situation in ‘Uzbekistan’ at the time of the Russian Revolution was not conducive to the creation of national identity. The development of national languages, therefore, became vitally important for the Soviets. Soviet language planning in Uzbekistan80 The Soviets were well aware that language was a powerful symbol of unity and identity, and, after the creation of the Uzbek SSR, they pushed for the adoption of a single dialect which would determine the ‘national’ language of Uzbekistan. After lengthy debate, the Persianised urban dialect of Tashkent (although arguably not the best choice in linguistic terms) was chosen as the basis for the new Uzbek grammar and vocabulary, while the more purely Turkic dialect of Turkestan was chosen to provide a phonetic structure.81 As this form of Uzbek later proved to be too easily understood by other Turkic groups in the region (thereby creating the possibility of increased feelings of Turkic identity), a final switch to the phonetic system of Tashkent Uzbek was made in 1937. The question of alphabet reform, which had received considerable attention in the indigenous press during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, came to fruition at the First All-Uzbek Conference on Language and Orthography in 1921.82 After a short-lived attempt to modify the Arabic script to meet the needs of the various Turkic languages, the Soviets decided to force the adoption of the Latin alphabet. While there had been previous attempts to introduce it, the official decision was taken after the First All-Union Turcological Congress in 1926.83 Following this congress, the All-Union Central Committee for the New Turkic Alphabet was established to oversee the standardisation of the various Latinisation processes, and to develop orthography and terminology. In 1928, the same year that Mustafa Kemal adopted the Latin alphabet in Turkey, the Unified Turkic Latin Alphabet was introduced across Central Asia.84 The change from Arabic to Latin script was one of the most meticulous and comprehensive development policies the Soviets ever attempted with regards to language. But it was not to be final. In 1940, ‘the Supreme Soviet of the Uzbek SSR passed a resolution [“to comply with the request of the broad intelligentsia of the Uzbek SSR”] to transfer to the Cyrillic script’.85 While the switch 95

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certainly made the acquisition of Russian easier for the indigenous population, most scholars argue that the Cyrillic script was adopted more for political than linguistic reasons. The first decade of Soviet language planning concentrated on issues of dialect and alphabet. The second decade focused on other areas, such as simplification and codification, with the publication of dictionaries and grammar texts.86 As in Turkey, one of the most important goals for early Soviet language planners was to improve literacy. Mother-tongue education had become a primary concern across the entire Soviet Union, but in Uzbekistan (as in the rest of Central Asia), where literacy hovered well below 5 per cent prior to the communist take-over, a ‘cultural revolution’ was initiated. Beyond the development of universal elementary schooling, thousands of special literacy schools (shkoly likbeza), and ‘red corners’ in factories and workshops, were founded where adults might learn to read and write.87 Although plagued by a number of serious obstacles, such as a severe lack of resources, the literacy campaigns rapidly began to bear fruit. By 1939, it was claimed that literacy in Uzbekistan had risen to nearly 70 per cent.88 Another important linguistic development during early Soviet rule was the introduction of Russian as the official medium of communication in Central Asia. Although Lenin had stressed the absolute equality of all languages in a multinational state and came out against the maintenance of any single mandatory state language … [and] was quick to accuse of chauvinism those colleagues who argued that such a role should be guaranteed for Russian,89 his successors, with Stalin at the fore, were quick to reinforce the status of Russian across the Soviet Union. Central Asians had been exposed to the Russian language for some time, but it was only during the Soviet era that Russian language proficiency became a necessity for those who wanted to attain meaningful political, economic or professional status in the Soviet Union.90 Moreover, though the rural populations remained largely unaffected by the initial increase in Russian language usage, preferring their native tongue, the Soviet initiative to promote Russian did meet with considerable success overall. History as a tool of nation building in Uzbekistan We Turkistanians are completely uninformed about the situation of our deceased forefathers as well as the historicity of Turkistanian events. For, an ordered and beneficial, perfect work written with fresh research about the history of Turkistan has still not come into being. (Mahmud Khoja Behbudiy)91

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As with Ottoman historiography, pre-Soviet historiography in Central Asia was almost exclusively concerned with one of two themes: Islamic or dynastic history. Although little was ever written about the Central Asians from any different perspectives, a strong oral tradition among the nomads had preserved a less traditional form (in the Western sense) of group awareness.92 Among the sedentary populations, however, knowledge of history was limited, a fact which was a cause of concern for the likes of Mahmud Khoja Behbudiy and other leading Jaddidists, just as it was to Young Ottoman and Young Turk intellectuals. Coinciding with the emergence of Western-style national historiography during the late Ottoman era, ‘some educated Central Asians … began to look at history writing as a way of creating a historical awareness similar to that of more advanced nations’.93 These reformers, like their Ottoman counterparts, understood the importance of history to the creation and maintenance of group consciousness, but the issue of national histories would have to wait until the Soviet era to receive meaningful attention. The first generation of Soviets aspired to write ‘objective’ Western-style national histories, comprehensive in their study of all periods, from prehistory to the present. Aside from establishing cultural links with the past, the Soviet historians also sought to establish a strong historical link between the Uzbeks and their territory. As the Kemalists had tried to do in Turkey, the Soviets endeavoured to create national unity only within the Uzbek borders, and attempted to preclude any wider aspirations. The Soviets’ goal with regard to history writing, as with language planning, was to consolidate and differentiate. This programme was partly in response to, and partly in anticipation of, the development of panIslamism and pan-Turkism. The most important goal of the early Soviet historians was to develop national histories conducive to the consolidation of the populations within the newly created borders. If one important trend emerged during this early period of Soviet historiography, however, it was that accounts that related to Central Asia, and Uzbekistan specifically, were far from coherent and tended to be ambiguous. In fact, the problem for the Soviet historians was simple: as little evidence of a singularly Uzbek national tradition existed, they were forced to claim legendary historical figures of literature and science, such as Avicenna, Al-Farabi, Al-Khwarezmi, Ulugh Beg and Nayoi, as their own, and particular to a specific group. Uzbek Soviets might claim these men as theirs, but so would the Tajiks and Turkmen and other national groups in the region. The development of national histories by the Soviets presented the ‘modern’ Uzbeks with an unfamiliar, yet attractive, version of their own history, one that they would not readily give up. The emphasis was soon to change, however, and by the late 1930s a new trend had emerged: the shift in focus from national to international history writing. Desirous of creating internal solidarity within the Soviet Union as a whole, and not just within the various republics, tighter control from Moscow became evident. The result was that the portrayal of national histories would receive primary attention no longer. Central to the new orientation of Soviet historiography was the so-called ‘Friendship of the Peoples’ theory. 97

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Friendship of the Peoples The friendship of the peoples of the Soviet Union with the Russian people has deep historic roots and a remarkable history. (M. Mustafaev)94

The need to create a common historical link between the newly fashioned nationalities and the Russian people themselves was, perhaps, the most important reason for the shift in focus of Soviet historiography. In contrast to the first generation of Soviet historians, who had attempted both to rationalise the national delimitation and to foster feelings of national identity within the newly created republics, Soviet historians from the 1930s were charged with the task of fostering pride in the Soviet Union itself. Central to this aim was the ‘friendship’ theory, which aimed at building solidarity amongst the various Soviet peoples. According to Tuzmuhamedov, ‘the friendship of the peoples of the USSR, which developed as a result of their genuine national liberation attained thanks to the Leninist nationalities policy … [became] a great force’.95 One of the most overt manifestations of the ‘friendship’ theory in Central Asia was the favourable rewriting of the history of the Russian Empire, which omitted details of internal disquiet and conflict, and articulated the positive aspects of its imperial status. In Uzbekistan, as in the rest of Central Asia, the relationship between the Russian and indigenous peoples was fragile. The ‘friendship’ trend was based on the assertion that the communist revolution had succeeded in liberating the Uzbeks (and all other Central Asians) from Tsarist oppression. While Tsarism was still to blame for many of the hardships it had imposed on the Uzbek people, it was argued that the Tsarist Empire was preferable to either conquest by a ‘foreign’ power, or the preservation of corrupt local leadership. 96 The various local revolts under the Basmachi, which had begun to take place in the waning years of the Tsarist rule, and continued into early Soviet times, were also reinterpreted. Previously classified as progressive, on the grounds that they had fought against colonial oppression, the revolts came to be portrayed in a more neutral manner.97 This reinterpretation sought to emphasise that the various revolts were not aimed at the Russian people themselves, but exclusively at the Tsarist administration. It was maintained that the Russian people had contributed significantly to the evolution of the Uzbeks. Consistent with this assertion, Tuzmuhamedov declared boldly that, ‘rooted in the internationalist unity and community of aspirations of the progressive people of Russia and Central Asia, the history of this friendship goes back to the pre-revolutionary times’.98

Conclusion The experiences of Uzbekistan and Turkey provide rare answers to the question of how national identity is created where the roots of national consciousness are 98

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shallow. The birth of the Turkish Republic in 1923, and the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic in 1924, created an intriguing dilemma: the formation of a state without a corresponding nation. In both Turkey and Uzbekistan, the absence of national identity was seen as a barrier to modernisation and reform; in each case, therefore, comprehensive nation-building projects were initiated. The development of Turkish political nationalism, and the respective nationalities policy applied throughout the Soviet Union, became the most palpable attempts to address the issue of national identity. The promotion of official national identities, it was hoped, would foster much-need unity among the respective populations. Perhaps the most important similarity, however, was the fact that the creation of national identity in both Turkey and Uzbekistan was exactly that – a creation. Far from being the fruit of spontaneous cultural awakenings or gradual evolution (as in Europe during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries), the Turkish and Uzbek identities were provoked, and determined, by the Kemalists and Soviets, respectively. Yet, by the end of the 1930s, despite numerous similarities, the nature of national identity created in each case was markedly different. The Kemalists sought to reform society from within, unlike the Soviets. Further, it seems that the Kemalists were more resolute and uncompromising, both in choosing a path to follow and in adhering to it. The Soviets also made clear and considered decisions, but they repeatedly changed their strategy, most noticeably concerning their alphabet and historical policies. It would appear that, during the early years, the Soviets’ nationalities policy was marked by an inability to maintain a fixed plan of action. Turkey, on the other hand, was under the firm grip of Mustafa Kemal, who was more uncompromising and pragmatic. In mitigation, the Soviet task was particularly difficult due to the fact that they, unlike the Kemalists, were trying to inculcate simultaneously national identity and a broader Soviet identity.

Notes 1 Bernard Lewis, ‘History-writing and National Revival in Turkey’, Middle Eastern Affairs, Vol. 4 (6–7), 1953, p. 218. Emphasis added. 2 Ibid., p. 220. Although Lewis states that ‘traces of a Turkish awareness of identity can be found in the early Ottoman period’, the group affinity among the various Turkic peoples living within Ottoman territory could hardly be considered ‘national’ in the modern sense. Even Ziya Gökalp himself stated that prior to the twentieth century there was no Turkish nation to speak of. See Bozkurt Güvenç, ‘Secular Trends in Turkish Identity’, Perceptions: Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 2(4), December 1997–Feburary 1998, p. 54. 3 Patrick Kinross, Atatürk: The Rebirth of a Nation (London: Phoenix, 1995), p. 468. 4 Alexandre Bennigsen and Chantal Quelquejay, The Evolution of the Muslim Nationalities of the USSR and Their Linguistic Problems, translated by Geoffrey Wheeler (London: Central Asia Research Centre in Association with St Anthony’s College [Oxford] Soviet Affairs Study Group, 1961), p. 4. As Bennigsen and Quelquejay point out, ‘the Muslim world of pre-revolutionary Russia was more lacking in unity than any other part of the Muslim world’ (ibid.). While the authors were speaking here of the entire

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5

6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

17

18 19 20

21 22 23

Muslim population of the Tsarist Empire, and not just Central Asia or Uzbekistan, their argument seems to hold nonetheless. In fact, the national-state demarcation eventually gave rise to not one, but five ‘states’ without corresponding nations. The Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR) and the Turkmen SSR were created in 1924. Tajikistan was given union republic status in 1929, while the Kirgiz and Kazakh SSRs were created in 1936. Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1983 edition), ‘National State Demarcation of the Soviet Republics of Middle Asia’, p. 380. Emphasis added. Although a more extensive comparison of national identity in Turkey and Uzbekistan would be desirable, the scope of this chapter is limited to the inter-war period. Bernard Lewis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey (London: Oxford University Press, 1961), p. 338. Donald Webster, The Turkey of Atatürk (Philadelphia: AMS Press, 1973), p. 154. Hugh Poulton, Top Hat, Grey Wolf and Crescent (London: Hurst & Company, 1997), pp. 39–40. Lewis, The Emergence, op. cit., p. 323. Ibid., pp. 339–40. A. Kadiolu, ‘The Paradox of Turkish Nationalism and the Construction of Official Identity’, Middle East Studies, Vol. 32, 1993, p. 182. Uriel Heyd, Foundations of Turkish Nationalism (London: Luzac & Company Ltd and Harvill Press Ltd, 1950), p. ix. Ziya Gökalp, Turkish Nationalism and Western Civilization: Selected Essays of Ziya Gökalp, translated and edited by Niyazi Berkes (London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd, 1959), p. 13. Ibid., pp. 14–15. In other words, Gökalp believed that race did not determine one’s nationality, but that culture, as gained through education, was the essential factor. This liberal definition of nationality – one not based purely on ethnic identification – became particularly important under the Kemalists. Lewis, ‘History-writing’, op. cit., pp. 220–1. Others who influenced the development of Turkish identity included European scholars such as Arthur Lumley Davids, Léon Cahun and Arminius Vambéry; Ottoman scholars such as Ahmed Vefik Pasha and Süleyman Pasha; and Russian Turks such as Ismail Gasprinskii, Akçuraolu Yusuf and Hüseyinzade Ali. Webster, op. cit., p. 141. The obvious exception was the Kemalist attempt to reform Islam, an idea that Gökalp had never posited. See also Poulton, op. cit., pp. 76–81. Op. cit., p. 141. Enver Ziya Karal, ‘The Principles of Kemalism’, in Ali Kazancgil and Ergun Özbudun (eds), Atatürk: Founder of a Modern State (London: C. Hurst & Company, 1981), p. 11. As Erik Zürcher, states: ‘It [Kemalism] never became a coherent, allembracing ideology, but can best be described as a set of attitudes and opinions, which were never defined in any detail’ (Turkey: A Modern History [London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 1995], p. 189). Frank Tachau, ‘The Search for National Identity Among the Turks’, Die Welt des Islams, Vol. 3, 1963, p. 165. Ibid., p. 166. Paul Dumont, ‘The Origins of Kemalist Ideology’, in Jacob Landau (ed.), Atatürk and the Modernization of Turkey (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1984), p. 29. Dumont offers a further definition given by Recep Peker in 1931: We consider as ours all those of our citizens who live among us, who belong politically and socially to the Turkish nation and among whom ideas and feelings such as ‘Kurdism,’ ‘Circassianism’ and even ‘Lazism’ and ‘Pomakism’ have been implanted. We deem it our duty to banish by sincere efforts, those false concep-

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tions, which are the legacy of an absolutist regime and the product of longstanding historical oppression. … we want to state just as sincerely our opinion regarding our Jewish and Christian compatriots. Our party [Republican People’s Party] considers these compatriots as absolutely Turkish insofar as they belong to our community of language and ideal. (ibid.) 24 Karal, op. cit., p. 18. See also Poulton, op. cit., pp. 92–101, who takes an opposing view to Mustafa Kemal’s position on race and religion. It appears clear, however, that Kemal’s ideas were a deviation from earlier thinking, indeed a departure from Kemal’s own earlier declarations. For example, Kemal had earlier looked to religion as a means of identification, such as when he appealed for the unity of ‘Muslim Ottomans’ in the National Pact. He had even paid lip-service to the separate ethnicity of the Kurds, until problems such as the Sheikh Said revolt emerged. 25 Tachau, op. cit., p. 166. 26 Dumont, op. cit., p. 29. 27 Cited in Harry Luke, The Making of Modern Turkey (London: Macmillan and Co. Ltd, 1936), p. 202. 28 Lewis, The Emergence, op. cit., p. 19. The most obvious borrowing, of course, was the Arabic script, which was used to render the Ottoman Turkish language, but other borrowings, such as vocabulary, grammar and literary styles, also affected the evolution of the language. 29 Arabic was the language of religion, while Persian enjoyed considerable use as literary language. 30 David Kushner, The Rise of Turkish Nationalism, 1876–1908 (London: Frank Cass and Co., 1977), p. 56. Various Turkish authors had begun to lament, for example, that the Turkish language was ill suited to Arabic and Persian grammar forms and literary styles, which had inundated the Ottoman Turkish language for centuries. Furthermore, problems of orthography and the lack of an acceptable Ottoman Turkish dictionary were also subjects of debate. 31 Ibid., p. 58. 32 Fahir Oz, ‘Atatürk and Turkish Language Reform’, Turkish Review, Vol. 5 (23), Spring 1991, p. 77. 33 Lewis, The Emergence, op. cit., p. 423. 34 Lewis, ‘History-writing’, op. cit., p. 205. While most scholars see the language reform movement of the Kemalists as rooted in the Young Ottoman and Young Turk periods, Fahir Oz (op. cit., pp. 69–82) sees Turkish language reform as rooted in the fundamental cultural change of a thousand years ago. 35 Lewis, The Emergence, op. cit., p. 421. The issue of mass literacy became of primary importance during the early years of the Kemalist regime. 36 Ibid., p. 110. Lewis argues that the basic problem surrounding the use of the Arabic alphabet to render the Turkish language was that Turkish is vowel-rich, with eight short vowels, while the Arabic language, when it does distinguish them at all, has only three short vowels. The Arabic consonant system did the Turkish language no better justice, as letters and sounds did not always correlate. The Arabic letter kaf, C, for example, represented the Turkish sounds associated with k, g, gn, y and v. 37 Zürcher, op. cit., p. 197. 38 By the time of the republic, the Ottoman language had become so inundated that over half of the words commonly found in Ottoman dictionaries had either Arabic or Persian roots. Interestingly, however, the drive to purge the Turkish language of foreign words did not affect words of European extraction. 39 The party most responsible for the preponderance of neologisms was Mustafa Kemal himself, who had become a keen amateur etymologist.

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40 Lewis, ‘History-writing’, op. cit., p. 207. 41 The links were especially strong, Kvergi argued, in the Turkish pronouns: ‘M’ indicates oneself, as in men and elim; ‘N’ indicates what is near oneself, as in sen and elin; and ‘Z’ indicates a broader area, as in biz and siz. 42 John Perry, ‘Language Reform in Turkey and Iran’, International Journal of Middle East Studies, February 1985, p. 302. Perry goes on to say that possibly ‘Atatürk launched this ultra-nationalistic and blatantly unscientific piece of hokum, tongue in cheek, specifically to pull the rug from under the extremists of the purist movement’ (ibid.). 43 Tachau, op. cit., p. 33. 44 Ottoman historians followed the Islamic concept of Jahiliyya (Age of Ignorance), which held that history prior to the rise of Islam was unenlightened and therefore unworthy of serious consideration. 45 Lewis, ‘History-writing’, op. cit., p. 219. 46 Kushner, op. cit., p. 29. 47 Irvin Schick and Erturul Tonak (eds), Turkey in Transition: New Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), p. 7. The traditional Western view held that the Turks were a barbaric race which had contributed little or nothing to the civilised world. 48 The previous discussion of Ottoman historiography is evidence enough of this. 49 Lewis, ‘History-writing’, op. cit., p. 223. 50 Kerim Key, ‘Trends in Turkish Historiography’, Report on Current Research: Survey of Current Research on the Middle East, Spring 1957, pp. 41–2. Kinross (op. cit., pp. 467–8) states that Mustafa Kemal’s conception of history was particularly influenced by H. G. Wells’s Outline of History. 51 Lewis, ‘History-writing’, op. cit., p. 224. 52 Kushner, op. cit., p. 27. 53 Niyazi Berkes, The Development of Secularism in Turkey (Montreal: McGill University Press, 1964), p. 500. 54 Key, op. cit., p. 42. See also Poulton, op. cit., pp. 104–5. 55 Lewis, ‘History-writing’, op. cit., p. 24. For a list of primary sources which deal with the Turkish History Thesis see Key, op. cit., pp. 42–3. 56 Berkes, op. cit., p. 500. Lewis (‘History-writing’, op. cit., p. 225) takes an equally apologetic view of Kemalist history reform, stating that ‘one of the reasons for the campaign [history reform] was the need to provide some comfort for Turkish national self-respect’. 57 Poulton, op. cit., pp. 105–6. 58 Richard Robinson, The First Turkish Republic: A Case Study in National Development (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1963), p. 84. 59 Donald Carlisle, ‘Geopolitics and Ethnic Problems of Uzbekistan and Its Neighbors’, in Yaacov Ro’i (ed.), Muslim Eurasia: Conflicting Legacies (London: Frank Cass, 1995), pp. 72–3. See also Ronald Wixman, ‘Recent Assimilation Trends in Soviet Central Asia’, in Edward Allworth (ed.), The Nationality Question in Soviet Central Asia (New York: Praeger, 1973), p. 74. 60 Bennigsen and Quelquejay (op. cit., pp. 13–14) argue it was especially among the Kazakhs, and, to a slightly lesser extent, the Turkmen. See also Edward Allworth (ed.), Central Asia: 130 Years of Russian Dominance, A Historical Overview (Durham, NC, and London: Duke University Press, 1994), p. 174. Timur Kocaolu, ‘The Existence of a Bukharan Nationality in the Recent Past’, in Allworth (ed.), The Nationality Question, op. cit., p. 151, points to the ‘distinct homogeneity’ of the Kazakhs and Turkmen as reason for their early national consciousness. 61 Shahram Akbarzadeh, ‘A Note on Shifting Identities in the Ferghana Valley’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 16 (1), March 1997, p. 66. See also James Critchlow, Nationalism in Uzbekistan (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1991), pp. 3–15.

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62 Bennigsen and Quelquejay, op. cit., p. 14. 63 Shirin Akiner, ‘Melting Pot, Salad Bowl – Cauldron? Manipulation and Mobilization of Ethnic and Religious Identities in Central Asia’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol. 20 (2), April 1997, p. 363. 64 Timur Kocaolu, ‘The Existence of a Bukharan Nationality in the Recent Past’, in Allworth (ed.), The Nationality Question, op. cit., pp. 151–2. For a more complete description of the original Uzbek tribes, see Edward Allworth, The Modern Uzbeks (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1990). 65 Shirin Akiner, ‘Uzbekistan: Republic of Many Tongues’, in Michael Kirkwood (ed.), Language Planning in the Soviet Union (London: Macmillan Press, 1989), p. 101. 66 Edward Lazzerini, ‘The Jadid Response to Pressure for Change in the Modern Age’, in Jo-Ann Gross (ed.), Muslims in Central Asia (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1992), pp. 161–3. 67 Akiner, ‘Melting Pot, Salad Bowl – Cauldron?’ op. cit., p. 370. However, ‘Muslim’ was not necessarily a religious distinction, just the most obvious way for Central Asians to set themselves apart from the Russian settlers, while not distinguishing amongst themselves. 68 Bennigsen and Quelquejay, op. cit., p. 8. As mentioned earlier, however, Central Asians would still continue to distinguish between themselves in terms of regions, dynasties or clans. 69 Akiner, ‘Melting Pot, Salad Bowl – Cauldron?’ op. cit., p. 371. The Jaddidists were the obvious exception, and they gradually developed ‘strong pan-Turkic and pan-Islamic overtones’. The Jaddidists, however, were never representative of the entire Uzbek (or Central Asian) population. 70 Ibid., p. 372. As Akiner points out, these first administrative units were directly descended from Tsarist organization. As the Soviets sought to distance themselves from the Tsarist legacy, however, a new form of delimitation was necessary. 71 One of the problems with works on the Soviet nationalities policy, as with works on the Soviet Union in general, it seems, is that all too often Western sources take a highly moralistic view of Soviet actions, while Soviet sources tend to argue from an equally dubious perspective. For a particularly intriguing discussion of the enigma surrounding the nationalities policy see, Rein Taagepera and Ralph Michelsen, ‘If the Navajo Were Inside the Soviet Union: A Comparative Approach to the Russian Nationality Policy’, in Ihor Kamenetsky, (ed.), Nationalism and Human Rights: Process of Modernization in the USSR (Littleton, CO: Libraries Unlimited, 1977). 72 Akiner, ‘Uzbekistan’, op. cit.,p. 103. Akiner notes that ethnolinguistic data collected from previous censuses played a large role in the decisions regarding territorial delimitation. Further, Akiner points out that even though the ‘decision to divide the region was taken by the central government … it was Central Asian representatives who argued the case for the different schemes’ (‘Melting Pot, Salad Bowl – Cauldron?’ op. cit., p. 373). Especially important in Uzbekistan was the Bukharan Jadid Faizulla Khojaev, see Carlisle, op. cit., pp. 74–5. 73 Cyril Black, Louis Dupree, Elizabeth Endicott-West, Daniel Matuszewski, Eden Naby and Arthur Waldron (eds), The Modernization of Inner Asia (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1991), p. 278. Further, according to Akiner, ‘some 90 per cent of the main Turkic groups were encompassed within the borders of their titular national unit’ (‘Melting Pot, Salad Bowl – Cauldron?’, op. cit., p. 375). The Great Soviet Encyclopedia goes even further, arguing that ‘as a result of national-state demarcation of Middle Asia, the territories inhabited by the Uzbeks, Kazakhs, Tadzhiks, Turkomans, and KaraKalpaks, which had been artificially separated before October 1917, were reunited into Soviet nation-states’ (op. cit., p. 380). 74 Great Soviet Encyclopedia, op. cit., p. 380. A view, of course, rejected by Western scholars. See Michael Bruchis, ‘The Effects of the USSR’s Language Policy on the National

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75 76 77

78

79

80

81

82 83

84 85

Languages of Its Turkic Population’, in Yaacov Ro’i (ed.), The USSR and the Muslim World (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1984), pp. 129–48. Bennigsen and Quelquejay, op. cit., p. 16. Although a separate Turkic literary language (Chagatay) did develop, much as in Ottoman Turkey, Arabic was the language of religion and Persian dominated literature. Bennigsen and Quelquejay, op. cit., p. 6. Interestingly, however, some have argued that the ‘limitations of the Arabic alphabet had the effect of obscuring to some extent dialectical differences among the Turkic languages’, thus heightening the degree of mutual intelligibility across dialects. See Elizabeth Bacon, Central Asians under Russian Rule: A Study in Culture Change (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1966), p. 189. Ahmed Rasid, The Resurgence of Central Asia: Islam or Nationalism? (London: Zed Books, 1994), p. 86. Navai is today considered the Uzbek national poet. See also E. G. Lewis, Multilingualism in the Soviet Union (Paris: Mouton, 1972), p. 170. Some argue that an Uzbek literary language did not start to take shape until much later. See Bacon, op. cit., p. 192. Bacon, op. cit.p. 32. The reason for the rift between sedentary and nomadic Uzbek was the influence of Tajik. Whereas the Uzbek spoken by the bilingual (Turkic and Persian) Sarts was heavily influenced by Tajik, the nomadic Uzbek remained much closer to other Turkic languages. For a brief description of the Soviet view of language planning (or language building), see J. Desheriyev, ‘From the Soviet Experience of the Development of National Languages’, in Istvón Fodor and Claude Hagège (eds), Language Reform: History and Future, Volume One (Hamburg: Buske Verlag, 1983), pp. 438–47. Bacon, op. cit., p. 193. See als, Simon Crisp, ‘Soviet Language Planning, 1917–1953’, in Kirkwood (ed.), op. cit., p. 32. As Crisp notes, while other dialects may have been more representative of the Uzbek population as a whole (such as the Ferghana dialect, which was originally chosen to be the base of the new Uzbek language), the urban dialects, specifically the Tashkent dialect, had all of the practical advantages. It was for this reason that the Tashkent dialect was chosen as the basis for the national Uzbek language. William Fierman, ‘Language Development in Soviet Uzbekistan’, in Isabelle Kreindler (ed.), Sociolinguistic Perspectives on Soviet National Languages (New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 1985), p. 210. Crisp, op. cit., pp. 26–7. It is interesting to note that the Soviet decision to adopt the Latin script came two years prior to the Kemalist decision to make the same transition. However, in Uzbekistan, for instance, the transfer to the new script took much longer than in Turkey. According to Akiner (‘Uzbekistan’, op. cit., p. 107), the new script was not phased in until January 1928; and the transfer was not completed until 7 November 1930, almost two full years after the finalisation of the script change in Turkey. The results, however, were the same: Central Asians were cut off from their Islamic past and reorientated toward the West, just as had been done in Turkey. Crisp, op. cit., p. 27. An interesting topic for further research would be the influence that the various Turkic reformers had on each other. See also, Bacon, op. cit., p. 190. Akiner, ‘Uzbekistan’, op. cit., p. 107. The statement ‘to comply with the request of the broad intelligentsia of the Uzbek SSR’ is, of course, highly suspect. Without delving into the topic too deeply, it is enough to note that most Western sources (such as Crisp, op. cit., p. 29) tend to argue that the comparative lack of discussion of the transfer to Cyrillic and the evidence of oppositions to the reform seem to point to the conclusion that it was introduced as the result of a change of policy in Moscow rather than [as Soviet accounts

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usually say] a natural development, called for by popular demand and implemented smoothly and carefully. 86 Fierman, op. cit., pp. 211–12. Also worthy of mention is the fact that vocabulary purification received considerable attention. Although not to the same extent as in Turkey, there was a desire to remove words of Arabic and Persian origin from the new Uzbek national language, and replace them with Turkic words. 87 Akiner, ‘Uzbekistan’, op. cit., p. 108. 88 Ibid., p. 108. As Akiner notes, the literacy campaign in Uzbekistan achieved remarkable success: ‘by 1932, 52.5 per cent of the population were literate, by 1939, 67.8 per cent’ (ibid.). It is important to note that these rates were much higher than achieved in Kemalist Turkey. 89 Crisp, op. cit., p. 23. It is important to note that Lenin’s policy of linguistic equality was part of a larger policy, korenizatsiia (‘nativisation’), aimed at national equality. Only when Stalin abandoned this policy did the changes with regards to language take place. Bruchis (op. cit., pp. 129–31) argues that Lenin himself had already abandoned the ideal of linguistic equality prior to his death. 90 Bacon, op. cit., p. 194. See also Akiner, ‘Uzbekistan’, op. cit., p. 108. 91 Behbudiy was a leading Jadid from Samarkand. Cited in Allworth, Uzbeks, op. cit., p. 127. 92 Genealogy was especially important, as nomads could routinely trace their lineage up to nine generations. 93 Allworth, Uzbeks, op. cit., p. 122. 94 Voprosy istorii, No. 9, 1951. Cited in Lowell Tillet, The Great Friendship: Soviet Historians on the Non-Russian Nationalities (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1969), p. 3. 95 R. Tuzmuhamedov, How the Nationalities Question Was Solved in Soviet Central Asia (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1973), p. 173. 96 Ibid., pp. 15–16. 97 Ibid., pp. 171–2. 98 Ibid., p. 171.

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6 NATION BUILDING AND IDENTITY IN THE KYRGYZ REPUBLIC Robert Lowe The proclamation of the first modern independent Kyrgyz state, in August 1991, was met with little rejoicing. For the people of the former Soviet Socialist Republic of Kirghizia, there were few reasons, either of the head or of the heart, to support the detachment of their small mountainous country from the Soviet whole.1 The new state lacked even a credible flag or other legitimate ‘national’ symbols around which people might rally, and would not have existed as a separate country but for the hard truth that the Soviet Union had imploded. Kyrgyzstan, therefore, was left with no option but to accept this seismic shift in political power and to proceed with the daunting task of building the independent state that no one seemed to have wanted. All the post-Soviet republics were confronted by enormous problems after independence, but the lack of national awareness and unity in the Central Asian republics made national consolidation uncertain. Until the Soviet period, Kyrgyz society was based on kinship rather than national ties, and a strong sense of specifically ‘Kyrgyz’ self-consciousness had never developed. Central Asia has a rich history pre-dating the Russian invasions, but the region was not governed along ethno-national lines until the Soviets demarcated ‘national’ boundaries in 1924 and created modern, though highly artificial, ‘national’ republics. These federal units are now independent states, despite this extraordinary absence of ‘national’ evolution and self-determination and the lack of a distinct ‘national’ history. While questions of ethnicity, nationalism and nation building have been widely studied in capitalist countries, less is known of these phenomena in postcommunist societies.2 All five Central Asian states have been compelled to cultivate a sense of national awareness in an attempt to justify and strengthen their existence, making the area a unique ‘laboratory’ for the development of modern states and their ideology. For Kyrgyzstan, as for most of the Central Asian states, this is an especially difficult and delicate task, as the republic is not a nation-state, but rather a rich ethnic tapestry. Attempts at nation building cannot ignore the significant non-Kyrgyz population. 106

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Pre-Soviet history and identity Identity is shaped, in part, by history, whether real or perceived, and an outline of Kyrgyz history is essential in understanding modern Kyrgyz consciousness. There is much debate and uncertainty over the history of the Kyrgyz people, not least because of insufficient evidence and imprecise terminology. The Soviet scholar S. M. Abramzon warned, ‘The question of the origins of the Kyrgyz nation is among the most complex and controversial aspects of the ethnic history of Central Asia.’3 The weakness of Kyrgyz national identity in the modern period is related to the confusion surrounding the ethno-genesis and development of the Kyrgyz people. The ancient and medieval history of the Kyrgyz must be treated with caution. There are claims that a Kyrgyz state may be identified as existing during the third millennium BC, while others suggest it is impossible to date a Kyrgyz presence in the modern territory of Kyrgyzstan until at least the tenth century AD.4 Less controversial is the question of migration of a Turkic tribe from the banks of the Yenisey, in southern Siberia, to the Tien Shan mountains some time around the tenth century AD. This group has been identified as ‘Kyrgyz’, and it is probable that today’s Kyrgyz are descended from these Eastern Turks, as well as from Mongols and a myriad other groups who passed through the region. Chingis Khan and his Mongol descendants held sway over the area from the thirteenth century until the fifteenth century, when an autonomous Kyrgyz khanate was established. This period appears to have been significant for the consolidation of an identifiable ‘Kyrgyz’ people who developed a distinctive Turkic dialect, and some sense of ethnic awareness linked to a common territory, nomadism and a shared oral narrative.5 However, care must be taken over the dating of any fusion of a Kyrgyz ‘proto-nation’, as the developing consciousness was ethnic, not national, and seems to have remained highly ambiguous: family and tribe continued to form the basis of social organisation.6 Another Mongol group, the Jungarian Oirots, maintained control of the Kyrgyz lands in the seventeenth century until the Chinese Manchus overthrew their empire in 1758. The Kyrgyz tribes were then left alone, in the main, until the growing power of the Kokand khanate to the west forced all to pay tribute by 1830. Islam, which had previously had but a minimal affect on the Kyrgyz, took a deeper hold in the south. Even there, however, most still practised a highly syncretistic religion and the penetration of Islam remained limited. Expansion of Russian influence forced a number of Kyrgyz groups to declare allegiance to the Tsar in the mid-nineteenth century, and in 1862, Kyrgyz troops fought alongside Russian soldiers in the capture of Pishpek fort, now the site of the capital. By the time the Kokand khanate was formally abolished in 1876, all Kyrgyz tribes had submitted to Russian rule. Imperial Russia began the colonial process of modernisation, later greatly extended by the Soviets, which changed Kyrgyz life for ever. Until the late 1800s, the way of life of the Kyrgyz tribes had been largely unchanged for centuries. They were still a nomadic people who loosely controlled a vast expanse of territory 107

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and whose society operated within a flexible structure, in which each family belonged to a clan group and, in turn, to a wider tribal confederation.7 The Russians maintained the long trend of outside control of the Kyrgyz people, but had a much greater impact than any of their predecessors. By introducing private ownership and settled farming, they began a process that signalled the end of traditional society. From the 1860s, Russian and Ukrainian settlers were given land to encourage this ‘civilised’ method of farming and became the dominant group in the new urban centres. The peoples of the Tien Shan were long accustomed to assimilating new ethnic groups, but the Slavs came from a radically different society and culture and transformed the lives of the native Asians. In 1916, a mass rebellion against mobilisation for the First World War resulted in reprisals which left many thousands dead and forced around a third of the Kyrgyz population to flee to China.8 When the Bolsheviks came to power in 1917, the issue of unequivocal identity among Kyrgyz people was not prominent. Pre-Soviet identity construction throughout Central Asia was loose and variable, and did not conform to rigid European categories and definitions. After the arrival of the Russians, Central Asians, at the broadest level of self-consciousness, considered themselves ‘Muslims’ rather than ‘Kyrgyz’ or ‘Uzbeks’. ‘Muslim’ was used as a label to distinguish individuals and groups from the non-Muslim Europeans, regardless of actual religious beliefs. Amongst Central Asians, the main distinction was between nomadic and settled peoples with ethnic labels holding little meaning in a society that did not operate along such lines. Ethnic divisions were rarely obvious, as the Kyrgyz people, themselves encompassing a rich mixture of ethnicities, co-existed in multi-ethnic khanates and empires with Kazakhs, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Uighurs, Dungans and others. Local affiliations were the most important to the individual, and, as the Kyrgyz rarely settled, clannish and tribal ties, rather than a sense of precise locality, provided the foremost elements of their identity. Loyalty was always much stronger to family ties than to any sense of Kyrgyz brotherhood and, while the Manas legends acclaim the unity of the Kyrgyz people, internal conflict has predominated. Tribal disunity prevented any consistent opposition to the Mongol invaders, and in the eighteenth century a division developed between northern and southern tribal groups that remains today.9 Before 1917, it is unlikely that many Kyrgyz people had given any thought to national identity.

The Soviet arrival The great Bolshevik project for the socialisation of the Tsarist Empire involved a fundamental reconstruction of society. This task was most challenging in remote Central Asia, where the ‘backward peoples of the east’ required a massive programme of education and modernisation to reach the standards envisaged by the Soviet planners. Bolshevisation conflicted with the ordering of traditional society and radically transformed Central Asia, leaving a legacy of crucial 108

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importance to today’s independent states. Moscow’s grand scheme involved farreaching political, economic and social changes which irreversibly reshaped life and identity (albeit indirectly), while more abstract central ideological planning, designed to create new labels of self-consciousness, had a direct impact on the question of identity. The nationalities policy that formed the bedrock of Soviet plans for Central Asia was, in theory, straightforward. A clear distinction was made between ‘nationality’, defined by race and genetic inheritance (effectively ethnicity), and the more important issue of ‘citizenship’, the legal and equal status given to all living within the Soviet Union. ‘National’ identity was to be encouraged, as the Bolsheviks claimed to be liberating all oppressed peoples from Russian imperialism, but only as a component of the greater affiliation to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. All national attachments were destined to disappear during the process of sblizhenie (rapprochement) as they became subsumed in a broader and higher ideal of socialist awareness and Soviet brotherhood. It was possible to theorise about remodelling mass identity, but quite another matter to achieve it. Central Asia was particularly ill suited to well-developed European concepts of identity, as it was inhabited by Muslims who were overwhelmingly illiterate and had no clearly defined concept of ‘national’ or ‘ethnic’ self-consciousness. The incorporation of these peoples into the Soviet project and the development of a ‘Soviet’ identity, therefore, initially required the creation of national distinctions to fit the theoretical structure. Soviet planners boldly attempted to obliterate the traditional markers of identity and to engineer two new dominant layers of individual self-consciousness: the national and the supranational. The Bolshevisation of Central Asia was implemented within a new governmental framework essential both for socialisation and the reshaping of identity. In 1924, Stalin oversaw the demarcation of national boundaries and the creation of national socialist republics. Although this produced largely artificial units, these were not randomly constructed, but were defined after an extensive and much-debated investigation into the area’s demography.10 Ethnic distinctions were blurred rather than absent, and the Soviets were able to develop the classification begun by Tsarist scholars. Taking language as the prime marker of ethnicity, they crafted national republics from Central Asia’s ethnic mix. Despite boundary oddities – most notably in the Ferghana Valley – designed to equalise resources and guard against national unity, the units were impressively accurate. For example, 86 per cent of those defined as ‘Kyrgyz’ in 1924 lived within the designated ‘Kyrgyz’ territory.11 It was essential to mould nations to fit these new national units, and the Soviets were inventive and resourceful in their development of the trappings of European-style nationhood for these Asian peoples. Language was seized upon as a key element of identity, and the under-developed Kyrgyz tongue was given a script (Arabic, then Latin, later Cyrillic), an expanded vocabulary, grammar, dictionaries, literature, and other elements necessary to declare it formally as a 109

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separate Turkic language. Exclusively ‘Kyrgyz’ national history was produced to justify the creation of the republic, and Western-style art forms such as theatre, ballet, opera and film were given a Kyrgyz theme, while conforming to Soviet ideology. A republican flag and national institutions such as academies, universities, trade unions and the Communist Party were promoted to foster a sense of national pride. The 1920s and 1930s were also years of deeper structural change in Kyrgyz society. Soviet schools were opened and the previously negligible level of literacy shot up during the 1930s. Islam, a major element in Central Asian identity, was suppressed, while the khudzhum (attack) campaign encouraged women to enter education and the workplace. For the nomadic Kyrgyz, the most significant Soviet scheme was the forced settlement and collectivisation drive. A centuriesold way of life, and much of its accompanying tradition, was brought to an abrupt end as the rural system was transformed. By 1940, 98 per cent of the republic’s farmers had been forcibly settled on collective farms.12 The campaign had disastrous results: livestock was destroyed and thousands of people died of famine or fled to Xinjiang. Despite this, traditional communities survived on the collective farms, albeit within a different structure. Industrialisation was also introduced and swiftly increased, bringing a large influx of Slavic migrants and a fundamental restructuring of the economy. Kyrgyz leaders initially tried to influence domestic policy, but many lost their lives in Stalin’s brutal purges of the 1930s, and, thereafter, local leaders became compliant and dependent upon Moscow. The Bolsheviks had hoped that as socialist building proceeded, a new sense of ‘Sovietness’ would evolve, causing local and national attachments to wither. The ultimate goal was the creation of this wholly new identity, embodied in the utopian vision of the ‘New Soviet Man’ – one whose appreciation of the great worth of the Soviet state conditioned him to relate his primary identity to this supranational construction. However, the process was slow in Central Asia. It would take the harrowing experience of the Great Patriotic War to forge a new sense of Soviet brotherhood. But, as the decades passed, familiarity with the concept, and pride in belonging to a world superpower, seeped into the general consciousness. Sovietisation became increasingly related to Russification in Central Asia as Moscow sought to impose the language, industry, society, culture and ‘glory’ of the Russian people upon an ‘inferior’ civilisation. The Russians were presented as generous friends who had released the Muslims from their barbaric medieval past and brought them forward into the shining light of socialist progress and modernisation. Teaching of the Russian language in schools became compulsory under Stalin, while Khrushchev extended the Russification of the Soviet model. The language failed to penetrate rural Kyrgyzstan fully, but urban areas populous with Slavs developed as Russian-speaking towns, and most urban Kyrgyz educated after the war are more comfortable speaking Russian than their own language. The pre-Soviet fluidity of identity in Central Asia meant Russification 110

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was able to penetrate more deeply and to create greater societal distortions than in the Baltic or Caucasian republics. Until recently, indeed, Frunze was one of the best places in the Soviet Union to find nineteenth-century Russian literature.13 Indigenous markers of identity were affected in different ways by the central assault on tradition. Islamic practice was stifled, but although Kyrgyz devotion to the faith had never been especially strong, attachment to it as an identity construct was never severed. While a ‘national’ history and ideology were supported by the Soviet state, these were highly selective and critical of much of the ‘backward’ past and many popular figures. Although transhumance continued, the nomadic way of life was perhaps the greatest victim of socialisation. The cultural and belief systems of the nomads were shattered and became reduced to a contrived element of the Kyrgyz’s new fake heritage, retaining only a sentimental place in their hearts. Other markers of identity were scarcely affected by the total assault on society, and clan, tribal and regional affiliations remain strong today. In the post-war period a greater identification with the Kyrgyz Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR) developed, although the importance of this should not be exaggerated. Domestic direction came from Frunze and the policy of korenizatsiia (indigenisation) encouraged native cadres to assume senior positions in the republican administration, allowing significant access to power. While Moscow retained control of all non-domestic affairs and overall policy, local party leaders, especially under Brezhnev, were allowed considerable autonomy, provided they met production quotas. This political arrangement was mirrored culturally and institutionally. The national language, education, communist organisations and traditional customs were officially supported at republican level as a form of native self-expression, while foreign affairs, the army, passports, currency and sports were bound to the Soviet whole as befitted their significant status. Modern Kyrgyz identity was therefore shaped by the Soviet planners, who rearranged and presented the politically correct trappings of nationhood as a clearly defined, yet somewhat sterile, set of identity constructs. The post-Soviet Kyrgyz have had to decide which of these elements to retain and how to invigorate them. By the late Soviet period, Kyrgyz identity remained multi-layered and complex. At the broadest level, and certainly for international purposes, there was a strong sense of Soviet citizenship, of belonging to a vast multi-ethnic world superpower. Contrary to the expectations of the communist idealists however, this had failed to supplant all other markers of identity. The sense of ethnic group (nationality) did not attract the devotion recognisable in other parts of the world, but was perhaps stronger than at any time in Kyrgyz history owing to the structure and support provided by the nationalities policy. It is paradoxical that Soviet ideology ‘impeded the consolidation of ethnic and national identity’,14 yet, within the Kyrgyz context, also created and nurtured it, albeit in a stifled form. The development of language illustrates how Russification stunted the 111

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development of Kyrgyz, which had itself been modernised by the Soviets. Subnational allegiances were also supposed to vanish under the socialist programme, but survived strongly beneath the surface within kin groups and regional networks. Most Kyrgyz still thought of themselves as Muslims, despite their minimal religious observance, as Islam remained a cultural marker of identity that transcended all other labels. Such subtle layers of self-consciousness were complementary, rather than contradictory, and are difficult to evaluate.

Perestroika The long years of Brezhnev’s stagnant rule allowed Central Asian leaders the stability and autonomy to manage their republics as personal quasi-fiefdoms with little interference from Moscow. Turdakun Usubaliev’s twenty-five-year leadership of the Kyrgyz Communist Party was characterised by ingratiating deference to the Russian elder brother, but also an increasing demand for resources from the centre and the gradual development of a large indigenous élite. This atmosphere was transformed under Gorbachev, whose encouragement of perestroika and glasnost set the Soviet Union on the road to disintegration. These perestroika years are vital to understanding independence, and its aftermath, in Kyrgyzstan. It might be expected that the last years of colonial rule would have witnessed an upsurge of national feeling and calls for political autonomy. However, while there was a measure of cultural and ethnic awakening amongst the Kyrgyz, it is crucial to recognise that this did not involve any articulation of demands for national independence. In November 1985, the replacement of Usubaliev by Absamat Masaliev as First Secretary of the Kyrgyz Communist Party heralded a new political climate. The old leaders were denounced as corrupt and nepotistic, and there were many personnel changes as part of an ineffective campaign to purge the government. The ‘ethnic revival’ in Central Asia has been traced back to the 1960s, when a spontaneous interest in ethnic origins emerged out of simple curiosity.15 The slight loosening of authoritarian control in the mid-1980s helped encourage a tentative interest in the history and culture of the Kyrgyz people. As is common in such movements, the language question was a leading issue, and there were calls to improve the teaching and use of Kyrgyz after decades of Russification. Kyrgyz history began to be reassessed, and while anti-religious propaganda remained prevalent, the authorities adopted a markedly less repressive official tone and allowed religious observance to increase. However, Masaliev did not share Gorbachev’s enthusiasm for glasnost, and the openness emerging in other parts of the Soviet Union was not visible in Kyrgyzstan: it was considered the most conservative republic at that time.16 Growing ethnic awareness and an atmosphere of impending change throughout the USSR encouraged political leaders to reposition themselves cautiously and to begin emphasising their Kyrgyz credentials. In September 1989, as part of a Union-wide trend, the Supreme Soviet made Kyrgyz the state 112

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language of the republic, while Russian was designated the language of ‘interethnic communication’. This move gave rise to fears amongst non-Kyrgyz nationalities of incipient ethnic discrimination. There was also a much darker side to this reassertion of ethnic rights that still casts a shadow over ethnic relations in Kyrgyzstan. In the summer of 1990, increasingly scarce resources and housing shortages in the Osh oblast inflamed tensions between the Kyrgyz and Uzbek communities: rioting and bloody violence left over 200 dead.17 The horrific atrocities carried out by Kyrgyz and Uzbeks alike articulated a severe warning against complacency regarding Kyrgyzstan’s ethnic diversity. It was painfully apparent that the crumbling of Soviet rule had allowed ethnic tensions formerly considered dormant to bubble to the surface. Masaliev’s position was fatally undermined by the ethnic conflict and a housing crisis, and, in the first presidential elections in October 1990, a compromise candidate, Askar Akaev, was the surprise winner. A physicist and former head of the Kyrgyz Academy of Sciences, Akaev is unusual amongst Central Asian leaders for having spent most of his career in academia rather than politics. Stating his commitment to reform immediately, Akaev renamed the country the Republic of Kyrgyzstan in December 1990. His support of Yeltsin during the decisive hard-line coup in Moscow in August 1991 enabled him to defeat his communist opposition, but he strongly supported attempts to keep the Soviet Union intact. On 31 August 1991, following the lead of seven other Soviet republics, the Republic of Kyrgyzstan declared itself an independent state with the intention of pressing claims to greater autonomy, in preference to leaving the Soviet Union. The referendum on the preservation of the USSR in March 1991 demonstrated the strength of support for the Union as 94.6 per cent of the 92.9 per cent turnout in Kyrgyzstan voted in favour.18 The new constitutional settlement was ultimately decided elsewhere with the Soviet Union broken by the three Slavic republics in December 1991. Seemingly against the wishes of its own people, Kyrgyzstan was condemned to full independence.

Independence and national ideology Despite the growing clamour from certain republics, the post-Soviet states emerged as a result of the collapse of the centre rather than as a result of challenges from the periphery, and the momentous events of 1991 caught the Soviet peoples unawares. Nowhere was there less warning of the dramatic impending changes than in Kyrgyzstan, where the greater Soviet body had long been accepted. In sharp contrast to republics such as Lithuania, few Kyrgyz had even considered the possibility of independence. The processes and people involved in wrecking the Soviet Union had little to do with Kyrgyzstan, and the small republic could only watch helplessly as the Union crumbled: that which had been violently forced upon the Kyrgyz was now peacefully lifted from them. The extraordinary manner of Kyrgyzstan’s birth as an independent nation has the strongest implications as the country labours to define itself and legitimise its existence. 113

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All former Soviet republics struggled to cope with the practical difficulties of establishing independent states and the deeper economic, social and environmental problems inherited from Soviet rule. For the five Central Asian states, there was another challenging factor to grapple with: the ideological vacuum left by the discrediting of the communist system. As a state that apparently nobody had wanted, Kyrgyzstan lacked unity, legitimacy and credibility. This absence of national cohesion and purpose magnified the enormous practical challenges of establishing an independent state in this poor and remote region of Central Asia. Kyrgyzstan was one of the least nationally conscious of the Soviet republics. Ethnic revival had not gathered enough momentum to develop the kind of national ideology immediately pressed into service in Latvia, Ukraine or Armenia. It was therefore the task of the Kyrgyz government to create a new ideology by co-opting any available symbols of the perceived culture and traditions of the indigenous population in an effort to build a stronger Kyrgyz nation. Party leaders underwent a dramatic shift in their beliefs and now worked hard to promote their links to the traditional society and nationally minded activities that they had spent their careers denouncing. The state outlined the official sense of Kyrgyz national identity it wished to encourage and was supported by the intelligentsia and the media. They had a useful model, with the work of Soviet ideologues providing an outstanding example of a politically orchestrated presentation of identity. However, the severe challenge of this task was highlighted when the acclaimed Kyrgyz writer Chingis Aitmatov expressed his concern that, given the hazy history of his people, it was unclear which elements of Kyrgyz heritage deserved preservation.19 The revival of Kyrgyz culture, and its elevation to a predominant status, seriously threatened the significant non-ethnic Kyrgyz population. With more than eighty nationalities resident in the republic, the government realised the necessity of reconciling them to the independent Kyrgyz state and retaining their vital skills. Nationality policy would therefore promote Kyrgyz culture and identity, but also would protect the specific interests of all ethnic groups. In October 1991, Akaev was popularly re-elected President under the slogan ‘Civil Consensus and National Unity – Yes; Chauvinism, Nationalism and Extremism – No’.20 However, attempts to reassure the ethnic minorities have been less visible than the efforts to nurture a sense of Kyrgyz national identity.

The nation-building process – semiotics and ethnosymbols The most visible and straightforward element in a process of nationalisation is the redefinition of semiotics and ethnosymbols – the words, signs and figures by which an ethnic group may be identified. Ethnonyms and toponyms come under scrutiny in a post-colonial setting, as the ‘ideology of return’21 demands the use of historical or traditional names and linguistic ‘corrections’ of colonial language transliterations. The Kyrgyz were quick to clear Russian and Soviet terms from 114

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their linguistic landscape. In December 1990, the ‘Kirghiz Republic’ became the ‘Republic of Kyrgyzstan’, ostensibly to reflect clearly the pronunciation of the titular name in its language, but also to mark a symbolic break with the past. In 1993, the name was changed again to the ‘Kyrgyz Republic’ in what appears to have been a nationalist-influenced move to better reflect the ‘idea of national statehood’,22 although this is debated.23 While the terms ‘Kyrgyz’ and ‘Kyrgyz Republic’ are now widely recognised, these are still disputed and often misspelled in contemporary literature.24 The difficulties in supporting national consolidation are apparent when even the name of the country is unfamiliar, and its spelling and form are variable. The Supreme Council or Soviet of the republic was also renamed Zhogorku Kenesh, a Kyrgyz title evocative of pre-Soviet tribal assemblies. Towns with new names include Karakol, formerly Przheval’sk, and Balykchy, formerly Rybach’e. The most prominent change was that of the capital city from Frunze to Bishkek in 1991. Mikhail Frunze, a successful Soviet commander in the 1920s, may have been born in the town, but was sure to lose the honour of having it named after him in the face of assertive Kyrgyz ethnicity. Before the Russians entered the region, there was a small fort called Pishpek on the site and the old name was revived with a reformed spelling and eulogised as supposedly meaning ‘Five Knights’.25 In Bishkek, Osh, Jalalabad and other towns, the major streets have been renamed, and names associated with the Soviet regime, such as October, Komsomol, Lenin and Engels, have been erased, although in many cases they remain in popular usage. It is interesting to note that in Osh, ulitsa Lenina has not disappeared, but simply moved one block, suggesting little urgency to erase the Soviet past completely.26 These changes have been implemented less zealously than in other former Soviet republics, reflecting Kyrgyz ambivalence about the Soviet legacy and realistic acceptance that its influence remains strong. The highest mountains in Kyrgyzstan are still named Lenin Peak and Victory Peak, and statues of Lenin, Dzerzhinsky and Frunze continue to occupy prime sites in Bishkek, although the names have been removed. The museum at Frunze’s birthplace remains open and untouched, and, though the national museum has introduced exhibitions on Stalin’s purges, the original displays of Soviet achievements survive. Further changes may indeed be planned, but are not deemed so urgent as to demand the allocation of sparse resources. A flag representing the distinctiveness of the nation is one of the most prominent symbols of nation building, but with no experience of statehood and no strong nationalist movement, the Kyrgyz had never created a flag for themselves. As part of the Soviet nation-building process, they were given a republican (not a national) flag with a blue–white band crossing the standard red Soviet background with the hammer and sickle motif. After independence, the Kyrgyz were obliged to design their own flag and the ideas contained within this valuable badge of nationhood provide illuminating insights into the new official thinking. Perhaps surprisingly, and uniquely amongst former Soviet republics, the Kyrgyz 115

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selected red as their primary national colour. This caused some controversy, but complaints about the continued use of the colour of socialism were assuaged by the claim that red was the colour of Manas, the legendary Kyrgyz superhero. Manas supposedly flew a red banner in the Middle Ages and the Kyrgyz would fly it again.27 The central motif on the red background of the flag is a most deliberate and precisely contrived national symbol. A blazing golden sun proclaiming eternal life casts out forty rays to represent the forty mythical tribes who formed the historical Kyrgyz.28 In the centre of the sun disc is a stylised representation of a tunduk, the distinctive cross-framed roof of a yurt. The yurt, a mobile tent used by nomadic groups, is the great symbol of Central Asian nomads and features prominently in the new iconology of both Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. The tunduk represents ‘not only the stability of home, familiar ways of living and centuries-old popular traditions, but the deep philosophical unity of heaven and earth’.29 The state seal has similarly romantic imagery, with a sun beaming above the dramatic Ala-Too mountain range and the waters of Issyk-Kul, fronted by an eagle and decorated with ‘national ornaments’. Both these artworks have been thoughtfully designed and much-debated and can be seen as linking the modern Kyrgyz Republic to the physical landscape and a simplistic and comforting nomadic past. Both are essentially exclusive and glorify the Kyrgyz people rather than the inhabitants of Kyrgyzstan. A national ideology benefits from great historical figures written as the inspiring subjects of myths woven to assert the identity of a people, and to consolidate a sense of unity and pride. Most national heroes are independence fighters, strong rulers of a flourishing state or representatives of a great cultural or intellectual tradition. Kyrgyz history both lacks outstanding examples of these and, with no modern independence movement or experience of statehood, further possesses no founding figure for the modern nation. Instead, a mythical figure, the warrior Manas, has been acclaimed as the father and moral exemplar of the Kyrgyz people, and efforts have been made to promote him to the Kyrgyz people and the wider world. The nomads of Central Asia possessed no literate culture, but developed a rich and intricate body of oral folklore that was extended and cherished through the ages. The tradition was especially strong amongst the Kyrgyz, and numerous epic legends gradually coalesced and were attributed to one person, the great leader Manas, who rode a winged charger and performed superhuman feats in defeating all his enemies. The tradition is wider and older than the Kyrgyz peoples, but became especially closely associated with them under the Soviet demarcation of separate ‘national’ cultures. Despite attaining printed status under the Soviets, representation of Manas in a nationalist context was repressed, and the storytelling tradition withered in the aftermath of collectivisation. In the last decade, Manas has enjoyed a massive revival as the collection of legends is promoted for the Kyrgyz people. 116

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The state has sponsored considerable efforts to place Manas at the forefront of modern Kyrgyz identity with the intention that the epic tales will be considered the ‘Kyrgyz spiritual object’30 and the pivotal component of the Kyrgyz peoples’ mentality. Since independence, the heroic warrior and the considerable corpus of tales about him (over 500,000 lines in their entirety) have acquired a commanding status in the new Kyrgyz pantheon, and his name and fame is widely recognised throughout contemporary Kyrgyzstan. Muslim pilgrims pray at Manas’s supposed tomb near Talas and his name and picture decorate banknotes, cognac, cigarettes, the International Airport, the World Health Organisation Manas Programme and the ‘Father Manas Association’, which develops ties with the Kyrgyz Diaspora. Books, films, television serials, operas and comics have all been based on Manas. In 1995, the state went to great lengths to promote the ‘International Year of Manas’. UNESCO recognised this as a ‘significant world cultural event’, and at dazzling celebrations to mark the randomly chosen 1,000th anniversary of Manas, President Akaev proclaimed the hero’s greatness from the world’s first three-storey yurt. The perceived value of promoting the national epic was reflected in the estimated $8 million spent on this event.31 Kyrgyzstan may be said to be ‘charting a course into the twenty-first century with the aid of an epic collection of poetry’32 as the new nation, desperately lacking a legitimate ideology, has clutched at the comforting and definably ‘Kyrgyz’ Manas myth. In the difficult days that have followed independence, the Kyrgyz have reached back into their nomadic past and embraced Manas as a powerful and just guardian who might help to light the path to a better future. This recourse to a mythical historical leader in the search for a modern identity is a fine example of the past being mined and adapted to suit present political purposes. This ‘made to measure’ hero excludes none by clan, tribe or region and stands astride both shamanist and Islamic traditions. Unfortunately, however, the myths surrounding Manas ignore non-ethnic Kyrgyz. Thus, the promotion of the very ‘Kyrgyzness’ of this national icon simultaneously automatically excludes non-Kyrgyz citizens.

Language Language is one of the prime markers of ethnic identity and has been a prominent issue throughout the post-Soviet republics in the period of ethnic resurgence. In the late 1980s, it was clear that Kyrgyz was one of the weakest titular languages in the USSR. The high numbers of non-Kyrgyz inhabitants, the late emergence of literature and the concentration of Kyrgyz speakers in rural areas afforded the language a position well below Russian in the official and cultural life of the republic. Although Moscow’s language policy had earlier encouraged the development of Kyrgyz, later efforts at Russification and the obsequiousness of the Kyrgyz leadership relegated it to an inferior status. Russian became the first language of the urban Kyrgyz élite, some of whom lost the use of their mother 117

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tongue, while all but the most isolated Kyrgyz acquired a familiarity with Russian. In 1989, only three of Frunze’s 69 schools used Kyrgyz as the primary language of instruction and 4 per cent of the national library’s books were in Kyrgyz, while 83 per cent of students took higher education in Russian.33 Social and political changes created a large disaffected group of Kyrgyz settlers in the cities in the late 1980s, while a new Kyrgyz intelligentsia began challenging the dominance of Russian language and culture. Meanwhile, Gorbachev’s political reforms were encouraging ethnic awakening, and campaigns to reform language legislation developed throughout the USSR. In September 1989, after an unprecedented vigorous national debate, the Kyrgyz parliament passed the Law on State Language, which made Kyrgyz the ‘state language’ and Russian the ‘language of inter-ethnic communication’. Bilingualism was endorsed in many areas, but the controversial Article 8 required the use of Kyrgyz by all public officials and in official documentation. The effect of this bill on inter-ethnic relations was significant, as the non-Kyrgyz population perceived a rise in Kyrgyz nationalism. A commentator in Literaturnyi Kirgizstan noted, ‘The discussion of the bill on the state language was the first stage in the supercharging of tension on the national question.’34 The non-Kyrgyz peoples might have felt less anxious had they understood that the 1989 law was intended as no more than a symbolic assertion of national prestige.35 However, the collapse of the Soviet Union gave greater impetus to the resuscitation of the titular languages that were now promoted as essential elements of legitimate nation building. Akaev’s government found the implementation of the language law a very delicate issue. The Kyrgyz language was clearly a primary marker of Kyrgyz identity that should be supported as necessary to the enhancement of independent sovereignty and the fortification of Kyrgyz national feeling. On the other hand, as Akaev noted, ‘We must be concerned about the reaction of the non-Kyrgyz to the new language policy.’36 The president was well aware of the danger of alienating the large and highly skilled Slavic population, who were inclined to view emigration as the only answer to loss of status and opportunity. The Uzbek population in the south was also a serious consideration in the aftermath of the Osh riots, and care had to be taken to reassure them of their place in the new Kyrgyzstan. The government has therefore taken a moderate line and accepted that a cautious and gradual transition from Russian to Kyrgyz is practical and sensible. The rough policy of implementing the language law within a generation, rather than in the space of a few years, is also self-serving as the regime is dominated by Russified Kyrgyz, who must understand Russian if they aspire to successful careers. The chairman of the Kyrgyz language society, Kyrgyz Tili, complained that the language law was being obstructed by ‘certain parts of the native population who do not want to learn their own language’.37 In August 1999, the National Commission on State Language was still working on a new language law draft and had announced an ambitious programme for the use of Kyrgyz in all official documentation.38 118

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More than a decade after the Law on State Language was passed, the linguistic shift is clearly visible, most obviously in the use of Kyrgyz place-names, though modest progress has also been made in strengthening the language. The use of Kyrgyz in schools and higher education has increased considerably, and there has been some success in teaching or improving the language of adult Kyrgyz. Unfortunately, a number of the Kyrgyz-language schools that opened in a flurry in 1990–1 soon had to close, owing to lack of materials and teachers. However, Kyrgyz-language publications have significantly increased, and the new constitution adopted in 1993 made knowledge of Kyrgyz essential for the presidency. Despite this, Russian is still predominant in political and cultural life owing to the deeply rooted strength of its position and the material and organisational constraints on promoting Kyrgyz. It has been difficult to alter perceptions of Russian as the ‘serious’ and ‘sophisticated’ tongue and of Kyrgyz as belonging to the realm of folklore and the domestic sphere. Government business is conducted in Russian and many well-educated Kyrgyz, while proclaiming a love for the mother tongue, still consider Russian to be more practical, cosmopolitan and intellectual. Furthermore, many Kyrgyz feel uncomfortable in the Kyrgyz language and prefer to use Russian, while the non-Kyrgyz ethnicities have negligible knowledge of, or interest in, learning the titular tongue. Owing to the under-funding of Kyrgyz television channels and their uninspiring content, audiences prefer the more refined Russian stations, while the bulk of printed material remains in Russian. Consequently, it would appear that Russian will continue as the lingua franca for the foreseeable future. Perhaps the most significant change in the language position lies not in the details, but the general attitude, especially amongst Russified Kyrgyz. It is now politically correct amongst Kyrgyz to be recognised as knowing the Kyrgyz language, and personal advancement seems to be dependent upon this. Kyrgyz is now a language of opportunity, not just for shepherds and folktales. The next generation of the Kyrgyz élite will probably be bilingual as a matter of course, and the status of the language should be higher. Yet the refusal of the nonKyrgyz to learn the state language continues to present a significant obstacle to the uniform use of Kyrgyz, and hinders the development of ethnic harmony that a common tongue usually encourages.

Legal framework The legal framework created by a new state provides a fundamental base for the intended nature of the state and society, and frames the outlines of its interethnic discourse. The constitution serves as a primary symbol of independent status and may be described as an ‘official blueprint’, which can map the ideology and functions of the political system.39 The constitutions of the Central Asian republics have all ensured the political pre-eminence of the titular nation and provided special protection for its culture, and are thus instrumental in the 119

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nation-building process. The significance of this statute was appreciated in Kyrgyzstan, where there was a long and heated disagreement about all matters of the constitution, from the structure of government to the choice of national anthem.40 It is notable that comparatively democratic Kyrgyzstan was the last Central Asian state to adopt a new constitution, while authoritarian Turkmenistan was the first.41 Akaev’s promotion of democracy has made his nation-building programme the toughest as he is more restricted by vocal opposition than any other leader. Kyrgyzstan drafted a somewhat nationalist-minded constitution that was less concerned with the status of the non-Kyrgyz than subsequent government policy has been. It was adopted on 5 May 1993, with a preamble which proclaimed the importance of ‘providing for the national renaissance of the Kyrgyz’.42 The promotion of the needs of the titular nationality was of primary importance, while ‘the protection and development of the interests of the members of all nationalities who, together with the Kyrgyz, form the people of Kyrgyzstan’43 was also acknowledged in an affirmation of multi-ethnic unity. Thus, the constitution maintained the status of Kyrgyz as the official language, yet stressed that citizenship was open to all and that every member of the community had equal rights. There was particular controversy over the ethnicity of the President, with calls that the position should be reserved for a member of the titular ethnicity, as in Turkmenistan. This was stated in the original draft, but Akaev successfully fought to remove this stipulation from the final version.44 Kyrgyz citizenship was automatically conferred on all permanent residents at independence, but was not welcomed by the large non-Kyrgyz population. The Russians have been especially reluctant to embrace Kyrgyz identity, although acceptance of Russian citizenship would ruin their position in Kyrgyzstan. Consequently, one survey found 58 per cent of Kyrgyzstani Russians favouring the system of dual citizenship45 that operates in Turkmenistan and Tajikistan. Akaev initially supported dual citizenship as a means of placating the Russian community, but was forced to reverse under pressure from nationalist elements. Ethnic Kyrgyz have attempted to enshrine the exclusive membership rights of the titular group in legislation. The Asaba (Kyrgyz warrior banner) Party of National Revival asserted that the entity ‘People of Kyrgyzstan’ was a fiction and that, through the privatisation process, the land should be the exclusive property of the ethnic Kyrgyz.46 The land law adopted by parliament in May 1991 declared the land and natural resources the property of the ethnic Kyrgyz, but Akaev vetoed this threatening article and successfully proposed the formulation ‘the land is the property of all the peoples of Kyrgyzstan’.47 The Soviets institutionalised the difference between nationality and citizenship manifestly in the fifth column of USSR internal passports that denoted nationality (that is, Kyrgyz, Moldovan, Tatar) in addition to citizenship (Soviet). In 1996, the Kyrgyz government decided to remove the line denoting nationality and replace it with the phrase ‘citizen of the Kyrgyz Republic’. Nationalist protests and accusations of ‘betraying national interests’ followed and the fifth 120

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column was restored shortly after.48 ‘Kyrgyzstani’ was proposed as the most appropriate adjective for all resident in Kyrgyzstan as it encourages a collective sense of belonging and inter-ethnic harmony.49

History In the creation of a national ideology, history plays a valuable if not dominant, role, as perceptions of the past are essential for the creation of a national selfconsciousness. The Kyrgyz government and intelligentsia prudently supported a pro-Kyrgyz history in an attempt to secure the ideology of independent national consolidation. As has been noted, Kyrgyz history is not particularly well equipped to provide the basis for a sense of national awareness and pride. It has therefore been one of the most inventive elements of the nation-building process to manipulate history in the promotion of an idealised ‘Kyrgyzness’. Starr notes that historical consciousness is not defined or constrained by facts, but is a ‘creative process that can handily ignore or dismiss reality’.50 This is convenient for Kyrgyz historical reconstruction, as the reality is not conducive to supporting the existence of an independent Kyrgyz state, while a dearth of evidence makes pre-modern Kyrgyz history elastic. Limited resources inhibit the rewriting of Kyrgyz history, although there is an obvious desire to grant the Kyrgyz people a prominent place in history. The government and intelligentsia are understandably keen to portray the Kyrgyz as an ancient and united people with a proud history of independence and achievement. Rakhat Achylova of the Kyrgyz State University writes: ‘The political mentality of the Kyrgyz, as its more than two thousand-year history has shown, has always been expressed in a constant striving for independence and autonomy.’51 Claims are made for the existence of a powerful Kyrgyz state in the late fifth century, and the independence of the Kyrgyz tribes into the twentieth century has been exaggerated.52 The Kyrgyz are presented as a brave, strong and warlike people with respect for property and love of community,53 and ‘one can only wonder at the remarkable perseverance of the small tribes, preserving their ethnic unity in the face of powerful enemies’.54 ‘Throughout its history, Kyrgyz society has remained democratic’55 and, according to a Bishkek editor, the rule of law, human rights and freedom of speech and press are supported in an ‘ethnic and cultural sense’ by the ‘mentality of the peoples of Kyrgyzstan’.56 Five years after the event, the President of the National Academy of Sciences of the Kyrgyz Republic overlooked the accidental nature of his country’s premature birth and asserted: ‘The proclamation of the independence of the Kyrgyz Republic was a great event for the people of Kyrgyzstan.’57 For all these claims, there is a realistic acceptance of the role played by the Soviets in forging the modern Kyrgyz nation, endorsing Starr’s suggestion that ‘the pre-Soviet experience, for all its importance, pales into insignificance by comparison with the experience of the Soviet era’.58 It is impossible to ignore 121

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the enormous changes wrought by the Soviets, and improvements in literacy, healthcare and the emancipation of women are still admired. Furthermore, it is impossible to correct the basis of the Soviet nationalities policy that legitimises Kyrgyzstan’s existence. The leadership also remains essentially the same as before independence, and the people have no desire to dismiss the Soviet years entirely. Therefore, unlike the experience in other Central Asian states, a measured acceptance of the immediate past, and not an attempt to erase it, has been a subtle element of the nation-building process. While there has been much discussion of the theoretical need to rewrite history and remove the Soviet/Russian bias, little has been done in practice. Certain dark areas of the past have been illuminated, like the 1916 revolt and the purges of the 1930s, and some historical figures rehabilitated, but not to the same extent as in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.

Islam Seven decades of Soviet rule failed to extinguish the emotive and powerful force of Islam and it seemed likely that the religion would play a major role in the emergence of the Central Asian states. Islam had great potential for the nationbuilding process as a distinctive element of Kyrgyz identity representing an alternative to the Soviet ideology that the state wished to replace. The Kyrgyz received Islam late, and lightly, and Soviet rule left them with a vague conception of being ‘Muslim’, as much in a cultural as a religious sense. An Islamic consciousness was maintained in relation to ethnic identity, and the labels ‘religious’ and ‘national’ became increasingly intertwined under the umbrella of ethnic revival, as Islam was regarded as part of the national heritage. Islam is an important means for ethnic Kyrgyz to identify with their nation and history, but it is only one element in a complex mesh of identities. The Westernised and secular Kyrgyz élite understand little about Islam, but have felt obliged to promote the faith as part of the Kyrgyz heritage and have therefore appropriated Islamic symbols while preventing the manifestation of political Islam. Religious freedom and the secular nature of the state were proclaimed, and Islam has been utilised in a deliberate manner to promote Kyrgyz identity and legitimise authority. Islam is employed by the state as a political tool to boost national credentials and is hijacked, where appropriate, to buttress new state ideology. Akaev suggested that the new Kyrgyzstan should reflect the moral values of Islam, took his presidential oath of office on the Koran and made two traditional Islamic feasts national holidays.59 The Kyrgyz government has subsequently cultivated Islamic symbols, notably in supporting the construction of mosques and madra’sas and the refurbishment of holy places. However, Akaev has been less keen than other Central Asian leaders to cloak himself in Islam, except when it might produce economic gain. The superficial acceptance of Islam and its cynical use by Kyrgyz leaders was illustrated when the President joked he would perform the haj if it resulted in financial aid.60 The 122

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religious revival has proceeded only fitfully, inviting the question of whether the broader Muslim community (‘umma) is relevant to the cultural ‘Muslims’ of Kyrgyzstan. Kyrgyz Muslims were organised nationally for the first time at independence, when they created their own muftat. The first kurultai (council) of Kyrgyz Muslims was held in 1993, attracting only a modest turnout. Islam is still a significant factor in identity construction, but the weak attachment of the Kyrgyz to Islam, the perceived political threat of the religion and the significant numbers of non-Muslim citizens have limited its place in the new national ideology.

Impediments to nation building Ethnic minorities The nation building process in Kyrgyzstan has been less extensive than in Uzbekistan or Turkmenistan as the Kyrgyz revival has been checked by a number of factors. As all-powerful authoritarian rulers, Karimov and Niazov have been able to implement their nationalising policies unhindered. As Akaev’s weaker power base rests on a more delicate balance of interests, he has been forced to take a less nationalistic stance due to the large number of non-ethnic Kyrgyz resident in his republic. The presence of other ethnicities, presently making up around 39 per cent of the population, has reined in the Kyrgyz national resurgence and forced the development of a more careful and subtle national ideology.61 The ethnic revival and collapse of the Soviet Union left the non-Kyrgyz uncertain about their position in the new republic. Assertions of Kyrgyz dominance in the political and cultural spheres created an impulse to leave a country they felt was not theirs and return to the ‘historic homelands’. The Russians were the most aggrieved amongst the ethnic minorities. The Soviet Union had supported Russian language and political dominance, and the Russians believed in their economic and cultural superiority over the Kyrgyz. With the collapse of Moscow’s control, this large community was isolated, in effect, within a country they neither identified with nor believed was a viable entity. The two-tiered system of ethnic stratification operated by the Soviets, which afforded privileges to both Russians and Kyrgyz, was dismantled and the titular nationality alone became the hegemonic group. The Russian community was never integrated into Kyrgyz society or had any motivation or encouragement to learn the titular language, and in 1989, a mere 3 per cent of Russians claimed knowledge of Kyrgyz.62 The Russians keenly felt the loss of their privileged status as ‘elder brother’ and experienced a decline in their social status. Some claimed that the obligation to learn the ‘inferior’ Kyrgyz language to maintain their jobs was an infringement of human rights and warned of cultural repression. Some 84 per cent of local deputies elected in 1994 were from the Kyrgyz ethnic group, which 123

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comprised just 56 per cent of the population, reflecting the widespread overrepresentation of Kyrgyz in public office.63 The denial of dual citizenship was described by Russian nationalists as an ‘offence to those who worked for 150 years with their own hands to transform this region of the nomads into a modern state’.64 Whatever the truth of Kyrgyz official policy, as Brubaker points out, ‘events, officials, organisations, even “the state” as a whole are perceived as nationalising’.65 Many Russians simply could not accept the existence of an independent Kyrgyz state dominated by the ethnic Kyrgyz and found themselves in an uncomfortable and dislocated position as the entity they continued to view as their homeland, the Soviet Union, no longer existed. These fears of cultural oppression were most influenced by the predominant status given to the Kyrgyz language. Rather than struggling for their cultural rights, many abandoned the new republic and opted to emigrate, taking valuable professional and technical skills with them. Emigration from Kyrgyzstan had begun slowly during the 1970s due to economic stagnation and rising competition, but this was minimal compared with the numbers fleeing the country in the first few years of independence. In comparative terms, during its first five years of independence, Kyrgyzstan experienced the largest decrease in its Russian population of any Central Asian country, with the exception of war-torn Tajikistan.66 In 1991, the Russian population comprised 20 per cent of the republic’s total, but the figure had fallen to 14.9 per cent in 199767 as roughly 265,000 Russians emigrated between these years.68 Ethnic questions were not the only determinants of migration. The severe economic crisis and sharp drop in living standards after independence also influenced the number of those leaving.69 Similar problems were experienced by Uzbeks, Germans, Tatars, Ukrainians and other groups who had felt secure in Kyrgyzstan while it was part of the Soviet Union and who, on the whole, also maintained their attachment to that supranational construct. Askar Akaev has treated the non-Kyrgyz groups with respect and has maintained that ‘Kyrgyzstan has always been a multi-ethnic state and our multi-ethnicity is one of our main treasures’. He referred to the departure of the Slavs as his ‘main sorrow’70 and has actively attempted to stem the tide of emigration, recognising the damage inflicted on the country’s prosperity. While Akaev knew that the revitalisation of the economy was crucial to persuading Russians to stay, he found it easier to open a Kyrgyz-Slavic University in Bishkek in 1992 and promote the Russian language. Russian had been designated the language of ‘international communication’ in 1989, but the 1993 constitution eliminated this special status. In March 1996, the legislature adopted a presidential decree making Russian an official language in predominantly Russian-speaking areas as well as in ‘vital areas of the national economy’.71 This was a unique measure in Central Asia and an official acknowledgement by the Kyrgyz authorities of their responsibility to slow the out-migration of non-titular groups. From 1996, Akaev repeatedly tried to pass a constitutional amendment that would elevate the position of Russian by making it an ‘official language’, but the measure was blocked by parliament in 1997. 124

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Nonetheless, Akaev appears to have been fairly successful in persuading the non-Kyrgyz of his commitment to inter-ethnic harmony, and the Russian emigration figure more than halved in 1994 from the massive 90,000 of 1993, and was down to 9,891 in 1997. The total emigration figure fell from 143,619 in 1993 to 19,538 in 1997.72 A significant number of emigrants have returned to Kyrgyzstan in the last few years, having discovered that life was no easier elsewhere. One Russian complained that he had been frustrated in his search for work in Moscow, where he had been called a ‘Kyrgyz’, dramatically demonstrating the identity crisis presently suffered by the Russians in the new ‘near abroad’.73 Relations between the ethnic communities have appeared fairly amicable and stable in the last few years, although the suddenness and severity of the 1990 conflict in Osh must warn against complacency. Sub-national allegiances Sub-national allegiances to family, tribe or locality have always been stronger amongst the Kyrgyz people than any attachment to the ethnic label ‘Kyrgyz’. While supranational concepts of pan-Turkism and pan-Islamism have little support, these sub-national levels of self-consciousness remain powerful today, and differences between the Kyrgyz peoples can be greater than those between Kyrgyz and Russians. Achylova claims that ‘tribalism is a fundamental aspect of modern Kyrgyz national consciousness’ which has ‘emerged in every sphere of Kyrgyz society’.74 Leaders who seek to gain all possible support promote ties to clan or region, and these ‘invisible’ factors have re-emerged since independence as integral elements of Kyrgyz political machinations.75 Ambassador Otunbayeva believes ‘you have to know which button plays and you have to play well’,76 and Akaev supposedly has a useful tribal network of his own. Although he has publicly stressed his desire for representative government, a number of the President’s major appointments have been given to members of his wife’s clan.77 The most apparent sub-national divide is between the Russified north around Bishkek and the Chu Valley, and the southern areas of Osh and Jalalabad, which have large Uzbek populations. The great mountainous barrier that splits Kyrgyzstan created this historical divide initially, and communications remain difficult. The sedentary south has a stronger attachment to Islam and a more traditionally Asian society than the north, which is more industrialised and heavily settled by Slavs. For much of the Soviet period, a clan from the Naryn oblast dominated Kyrgyzstan, until Absamat Masaliev, from a southern clan, came to power in 1985. Masaliev’s defeat by the northerner Akaev in 1990, and the subsequent restructuring of Kyrgyz politics, left southern politicians, who had traditionally dominated certain key posts, feeling disgruntled. The serious ethnic clashes of 1990 created a tense atmosphere, fuelled by the subject of these delicate strategic balances, and the Uzbek government was not been slow to make its presence felt. The disenchanted political groupings or ‘families’ of the 125

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south called for greater political devolution, and the possibility of separation was implicit in Osh legislators’ introduction of a new anthem for the area in 1993.78 Huskey suggests that autonomy is demanded not to aid the development of the region’s society and economy, but rather to maintain local political networks and promote personal advancement.79 Another clear division between the Kyrgyz, ‘potentially the most serious’,80 exists between the Russified urban Kyrgyz and those living in the countryside. The Russification policy of Soviet rule had a tremendous impact on the educated Kyrgyz élite, who became immersed in Russian language and culture and lived side-by-side with the Slavic settlers in the new towns. The Kyrgyz revival has left these elites oddly placed as they remain in control of the structure of government, yet are unable to identify wholly with the cultural resurgence they have been obliged to sponsor. The ethnic revival has more resonance for the rural Kyrgyz, who today number over two-thirds of the ethnic Kyrgyz population.81 The Russified Kyrgyz are vulnerable to the nationalist claims made by these rural Kyrgyz and must establish a middle course in ethnic policy, or find themselves culturally adrift.82 This line has prevailed since independence, but the government is well aware of the potential threat of Kyrgyz nationalism and has repeatedly attacked populist leaders. It is difficult to judge the full significance of such ties and assess how deeply sub-national allegiances are held amongst the general population, but it is clear that the ideal of the ‘nation’ is compromised by these familial, local and cultural attachments.

Conclusion: Nation building and modern identity The Kyrgyz people are more aware of their national identity than ever before since their newly acquired independent status and the subsequent efforts to cultivate a sense of Kyrgyz nationhood. Changes in terminology may take time to become universally accepted, but they have been extensively implemented and appropriate new symbols have been developed to reflect the new ideology. The character of Manas has been successfully raised to the status of a glorious national figure and is now inseparable from modern Kyrgyz identity, while history and Islam have been utilised to support the development of a national consciousness. Changes to the constitution and the status of languages assure the primary position of its titular ethnicity and mark the break with the Soviet past. Although the field of identity reshaping is described as ‘virgin land’83 for the Kyrgyz, it had already been deeply ploughed by the Soviet outsiders. Official efforts to elevate the ‘Kyrgyz’ label of identity may be seen as part of the second process of identity engineering to have been attempted in Kyrgyzstan in the twentieth century. President Akaev is correct in believing that the first few years of independence are ‘too short in destiny for the country and nation to come to conclusions’ regarding the nationalities question, especially when compared to the seven decades of stability, vast resources and comprehensive ideology enjoyed by the Soviets. Although the fusion of peoples (sliianie) envisaged by 126

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Marxixt-Leninist theory never developed, the Soviets enjoyed limited success in nurturing Soviet and ‘national’ identities. Post-independence concepts of ‘Kyrgyz’ and ‘Kyrgyzstan’ owe more to the immediate, than the distant, past. This legacy has been accepted by a country comfortable with flying a red flag despite the so-called ‘Silk Revolution’ and nation-building rhetoric of Akaev’s government.84 The difficulties of a nation-building process are evident from the Soviet experience, and the promotion of Kyrgyz ethno-culture has been restricted. Identity is problematic for policy makers as ‘the people are not sheep on the fields. They will go wherever they like.’85 Furthermore, the lack of national awareness and history is a great hindrance, but one which might be overcome by propaganda, and time. However, the crucial presence of non-ethnic Kyrgyz citizens makes the development of a ‘national’ ideology awkward. Akaev’s slogan ‘Kyrgyzstan is our Common Home’ indicates his awareness of the delicate balance required to consolidate the independent state without wholly alienating its ethnic minorities. Perhaps because of the level of democratisation and the reluctance of nonKyrgyz to engage in politics, whenever the balance has tipped, it has gone in favour of the more nationally minded Kyrgyz. The question of identity in modern Kyrgyzstan remains more vague and elusive than in most societies. Nationalism may be the most forceful ideology of the post-colonial period, but the limited support for nationalist groups indicates the continuing relative weakness of Kyrgyz national consciousness. Sub-national layers of self-consciousness are the hardest to assess, but clearly remain important and undermine Kyrgyz unity. Although the revival of Kyrgyz culture and language has encouraged Kyrgyz national awareness, after years of severe economic crisis, simple survival is the preoccupation of most and identity is not considered as important. For the non-Kyrgyz ethnicities, identity is a more painful and pressing concern. With the disappearance of their Soviet homeland, these peoples were stranded in a newly foreign land and many have responded to the perceived relegation of their status by emigrating. Their identity is conditioned by Soviet demarcation, and with the removal of the Soviet layer, the national/ethnic level of consciousness – whether Russian, Uzbek, German or Korean – has become dominant. Instead of attachment to the Kyrgyz Republic, a forlorn acceptance of the new order and an overriding concern for economic survival has emerged. While the government has worked hard to include various groups in the new republic, it is difficult for nonKyrgyz peoples to identify with a state that strongly promotes Kyrgyz culture and the legends of Manas. The government must continue to treat its people sensitively while the promotion of the term ‘Kyrgyzstani’ could be useful in creating a shared attachment to this impoverished country. It may be too early for the country to form such a sophisticated definition, but the concept of a ‘Kyrgyzstani’ rather than a ‘Kyrgyz’ nation must be the goal.86 Nation building is undoubtedly significant for the consolidation and development of Kyrgyzstan, but a successful future also depends on economic recovery. 127

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As a Bishkek taxi driver put it, ‘Manas does not put bread on the table.’87 The nature of the nation-building process itself is also crucial. The effort to legitimise the Kyrgyz state and arouse Kyrgyz national consciousness has been essential, but it is vital to determine a position for the non-Kyrgyz within this apparently exclusive ideology. There is a possibility that Kyrgyz nationalism may escalate, especially within the context of economic collapse, but the general disinclination to indulge in national chauvinism is heartening. It might be argued that, during the last decade of the twentieth century, ‘Kyrgyz’ nation building was accomplished to the extent that the new state is clearly identifiable, and that the trappings of nationhood have been invented and reshaped, albeit in nascent form. The national ideology of the future will require a formula to meet the far greater challenge of creating a ‘Kyrgyzstani’ nation.

Notes 1 In 1990, the name Kirghizia was changed to Kyrgyzstan. For convenience, the forms ‘Kyrgyz’ and ‘Kyrgyzstan’ will be used throughout this chapter. 2 R. Szporluk, ‘Statehood and Nation Building in Post-Soviet Space’, in R. Szporluk (ed.), National Identity and Ethnicity in Russia and the New States of Eurasia (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1994), p. 3. 3 Quoted in E. Huskey, ‘Kyrgyzstan: The Politics of Demographic and Economic Frustration’, in I. Bremmer and R. Taras (eds), New States, New Politics: Building the PostSoviet Nations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. 412. 4 See R. Achylova, ‘Political Culture and Foreign Policy in Kyrgyzstan’ in V. Tismaneanu (ed.), Political Culture and Civil Society in Russia and the New States of Eurasia (New York: Armonk, 1995), p. 319; John Anderson, Kyrgyzstan: Central Asia’s Island of Democracy? (Amsterdam: Hardwood, 1999), p. 1; Martha Brill Olcott, ‘Ceremony and Substance: The Illusion of Unity in Central Asia’, in M. Mandlebaum (ed.), Central Asia and the World (New York: Council on Foreign Relations Press, 1994), p. 23; Ahmed Rashid, The Resurgence of Central Asia: Islam or Nationalism? (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1994) p. 139. 5 A. Bohr and S. Crisp, ‘Kyrgyzstan and the Kyrgyz’, in G. Smith (ed.), The Nationalities Question in the Post-Soviet States, (Harlow: Lomgman, 1996), p. 385. Anderson, op. cit., p. 2. Abramzon dates this to the eighteenth century; Huskey, op. cit., p. 399. 6 S. Akiner, ‘Melting Pot, Salad Bowl – Cauldron? Manipulation and Mobilization of Ethnic and Religious Identities in Central Asia’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol. 20 (2), April 1997, pp. 367–8. 7 There was a certain measure of debate within this ‘consensual’ nomadic culture that is acclaimed today as the origin of the relatively ‘democratic’ nature of modern Kyrgyz politics. Achylova, op. cit., pp. 321–2; Olcott, op. cit., p. 32. 8 Anderson, op. cit., p. 7. 9 Ibid., p. 3. 10 The shape of the new republics was contested by Central Asian leaders, indicating a measure of attachment to ethnicity; this simply was not the dominant marker in a complex and fluid personal consciousness. 11 Akiner, op. cit., p. 375. The accuracy of the Soviet definition ‘Kyrgyz’ may, however, be questioned as surveys were far from foolproof. 12 Anderson, op. cit., p. 11. 13 P. Carley, ‘The Legacy of the Soviet Political System and the Prospects for Developing Civil Society in Central Asia’, in Tismaneanu (ed.), op. cit., p. 300.

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14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23

24

25 26 27

28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

Ibid., p. 301. Akiner, op. cit., p. 384. Huskey, op. cit., p. 554. Anderson, op. cit., p. 20. V. Tishkov, Ethnicity, Nationalism and Conflict in and after the Soviet Union: The Mind Aflame (London: Sage, 1997), p. 51. See M. Atkin, ‘Religious, National and Other Identities in Central Asia’, in Jo-Ann Gross (ed.), Muslims in Central Asia: Expressions of Identity and Change (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1992), p. 51. Huskey, op. cit., p. 411. Tishkov, op. cit., p. 103. J. Chinn and R. Kaiser, Russians as the New Minority: Ethnicity and Nationalism in the Soviet Successor States (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996), p. 226. Bohr believes the change was enforced by nationalist elements to enhance the status of the ethnic Kyrgyz by describing the state as specifically ethnic Kyrgyz, rather than that of all those who live in Kyrgyzstan. A. Bohr, ‘The Central Asian States as Nationalising Regimes’ in G. Smith et al., Nation-Building in the Post-Soviet Borderlands (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), p. 148. Hiro argues the new name is less ethnically charged, as the ‘republic’ of the Kyrgyz is a political construct, rather than a claim for the whole physical land for the Kyrgyz. D. Hiro, Between Marx and Muhammad: The Changing Face of Central Asia (London: HarperCollins, 1994), p. 141. Ambassador Otunbayeva dismisses both suggestions and claims this was nothing more sinister than a simple terminological change. Interview with Ambassador Otunbayeva, London, 1999. Tishkov argues that ‘Kirgizia’ remains the form used in practice and the ‘radical’ term ‘Kyrgyzstan’ therefore lacks legitimacy. Tishkov, op. cit., p. ix. The terminology is further confused by the Tsarist and early Soviet use of ‘Kirghiz’ to denote the Kazakhs, and ‘Kara-Kirghiz’ to denote the Kyrgyz. According to Jumabek Ibraimov, Mayor of Bishkek, the site was so attractive that five knights fought for its possession. Passport to the New World, May–June 1994, p. 21. The change of name of an Osh department store from the Russian Liudmilla to the suitably Kyrgyz Aisula aroused furious protests. J. King et al., Central Asia: A Lonely Planet Survival Kit (Hawthorn: Lonely Planet, 1996), p. 415. The north/south divide was also apparently influential as blue was favoured by the north and red by the south, but parliamentary deputies from the south prevailed by arguing that blue was unacceptable as it is the colour worn by women in mourning. Achylova, op. cit., p. 326. It is suggested that the ethnonym ‘Kyrgyz’ means ‘forty clans’. Rashid, op. cit., p. 138. K. Otorbaev, et al., Kyrgyzstan (Bishkek, 1994), p. 18. T. Koichuiev, ‘Kyrgyzstan: The Road to the Future’, Eurasian Studies, Vol. 3 (2), 1996, p. 15. King et al., op. cit., p. 357. Ibid., p. 357. Huskey, op. cit., p. 554. Ibid., p. 557. Akiner, op. cit., p. 388. Huskey, op. cit., p. 559. Bohr and Crisp, op. cit., p. 405. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Kyrgyz Service, 6 August 1999. J. Anderson, ‘Constitutional Development in Central Asia’, Central Asia Survey, Vol. 16 (3), 1997, p. 301. Ibid., p. 303. Hiro, op. cit., p. 141.

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42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49

50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69

70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80

Bohr, op. cit., p. 147. Ibid., p. 147. Ibid., p. 148. Chinn and Kaiser, op. cit., p. 227. Bohr, op. cit., p. 159. Ibid., p. 149. Ibid., p. 155. The term is favoured by Ambassador Otunbayeva, who considers herself a representative of all the ‘Kyrgyzstani’ people, but it is not in official or practical use (neither the Kyrgyz nor the non-Kyrgyz use the label) and ethnic demarcation officially survives. The government has not yet discussed using this term, but Ambassador Otunbayeva hopes it will become established in a manner similar to Kazakhstan, where official speeches refer to the Kazakhstani people. Otunbayeva, interview. S. F. Starr, ‘Introduction’, in S. F. Starr (ed.), The Legacy of History in Russia and the New States of Eurasia (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1995), p. 7. Achylova, op. cit., p. 374. Ibid., pp. 319–20. Koichuiev, op. cit., pp. 19–20. Otorbaev et. al., op. cit., p. 16. Achylova, op. cit., p. 321. K. Moldobaev, ‘The Transformation of Societal Values in Kyrgyzstan’, Central Asian Monitor, Vol. 4, 1998, p. 12. Koichuiev, op. cit., p. 34. Starr, op. cit., p. 10. S. Akiner, ‘Islam, the State and Ethnicity in Central Asia in Historical Perspective’, Religion, State & Society, Vol. 24 (2/3), 1996, p. 26. S. Hunter, Central Asia Since Independence (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1996), p. 142. 1997 figure. UNDP, Common Country Assessment of the Kyrgyz Republic, p. 7. Chinn and Kaiser, op. cit., p. 234. Anderson, Kyrgyzstan, op. cit., p. 45. Bohr and Crisp, op. cit., p. 394. Bohr, op. cit., p. 144. Bohr and Crisp, op. cit., p. 394. UNDP, Common Country Assessment, p. 7. Ibid., p. 11. Kyrgyz government officials privately estimated that at the height of Russian outmigration (1993), real per capita income was US$800 per year, compared to US$3400 in Russia. M. Olcott, Central Asia’s New States: Independence, Foreign Policy, and Regional Security (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 1996), p. 91. Bohr and Crisp, op. cit., p. 394. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Kyrgyz Service, 6 August 1999. UNDP, Common Country Assessment, p. 11. Bruce Pannier, ‘A Linguistic Dilemma in Kyrgystan’, Transition, 29 November 1996, p. 29. Achylova, op. cit., p. 326. Martha Brill Olcott, ‘Islam and Fundamentalism in Independent Central Asia’, in Yaacov Ro’i (ed.), Muslim Eurasia: Conflicting Legacies (London: Frank Cass, 1995), p. 24. Interview. Olcott, ‘Islam and Fundamentalism’, op. cit., p. 24. Olcott, Central Asia’s New States, op. cit., p. 106. Huskey, op. cit., p. 409. Ibid., p. 410.

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81 UNDP, Kyrgyzstan. National Human Development Report, p. 56. 82 The cultural dichotomy of the Russified Kyrgyz was illustrated by an ethnic Kyrgyz member of parliament: ‘I would not have the right to call myself a son of my people without knowing the Kyrgyz language. But without a deep knowledge of Russian, I would not consider myself a complete man.’ Quoted in Huskey, op. cit., p. 409. 83 Ambassador Otunbayeva, Interview. 84 ‘Silk Revolution’ refers to Kyrgyzstan’s relatively smooth transition from a Soviet republic to an independent state with a degree of social and political pluralism. 85 Ambassador Otunbayeva, Interview. 86 This was suggested by Ambassador Otunbayeva, Interview. 87 Anderson, Kyrgyzstan, op. cit., p. 61.

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7 THE USE OF HISTORY The Soviet historiography of Khan Kenesary Kasimov Henri Fruchet

On 26 December 1950, Pravda, the official mouthpiece of the Communist Party, contained an article entitled ‘For a Marxist-Leninist Examination of the Problems of the History of Kazakhstan’,1 in which the rebellion led by Khan Kenesary Kasimov from 1837 to 1847 was described as a ‘reactionary feudal movement’.2 Such a re-evaluation represented a fundamental shift for the Party, as this revolt, and the many others which shook Central Asia and the Caucasus under Tsarist rule, had previously been regarded as ‘progressive acts of national liberation’.3 The radical nature of this re-evaluation raises several important questions. What factors could have prompted the Party to abandon views that it had held since before 1917? What was so important about the Kenesary Revolt that it warranted a large article in Pravda? What does this re-evaluation reveal of the use of history by the Communist Party to further its goals and needs? To answer these questions, the transformation of the historiography of Khan Kenesary Kasimov’s revolt must be addressed. Originally, a ‘progressive act of national liberation’, the revolt mutated into a ‘reactionary feudal movement’, with Kenesary himself undergoing a metamorphosis from a ‘hero of the people’ into an ‘oppressor of the Kazakh people and representative of the feudal class’.4 The re-evaluation, officially endorsed by the Party in 1950, must be understood as a response by the Party to what it perceived to be a lack of loyalty on the part of Central Asian historians to Soviet ideology, and their attachment to both ‘bourgeois-nationalist’ and ‘cosmopolitan ideas’. The question of both loyalty to, and faith in, the Marxist-Leninist laws of history (zakonomernost), especially the idea of the inevitable triumph of communism (and thus the Soviet Union), became considerably more important as the new bipolar geo-political reality of the Cold War emerged. Moscow’s position at the head of one of those poles determined the way in which the Party hoped that history would be read. Any attempt to understand the re-evaluation endorsed by the Party in 1950 must begin in 1934, with the posthumous purge of the father figure of early 132

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Soviet historiography, M. N. Pokrovsky.5 His sociological view of history,6 and his condemnation of Russian colonial rule as an absolute evil, came to be seen as inimical to the regime.7 As Bertram Wolfe writes: Pokrovsky was accused of being antinational and antipatriotic (he shared Lenin’s personages in favor of generalized sociological schemata, until then considered a hallmark of Marxist historical interpretation); of being ‘antiscientific’ and ‘anti-Marxist’; of ‘underestimating’ Lenin (he wrote: ‘Whenever Lenin differs from me I blindly accept his view; he can see ten feet deeper into the earth than any of the rest of us’); and of underestimating Stalin (which was undoubtedly true and the immediate though not the only explanation of his downfall).8 Following his purge, the Party engaged in an ambitious project not only to write new history textbooks, but also to change both the way that history was understood, and, especially, how it was taught. In the ‘Decree of 16 May 1934, on the Teaching of History in Schools’, Stalin and Molotov wrote: The decisive condition for enduring mastery of a history course by students is the observance of historical and chronological sequence in the statement of historical events, with strict implantation in the students’ memory of important historical events, historical personalities, and chronological dates. Only such a history course can ensure the comprehensibility, clarity, and concreteness of historical material that the students need; correct analysis and correct generalization of historical events leading the student to a Marxist understanding of history are possible only on this basis.9 In addition to the promotion of this new historical method, the Party also began to demand that the historians offer a somewhat brighter interpretation of the Russian colonial past.10 This order had several important repercussions for the historiography of Central Asia. First, it was followed by a complete ban on the ‘Pokrovsky school’, on the grounds that Pokrovsky and his followers were said to foster ‘nihilistic attitudes towards Russian history and national traditions’.11 Second, it led to the formulation in 1937, by Stalin and Shestakov, of the doctrine of ‘Lesser Evil’, which claimed that Russian colonial rule was the ‘lesser evil’ compared to potential domination by the Turks, Iranians or British. Third, the Boris D. Grekov Russian nationalist history school was promoted to a leading position in Soviet historiography.12 While these new policies did not lead to an immediate re-evaluation of Tsarist colonial rule (and thus the anti-colonial revolts), they did, along with Stalin’s purges, seriously affect the study of history in the Soviet Union on the eve of the Second World War. Marin Pundeff writes: 133

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At any rate, what now arose was the Stalinist totalitarianism which pressed the elimination of whatever intellectual independence survived in the Party, the enforcement of rigorous theoretical dogmatism, and the regimentation of all areas of life to serve the purposes of Stalin’s regime. Prominent among these purposes were the preparation of the Russian people through patriotic education and propaganda to face the German threat, and the restoration of traditional history to serve this education and make possible the creation of the ‘great leader’ myth.13 This process of ‘patriotic education and propaganda’ involved several trends that would greatly affect, both indirectly and directly, the evaluation of the revolt led by Khan Kenesary Kasimov. The first can be seen in the return to the ideas of both pan-Slavism and the glorification of the Russian past (for example, the rise of the Grekov school)14 for the purpose of supporting the slogan ‘All for the Front, All for Victory’.15 Not only was the past glory of Russian history championed, but the old themes of the patriotic heroism of the Russian people, and the unity of all Slavs in the face of recurring German aggression, were also emphasised.16 While this rhetoric was toned down after the signing of the Nazi–Soviet Pact, it was quickly resumed after the launch of Operation Barbarossa, when the Germans reclaimed their status as the prime enemy.17 Grekov was placed in charge of a committee whose main goal was to foster ‘the unity of the Slavic people in the struggle against Hitler’s Germany’ and to illuminate ‘the glorious pages of the history of the Slavic peoples [and their] contributions to the civilization of mankind’.18 As part of this barrage of Russian nationalist propaganda – designed to instil patriotism in the Soviet populace – historians placed considerable emphasis on the promotion of great military figures from the Russian past.19 However, this act created several problems, the first of which was the impact of ethnic nationalism in a multi-ethnic state. As Lowell Tillett writes: In their eagerness to secure the allegiance of non-Russian subjects, the ideological authorities tried to instil a new patriotism based on military traditions with Russian military exploits as a leading element. But the scheme had a fatal flaw. Russian nationalism was not exportable to nonRussian people. Nationalism in a multi-ethnic state is a centrifugal, not unifying, force.20 The Soviet drive to promote patriotic support for the war through the glorification of military heroes did not meet with much success in Central Asia during the early years of the war. In 1942, an article decrying this problem appeared in a party publication entitled Propagandist. It argued that: It must be noted, as a shortcoming in the work of the local publishing houses, that there is an almost complete lack of books on national 134

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heroes, on the participation and military co-operation of the various peoples of our country in popular, patriotic wars against foreign conquerors, on the love of the motherland and love of freedom of these peoples. Meanwhile there exists, among all peoples of our motherland, a burning desire to know more about the heroism of their ancestors, about the participation of their sons in patriotic liberation wars.21 The scholarship produced in the non-Russian areas that was intended to fill this gap did not, however, correspond to the needs or wishes of the Party. While the Central Party produced propaganda in which ‘emphasis was placed on military cooperation between Russians and non-Russians, and on Russian military aid for the other peoples of the future U.S.S.R.’, the work produced in many of the non-Russian areas tended to focus on both the native military traditions and heroes and also on their struggles against the Russians, not on their alliance with them.22 The prevalence of anti-Russian views in this scholarship, coupled with the knowledge that several of the non-Russian peoples on the western front of the Soviet Union had treated the advancing Nazis as liberators, rather than conquerors,23 induced in the communist leadership the realisation that both patriotism for, and loyalty to, the Soviet Union were far from being a fait accompli among the non-Russian population.24 The campaign to promote ‘local’ military heroes, designed by the Party to encourage patriotism toward the Soviet Union, must be viewed as a failure. Not only did it serve to stoke national pride amongst many of the non-Russian peoples, it also forced the Party to confront a difficult, and potentially divisive, issue: it had to find a way to assess and classify the anti-colonial revolts that shook many parts of the Tsarist Empire during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. By examining the controversy surrounding the evaluation of the political nature of the Kenesary Revolt, it is possible to find not only other revolts which came under the scrutiny of the Communist Party, such as the revolt led by Shamil in Dagestan (1834–59), the Andizhan Revolt (1898) or the 1916 Revolt, but also to view the change in Soviet historiography on the inclusion of Central Asia into the Tsarist empire. In addition, a study of the historiography of the Kenesary Revolt is rendered more fruitful by the fact that many of the leading Soviet historians from Moscow’s Institute of History were relocated to Kazakhstan for the duration of the Second World War.25 While in Kazakhstan, they collaborated with many leading Kazakh historians on a series of works on Kazakh history that the Communist Party leadership in Moscow hoped could both rectify the problems raised in the Propagandist article, and serve as pilot projects to be emulated in the other non-Russian republics.26 The History of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, published in 1943 by the Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnicity of the Kazakh Academy of Sciences, was the first product of this collaboration.27 Under the editorship of the Deputy Director of Moscow’s Institute of History, Anna Pankratova, this 135

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book included contributions by leading Russian and Kazakh scholars, as well as senior members of the Kazakh Communist Party such as Mukhomedzhan Abdykalykov, the Secretary in Charge of Propaganda of the Kazakh Party’s Central Committee.28 The various contributors, however, were by no means in agreement as to what position the book should adopt on the issue of the incorporation of Kazakhstan into the Tsarist Empire.29 Their disagreements highlight the problems faced by the Party in its attempts to promote patriotism among the diverse peoples of the Soviet Union. As Eli Weinerman notes, the scholars who worked on the project splintered into two groups: some ‘tended to emphasize the colonial policies of tsarism, while others put the stress on the beneficial results of incorporating the Kazakh peoples into Russia’. As the struggle for national survival against Germany fanned Russian nationalism, many Russian historians found it simply unacceptable to condemn Russian colonialism: such a condemnation would wholly minimize Russian’s historical past.30 Ultimately, however, Pankratova, a staunch promoter of Bolshevik criticism of Russian colonialism, and her Kazakh co-authors, won the argument, and the resulting book not only characterised colonial rule in very negative terms, it also made no mention of the ‘Lesser Evil’ formula.31 The book expounded the idea that ‘the major goals of Russian colonialism were the exploitation of the Kazakh people, with utter disregard for their well-being, and the deliberate suppression of any progressive elements potentially beneficial to the Kazakhs’.32 Needless to say, the book treated the revolt led by Kenesary in very favourable terms, describing it as ‘a struggle for independence and political unification’.33 Upon its release in 1943, the book received very mixed reviews. It was highly praised by both the Kazakh Party’s Central Committee and the People’s Commissariat of Education, with the Kazakh Party nominating it for the highest Soviet award, the Stalin Prize.34 In July 1943, it received a favourable review in Pravda by A. V. Piakovskii, a specialist on Central Asia, who described the book as ‘an important addition to the accomplishments of Marxist-Leninist scholarship’.35 Soon after, however, Aleksei I. Iakolev, whom the State Committee had asked to review the book, objected to its nomination for the Stalin prize.36 He described the anti-colonial stand taken by Pankratova and her co-authors as being ‘disrespectful towards the Russian people and the Russian state’, and further criticised the authors for failing to notice that Russia had brought the benefits of a higher economy and culture, and thus had led the Kazakhs towards progress.37 On 12 October 1943, a short article appeared in Istorichevskii zhurnal which sheds a considerable amount of light not only on the debate over the book, but also on the changing nature of the opinions held by scholars vis-à-vis the revolts.38 The article was a report of a discussion hosted by the editors of Istorichevskii zhurnal to discuss the new book. Among the twenty-seven participants 136

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were found many of the most prominent Soviet historians, including Pankratova and Grekov. Lowell Tillett describes the meeting as follows: It seems likely, from the defensive tone of many of the speakers, that some Party criticism had already been heard, and the historians, under conditions of comparative freedom, were explaining their positions and making a collective defence. … Their remarks, for the most part, supported well-established interpretations, or those recently called for by Party spokesmen. In many cases they admitted that they were sailing uncharted seas, and explained the careful reasoning upon which their interpretations were based. In view of what happened to these interpretations in a short time, the arguments of this little known meeting take on a great significance, both as a candid statement of a group of distinguished Soviet historians on several important questions, and as an indication of the historian’s predicament in trying to anticipate the Party line.39 At the beginning of the meeting, Pankratova raised the issue of the interpretation of the Kazakh resistance movements, noting that there had been a great deal of disagreement on the issue among the authors. She noted that while some had viewed all of these movements as ‘progressive’ acts of national liberation (and thus very much in tune with the patriotic drive of the Party), others had viewed them as ‘reactionary’.40 The importance of this lies in the fact that this was apparently the first time that several Soviet historians openly viewed the resistance movements as being reactionary in nature, an event that Tillett attributes to the influence of recent Party statements that both promoted the centralised state, and began the rehabilitation of Tsarist foreign policy.41 The predicament in which historians found themselves when writing about the non-Russian areas, exemplified by the fact that the History of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic was not awarded the Stalin Prize, can be viewed as the problem of how to adhere faithfully to the scientific Marxist-Leninist laws of history, on the one hand, and, on the other, to remain in line with the oscillating goals and policies of both Stalin and the Party.42 In order to understand the problem, it is necessary to examine at length the statements made by Anna Pankratova in her 1942 article, ‘Twenty-five Years of Soviet Historical Science’. She writes: Marxist-Leninist historical science alone has produced a scientifically argumented periodization of world history. … The development of periodization of world history by Comrade Stalin is not limited to extending the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of the formations. Comrade Stalin has brought out the process of the acceleration of human history. … What are the tasks at present on the historical front of the U.S.S.R.? The tasks are entirely defined by the demands and exigencies of the Great Patriotic War against Hitlerite barbarian fascism. The task of 137

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increasing the ideological armament of the entire Soviet people … is foremost before all Soviet historians and the scholarly centres encompassing them. … Above all, Soviet historians must give a profoundly truthful illumination of the heroic past of the peoples of the Soviet Union. Historians in the U.S.S.R. are writing the history of their Motherland as fervent patriots. … The images of the great Russian patriots and heroes of liberation struggle of the peoples of the U.S.S.R. must be enveloped in glory and carefully preserved for future generations in the works of Soviet historians.43 In editing the History of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, Pankratova remained true to her word. As Kudriatsev, the editor of Istorichevskii zhurnal, wrote: ‘We can in all truth say that this book actually inculcates patriotism, the will to fight, faith in victory, inspired by feats in the name of the Motherland. Therefore it is difficult to over-estimate the importance of this book.’44 The problem, however, was that while historians such as Pankratova were attempting to promote ‘Soviet patriotism’, firm in their belief that ‘all national movements were progressive because they were directed against Tsarist power, against Tsarist Russia’,45 Moscow was becoming increasingly enamoured with Russian nationalism. As Tillett notes: ‘The struggle for independence of the Kazakhs could only be regarded from the viewpoint of Russian nationalism as an enemy action aimed at weakening the now hallowed strong Russian government.’46 The effect of the entrenchment of Russian nationalism on the historiography of Central Asia is evident from an article that appeared in 1945 in a publication entitled Bolshevik. The author of the article, M. Morozov, who only three years earlier had written the aforementioned article in the Propagandist, wrote: They [the authors of the History of the Kazakh S.S.R. (Alma-Ata, 1943) ] present the history of the Kazakh people exclusively as a process of forming military traditions in the struggle of the Kazakhs for their independence. All phenomena and events which are considered in the book are evaluated from this one-sided and therefore incorrect point of view.47 The same article assumed a significant role in the development of the historiography of the revolts, which would have a tremendous impact on all future evaluations. It contained the first open critique of Khan Kenesary Kasimov himself. Morozov described him as a member of the exploiting class, a supporter of the feudal class, and an opponent of the interests of the working class.48 The importance of this open denunciation is underscored by the fact that at the meeting sponsored by Istorichevskii zhurnal, the issue of the leadership of the revolts had been almost entirely ignored.49 This lack of attention, despite the fact that Kenesary had received a great deal of attention and praise in the book, is indicative of the rise of new ideas and pressures which were soon to radically 138

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alter the Soviet historiography of Central Asia. The silence of the book’s critics can be justified, as they were willing to criticise the book in general, but were unwilling to defy the Party policy of promoting military heroes in order to aid the war effort. However, the silence of the book’s authors can only be understood if their earlier views, namely that Kenesary’s leadership had been an excellent example of the fight for independence and the formation of a strong Kazakh state50, were quickly becoming potentially dangerous to hold. As Tillett states: But such a positive interpretation was accomplished at the expense of two other factors, which had to be ignored: he had waged his struggle against future Soviet peoples – the Kirgiz and, more importantly, the Russians – and his movement was feudal and separatist in character. The reluctance of the authors of the Kazakh history to discuss the hero whom they had extolled a short time earlier is perhaps another indication that these points were becoming more sensitive within the party.51 By the time that Morozov’s criticism was published, the wave of recrimination against scholars had already broken. In September 1944, Pankratova had been officially reprimanded by the Party’s Central Committee, who accused her of both rejecting the ‘Lesser Evil’ theory, and of provoking nationalism in Central Asia.52 Although relieved from her post as Deputy Director of the Institute of History, the Party did not choose to silence her completely, perhaps because she chose to adopt the ‘Lesser Evil’ theory. They did, however, want to send a message that the views advocated by Pankratova and her followers were no longer to be tolerated. The Morozov article was the vehicle chosen for this task.53 The message, it seems, was well understood. Both Voprosy Istorii, the main historical journal, and the Kazakh Party issued blistering attacks on the book, with the latter minimising, almost to the point of non-existence, its participation in the writing of the book.54 In addition to reprimanding certain individuals, the Party also began to demand four main conditions from historians examining Central Asia during colonial times. First, the history of Russian colonial rule had to be examined through the lens of the ‘Lesser Evil’ formula.55 Second, resistance movements and revolts had to be interpreted from the standpoint of class, and not from the standpoint of nationality.56 Third, Soviet patriotism was in no way to be associated with non-Russian nationalism, an order designed to restrict the idealisation of the ‘feudal past’. Fourth, emphasis was to be placed on the mutual struggle of Russians and non-Russians against ‘foreign enemies’. Inherent in this directive was the idea of downplaying the existence of conflict between those future Soviet ‘natural allies’.57 In describing the historians’ silence vis-à-vis the question of the leadership of the revolts at the 1943 Istorichevskii zhurnal meeting, Lowell Tillett writes: It is also worth noting that the historians at this point were still inclined to put all movements in the same category. No one had yet considered 139

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that a formula might be found by which they would be divided, good and bad.58 The Party’s order to adopt these four new ‘analytical tools’, especially the second and the fourth, can be taken as a clear indication that this ‘formula’ was close to being discovered. At the end of the war, Stalin made a toast at a reception in the Kremlin that indicated clearly the extent to which Soviet patriotism had become eclipsed by Great Russian nationalism. He stated: ‘I drink, above all, to the health of the Russian people, for it is the most outstanding nation of all the nations forming a part of the Soviet Union.’59 This rising Russian nationalism was fuelled by the new position occupied by the Soviet Union on the world stage. The Communist Party found itself at the head of a ‘superpower’ nation in a world that was quickly becoming polarised into two opposing camps. As Bertram Wolfe notes: The war ended with the Soviet Union as the only great power astride the Eurasian land mass, with a power vacuum to the west and a power vacuum to the east of it. The United States represented the only possible obstacle to the rapid expansion of power of the Soviet empire in both vacuums.60 Not surprisingly, this new strategic and ideological reality led to the imposition of a new set of pressures on Soviet historians, which were designed not only to support the Soviet Union itself, but also to validate the Marxist-Leninist laws that had governed its rise and guaranteed its glorious future. Where historians had previously been called upon to use their scholarship to support the war effort, the outbreak of the Cold War demanded that they destroy much of that which they had so recently constructed. As Bertram Wolfe notes: ‘The first problem was to make the Soviet people forget their most recent and greatest experience.’61 For the Central Asians, a large part of this experience had been a escalation of national pride and consciousness, a process driven largely through the glorification of figures such as Khan Kenesary Kasimov. It was exactly this experience that the Soviet authorities set out to erase, and the weapon they chose to for the task is indicative of the sophistication of the feat that they were attempting to accomplish. Instead of attempting the essentially impossible task of purging the perpetrators of the national myth, they chose to combat it by analysing the incorporation of Central Asia into the Tsarist Empire through the framework of Marxist-Leninist dialectical materialism – most simply defined as an interpretation of historical phenomena derived from class struggle62 – and by emphasising the cause of that struggle, the mode of production.63 Their belief (or hope) was that by stressing the positive economic benefits brought about by Russian influence, and contrasting that with the negative role played by the members of the feudal aristocracy (such as Kenesary) in attempting to oppose this beneficial process, the ‘correct’ interpretation of the incorporation of Central Asia would arise, and this sense of nationalism on the part of Central Asians would disappear.64 140

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In order to facilitate the successful completion of this task, the Party began to play a proactive role in the writing of history. In 1946, it established the Commission on the History of Historiography, under the direction of the historian M. V. Nechkina, whose stated function was to ensure that all historical research, co-ordination as well as interpretation, was to follow a line defined by leading Party members.65 One of the first tasks set by the Party for historians was the production of histories of the non-Russian peoples from the MarxistLeninist viewpoint,66 a task deemed necessary to counter the existing works, which were all viewed as being insufficient due to their ‘bourgeois nationalist nature’, their ignorance of ‘Marxist-Leninist Science’, and their failure to prove the inevitable triumph of communism.67 As the Party was busy attempting to re-establish the supremacy of the Marxist-Leninist laws of history as the base for all historical scholarship, a work appeared which, once again, placed the difficult issue of classifying the Kenesary Revolt at the centre of heated debate. The title in question was E. B. Bekmakhanov’s 1947 book, Kazakhstan from the 1820s through the 1840s, which was the most in-depth examination ever published of the movement led by Khan Kenesary Kasimov.68 The controversial nature of the book rested not so much in its contents, which echoed in great detail all previous analyses of the movement, but in the fact that it was published at all. While the book may have served a positive purpose during the Second World War, in the new context of the Cold War it could only be viewed as a challenge to the authority of the centre. That it developed into a nuisance for the regime is due in large part to the quality of the work itself, as is attested to by the fact that, when it was reviewed in 1948 at a conference at the Institute of History of the USSR Academy of Sciences, it was defended by six of the seven panellists, with the lone critic severely attacked by the others.69 It was exactly because of the high quality of the work, because it subscribed to the Marxist-Leninist laws of history, that it was both so important and so dangerous. As Tillett writes: It is clear that Bekhmakhanov was not defying recent party directives altogether, but was attempting to work out a formulation that would find acceptance without basically changing a long-standing interpretation. … He sought to comply with Party demands by his emphasis on building a powerful centralized government, on the sanctity of the struggle for independence (both of which had been strongly emphasized during the war and had not been repudiated), by his implicit acceptance of the ‘lesser evil’ concept, by avoiding the idealization of Kenesary and his feudal system, and above all by his emphasis on the progressive significance of annexation. As it turned out, only the last point survived.70 It is the process of the elimination of these ideas, all staples of the wartime construct, that represents the final stage in the re-evaluation of the political 141

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nature of the Kenesary Revolt, and its recasting as a ‘reactionary’ event. This last phase, however, would prove to be the most difficult. During the Second World War, historians had a relatively simple task: all scholarship was to be directed towards aiding the war effort. In the Cold War context, however, historians became subject to a number of more complex and, in some cases, contradictory constraints and guidelines. The development that would most strongly affect the study of Central Asia was the decision taken by the Party to extend the idea of the ‘friendship of all Soviet peoples’ beyond its pre-war confines of 1917 into the distant past.71 A state of confusion, strongly influenced by the exigencies of the Great Leader mythology, and the continually changing political landscape, overcame the historical community. In this time of confusion, the Party assigned historians a daunting new task. This task, spelled out by the Party in The 1945 Plan for Post-war Historical Work, was to prove the universal validity of the Marxist-Leninist laws of history through the classification of all historical events, from the origins of history until the present, within the Marxist-Leninist periodisation of history.72 In attempting to establish the universal validity of Marxist-Leninist periodisation,73 the Communist Party was acting to address demands brought about both by its position as the vanguard country in the battle against imperialism (Soviet historical science now had the additional role of combating the untruths spread by ‘western imperialist bourgeois historians’),74 and by the persistence within the borders of the Soviet Union of what it saw as ideological deviation, a hotbed of which could be found in Central Asia.75 In 1948, the Party, as part of its growing emphasis on the idea of ‘the friendship of peoples’, began a campaign to rid the Soviet Union of the remnants of this ideological deviation.76 It is only in such a context that the reason for the attack on Kenesary, and the method in which it was undertaken, can be understood. While discussing the Party view of ‘cosmopolitanism’, one of the main sources of this deviation, Anatole Mazour states: ‘ “Cosmopolitanism” was defined now as a “reactionary ideology” that preached reciprocal influence and did not credit sufficiently national traditions; it represented a nihilistic attitude toward one’s own nation and towards Soviet patriotism, and minimized national traditional values.’77 While, at first glance, one could imagine that the Party, with lingering difficulties over the lack of Soviet patriotism, would fully endorse ‘cosmopolitanism’, the growth of the idea of the ‘eternal’ nature of the friendship of the Soviet peoples necessitated its attack. ‘Cosmopolitanism’ was viewed as dangerous because it questioned the origins of Russian culture at a time when the Party was busy eliminating the historical bonds which had existed between the non-Russian peoples and both Europe and Asia, and replacing them with new (eternal) ties to the historically superior Russian culture.78 Great Russian, and now Soviet, culture had been the source of a lasting friendship which had existed between Russia and its neighbours since medieval or even ancient times.79 For the Party, ‘cosmopolitanism’ was a symbol of a larger international threat. As Anatole Mazour argues: 142

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Cosmopolitanism was presented as nothing but a renunciation of national independence and state sovereignty in favor of world government advocated by American imperialism for the enslavement of smaller nations. It was a movement which was bound to impute foreign origins to Russian science and culture to deny national cultural legacy.80 During the late 1940s, the Communist Party was looking for more peaceful, more pro-Russian heroes among the non-Russian peoples of the Soviet Union in order to embellish these ideas.81 This search, however, was hampered by the controversy spawned by Bekmakhanov’s book. Following the appearance of the long-awaited new History of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic in 1949, the Party found itself under increasing pressure. The editors of the book accepted and corrected all except one of the criticisms that had been levelled against the previous edition: on the question of how to characterise the revolts, they stood their ground.82 After several years of remaining almost mute on the subject, and possibly prompted into action by potentially incendiary events, such as the independence of India in 1949, the Party finally voiced its opinion in Pravda in 1950.83 Under the rubric of the class-based analysis that governed its battle against ‘objectivism’, defined as ‘the historical analysis which neglects class struggle’,84 the Party officially denounced the Kenesary Revolt as being a reactionary movement. It ruled that the revolt was reactionary due to the fact that it dragged the people back toward the strengthening of patriarchal-feudal principles,85 and that it tried to alienate the Central Asian people from Russia, thus rendering them easy prey for foreign imperialist aggression.86 Kenesary himself was accused of being a pawn of foreign imperialists, and of misleading the Kazakh people into following him into a rebellion, the goal of which was the strengthening of patriarchal-feudalism.87 The denunciation of the revolt led by Khan Kenesary Kasimov, which was followed shortly thereafter by the abandonment of the ‘Lesser Evil’ formula in favour of the view that the incorporation of Central Asia into the Tsarist Empire had been an ‘absolute good’, can be seen as a prime example of the Party practice of altering history according to its needs. The Party, in its drive to prove both the validity of the Marxist-Leninist laws, and the idea of the ‘eternal’ friendship of the Soviet people, was forced into action by the stubborn resistance of both Soviet historians and native Party members. Although the denunciation, and the purge that followed, managed to silence the opposition temporarily, it was to rise again following the death of Stalin in 1953.

Notes 1 Konstantin Shteppa, Russian Historians and the Soviet State (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1962), p. 281. 2 Lowell Tillett, The Great Friendship: Soviet Historians on the Non-Russian Nationalities (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1969), p. 16.

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3 N. N. Poppe, ‘Ideological Work in Central Asia since The Second World War’, The East Turkic Review, Vol. 1, April 1959, p. 13. 4 G. A. von Stackelberg, ‘The Tashkent Conference on the History of the Peoples of Central Asia and Kazakhstan – 1954’, Bulletin of the Institute for the Study of the History and Culture of the U.S.S.R., Vol. 1, May 1954, p. 9. 5 Bertram Wolfe, An Ideology in Power (London: George Allen Unwin, 1969), p. 274. 6 Marin Pundeff (ed.), History in the USSR: Selected Readings (San Francisco: Chandler Publishing Co., 1967), p. 98. 7 Eli Weinerman, ‘The Polemics Between Moscow and Central Asians on the Decline of Central Asia and Tsarist Russia’s Role in the History of the Region’, The Slavonic and East European Review, Vol. 71, July 1993, p. 431. 8 Wolfe, op. cit., p. 274. 9 Pundeff, op. cit., pp. 98–9. 10 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 431. 11 Ibid., p. 433. 12 Ibid. 13 Pundeff, op. cit., p. 98. 14 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 433. 15 Pundeff, op. cit., p. 143. 16 Ibid. 17 Ibid., p. 144. 18 Ibid. 19 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 59. 20 Ibid. 21 Ibid., p. 58. 22 Ibid., p. 59. 23 Poppe, op. cit., p. 9. 24 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 58. 25 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 435. 26 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 70. 27 Serge Zenkovsky, ‘Ideological Deviation in Soviet Central Asia’, The Slavonic and East European Review, Vol. 32, 1953–4, p. 424. 28 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 435. 29 Ibid. 30 Ibid. 31 Ibid. 32 Ibid., p. 436. 33 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 71. 34 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 436. 35 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 72. 36 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 436. 37 Ibid. 38 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 72. 39 Ibid. 40 Ibid. 41 Ibid., p. 73. 42 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 436. 43 Pundeff, op. cit., pp. 147–9. 44 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 173. 45 Ibid., pp. 173–4. 46 Ibid., p. 73. 47 Ibid., p. 58.

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48 Lowell Tillett, ‘Soviet Second Thoughts on Tsarist Colonialism’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 42, January 1964, p. 311. 49 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 74. 50 Ibid. 51 Ibid. 52 Weinerman, op. cit., p. 437. 53 Ibid., p. 438. 54 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 81. 55 Weinerman, op cit, p. 437. 56 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 82. 57 Ibid. 58 Ibid., p. 73. 59 Shteppa, op. cit., p. 276. 60 Wolfe, op. cit., p. 282. 61 Ibid., p. 281. 62 Anatole Mazour, The Writing of History in the Soviet Union (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1971), p. 363. 63 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 81. 64 Ibid., p. 96. 65 Mazour, op. cit., p. xiv. 66 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 84. 67 Mazour, op. cit., p. xiv. 68 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 111. 69 Ibid., p. 117. 70 Ibid., p. 113. 71 Ibid., p. 6. 72 Pundeff, op. cit., pp. 150–62. 73 Marxist-Leninist periodisation can be simply defined as a framework based on socioeconomic formations in which history is divided into a series of identifiable epochs that follow one another in an unalterable evolutionary order. Mazour, op. cit., p. 360. 74 Pundeff, op. cit., p. 150. 75 Zenkovsky, op. cit., p. 424. 76 Ibid., p. 424. 77 Mazour, op. cit., p. 362. 78 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 86. 79 Tillett, ‘Soviet Second Thoughts on Tsarist Colonialism’, op. cit., p. 310. 80 Mazour, op. cit., p. 362. 81 Yuri Bregel, Notes on the Study of Central Asia (Bloomington: Research Institute for Inner Asia Studies, 1996), p. 9. 82 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., pp. 121–2. 83 Poppe, op. cit, p. 8. 84 Mazour, op. cit., p. 362. 85 Tillett, The Great Friendship, op. cit., p. 150. 86 Poppe, op. cit., p. 14. 87 Tillett, ‘Soviet Second Thoughts on Tsarist Colonialism’, op. cit., p. 310.

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8 SOVIET DEVELOPMENT IN CENTRAL ASIA The classic colonial syndrome? Alex Stringer The region defined since independence as Central Asia1 comprises Kazakhstan and the four former Soviet republics of Middle Asia (Srednyaya Azia). Owing to geography, ethnicity and the demands of economic development, the region is notably diverse. Historically, the biggest division has been between the civilisations of the Steppe lands to the north, and the oases in the south. Other fault-lines – linguistic, ethnic and social – divide the peoples of Central Asia. Moreover, policies pursued during the Soviet period caused further divisions, whilst simultaneously providing an element of uniformity. Uzbekistan is the most influential of the republics. The capital, Tashkent, was the seat of colonial government in the Tsarist period. It was also the scene of some of the most dramatic political events in the region’s early Soviet history: the establishment of Soviet power in Tashkent, and the disbanding of the short-lived Kokand government. Dominated by the cotton monoculture, Uzbekistan has been ravaged by its environmental consequences, and towards the end of the Soviet period the republic was at the heart of the great cotton scandal of the 1980s – the so-called ‘Uzbek affair’. In addition, Uzbekistan has produced some of the most significant figures in Soviet Central Asian history: Khojaev, Mukhitdinov and Rashidov. It remains the pivotal Central Asian state. Academic writing in English on Soviet Central Asia has been limited both chronologically and geographically by fluctuating levels of international interest. From the 1930s until the 1980s, ostensibly peaceful Sovietisation, albeit behind closed doors, led to a decline in Western interest. Difficulties in physical access and in obtaining reliable source material limited research, with the result that, for many years, the region was poorly served by Western scholars.2 The onset of glasnost, and growing evidence of serious internal problems in the Soviet Union, however, rekindled Western interest during the 1980s, especially as Central Asia was expected to be the most likely seat of resistance to Soviet power, and with the drama of the Soviet collapse and the emergence of five new states onto the world stage, Central Asia has attracted a new audience. 146

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The debate on Soviet development in Central Asia The Bolsheviks came to power at a time when European colonialism shaped the world. According to Marxist-Leninist ideology, imperialism was one of the poisoned fruits of capitalism. The promise of ‘national self-determination’ for the diverse peoples who had been absorbed into the Tsarist Empire in the nineteenth century, articulated by the new Bolshevik government in Moscow, was confounded by the Civil War’s legacy of a substantial colonial inheritance. During the first decades after the Second World War, the process of modernisation in Central Asia attracted a degree of sympathetic attention from the West. Works such as Alec Nove’s The Soviet Middle East: A Model for Development? argued that the region had experienced notable economic and social gains as a result of the Soviet involvement; that living standards compared favourably with those in neighbouring countries and in Russia itself; and that Soviet ideology had ‘caused a diversion of capital to those areas which, on strictly economic grounds, would have provided a higher return elsewhere’.3 Nove concluded that, although Moscow’s political control over the region was undoubted, the nature of the economic relationship and the position of Central Asians as Soviet citizens within a multi-national state undermined the idea that the Central Asian republics were colonies of Soviet Russia.4 During the 1980s, evidence of worsening economic, social and environmental conditions came to light under glasnost. This led to a renewed Western interest in Central Asia, perhaps connected to the possibility of unrest, and the awakening of political nationalism following disturbances in 1986 in Alma Ata, the capital of Kazakhstan. This resulted in the publication of a number of works with negative subtitles, such as The Failed Transformation and A Tragic Experiment.5 Such works contained a number of specific criticisms of Soviet policies in Central Asia: that they had led to excessive specialisation in the production of raw materials at the expense of other industries; that the environment had been severely damaged through ruthless and insensitive procurement policies; that living standards in the region were lower than anywhere else in the Union; and, finally, by implication, that the Central Asian periphery had been a victim to colonial exploitation by the core. At the same time, the first overt public criticisms of these policies began to be heard within Central Asia and other parts of the Soviet Union. A debate on the nature of the republics’ relationship with the rest of the Union began in the Soviet press. There are a number of reasons for this shift. Glasnost made public discussion and criticism possible for the first time, and affected the exposure of the serious environmental and health-related consequences of Soviet development policies. The aftermath of the ‘Uzbek affair’ led to feelings of resentment towards Moscow, particularly in Uzbekistan. The cotton scandal had caused the core to launch an assault on the native republican élites in an attempt to regain the political control that had ebbed during the Rashidov period. These native élites had consequently turned on the core in self-defence. In one sense, this was part of a response to the wider threat that glasnost and perestroika posed to the conservative 147

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republican regimes in the USSR. On a popular level, Uzbeks felt they had been blamed unfairly for the results of Moscow’s inflexible and unrealistic cotton procurement policies. Further, they resented their portrayal in the Soviet press as being temperamentally corrupt, a criticism that offended their sense of national honour. Independence has brought a further revision of views amongst Western observers. The more dire predictions of political and social upheaval made during the late 1980s have not been realised. The eventual dissolution of the Soviet Union occurred as the result of pressures that had little do with Central Asia, whose leaders – and perhaps people – were ultimately among its more loyal supporters. Most Central Asian communist leaders are still in power and appear to enjoy some measure of popular support. Nascent opposition movements have been suppressed and remain weak.6 Yet failure to find a productive path forward since independence has undermined initial predictions of economic potential and cast doubt on the feasibility of the rapid integration of the region into the world economy. In some cases, the economic viability of the republics as independent states has been questioned, prompting a reassessment of the notion that the states were necessarily disadvantaged by their economic relationship with the Soviet state. Not all of Central Asia’s woes can be blamed on the Soviet legacy, nor can they be solved easily by independence.7 The continuing uncertainty surrounding the future of the region, and the controversial process of reform within the Central Asian states and Russia, has meant that the debate on Soviet development has remained alive and the ‘colonial question’ persists.8 The suggestion of one-sided Soviet development is widespread among Western commentators.9 It has been asserted that specialisation in the production, but not the processing, of raw materials led to an excessive degree of dependence on the rest of the USSR, especially on Russia. This was intensified by the employment of large numbers of Russians and other skilled European workers in key sectors of industry. Some have suggested that this amounted to a deliberate strategy designed to ensure continuing political dependence on the Soviet Union.10 The degree of specialisation is not really under question, although it should be stressed that it was much greater in the four southern republics than in Kazakhstan. Central Asia was developed primarily as a base for agricultural produce and raw materials (that is, cotton in the southern republics of Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan, and grain and livestock in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan), as had been the case during the Tsarist period.11 Mineral resources were developed in all the Central Asian republics, but especially in Kazakhstan, where it has been suggested that the north of the republic was developed as ‘an appendage of the metallurgical complex in West Siberia and the Urals’.12 Oil and gas resources were developed in Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, and hydroelectricity projects were launched in the mountainous republics. 148

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The cotton monoculture Cotton is the product most frequently associated with Central Asia. A level of specialisation amounting to a monoculture has been singled out for criticism both in the West and in the region itself. It has been argued that, in addition to causing extreme dependence on the rest of the USSR, it was highly labourintensive, caused periodic disruptions to the labour force, and was both agronomically unsound and ecologically dangerous.13 Cotton specialisation has an almost symbolic significance in the debate on Soviet Central Asia. The statistics are well known and need be recounted only briefly. By the end of the Soviet period, Central Asia was producing 92 per cent of all Soviet cotton (much of the remaining 8 per cent was produced in Azerbaijan)14 and had become one of the world’s leading cotton-growing regions, accounting for around 17 per cent of global production.15 Two-thirds to three-quarters of Soviet cotton was grown in Uzbekistan16 and, during the late Soviet period, accounted for approximately 75 per cent of national income,17 employed 40 per cent of the workforce, and consumed 60 per cent of the republic’s resources.18 In Turkmenistan and Tajikistan, cotton cultivation was the main agricultural product, where agriculture itself formed the single largest sector of the economy. The small, mountainous republic of Tajikistan accounted for 11 per cent of Soviet cotton production.19 Even today, following a considerable drop in production, Uzbekistan alone accounts for around 7–10 per cent of world cotton production and 18–23 per cent of world cotton exports, ranking fifth and second, respectively, in world league tables.20 This is all the more remarkable considering that the greater part of the southern republics consists of desert or mountainous terrain unsuited to cotton growing. The cotton plantations must be contained within the very limited amount of arable land,21 with the result that in some regions they occupy up to 70 per cent of the sown area.22 The growth of the cotton monoculture is equally astonishing. The annual cotton yield in the area covered by present-day Uzbekistan increased by an estimated fifty-fold from the last years of the Tsarist Empire until the end of the Soviet period.23 A further push for increased production in the 1960s and 1970s resulted in the doubling of seed cotton production in Uzbekistan between 1962 and 1982,24 while the Soviet share of world cotton fibre production increased from 15 per cent to 21 per cent between 1965 and 1983.25 The corollary of cotton specialisation was a high dependence on imported food and consumer goods. Given the favourable climatic conditions for food cultivation in Central Asia, the need to import food has been heavily criticised. At the same time, the processing of most Central Asian cotton in European Russia is cited as a key element in the allegedly ‘colonial’ relationship between Moscow and the periphery. This refers essentially to the location of the Soviet textile industry. The initial stage of processing, ‘ginning’, occurred predominantly in Central Asia. It has been argued that the availability of labour in Central Asia, or, rather, the pressing need to find employment for large and increasing numbers of 149

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unemployed or underemployed workers, demanded the relocation of part of the Soviet textile industry to this area. The availability of local energy resources, and the questionable economic sense in shipping raw cotton to European Russia for processing when a large market for finished cotton textiles existed in Central Asia, reinforced the argument. Underlying these criticisms lay the notion, either implied or stated, that this system was comparable to exploitative trading relations, usually identified with ‘classic’ nineteenth-century capitalist imperialism so vehemently denounced by the Bolsheviks. Both historical and geographical factors help to explain the growth of the cotton monoculture in Central Asia. Parts of the region and Azerbaijan, for reasons of climate, were the only areas of the Soviet Union in which cotton could be cultivated successfully.26 However, the extreme aridity of the region creates difficulties. The areas best suited to cotton receive only 70–200 millimetres of rainfall per year27 and require constant irrigation: cotton needs large quantities of water both to feed and wash the plants. The region’s rivers, in particular the Syr Darya and the Amu Darya, determine the availability of water for irrigation. This situation is complicated further by the seasonal nature of their flow, and by the large quantities of water lost to evaporation in summer.28 Therefore, the Central Asian environment simultaneously invites and inhibits the growth of cotton. Historical factors have intervened also in the establishment of the industry. Cotton has a long history in Central Asia. The first great boost came during the American Civil War, when disruptions to the hitherto dominant American cotton industry necessitated alternative supply. By the time of the Bolshevik Revolution, a cotton industry was already well established in Central Asia, with supporting financial and technical infrastructures either already in place or under development. During the Soviet period, other significant factors emerged. The USSR was a largely closed system that aimed at autarky within the context of frequently hostile political relations with other world powers. Cotton cultivation was encouraged to meet domestic requirements and avoid dependency on world markets. In addition, cotton exports generated hard currency that was vital for the USSR. By the late 1970s, the negative impact of this policy was becoming apparent. The area under irrigation had reached nearly 8 million hectares, or 46 per cent of the total of irrigated land in the USSR – a dramatic increase of 3 million hectares in just twenty years.29 The flow of the main rivers had been drastically reduced: the Aral Sea was being fed only 10 per cent of the river water it had received twenty years earlier. Consequently, during that period, its surface area halved, its volume contracted to a third of its 1960 level, and salinity increased three-fold.30 At the same time, the health of the population was threatened as supplies of potable drinking water declined and the heavy use of fertilisers and pesticides resulted in high levels of chemical pollution. By the late 1980s, it was claimed that the quantities of poisonous chemicals used per hectare in some areas 150

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exceeded the Soviet average by more than fifty times, with consequently high incidences of health problems, particularly among children.31 Meanwhile, the abandonment of crop rotation for long periods and the intensive use of machinery contributed to the growing problem of soil erosion.32 By the early 1980s, Soviet cotton production was in decline with average yields per hectare falling from about 2,800 kilograms in the late 1970s to 2,300 kilograms in 1987.33 Such circumstances would seem initially to deny that cotton specialisation in Central Asia brought any notable benefits to the population. However, various factors suggest that the Soviet Central Asian experience is more an example of poor management and planning than an argument against cotton specialisation per se. The ability of the arid Central Asian environment to support cotton production on the scale the Union demanded is debatable, whilst it is a common fallacy that cotton requires more water than any other crop. 34 The claim that ‘excessive cottonisation’ is the chief reason for the shortage of water in Central Asia35 is somewhat misleading. It has been argued that while cotton requires huge quantities of irrigation water, food and fodder crops use nearly as much: rice, a staple of traditional Central Asian dishes, requires considerably more water.36 Moreover, given the huge population increase in the region since the Second World War and the consequent need for increased quantities of food and water for domestic consumption, the water situation in such an anhydrous region was always going to be problematic. The commonly held assumption that the increase in acreage under cotton in the post-war period occurred directly at the expense of food and fodder crops also requires modification. Areas for both of these products were expanding in the 1960s and 1970s. Even at the peak of cotton sowings, the total acreage devoted to food was greater than before the cotton expansion drive. However, extremely high birth rates from the 1960s onwards meant that the acreage of food and fodder crops on a per capita basis had declined.37 The detrimental impact of cotton cultivation was exacerbated by the failings of the command economy, which emphasised targets based on quantity. With no incentives to improve efficiency, and without fruitful cooperation between the different agencies involved in production,38 chemical use on the land was excessive and needless, and water use inefficient. Despite dramatic reductions in cotton sowings since independence to reduce Uzbekistan’s reliance on food imports, cotton remains the backbone of the Uzbek economy. The country is still one of the world’s leading cotton producers and exporters. Key to government plans for the redevelopment of the country is a more efficient use of inputs to increase production.39 The environmental effects of the Soviet cotton programme have undoubtedly been severe. Yet Soviet planners were not unaware of the consequences of their actions. From the beginning, extravagant plans existed to alleviate water shortages caused by cotton production plans, with alternative supplies diverted from elsewhere in the Soviet Union. These may now seem over-ambitious: even within 151

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the Soviet Union they were controversial, although highly ambitious plans and radical transformation were essential components of Sovietism. Water diversion plans were strongly supported within Central Asia, and were only shelved during the 1980s when the resources and political will began to fail.40 Today, the region remains critically short of water, while the possibility of transferring water from outside is remote in the wake of the disintegration of the Soviet state. Plans such as the Sibaral project appear fanciful to recent Western observers and seem fraught with environmental dangers. Yet a cursory examination of contemporary Western literature suggests that thirty years ago such opinions were not voiced. Enthusiasm for grand engineering projects was not rare in an age that had not yet experienced their shortcomings. It might be added that political environmentalism is a comparatively late phenomenon even in the West.41 Writers such as Nove and the editors of the Central Asian Review generally noted with approval plans to increase irrigated land. In fact, Nove’s 1967 book on Central Asia does not contain a single mention of environmental issues.

Living standards in Soviet Central Asia Were the Central Asian republics underpaid for their contribution to the Soviet economy, or did they receive more than they invested? This question has commanded much attention both in the West and in Central Asia itself (especially during the glasnost period) in the face of worsening environmental and economic conditions, and during the political fall-out of the ‘Uzbek affair’. A number of influential figures in Uzbekistan, including the academic Oktir Hashimov and the poet Mohammed Salikh (later to become leader of the opposition party Erk), were at the forefront of the debate. Hashimov complained that Uzbekistan was forced to sell cheap raw cotton while having to buy textiles at inflated prices,42 and that prices for some foodstuffs were higher than in other parts of the USSR. Mohammed Salikh noted that grain farmers received 60.5 kopecks per hour, but cotton farmers only 16. Moreover, many cotton workers were employed on collective farms where wages were not fixed, but directly reflected the state procurement price. Thus, there was a close relationship between the price paid by the state and the incomes of the workers. Igor Lipovsky asserts that until the demise of the USSR, Soviet authorities forced Central Asian farmers to sell cotton at 810 roubles a ton, when the price ‘should have been’ more than 2,700 roubles a ton; by 1990, Central Asian economists were claiming that Uzbek cotton growers had been underpaid 14.6 million roubles between 1984 and 1988.43 It is not easy to make direct and meaningful comparisons with world prices for individual products such as cotton. The price that the state paid Uzbek kolkhozniki for raw cotton is not comparable with the price that an international firm might pay local farmers in other parts of the world. This is because the Soviet economy was a largely closed system in which the state not only procured, but also supplied most goods and services at non-market prices. The price at 152

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which Central Asian goods were sold to the state may well have been below the world market price; however, it is necessary to consider the possibility that they received other goods and services from the state at similarly low prices. Direct price comparisons alone are of limited value, and must be put into the context of what the periphery contributed to the Soviet core, and what it received in return. The provision of services such as healthcare, education and housing should be taken into consideration together with the issue of incomes, which lay at the heart of Central Asian grievances over the cotton economy in the late 1980s. There is little benefit in subsidising meat if, in reality, it is never available and one is forced to buy from private suppliers at a high price.44 One can also attempt to compare living standards with regional neighbours. However, mere regional contiguity reinforced by some degree of religious and linguistic homogeneity does not mean that the countries are necessarily comparable in terms of resources and other factors affecting their economic potential. A number of preliminary remarks should be made: the monetary standards of comparison to which we are accustomed in the West (in particular, those concerning incomes) are not always easy to apply accurately and meaningfully to the former USSR. Income levels, certainly in the post-war period, were low by comparison with the US and Western Europe.45 But the variety and availability of fringe benefits, which are difficult to measure, were important factors that significantly enhanced the standard of living for many.46 Moreover, in a society notorious for shortages of essential goods and a flourishing black economy, the value of cash money has to be conditioned by factors such as connections, the ability to perform favours, and a number of other non-monetary sources of power and influence. This situation is further complicated by Soviet statistics on incomes. These concentrated, until comparatively recently, on the industrial sector, reflecting Soviet priorities. However, Central Asia, particularly the southern part, is primarily an agricultural region.47 The marginal economy is crucial, though the value of private plots in supplementing income or domestic consumption is difficult to ascertain. Nonetheless, the 1991 study of the Soviet economy carried out by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded that, in contrast to some other regions, the availability of cheap fruit and vegetables in Uzbekistan did not compensate for the low incomes.48 Cultural factors may serve further to complicate the picture. Using a comparison of the monthly sums in savings accounts across the republics of the Union as a measure of living standards, Boris Rumer concedes that Central Asia’s low showing may reflect the fact that Central Asians prefer not to use savings banks rather than suggesting that they have less money to save.49 In very broad terms, despite the sustained economic growth and improvement in living conditions in many areas in the few decades following the Second World War, the Soviet Union began and ended in economic chaos. With hindsight it is easy to play down the significance of these middle years. Intentionally or not, one could paint a picture of almost unrelieved economic and social hard153

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ship by concentrating on the birth and death of the Soviet era. Yet this leaves the need to explain why resistance to Soviet rule was almost unheard of between the 1940s and the 1980s; why Central Asia played an entirely passive role in the eventual dissolution of the Soviet Union; and, finally, why there appears to be considerable nostalgia for the Soviet past today in the region. Incomes During the late 1960s, Alec Nove attempted to answer the above questions at a time when Soviet power showed no signs of diminishing.50 In the absence of detailed statistical information on incomes, he argued that, while the average in Central Asia was lower than in most parts of the Soviet Union, this was due to employment structure, rather than regional wage differentials. In other words, the same person doing the same job was paid more or less the same in Central Asia as in other parts of the Union. The exceptions were economically important but inhospitable regions such as the Soviet Far East, where higher wages were necessary in order to attract labour. Moreover, Nove argued that although agricultural incomes were generally very low due to low procurement prices for foodstuffs, industrial crops such as cotton were purchased at a much higher price, at least until 1953; thereafter, prices remained significantly higher than those for foodstuffs. This meant that agricultural incomes in Central Asia were generally much higher than those in European Russia, where the peasantry had lived in comparative poverty since the Revolution. Nove suggested that incomes of the best-situated collective farmers were probably higher than the average for industrial workers. Owing to the higher than average proportion of light industry in the region (which received less funding, in accordance with the Soviet policy of developing heavy industry), industrial incomes in Central Asia were slightly below average. The effect of this was slight, however, as all the Central Asian republics still employed at least twice as many people in heavy industry as in light. These findings are in marked contrast to those of scholars examining the situation in the 1980s. Using Soviet statistics, Boris Rumer has shown that average monthly earnings per employee in Central Asia (excluding Kazakhstan) declined in relation to the USSR average from 97.5 per cent in 1970, to 88.1 per cent in 1984.51 However, this figure is based on state wages only, and excludes the incomes of those working private plots (between 10.9 per cent and 18.2 per cent of the workforce in 1989) and collective farmers (between 10.6 per cent and 22.3 per cent of the workforce at the same time).52 Alastair McAuley later calculated per capita total income in Central Asia to be 63 per cent of that in the rest of the USSR in 1980, falling to a mere 55 per cent in 1988.53 Of course, this is quite different to average wages. The huge difference between Central Asia and the rest of the country is to some degree explained by the much greater number of dependants in Central Asia. This was a result of the far higher birth rates in the region – a factor that emerges as 154

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crucial in most comparisons. Later sources suggest that, contrary to the findings of Nove in the 1960s, actual incomes within the same employment sectors were, by the end of the Soviet Union, lowest in Central Asia. Quoting recent Soviet sources, the 1991 IMF survey shows that not only were average monthly wages in Uzbekistan 78.5 per cent of those in the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), but in all sectors of the economy they were below those in Russia, in some cases very significantly so. Perhaps the most striking piece of information illustrated in Table 8.1 is the considerable difference in agricultural wages. Nove suggests that although the preponderance of agricultural workers in the employment structure meant that incomes in Central Asia tended to be lower overall, the actual agricultural wages were probably higher than elsewhere due to the value placed upon semi-tropical industrial crops like cotton. This suggests either that the situation changed since Nove wrote his study in 1967, or that it was simply invisible in the 1960s due to the relative dearth of source material. The employment structure may have been partially responsible for lower incomes in Central Asia into the 1980s. The greater weight of dependants certainly gives the region a very poor showing when per capita incomes are compared. According to Soviet statistics, by 1988 nearly half of the population of Uzbekistan was living in poverty as defined in the Soviet press of the time, and more than half in Tajikistan.54 By the end of the Soviet period it is clear that whichever way the figures are viewed, incomes in Central Asia were lower than in other parts of the USSR. Consumption As details of cash incomes prove unsatisfactory as a standard of comparison, the levels of consumption of various commodities across the republics may be compared instead.55 It is clear that quantities of subsidised foods consumed in Central Asia towards the end of the Soviet period were, in nearly all areas, considerably lower than elsewhere in the USSR. To some extent this may reflect local dietary habits, but it can hardly account for substantial differences in all areas except vegetables.56 For example, consumption of state-subsidised meat and meat products in Uzbekistan in 1989 was on average only 49 per cent of the USSR average, and dairy products only 56 per cent.57 This suggests that Uzbek Table 8.1 Monthly wages by republic and branch, 1987 (USSR average = 1.00)

Industry Agriculture Transport Housing and services Construction

RFSFR

Uzbekistan

1.14 1.08 1.29 0.80 1.34

0.90 0.78 0.96 0.62 1.10

Source: Trud v SSSR: Statisticheskii sbornik, Moscow: Finansy i statistika, 1988.

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(and other Central Asian) consumption of these items was lower than elsewhere, although a proportion of the difference may have been made up by produce from private plots. However, others have suggested a similarly large disparity between Central Asian food consumption levels in all areas except vegetables over a long period.58 The belief that local food prices were higher and the availability of foodstuffs lower than elsewhere in the Union was a common complaint in the Central Asian press during the late 1980s.59 Per capita consumption of durable goods – in particular, consumer items, such as televisions, cars and washing machines – was lower than elsewhere in the USSR, and it has been argued that this was due chiefly to the population boom in the region and, consequently, larger families.60 Ultimately, it is not possible to draw unequivocal conclusions when so many imprecise variables are at work. There were differences between rural and urban markets. Those who had access to particular state supplies through their workplaces were better-off than those who did not. Some areas were better served than others, and certain goods were more plentiful at various times of the year. Nevertheless, the existing statistics suggest that the availability of many basic goods in Central Asia was certainly below the Soviet average, and this, significantly, was widely believed by Central Asian critics. Education Levels of education in Central Asia were very low at the time of the Bolshevik take-over: literacy was as little as 2 per cent among the native population (although it was over 35 per cent among Russians). In exploring the question of literacy, Nove has charted the massive expansion of both basic and higher education under the Soviets.61 Literacy is one area in which Central Asia appeared to be on the cusp of parity with the more developed parts of the USSR. Soviet census statistics show a leap from 3.6 per cent average literacy amongst the nationalities of Central Asia in 1926, to 52.1 per cent by 1959. At the very end of the Soviet period, McAuley calculated from Soviet statistics on primary and secondary education that ‘at least two-thirds, or three-quarters, of the adult population is literate and that there is no substantial difference between the USSR and Central Asia in this respect’.62 He chose this method of calculation in preference to Soviet figures on literacy that were derived from self-assessment in censuses. The Central Asian experience proved to be comparable with that of Turkey. According to recent sources cited by McAuley, Turkey had experienced a considerable increase in literacy from around 60 per cent in the mid-1970s to 70 per cent a decade later. This is in sharp contrast to Iran, where literacy stood at only 47 per cent by 1977. Moreover, whereas literacy amongst men and women was roughly equal in Central Asia, literacy among men was about double that for women in Turkey and Iran.63 In other respects, the education system in Central Asia still lagged behind other parts of the Union. It has been noted that the proportion of pupils in rural 156

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areas not attending school was high. Also, the practice of using child labour during the cotton harvest in Central Asia had a detrimental effect on education. Infant mortality and life expectancy Infant mortality is another indicator of living standards, reflecting the quality of housing conditions and medical services available to the poor. McAuley notes that there were difficulties with earlier Soviet statistics, which had come under attack from both Western and Soviet specialists for incomplete registration and misleading definitions of infant mortality. However, even these figures (excluding Kazakhstan) were much higher than the Soviet average, and by the 1980s they were possibly higher than those for Turkey and Iran. What they did show was an equally dramatic improvement over the Central Asian past. Using the most stringent World Health Organisation criteria, a decrease in infant mortality of more than a third was registered between 1970 and 1986.64 By contrast, McAuley found life expectancy figures for Central Asia both higher than those in Turkey and Iran and close to the Soviet average, being a little less for females and a little more for males – possibly reflecting the hard-drinking habits of men from the European regions of the USSR.65 Healthcare As with other indicators of living standards, the provision of healthcare in Central Asia during the Soviet period tends to show marked improvements over the past, while never quite catching up with the Soviet average. At the fall of the Tsarist Empire, healthcare was minimal: one doctor served around 20,000 people, compared to one doctor for around 5,000 in the Russian Empire as a whole.66 This situation dramatically improved during the Soviet period. The number of medical personnel increased by a factor of 21 in Central Asia and Kazakhstan, as compared to an 8.5-fold increase in the Soviet Union generally. However, the effect was somewhat patchy across the region, and the quality of medical training, and thus of medical personnel, has not been conclusively evaluated. By 1960, there were 17 doctors per 10,000 inhabitants in Turkmenistan, or 92 per cent of the USSR average. At the opposite end of the scale in Tajikistan the figure was only 11 per 10,000, or 60.5 per cent of the Soviet average. Yet even this figure was allegedly higher than those for the UK and France.67 Examining the situation in the 1970s and 1980s, Boris Rumer found that levels of healthcare in Central Asia were still generally the lowest in the USSR. He ascribes this, partly at least, to the very high population growth in the postwar years and the consequent pressure on resources. By 1970, the number of doctors in the region had reached 19.5 per 10,000, or 71 per cent of the Soviet average, rising to 30.5 per 10,000 in 1986, or 74 per cent of the Soviet average.68 The availability of hospital beds was better than in the Transcaucasus, 157

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but still slightly below the Soviet average and falling: 94.5 per cent in 1970 and 86.6 per cent in 1984. This reflected population growth and the failure of plans for dramatic expansion to accommodate the growing population.69

The political dimension The hostile international environment in which the Bolsheviks came to power, along with ideological considerations, led to a preoccupation with security and self-sufficiency and belief in the need to plan the economy on a national scale. Regions would specialise in those products deemed appropriate by the core. Such an approach demanded a strong degree of centralised control, and this was exercised throughout the Soviet era almost without exception. With independence, the apparent creation of nation states with boundaries, national languages and largely native leaders – which gave the illusion of regional autonomy – led to a sense of confusion that is still apparent in the republics to date. National delimitation and native élites An illusion of independence was given by the creation of ‘autonomous’ republics under Stalin’s national delimitation, and later by the nurturing of native élites responsible for the implementation of Soviet policy. These were essentially cosmetic moves aimed at avoiding the appearance of a continuation of the Russian Empire, albeit under Bolshevik leadership. Bolshevism was initially a European phenomenon, and early relations between the predominantly European Bolshevik revolutionaries and native Central Asians were often strained. The Basmachi, and other manifestations of resistance to Bolshevik rule, demonstrated the need for a measure of pragmatism and sensitivity when transforming Central Asia along socialist lines. Social, political and cultural goals were pursued only in so far as the resistance they provoked was containable. At the same time, the ability to impose far-reaching social transformations on a highly traditional society – divided from the Russian centre by language, religion and culture – required the recruitment of large numbers of Central Asian natives into local communist parties. This would help bridge the cultural divide, soften the impact of Soviet policy and reduce the risk of serious resistance to its implementation.70 The need for such a native communist élite would continue until Soviet economic, social and educational policies had created a socialist society without national or class divisions, where all of the nationalities had been assimilated (slianie), and ‘Soviet man’ had been born. In the post-war period, it became increasingly evident that this was not going to happen in the foreseeable future. Thus, terms such as slianie were gradually abandoned. The nationalities (created or developed) by Stalin’s national delimitation of the 1920s were there to stay. 158

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Republican autonomy in the USSR The continuing need for native élites did not mean that they enjoyed any real political or economic autonomy, nor were the republics ever much more than regions of a unitary Soviet state. Under the Soviet constitution they enjoyed limited scope for autonomous action. In particular, the responsibility for a large proportion of the duties and concerns of a modern state lay with the central administration. This included foreign relations, security, the forming of national economic policy, state budgets, legislatures and criminal codes, transport and heavy industry, as well as a host of others.71 In the case of conflict between AllUnion laws and those of a constituent republic, the former would prevail. The clause in the 1936 constitution which states that ‘outside these limits, each constituent republic shall exercise state power independently’ was of limited value. Moreover, the jurisdiction of Union republics was not fixed by the constitution but was to be decided by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. If the republican governments were highly subordinate to the central state under the constitution, Moscow held the reins of the other, more potent agency of power, the Communist Party, even more tightly. The system of appointments in republican communist parties and government – the so-called nomenklatura system – was designed to give Moscow a high degree of control over the native élites. Unwritten rules evolved through which certain posts were reserved for particular nationalities almost without exception: while the first secretary of the Communist Party in each republic was always a native Central Asian, the second secretary was almost invariably a Russian or Ukrainian. In Uzbekistan, posts normally occupied by Russians were the KGB chief and the commander of the Turkestan Military District.72 In 1956, Baymirza Hayit noted that the Ministries of Communications in the republican governments were, ‘as in the old days, completely in the hands of Russians’.73 This implied, as has been suggested by Carlisle, that Slavs were ‘more reliable’ from the centre’s point of view.74 At least they spoke the same language and shared the same cultural background. It has been suggested that the real control lay with the ‘shadow’ power structure of Europeans. However, in the aftermath of de-Stalinisation under Rashidov, the effectiveness of these Russian ‘minders’ may well have been undermined in the corrupt and lax atmosphere that ensued. It certainly appeared so to those Russians who were brought in to purge Central Asia and reassert central control during the 1980s, as a number of influential ‘local’ Russians were implicated in the cotton scandal of that time.75 At the same time, the proportion of Central Asian natives holding élite positions increased dramatically as a result of the stagnation that set in under Brezhnev.76 This issue was central to the crisis in relations between Moscow and the native élite following the ‘Uzbek affair’ of the 1980s. This was initially concerned with widespread fraud and falsification in the cotton industry in Uzbekistan and elsewhere. Yet, as a result of investigations, it became apparent that the native élites had found ways of subverting the nomenklatura system of appointments in the oblasts and raions. Moscow’s attempt to 159

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reimpose control by dispatching large numbers of Russian cadres met with only partial success. This policy was eventually reversed through indecisiveness in Moscow, as well as widespread resentment in Central Asia and the muted threat of a nationalist backlash. Perhaps this reflected an element of reluctance amongst some at the centre to risk the consequences of trying to work without native party élites, upon whom they had relied for more than half a century. The question of whether Moscow would ultimately have been able to force its will was obscured by the growing crisis across the country, and among the Soviet leadership, as the Soviet Union entered its final, chaotic phase. Nonetheless, the centre was able to exercise a significant degree of control over the Union republics for most of the Soviet period. If native élites succeeded in wresting a certain degree of personal power and autonomy for themselves, they exercised it in pursuit of short-term and personal goals, rather than in a bid to establish real political and economic autonomy for their republics. At most they were consultants, not originators of policy, and remained an integral part of the Soviet power structure. If Moscow depended upon them to a degree, for reasons mentioned earlier, they were dependent ultimately upon Moscow for their tenure of power. There is little evidence that any managed, or even aimed, to carve out real constituencies in their republics which would have enabled them to make a bid for power. Yet it is noteworthy that, on two occasions at least, when they were under attack from the centre, popular resentment of Moscow emerged with a nationalist flavour. This was true during the dismissal of Dinmukhamed Kunayev in Kazakhstan in 1986, and during the ‘Uzbek affair’. To a large extent the nature of political relations between core and periphery meant that development – facilitated by the low levels of economic and political development in Central Asia at the time of the Bolshevik take-over – could be planned and implemented on an all-Union scale. Nothing resembling a modern nation or modern national economy was inherited from the Tsarist past, while economic conditions had been worsened by the effects of civil war and famine. The existing administrative framework, the old Tsarist governorates and the two nominally independent khanates hardly formed the political or administrative basis for modern states. It was, therefore, possible to integrate the Central Asian region into the Soviet economy, rather than having to reorganise existing and developed national economies on a federal footing. Taken together, these factors were the political prerequisites for the development of Soviet Central Asia as an integral part of the Soviet economy, with the high degree of economic specialisation and dependence that this involved. This was significant both for post-independence development, and for the meanings of independence in the region. Specialisation and dependence in the Soviet state Ultimately, interpretations of the impact of one-sided development are largely determined by political considerations. A high degree of economic specialisation 160

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undoubtedly led to dependence on the rest of the Soviet Union, especially on Russia. Yet, on the very eve of the Union’s disintegration in 1990, Mikhail Gorbachev argued against the inclusion of issues such as interdependence and specialisation within the context of a single Soviet state.77 The consequences for the republics when faced with sudden, unexpected independence were profound. The Bolsheviks and their successors never intended to foster national independence or autonomy. Rather, their goal was complete national integration (slianie) and the ultimate creation of a single Soviet socialist identity. The expression of these aims was muted in the post-war years, but there is still evidence that by the end of the USSR there had been some movement towards achieving them. Arguments for the bias of Soviet development in Central Asia ultimately depend on whether Central Asia is viewed as part of the USSR. For those who see Soviet involvement in Central Asia as the suppression of the national will of the indigenous population, Soviet economic development is further evidence of an imperialistic relationship. Yet the republics created by Stalin’s national delimitation had no historical foundation; nor is there evidence that for the greater part of the Soviet period there was much enthusiasm for national separatism amongst the republics’ inhabitants.

Conclusions on Soviet development in Central Asia The material costs and benefits of Soviet economic development varied over time. From the 1930s, and into the post-war period, one-dimensional, rapid economic development resulted in a dramatic increase in living standards in Central Asia, even if the region lagged behind many other parts of the Soviet Union. By the 1950s and 1960s, living standards would seem to have been considerably higher than those in neighbouring countries, even accounting for the failings of Soviet statistics that were later shown to be over-optimistic. At the same time, the gap with the historically more developed parts of the USSR continued to narrow. Moreover, other circumstantial evidence supports the impression of general material, if not political, benefit brought about by Soviet development, at least until the 1970s. A number of foreign observers, such as Fitzroy Maclean, though hardly Bolshevik sympathisers, commented favourably on conditions, yet also mentioned with regret the erosion of traditional culture.78 The absence of political unrest in the region, although an extremely crude indicator of material contentment, is of some significance. Of course, it can be argued that this may simply reflect the efficiency of state coercion. However, when conditions deteriorated in the 1980s, evidence of unrest did appear – initially without the aid of glasnost – most notably in the Alma Ata riots of 1986. Linked to this is the limited extent of migration from Central Asia to other regions of the Soviet Union, although labour shortages in many areas would have encouraged it. Factors such as the need for proficiency in Russian, family 161

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ties, religious affiliation and the lack of skills to fulfil vacant posts elsewhere inhibited emigration from Central Asia. The same factors affect migrants elsewhere in the world, although economic motivations are sufficiently compelling to overcome them. This suggests that there may well have been some material incentives to stay in Central Asia.79 By the 1980s, conditions had clearly deteriorated and Soviet development appeared to have lost momentum. In the cotton-growing republics, the demands of the Soviet state had been too great. A fragile environment saddled with an inefficient command system of production was simply unable to meet the demands made upon it. The result was an eventual decline in production and profound environmental degradation. Moreover, the overall economic decline of the Soviet economy as a whole had severe repercussions: the centre became increasingly less able to provide the grants and subsidies upon which Central Asia had come to depend. Finally – and perhaps the single most important factor – in common with modernisation elsewhere in underdeveloped regions in the twentieth century, Soviet development in Central Asia was to some degree a victim of its own success. It is clear that improved living conditions and the provision of healthcare (in comparison with the past, if not with the more developed parts of the Soviet Union) had led to a sharp decline in infant mortality and an increase in longevity. In turn, this led to a dramatic growth in population. Simultaneously, Soviet policy both in Central Asia and elsewhere in the Union encouraged large families, providing material incentives for mothers to have greater numbers of children. The strain on the state developed accordingly. The main factor that emerges from a comparison of living standards in Central Asia and other parts of the USSR is the huge burden of dependants in the former. This proved to be a significant obstacle to the development of Soviet policy, as the impact of rocketing post-war birth rates coincided with a period of economic weakness. Finally, if living standards in Central Asia had hitherto compared favourably with neighbouring countries such as Iran and Turkey, the considerable economic and social progress enjoyed by those nations during the 1970s and 1980s began, at last, to undermine the Soviet advantage. Ahmed Rashid has described Soviet development in Central Asia as ‘the classic colonial syndrome’.80 How valid an assessment is this? In 1967, Nove concluded that although the relationship between Central Asia and the Soviet centre was ultimately one of subordination and dependency, other factors rendered misleading the use of the term ‘colonies’ in describing the Central Asian republics. In particular, he argued that characteristics of colonial status were ‘that the dominant Power uses the economy of the colony for its own benefit, keeping it industrially relatively under-developed, extracting profit from investments, underpaying colonial labour, neglecting education and so on’.81 Nove concluded that ‘none of these features of traditional colonialism can be discerned in an impartial analysis of Soviet policy in the republics’.82 162

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Over thirty-five years later, the situation has changed. It now seems likely that some of Nove’s earlier findings need revision. However, if Central Asia remained relatively underdeveloped and living standards never quite reached those in the more developed parts of the Union, they were certainly making considerable progress in that direction until the effect of massive population increase effectively meant that Soviet development had to run to stand still. By this time, the Soviet economy was seriously ailing and the central leadership was preoccupied with decline across the Union.

Notes 1 This regional definition has been chosen by the Central Asian states since independence. 2 For a fuller discussion of the problems in using Soviet sources, see Alec Nove, The Soviet Economy: An Introduction (London: Allen and Unwin, 1970), pp. 346–54; and International Monetary Fund/The World Bank/OECD/European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, A Study of Soviet Economy, 3 vols (Paris, 1991), Vol. 1, pp. 133–67. 3 Alec Nove, The Soviet Middle East: A Model for Development? (London: Allen and Unwin, 1967), pp. 120 and 122. Other works drawing relatively optimistic conclusions, at least as far as economic and social developments were concerned, are Geoffrey Wheeler’s Modern History of Soviet Central Asia (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964), and the Oxford-based Central Asian Review, which was published under the editorship of the same author during the 1950s and 1960s. This periodical gave reports on a wide variety of Central Asian topics gleaned from the Soviet press with often favourable comment. Soviets in Central Asia (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1951), by W. P. and Zelda K. Coates, is highly sympathetic but so uncritical towards Soviet source material that one has to question its worth. Another contemporary work, edited by Edward Allworth, Central Asia: 130 Years of Russian Dominance, a Historical Overview (3rd edn, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994), with contributions on development issues by the American scholar Ian Murray Matley (see, for example, ‘Industrialization (1865–1964)’), is rather more critical of Soviet development. One is tempted to question whether British scholars of this time such as Wheeler, born into the British colonial experience, were not in some respects more sympathetic to the Russians in Central Asia than were the Americans. 4 Nove, Soviet Middle East, op. cit., pp. 113–32. 5 Most notably Boris Rumer, Soviet Central Asia: A Tragic Experiment (Boston and London: Unwin Hyman, 1989); and William Fierman (ed.), Soviet Central Asia: The Failed Transformation (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1991). 6 A note pointed out by Nazif Shahrani, ‘Central Asia and the Challenge of the Soviet Legacy’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 12 (2), 1993, p. 123. 7 Peter Craumer, Rural and Agricultural Development in Uzbekistan (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1995), p. 44. 8 For example, Anatoly M. Khazanov, After the USSR: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Politics in the CIS (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995). 9 Matley, op. cit., pp. 308 and 348; Ahmed Rashid, The Resurgence of Central Asia: Islam or Nationalism? (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1994), pp. 59–60; Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 40. 10 For example, Khazanov, op. cit., p. 116; Shahrani, op. cit., p. 127. 11 Various statistics can be given to support this. In 1987 the agricultural sector in the four southern republics employed between 34 and 42 per cent of the workforce,

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12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

compared to a USSR average of 19 per cent, and as little as 14 per cent in the RSFSR. In Kazakhstan, the figure is 23 per cent (IMF et al., Vol. 1, p. 219). Figures for inter-republican trade balances in 1988 given in the same work show all of the Central Asian republics as having negative balances in at least nine of the twelve industrial sectors identified, the exceptions being electric power, oil and gas and nonferrous metals. By contrast, Ukraine had negative balances in seven sectors, Belorussia in six, and the RSFSR in four. Ibid., p. 288. Matley, op. cit., p. 344. Gregory Gleason, ‘The Pakhta Programme: The Politics of Sowing Cotton in Uzbekistan’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 2 (2), 1983, p. 109. IMF et al., Vol. 1, p. 218. Igor Lipovsky, ‘The Central Asian Cotton Epic’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 14 (4), 1995, p. 534. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 62. Gleason, op. cit., p. 109. Rumer, op. cit., p. 62. Richard Pomfret, The Economies of Central Asia (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), pp. 102 and 122. Craumer, op. cit., p. 23. Arable land forms only 10 per cent of the area of Uzbekistan, 3 per cent in Turkmenistan, and 6 per cent in Tajikistan. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 62. Lipovsky, op. cit., p. 537. Gleason, op. cit., p. 109. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 62. Only the southern republics receive 180–250 frost-free days per year and temperatures exceeding 20 degrees Celsius for 120–50 days per year. Boris Rumer, ‘Central Asia’s Cotton: The Picture Now’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 6 (4), 1987, p. 75. Ibid. Some 96 per cent of water withdrawn for agriculture in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan comes from rivers. The figure for Kazakhstan is 86 per cent, for Kyrgyzstan 85 per cent, and for Tajikistan 89 per cent. Philip P. Micklin, ‘Soviet Water Diversion Plans: Implications for Kazakhstan and Central Asia’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 1 (4), 1983, p. 17. Ibid., p. 17; Pomfret, op. cit., p. 29. Pomfret, op. cit., p. 29. Patricia M. Carley. ‘The Price of the Plan: Perceptions of Cotton and Health in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 8 (4), 1989, pp. 12–13. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 70. Pomfret, op. cit., p. 29. This is repeated in a recent and otherwise well-informed travel book by Giles Wittel, Extreme Continental (London: Victor Gollancz, 1992), p. 32. Lipovsky, op. cit., p. 534. Craumer, op. cit., p. 44. Ibid., p. 27. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., pp. 64–8. Craumer, op. cit., pp. 22–24. Micklin, op. cit., p. 9–43; and by the same author, ‘The Fate of Sibaral: Soviet Water Politics in the Gorbachev Era’, Central Asian Studies Vol. 6 (2), 1987, pp. 67–88. The late 1960s seem to have been the critical period in the growth of environmental awareness, resulting in a number of epoch-making events shortly afterwards. For example: the UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm in June 1972, where the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) was created; and Earth Day

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42 43 44

45

46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67

in the United States on 22 April 1970. Friends of the Earth was set up in 1970 and Greenpeace a year later. On a local level, the UK Department of the Environment was founded in November 1970. This information is taken from brief sketches of the history of environmental politics in Jeremy Richardson, ‘The Environmental Issue and the Public’, in Pollution and the Environment (Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1977); and Jacqueline Vaughn Switzer, Environmental Politics: Domestic and Global Dimensions (New York: St Martins Press, 1994). William Fierman, ‘ “Glasnost” in Practice: The Uzbek Experience’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 8 (2), 1989, p. 23. Lipovsky, op. cit., p. 537. Of those writers who tackle this question in some detail, Nove considers incomes and social services, (pensions and benefits), education and medical services in The Soviet Middle East, op. cit. (Chapters 5 and 6). When comparing Central Asia to regional neighbours, Alastair McAuley, author of ‘The Central Asian Economy’, in M. Ellman and V. Kontorovich (eds), The Disintegration of the Soviet Economic System (London: Routledge, 1992), divides ‘levels of living’ (monetary indicators), per capita consumption, per capita income and ‘quality of life’ (factors such as infant mortality, life expectancy, literacy and the environment). Boris Rumer, in Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., considers incomes, housing, trade, (with reference to the provision of consumer goods), public catering, and healthcare. The main reason for this is not wage differentials but the absence of income derived from property in the Soviet Union. This was the source of the highest incomes in the United States in the late 1960s. See Paul R. Gregory and Robert C. Stuart, Soviet Economic Structure and Performance (New York: Harper and Row, 1974) pp. 397–9. In the Soviet Union, wage policies were influenced by considerations of equality tempered with the need to attract labour to particular sectors of the economy, and to particular regions of the country. It has been calculated that the wage relativity ratio declined from 4.4 in 1956 to 2.8 in 1968, widening to 3.0–3.3 in 1986, and to around 4 in 1989. See IMF et al., Vol. 2. p. 150. IMF et al., Vol. 2. p. 153. Gregory and Stuart, op. cit., p. 398; Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 125. IMF et al., Vol. 2. p. 155. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 124. See Nove, Soviet Middle East, op. cit.. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 125, citing Narodnoe Khoziaistvo SSSR, Uzbekskoi SSR, and so on. IMF et al., Vol. 2, p. 198. McAuley, op. cit., p. 145. The poverty line was put at 75 roubles per month. See ibid., p. 146. IMF et al., Vol. 2, p. 155. Ibid., pp. 204–9. Ibid., pp. 204–6. Craumer, op. cit., pp. 29–31. Fierman, ‘ “Glasnost” in Practice’, op. cit., p. 23. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 133. Nove, Soviet Middle East, op. cit., pp. 67–86. McAuley, op. cit., pp. 150–1. Ibid., p. 150. Ibid., p. 148–9. Ibid., p. 150. Nove, Soviet Middle East, op. cit., p. 87. Geoffrey Wheeler and David Footman, ‘Medical Services in Central Asia and Kazakhstan’, Central Asian Review, Vol. 11 (1), 1963, p. 37.

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68 Rumer, Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., pp. 137–8. 69 Ibid., p. 140. 70 Donald S. Carlisle, ‘Power and Politics in Soviet Uzbekistan’, in Fierman (ed.), Soviet Central Asia, op. cit., p. 153. 71 See articles 11, 14, 15, 76, 77 and 78 of the 1936 constitution reproduced in Sidney and Beatrice Webb, Soviet Communism: A New Civilization (London: Longman, 1947), pp. 410–37. 72 Donald S. Carlisle, ‘The Uzbek Power Elite: Politburo and Secretariat, 1938–83’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 5 (3/4), 1986, p. 120. 73 Baymirza Hayit, ‘The Republics of Turkestan’, Central Asian Review, Vol. 4 (3), 1956, p. 245. 74 Fierman, ‘ “Glasnost” in Practice’, op. cit., p. 138. 75 Ibid.; and Allworth (ed.), Central Asia, op. cit., pp. 551–2, 556. 76 Allworth (ed.), Central Asia, op. cit., pp. 550–2; Carlisle, ‘The Uzbek Power Elite’, op. cit., pp. 121–5. 77 Pravda Vostoka on 13 January 1990, p. 2. 78 Fitzroy Maclean, Back to Bukhara (London: Jonathan Cape, 1959). Maclean, a British Conservative MP and former diplomat, had a wide experience of independent travel in the Soviet Union and the Central Asian region over a long period of time, spoke excellent Russian, and cannot be laid open to the accusations of partiality and naïveté that we can put to George Bernard Shaw when evaluating his Soviet experience in the 1930s. See also Patrick Sergeant, Another Road to Samarkand (London: Quality Book Club, undated) (description of journeys in Central Asia made September–November, 1954); David C. Montgomery, ‘An American Student in Tashkent’; ‘Return to Tashkent’; and ‘Once again in Tashkent’, in Asian Affairs, February 1972, pp. 28–40; June 1979, pp. 166–79; October 1979, pp. 292–303. There is also some interesting discussion in Laurens Van der Post, Journey into Russia (London: Hogarth, 1964), Chapters 4 and 5. 79 There is some discussion of the migration issue in Michael Rywkin, ‘The Impact of Socio-economic Change and Demographic Growth on National Identity and Socialisation’, Central Asian Studies, Vol. 3 (3), 1985, pp. 91–5. 80 Rashid, op. cit., p. 63. 81 Nove, Soviet Middle East, op. cit., p. 113. 82 Ibid.

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9 ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES IN CENTRAL ASIA A source of hope or despair? Lars Jalling The environmental legacy of the Soviet Union The Soviet political system and the pursuit of rigid command-style economic planning were the main causes of environmental degradation in Central Asia.1 The strong centralisation of the political structures and decision-making procedures created a giant physical and cognitive gap between the Politburo in Moscow and the conditions of everyday life in the provinces. The subservient political culture of the local party élite contributed to this, as did the practices of the communist bureaucracy. There were no independent political and legal institutions able or willing to control or correct unsound policies. Furthermore, the impact of soil erosion, salinisation, decreasing water supply and the pollution of water and soil due to the intensive application of pesticides were disregarded. This reinforced the image of never-ending economic and social progress in the Soviet republics of Central Asia. Environmental degradation was not unique to the Soviet system. However, unlike in democratic states, the Soviet structure was not accountable, lacking channels where doubts and alternative views could be articulated. Such conditions permitted the continuation of environmentally disastrous policies and practices over such a long time. It is essential to alter these unsustainable modes of production and reverse the environmental damages if an ecological collapse is to be avoided. It is doubtful, however, whether the Central Asian republics will be able to manage such fundamental tasks on their own. Even now, the political, economic and physical infrastructure developed during the Soviet period obstructs efforts to achieve ecological preservation and sustainable development. There is a high degree of interdependency between the newly independent states, particularly with regards to the economy and infrastructure. The states are also affected significantly by the economic fortunes of the Russian federation. Moreover, a number of issues remain unsettled, and hamper most attempts at increased regional cooperation. These include, inter alia, the question of who is responsible overall for maintaining infrastructures that affect more than one country (such as power plants, reservoirs and sluices on 167

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rivers running through two or more countries), and the current validity of production and distribution agreements concluded under the Soviet period. By far the most serious environmental problems created during the Soviet period stemmed from water utilisation. Inefficient irrigation systems use excessive amounts of water, which drains the region’s water resources. In the pursuit of increased agricultural production, hazardous levels of pesticides and chemicals are used, and the increasing salinisation of the water resulting from inefficient irrigation techniques damages the soil and decreases its fertility. Polluted water is also a primary cause of increasing levels of water-spread diseases, such as cholera and tuberculosis.2 Furthermore, the environmental degradation caused by agricultural practices has also had a direct impact on the economy, as can be seen in the relative decline in output from the cotton fields. Overall, water management is the most pressing environmental issue in the region, and probably the most difficult to solve.

Environmental issues and political opposition Environmental issues became the focal point for political opposition during the 1980s. To a large extent, this was as a reaction to President Mikhail Gorbachev’s glasnost policy, which created an opportunity for limited criticism of the Soviet authorities. The Chernobyl accident in 1986 was a pivotal incident. The authorities’ decision to withhold relevant information reinforced the impression of a paralysed regime unable to take sufficient measures to protect the environment. The demand for information increased, mobilising people at a local level to push for changes in environmental policies, and eventually within the political system itself. The nature of these demands meant that they were appropriate for political exploitation. The authorities did not consider environmental issues to be related directly to Soviet ideology or political structure. Environmental problems were almost exclusively explained as the result of local inefficiency, rather than as a consequence of unrealistic Soviet policies. The relationship between the requirements for increased production and, for example, the use of lethal amounts of pesticides within the cotton-growing industry was never acknowledged.3 In fact, pollution was considered a phenomenon somewhat alien to the Soviet system, as it was perceived to be a consequence of a free market and private corporations.4 Whenever environmental protection and economic policies conflicted, the debate was censored. During the 1980s, increasing criticism of the management of the environment focused on the Five-Year Plans and political directives issued from Moscow. Environmental degradation was identified as being caused by the distant Kremlin. Criticism of the manner in which environmental problems were handled soon developed into criticism of the centralised political structures: ultimately, environmental protests mutated into political demands for independence. The similarity between nationalistic and environmental questions related to terri168

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torial issues – with their capacity to stimulate emotional responses – further strengthened the connection between nationalist and environmental opposition.5 Furthermore, since the local politicians were often associated with the Politburo in Moscow, environmental protest was frequently also a protest against the political establishment. The environmental opposition was rarely organised within the traditional political structures. For example, the ‘Nevada–Semipalatinsk’ movement was founded at a meeting in the House of the Union of Writers of Kazakhstan and led by the Kazakh poet Olzhas Suleimenov. In 1989, the movement organised a number of demonstrations, collecting one million signatures in support of its protests against the nuclear tests in the Semipalatinsk area. The protests were not only motivated by concerns about the damage caused by radiation, but were also fuelled by anger directed at the Russians, who had chosen to locate the Soviet nuclear test site on Kazakh soil. A year later, the government issued a prohibition against further tests, and, in 1991, President Nazarbayev declared the Semipalatinsk test site closed. The ‘Nevada–Semipalatinsk’ movement had illustrated successfully that it was possible to influence the policies of the authorities, and in so doing, paved the way for other political pressure groups. In response to the increasing focus on environmental degradation during the 1980s, Central Asian political leaders announced a major shift in policy towards polluting industries. This included the introduction of measures against the extreme use of chemicals in agriculture, and attempts to slow the rapid deterioration of water quality. The aim of the local Communist Party élite was to create a new image of themselves as the defenders of national interests against the Kremlin. Following independence in 1991, however, the economic realities changed. With the suspension of resource transfer from other former Soviet republics, economic considerations outweighed environmental ones.6 For example, Uzbekistan’s dependence on cotton is too high to allow any substantial decrease in the production of the crop. At the same time, it is expensive to introduce new methods of irrigation, or to repair the existing infrastructure. Furthermore, unemployment and a worsening economic climate make it impossible to reduce the labour stock within the agricultural sector. Even since 1991, the use of water has continued to be detrimental to the environment, while pesticides are still relied upon heavily in the agricultural sector.

Current environmental problems The slow death of the Aral Sea There is hardly another region on the planet, except perhaps the zone of the Chernobyl nuclear catastrophe, where a profound environmental crisis has affected such large areas, and the lives of so many people. (World Bank Report)7

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The most visible sign of environmental degradation in Central Asia is the desiccation of the Aral Sea. Since 1960, the level of the sea has fallen by approximately 15–16 metres, and its volume by 60 per cent.8 The main rivers flowing into the Aral Sea are the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, which constitute some 90 per cent of the total water flow to the basin. The annual extraction of water from those rivers is estimated to be 125 per cent of the annual supply. Thus, the regional water resources are gradually being depleted.9 In fact, the Aral Sea today consists of separate bodies of water. Although the sea experiences fluctuations of its surface level due to the natural changes of the river flows, man-induced reductions of the sea level are by far the most important cause of the Aral’s fate.10 The environmental consequences of the contraction of the Aral Sea, once the fourth largest inland sea on Earth, are devastating. Fish have almost disappeared, leaving behind shattered fishing and canning industries. The Aral can no longer serve as a means of transport. Salt from the beds of the sea spreads over large areas, turning fertile soil into desert and increasing human diseases, such as throat cancer.11 Few dispute that the desiccation of the Aral Sea and the salinisation of the soil around it are a major ecological catastrophe.12 The areas around the Aral Sea, particularly the Karakalpak and Kyzyl–Orda regions, are also considered to be ecological disaster zones. Many of the diseases found there can be traced to the polluted waters of the main rivers, where chemicals and pesticides are dispersed along the waterway. The Syr Darya supplies water for domestic use for 65 per cent of the region to the east of the Aral, despite the fact that the river water is not potable.13 The situation of the Amu Darya is similar. The fresh water resources are drained to meet the demands of irrigation and domestic use; this allows saline and polluted water to pour into water wells. An inadequate sewerage system also contributes to the spread of disease. Many proposals to save the Aral Sea have been put forward. These range from improving the irrigation practices to water pricing, in order to encourage more efficient water use. More spectacular projects, such as the diversion of water from Siberia (the so-called Sibaral canal), or the pumping of water from the Caspian Sea up to the Aral Sea, were discussed during the Soviet period. Russian nationalists have criticised the Sibaral project harshly, and this issue has contributed to the tension between Kazakh authorities and Russians advocating annexation of northern Kazakhstan.14 The feasibility of such projects is disputed, and they have traditionally been favoured by the authorities rather than by scientists. It has been argued that diverting water into the Aral Sea would only delay the act of addressing the underlying problem. The alternative, supported by most international experts today, is a restoration of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya deltas together with the stabilisation of the Aral’s water level.15 170

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Nuclear radiation in the Semipalatinsk area Another issue that creates great concern is the former nuclear test area around Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan. Although President Nazarbayev closed the nuclear test area on a permanent basis in 1991, the effects of approximately 450 test explosions during forty years are still felt. During this period, the population around Semipalatinsk was exposed to radiation levels significantly higher than the radiation exposure following the detonation of the atom bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.16 Between 1.5 million and 2 million people have been affected by radiation from the nuclear tests in and around Semipalatinsk. Some researchers and local medical staff claim that one child out of three has some kind of serious defect, and that as many as four out of five will most probably develop severe diseases during their childhood. Although not all of these cases can be related to the nuclear tests and radiation levels in the area, there is little doubt that the level of serious diseases among children in and around Semipalatinsk is abnormal. However, given the present state of the Kazakh economy, it is almost impossible for the authorities to provide the necessary healthcare and medicines for more than a small minority of the victims.17 There has been some Western involvement in the Semipalatinsk area, particularly by the United States. However, the vast majority of such aid money is directed toward disarmament and the prevention of illegal export of nuclear material, rather than toward environmental programmes.18 Furthermore, after the Kazakh authorities dismantled or transported the last of the nuclear arms to Russia in 1995, foreign interest in the Semipalatinsk region diminished substantially. An additional problem is that much of the scientific material gathered concerning the consequences of the region’s long exposure to radiation has been sold to Western agencies and foreign private interest groups. There has also been a substantial exodus from the relatively small community of Kazakh nuclear scientists. Unfortunately, there is little evidence suggesting that this will change in the foreseeable future. Soil erosion and poaching Less spectacular, but serious nonetheless, are the increasing problems of soil erosion combined with a lengthening catalogue of endangered species. The balance between economic development and environmental protection is not merely a question of profit versus ecological considerations, but also involves cultural and social aspects. Traditional systems of animal husbandry, combined with a free market economy, have created an ecological threat. Expanded herds of sheep damage the fragile soil in Kyrgyzstan and cause soil erosion. In some cases, the authorities allow grazing in nature reserves, which inflicts damage on the vegetation and puts protected animals at risk. However, calls for restrictions aimed at saving the environment are viewed as an attack on traditional culture and are reminiscent of old political ideas opposed to a free market.19 Poaching, on the other hand, can only be attributed to greed. Ironically, it is reported that 171

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government agencies, charged with the protection of wildlife, arrange hunting trips for wealthy foreigners.20 Irrespective of who is responsible for these activities, the poaching business is particularly disturbing as Central Asia contains unique species of flora and fauna.

Environmental politics In response to the increasing focus on environmental issues, a number of nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) have been established in the Central Asian republics, such as the ‘Green Salvation’ in Kazakhstan, the ‘Tabiat’ of Tajikistan, the ‘Ashgabad Ecological Club’ in Turkmenistan, ‘Ecolog’ in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, the ‘Union in Defence of the Aral Sea and Amudarya’ in Karakalpakstan, and the regional ‘International Central Asian Biodiversity Institute’.21 In 1996, the number of independent NGOs was approximately two thousand.22 They are often organised at a grassroots level by individuals who have considerable local knowledge of the problems. Since criticism of the authorities’ handling of environmental issues is often perceived as political opposition, the NGOs must be cautious in order to avoid repression. However, the political dimension is important and some of the groups have sought parliamentary representation, albeit unsuccessfully, such as in the 1995 election in Kyrgyzstan. The strength and range of activities of these NGOs is varied and reflects the dithering character of the republics’ regimes. Though the climate for NGOs in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan is more tolerant than in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, the general attitude of each of the Central Asian republics results in severe restrictions placed on the activities of all NGOs. The situation in Tajikistan has been determined predominantly by internal upheavals that have followed independence. This is not entirely negative, however, as the weakening of central authority has enabled the NGOs to develop their activities and organisational strength further. Moreover, these NGOs often fill the void created by a weakening of central governmental control.23 Thus, they have become an important complement to the traditional social and political structures in Tajikistan. Although the internal conflict puts more constraints on the NGOs, they have been given the possibility to develop with little interference from the authorities. The Tajik experience offers some hope for the development of civil societies elsewhere in Central Asia, but this is likely to be determined by the moderation of authoritarian political systems. Environmental protection has become a means to attract aid from NGOs, governmental aid agencies and international organisations, such as the European Union, the United Nations and the World Bank. The Aral Sea is the main attraction. International focus on the Aral Sea is understandable, given the magnitude of the problem. Even so, this attention results in the support of the same governmental institutions that created the problem in the first place.24 Critics claim that the authorities throughout Central Asia merely pay lip service to a general improvement of environmental protection, arguing that the regional institutions 172

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related to water management may be considered to be little more than a means to attract foreign aid.25 Even though such a view may be too pessimistic, it is striking that there has been so little progress concerning regional water management despite the efforts and resources spent on the development of regional institutions and agreements by international agencies. Two major causes of this are the republics’ reluctance to enter any agreements that restrict their sovereignty, and disagreements over how the trans-boundary water resources should be allocated and utilised. However, their frequent demands for international economic aid, combined with their unwillingness to cede any national sovereignty to the regional institutions that they themselves argue should be in charge of water management, support the notion that their commitment to regional cooperation is dependent on the degree of financial support that accompanies it. 26 Another cause of concern is that many of the NGOs supported by the United Nations and the World Bank are in reality so-called governmental nongovernmental organisations (GONGOs).27 Instead of contributing to the development of a strong civil society, foreign aid is channelled into the republics’ government treasuries through the GONGOs.28 The international agencies and organisations operating in Central Asia appear to acknowledge such obstacles. However, it is hard to distinguish any coherent strategy that deals with such issues. Financial support is still given to the same governmental agencies that have been in charge of environmental protection in the past – despite their track records. Of course, international organisations, such as the World Bank, have to interact primarily with the official authorities. However, emphasis on somewhat more radical strategies, advocated by alternative actors, could hopefully motivate – or force – the governmental bodies to address the problems, rather than simply accruing foreign aid. Environmental protection has not traditionally been at the top of the political agenda, but it is likely that its importance will grow in the future, as environmental awareness becomes more prevalent. With increased foreign interest in the preservation of the unique ecology of Central Asia, environmental issues will increasingly attract foreign funds as well as occupying an important role within the sphere of state administration. At the same time, it is a field that will most probably create conflict, as financial support for environmental protection must be allocated (at least partly) from state budgets, and will therefore compete with the other responsibilities of the government. Moreover, the reforms aiming at transforming the economic structure and stimulating growth are likely to be in conflict with attempts to conserve resources and encourage environmentally acceptable modes of production.29 Consequently, the importance of environmental issues in Central Asian politics will probably increase rather than decrease.

Disputes over water in the Aral Sea Basin Though abundant in Central Asia, water is unevenly distributed between the five republics. During the Soviet period, the allocation quotas of regional water 173

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resources had a significant impact on regional water policies in Moscow. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, previously internal Soviet water resources now became trans-boundary. The previous political directives concerning water utilisation were inherently contentious: any agreement on water management that would restrict the possible actions of a state is perceived as an infringement of sovereignty. The uneven distribution of water resources has serious political implications. For example, Turkmenistan’s reliance on exogenous water resources exceeds 90 per cent of the total water extraction, while the same figure for Uzbekistan is 80 per cent.30 This makes both republics extremely vulnerable to changes in water extraction outside their control, as Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan determine the water flows of both Amu Darya and Syr Darya.31 Common to all the republics is the fact that, although the fundamental conflict is over access to, or control over, water resources, other tensions, such as ethnic rivalry or border disputes, increase the potential for conflict. This combination of water management and other factors has already been manifested in disputes between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan in the Ferghana Valley, between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan over water allocation, and between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan over the irrigation and water management in the Amu Darya delta.32 Another factor contributing to the instability is that data and statistics concerning water resources may be regarded as national security issues. Both negotiations on allocation quotas and assessments of actual water extraction have a tendency, therefore, to be based on estimates rather than true figures. The consequence is that natural changes in water flow, resulting in less water reaching downstream riverbank properties easily, are interpreted by the downstream states as a violation of allocation arrangements. The fact that measurement equipment and previous statistics are far from reliable further contributes to complications.33 Whether or not the states in Central Asia are prepared to go to war over access to water resources remains an open question. The immediate danger of inter-state conflict over allocation quotas or actual water extraction seems remote, although it is possible to imagine that strong inter-state tensions related to water resources could escalate to open conflict. For instance, local ethnic tensions or border conflicts reinforced by water disputes may be elevated to an inter-state level, and incidents like the Kyrgyz–Uzbek clash in Osh in 1990 could spiral out of control. However, the overall impression is that it is unlikely that two or more republics would resort to armed conflict in the present circumstances, as a number of less costly alternatives exist.

Regional cooperation An approach to water sharing increasingly favoured by experts is to determine allocation quotas on the basis of specified shares of the river’s flow, instead of determining absolute quantities that each riparian, or riverbank property, is enti174

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tled to have. Such a distribution system is based on how much water it is sustainable to extract from the water resource each year. Together with a water-pricing system, the owners of properties on the riverbanks are then motivated to save water in water-short years, since water shares can be sold and bought. A property able to increase the efficiency of its water utilisation and thus save water may in fact sell the surplus to other riparians.34 A prerequisite for such an allocation system is the existence of institutions and legal arrangements that supervise and manage joint water resources. There has been, and there continues to be, a certain degree of acknowledgement of the interdependence between the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries. In 1992, an agreement that established cooperation between CIS members concerning matters of environmental protection was signed in an attempt to save old Soviet structures. But there are many factors working against comprehensive environmental protection within the CIS structure. A low level of protection of the environment may be a competitive advantage in the international arena. Polluting industries banned from developed societies may be tempted to invest in the Central Asian republics due to weak legal protection of the environment. Another reason is simply the fact that the former Soviet republics are now sovereign states, pursuing their own interests, and suspiciously guarding their independence. Previous inter-republican water-sharing arrangements within the Soviet context have already been replaced by classic upstream–downstream tensions.35 As with other international agreements on environmental issues, the prospects for future cooperation in the environmental sphere are likely to be determined by the lowest common denominator: lack of enforcement mechanisms, and voluntary, rather than binding, treaties.36 Third-party mediation – or pressure – may be the only realistic way to reach a viable solution. The World Bank is involved in institution-building projects related to water management,37 and may be able to persuade the parties to reach, and comply with, an allocation model that is flexible enough to respond to changing demands and supplies without creating conflict. The fact that the World Bank is financing many projects in the region increases its ability to leverage its relations with each of the five republics. However, in a tense situation, there is an obvious danger that the republics will pursue their own narrow interests rather than cooperate for the good of all. It will be difficult to solve disputes over water allocation if the republics’ individual water demand is seen in isolation. The Kyrgyz need for hydro-energy during the winter fundamentally contradicts the Kazakh and Uzbek needs for water during the summer months. But if water to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan were to be exchanged for supplies of energy from Kyrgyzstan, an agreement on allocation quotas satisfying all three republics would probably be much easier to reach, as was achieved in 1995.38 Thus, the interlinking of issues may motivate the Central Asian republics to support an institutional framework and enter into negotiations over regional water management. Although, in practice, the existing institutions at the regional level lack sufficient resources and executive powers to 175

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have any substantial influence on the utilisation of shared water resources, they nevertheless reduce transaction costs and promote interaction at an inter-state level.39 Water management and utilisation is, by necessity, a regional issue, reflected by the strong interdependence between the republics regarding actions related to regional water resources. To a large extent, issues such as the maintenance of waterworks, hydro-energy stations and irrigation infrastructure or water quality are too complicated and expensive to be addressed at the national level. Consequently, cooperation is not only a requisite to solve immediate problems of water supply and avoid water-related conflicts at national or inter-state level, but also will most probably strengthen interdependence in a profitable way.40

Conclusion: Environmental policies in Central Asia in perspective In light of the fact that ecological awareness in the Western democracies did not gather meaningful political momentum until relatively recently, the neglect of environmental protection in the former Soviet Union should not necessarily be regarded as surprising. Both the capitalist and socialist systems, though employing differing methods, prioritise the creation of what is perceived to be an efficient economic and industrial infrastructure. Belief in progress and industrialisation was a part of the socialist credo; thus, environmental considerations were secondary, at best, to development objectives. Environmental awareness is not necessarily a phenomenon confined to rich and developed societies, either on the political or populist fronts. The parlous economic situation prevalent in Central Asia requires, however, that such humanitarian policies as feeding people should take precedence over environmental projects, such as preserving the biodiversity of the region. Nonetheless, environmental projects can both produce money and be of political significance. The serious ecological problem confronting the region in the form of the Aral Sea is a good example of a visible and symbolic issue powerful enough to attract both international and domestic attention. The present utilisation of water on a regional scale is unsustainable. Unfortunately, there is little evidence to suggest an immediate change of water management policies in the near future. Despite the marked change in the republics’ political status, the allocation schemes are based on Soviet principles. The bureaucrats in charge of the water management practices now are predominantly unchanged since the Soviet era, and they have not altered their perceptions or views on water management to any significant end. Although basic principles on the codification of how trans-boundary water resources should be utilised feature in various international agreements,41 they are open for interpretation. Naturally, the government in each republic advocates the interpretation that best serves their interests: to date, they have not been able to agree on the principles on which future allocation should be based. Furthermore, there are large groups who would protest fiercely against any attempt to intro176

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duce pricing policies. Here the republics have followed somewhat different strategies, with Kyrgyzstan pioneering the introduction of water pricing, albeit on a small scale. In contrast, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, who share the bulk of the region’s cotton production, have done very little to encourage consumers to use less water more efficiently.42 Arguably, without sufficient financial resources, it is difficult to make radical changes, and change will only arise from a shift in attitude toward the environment as a whole. In such circumstance, the Central Asian NGOs could play an important role in reframing environmental policies. Their members include highly qualified scientists, with considerable expertise in fields such as biology, geology and hydrology. The NGOs are often closer to the problems and the people affected by them than are the central authorities. Therefore, they are more likely to have a better understanding of the issues. Membership of a NGO increases awareness of the importance of preserving the environment, which is a prerequisite for altering the present environmental degradation. In addition, the activities of NGOs – such as monitoring the state of the environment – can complement those of the authorities. Considering the economic difficulties that all the republics experience, using voluntary NGOs as part of the informationgathering and -distribution system could save the authorities substantial expense. In effect, the question of how environmental protection may best be secured is intimately associated with the character of the republics’ political structures, and the practices of the authorities. The present suppression of dissident, or alternative, political ideas and solutions to environmental problems hampers the ability of the republics to find efficient, affordable and sustainable strategies for the preservation of the environment. Since the trend in all of the Central Asian republics has been an extension of presidential powers at the expense of political pluralism, the future for popular participation in the processes of defining strategies and policies to preserve the natural environment does not look bright. To prevent the continued environmental degradation of Central Asia, the republics must look to the international community to contribute toward the development of more democratic political systems, in terms of identifying (and of providing tangible aid to) alternative political and organisational bodies. Grassroots activities are already widespread in the region: they could be further developed and strengthened with assistance from international organisations and agencies. With increased support, the local NGO communities have the potential to articulate a comprehensive programme for environmental protection. If they fail to do so, the prospects for Central Asia look bleak.

Notes 1 See Boris Rumer, Soviet Central Asia: A Tragic Experiment (Boston and London: Unwin Hyman, 1998); Mildred Turnbull, Soviet Environmental Policies and Practices: The Most Critical Investment (Aldershot: Dartmouth Publishing Company Ltd, 1991); Keith Martin, ‘Central Asia’s Forgotten Tragedy’, RFE/RL Research Report, Vol. 3 (30), 29 July 1994.

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2 Martin, op. cit., p. 37. See also G. V. Sdasyuk, ‘Discussion of the Aral Problem at the Nukus Symposium’, Geojournal, Vol. 35 (1), 1995, pp. 67–70. 3 Patricia M. Carley, ‘The Price of the Plan: Perceptions of Cotton and Health in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 8 (4), 1989, pp. 1–38. 4 Marshall I. Goldman, ‘Environmentalism and Nationalism: An Unlikely Twist in an Unlikely Direction’, in John Massey Stewart (ed.), The Soviet Environment: Problems, Policies and Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 1. 5 Charles E. Ziegler, ‘Political Participation, Nationalisms and Environmental Politics in the USSR’, in Stewart (ed.), op. cit., pp. 35–6. See also the article by Bhavna Dave, ‘Kazakhstan Staggers Under Its Nuclear Burden’, Transition No. 17, November 1995, pp. 12–13. 6 Martin, op. cit., pp. 35–48; Stefan Klötzli, ‘The Water and Soil Crisis in Central Asia – A Source for Future Conflict?’ ENCOP Occasional Paper No. 11 (Zurich: Centre for Security Policy and Conflict Research Zurich; Berne: Swiss Peace Foundation Berne, 1994), p. 11. 7 World Bank Report, Diagnostic Study for the Development of an Action Plan for the Aral Sea (Washington, DC: World Bank, 1992), p. 1. 8 Philip P. Micklin, ‘The Aral Crisis: Introduction to the Special Issue’, Post-Soviet Geography, Vol. 33 (5), 1992, pp. 274–5; Igor Lipovsky, ‘The Deterioration of the Ecological Situation in Central Asia: Causes and Consequences’, Europe–Asia Studies, Vol. 47 (7), 1995, p. 1109. Note that the exact figures concerning the desiccation of the sea, the amounts of salt spread by the wind, the amounts of water reaching the sea each year, et cetera, vary from author to author. For a more detailed discussion on problems with statistical information, see James H. Noren, ‘Statistical Reporting in the States of the Former USSR’, Post-Soviet Geography, Vol. 35 (1), 1994, pp. 13–37; and‘Panel on the State of the Soviet Environment at the Start of the Nineties’, Soviet Geography, 1990; and World Bank Report, op. cit., p. 2. 9 Klötzli, op. cit., p. 2. 10 See articles by A. S. Kes, ‘Chronicle of the Aral Sea and the Sub-Aral Region’, Geojournal, Vol. 35 (1), 1995, pp. 7–10; and A. V. Belyaev, ‘Water Balance and Water Resources of the Aral Sea Basin and Its Man-Induced Changes’, Geojournal, Vol. 35 (1), 1995, pp. 17–21. 11 However, as with any figure from Central Asia, there are conflicting views on, for example, the amount of salt that has been blown from the shores of the Aral Sea, or how far this salt has travelled. While Zeev Wolfson in ‘The Massive Degradation of the Ecosystem in the USSR’ (in Stewart [ed.], op. cit.) claims that salt from the Aral Sea has caused an increased melting of the glaciers in the Pamirs, geographers at the Department of Geography, University of Oslo, have disputed such a claim (personal communication). A good article on the salt of the Aral Sea is N. F. Glazovsky, ‘The Salt Balance of the Aral Sea’, Geojournal, Vol. 35 (1), 1995, pp. 35–41. 12 See World Bank Report, op. cit., pp. 45ff.; World Bank, The Aral Sea Crisis: Proposed Framework of Activities. March 29, 1993, Europe and Central Asia Region, Aral Sea Basin Unit (Washington, DC: World Bank, 1993), pp. 17–18; and World Bank, Water and Environmental Management in the Aral Sea Basin (Washington, DC, draft 1996/7), p. 1 for data on health problems. 13 L. I. Elpiner, ‘Medical-Ecological Problems of the Eastern Aral-Land’, Geojournal, Vol. 25 (1), 1995, p. 44. 14 The plans of diverting water from Siberia to the Aral Sea instigated the first case of environmental protest in the former Soviet Union as the Russians, affected by such a scheme, opposed it heavily (according to former adviser to the Kyrgyz government, Professor Bryan Roberts, personal communication). 15 Micklin, op. cit., pp. 269–82; World Bank, The Aral Sea Crisis, op. cit., pp. 4, 10 and Fundamental Provisions of Water Management Strategy in the Aral Sea Basin: Common Strategy of

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16 17 18

19 20

21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

29 30 31

32

Water Allocation, Rational Water Use and Protection of Water Resources, Interstate Council for Aral Sea Problems (developed with the Assistance of the World Bank for Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, October 1996), pp. 96–109. See Chapter 13 below for further discussion of the Aral Sea crisis and problems of water supply in general. Bayan Orumbayeva and Anthony Robinson, ‘USSR Leaves a Toxic Legacy’, Financial Times, 11 July 1996. Ibid. Some $171 million has been allocated by the US government to assist the Kazakh authorities to implement the disarmament programme. $160,000 will be spent on research and studies of the radiation problem in the Semipalatinsk area. Dave, op. cit., p. 13. Victor Lukarevsky, ‘Saving the Leopard – Symbol of Turkmenistan’s Mountains’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol. 4 (1), 1 January 1996; Lyudmila Mitroshina, ‘Wild Plants of the Kopetdag’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol 4 (10), 1 October 1996. Sergei Solyanik, ‘Kazakhstan Sponsors Falcon Smuggling’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol. 2 (12), 1 December 1994; S. MalostVolov, ‘Welcome to Our Safari’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol 4 (5), 1 May 1996. See also article by ‘A Friend in Uzbekistan’: ‘Bustard Hunting in Uzbekistan’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol. 2 (11), 1 November 1994. See various issues of the Ecostan NEWS, as well as the excellent survey of Central Asian experts and organisations at the Interactive Central Asia Resource Project (ICARP) Internet pages. Eric Sievers, ‘Central Asian Democracy NGOs to Close Their Doors’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol. 4 (5), 1 May 1996. See Ecostan NEWS, Vol. 4 (5), 1 May 1996, and Vol. 4(7), 1 July 1996. William T. Davoren, ‘A Personal Memoir About a Tashkent Seminar in May 1995’, Ecostan NEWS Vol 3 (10), 1 October 1995. This view has been expressed by several other sources as well as in personal communication with the author. See, for example, Eric Sievers, ‘Aral Sea Situation Worsens with International Interest’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol 1 (1), 1 September 1993. See, for instance, the ‘Nukus Declaration’ from 1995 in Annex 6, World Bank, Aral Sea Basin Program Phase 1: Progress Report 1–3, Report No. 3, Europe and Central Asia Region, Aral Sea Basin Unit (Washington, DC: World Bank, 1995–6). D. J. Peterson, ‘The Environment in the Post-Soviet Era’, in RFE/RL Research Report Vol 2 (2), January 1993; Martin, op. cit.. See also various issues of Ecostan NEWS. Sievers, ‘Aral Sea Situation Worsens’, op. cit.. See also ‘They’re Dividing Us!’, Ecostan NEWS, Vol. 1–5, 1993–7, Internet site, http://solar.rtd.utk.edn/russia/science/ ecostan/ecostan.html or http://stsfac.mit.edu/projects/leep/Ecostan/enindex.html, and ‘To Save the Aral Sea from Foreign Aid’ (author unknown), Almaty Globe, 17 January 1997. Turnbull, op. cit., pp. xii and 2–6. David R. Smith, ‘Environmental Security and Shared Water Resources in Post-Soviet Central Asia’, Post-Soviet Geography, Vol. 36 (6), 1995, pp. 357–63. In fact, the entire Ferghana Valley constitutes an area with high birth rates coupled with high water vulnerability and may well be the scene for fierce conflicts over access to water resources in the near future. See Klötzli, op. cit., Ch. 4, pp. 1–2 and 10–13; and Smith, op. cit., pp. 351–70. Sandra Postel, ‘Dividing the Waters: Food Security, Ecosystem Health, and the New Politics of Scarcity’, Worldwatch Paper No. 132 (Washington, DC: Worldwatch Institute, 1996), p. 40. For a discussion of key concepts related to shared water resources, see Smith, op. cit., pp. 351–70; Peter Gleick, ‘Water and Conflict: Fresh Water Resources and International Security’, International Security, Vol. 18 (1), 1993, pp. 79–112; Thomas Homer-Dixon: ‘Environmental Scarcities and Violent Conflict: Evidence

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33 34 35 36

37 38 39 40 41 42

from Cases’, International Security, Vol. 19 (1), 1994, pp. 5–40; and Jon Martin Trolldalen, International Environmental Conflict Resolution: The Role of the United Nations (Oslo and Washington, DC: World Foundation for Environment and Development, 1992). Gleick, op. cit., pp. 79–112. Ibid., pp. 79–112; Postel, op. cit., pp. 47–9. Stefan Klötzli, The ‘Aral Sea Syndrome’ and Regional Cooperation in Central Asia: Opportunity or Obstacle? NATO Advanced Research Workshop (‘Conflict and the Environment’) (Bolkesjö, Norway, 12–16 June 1996), p. 7. Peterson, op. cit., pp. 43–6. However, as Peter Sand argues, there are ways to get around the problem of the ‘lowest common denominator’. See Peter Sand, Lessons Learned in Global Environmental Governance (Washington, DC: World Resource Institute, June 1990, Library of Congress Catalogue Card No. 90–71021). See the following World Bank Papers: The Aral Sea Crisis, op. cit.; Aral Sea Basin Program Phase 1: Progress Report 1–3, op. cit.. Postel, op. cit., p. 47. Klötzli, ‘The Aral Sea Syndrome’, op. cit., pp. 13–14. Smith, op. cit., p. 367. Such as the Helsinki Convention on the Protection and Use of Trans-National Waterways and International Lakes approved by the United Nations on 17 March 1992. Bryan Roberts, ‘Central Asian Water Allocation: Change Through Crisis’, Central Asian Newsfile, April 1996, pp. 8–9.

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10 INSTABILITY AND IDENTITY IN A POST-SOVIET WORLD Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan* Tom Everett-Heath The perils of the post-Soviet vacuum are starkly visible in Central Asia. The region enjoyed a long period of stability under Soviet rule but its demise has left an agglomeration of territories in which the various peoples’ overriding ethnic attachments make the new countries vulnerable to both internal conflict and meddling by outsiders. Resurgent religion has also become a divisive force. (V. Tsepkalo)1

Since Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan gained independence, analysts and commentators have rushed to predict the paths down which they would develop. While debates over security have focused on international relations, in which the influence of Russia, China, Pakistan, Turkey, Afghanistan and Iran has been heavily discussed, less attention has been devoted to the potential for internal instability, despite the warning offered by the descent of Tajikistan into civil war. Ethnic identity has already proved divisive in Kazakhstan, and although widespread violence has been avoided, the danger remains that it could prove to be the fault-line of future conflict. An escalation in migration from rural areas to urban centres, particularly in the north of the country, compounded by a weak or failing economic situation, could increase the dangers of profound instability. In Uzbekistan, the threat to internal security forms a more complex paradigm. The reality of diverse ethnicity and a bleak economic future expose the country to the potentially destabilising force of Islamism. These factors are compounded by Uzbekistan’s proximity to violent and unresolved conflict in * This chapter was written in the summer of 2000. Since then the 11 September terrorist strikes on New York and Washington, and the US response, have changed the political landscape of Central Asia. The Taleban regime has been toppled in Afghanistan, and the projection of US military force and political influence into Central Asia has had a considerable impact on the region’s development. This examination of potential threats to internal stability in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, however, continues to be pertinent: the scene has been altered but the themes running through it remain largely the same.

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neighbouring Tajikistan and Afghanistan, and are exacerbated further by the vast underlying strains of a rapidly expanding population. For both countries, youth is a handicap, as is the legacy of their recent history. The collapse of the Soviet Union induced the birth of the five Central Asian republics. Unexpected statehood, and the need for a common agenda, urged initial cooperation and collaboration over the issue of regional international borders. The frontiers established by the Soviet regime, most of which were drawn up in 1924 during the process of national delimitation, were confirmed. Loosely based on linguistic differentiation, these national boundaries cut piecemeal across ethnic constituencies. The original disparities were further compounded, during the Soviet era, by the extensive migration of peoples, both forced and voluntary. The new state nations of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are confronted with the fact that multiple ethnic communities reside within their boundaries, and that there is a subsequent absence of social cohesion. Unlike nation states, which are often cited as models for their development, the state is not coterminous with the nation in either of these republics. The potential for tension is heightened by the reality that, despite seventy years of communist rule, the politics of the region are still dominated by traditional, sub-national, forms of legitimacy that have their roots in ethnic identity. Throughout the region, tension lies along the twin fault-lines of inter-ethnic and intra-ethnic strife. Divisions within society are stark and the potential for discord is magnified by economic instability.

Kazakhstan Dichotomous society: the strains of ethnicity The population structure of Kazakhstan is indicative of a divided society: in 1989 (the time of the last reliable census), Kazakhs made up around 40 per cent of the population and Russians approximately 38 per cent, with six other ethnic groups significantly represented.2 While the ethnic Cossack, Uighur, German, Ukrainian, Uzbek and Tatar constituencies are of significance in an examination of the strains of ethnic diversity within Kazakhstan, the presence of ethnic Russians is of greater statistical, and political, importance. Despite high levels of out-migration,3 the Russian population still maintains its massive minority status, comprising approximately 35 per cent of the population. Since the 1986 Alma Ata riots, about which considerable debate still rages, there have been no examples of large-scale violence fuelled by clashes between Russian and Kazakh groups. However, it would be unwise to cite this as evidence of diminished tension between the two groups, or to suggest that the potential for major internal conflict does not exist. Discord between the two main ethnic groups has been provoked by a number of issues: the ongoing debate over dual-nationality for Russians; the status of Kazakh as the state language; the geographical location of valuable natural 182

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resources such as oil, iron and copper; and the large-scale replacement of Russians by Kazakhs in the higher echelons of both public and private institutions. All these factors contribute to strained relations between the Kazakh and Russian ethnic groups within the country, which are accentuated by the distribution of the two main ethnic groups: Russians dominate the population in the industrialised areas, with the majority living in the northern provinces of the country. The problem confronting President Nursultan Nazarbayev is complex: the need to create within Kazakhstan some form of national identity, from which the state can derive legitimacy and authority, conflicts with the demographic reality. While the post-Soviet era has necessitated the construction of new social structures and identities, the process in Kazakhstan has been beset by the dangers of making ethnic affiliation ascribable: the direct connections between ethnicity, language and territory, and the linkage of ethnic status with any degree of ethno-territorial autonomy, have only served to reinforce the barricades between ethnicity and nation. In addition, a threat is posed to the strength of central government. The problems faced in Kazakhstan are, to a great extent, the legacy of developments during the Soviet period. Some form of transition from a pre-modern to a modern society occurred but the development was uneven and determined by the needs of the Soviet core – the view from Moscow – rather than those of the provinces. The dictates of the core/periphery relationship determined both the nature and extent of the industrialisation process in Kazakhstan and its concomitant impact on social organisation. Owing to the location of the resources upon which industrial development was based, and the skills required from workers, urbanisation was most rapid in the north of the country, and the backbone of the skilled urban workforce was drawn from Europe. In 1987, only 21 per cent of the industrial workforce of Kazakhstan was indigenous, and, in 1979, only 20.8 per cent of the urban population was made up of ethnic Kazakhs.4 Of the seventyone districts of Kazakhstan, those with the highest proportion of Kazakh peoples also have the highest levels of unemployment.5 The developmental lag engendered in the economic development of the country under Soviet rule, and the ethnic division of labour that proved to be a central part of the programme, have combined to inflame ethnic competition. The violent disturbances in 1989 in Novyi Uzen’ Munaishi, Dzetybai and other parts of the Mangyshlak area stand as a warning for future strife along ethnic fault-lines. Identity building: cohesive or divisive? The move by the state to forge a new national identity based on ethnicity and reconstructed interpretations of the past has provided a breeding ground for aggressive Kazakh nationalism. As the intelligentsia has been responsible for initially promoting ethnic nationalism, the issues of rights and identity have become inextricably linked. Models of democratic systems based on individuals’ merits, guaranteeing equal rights to all citizens, regardless of ethnic group, have come to be seen as inimical to the interests of politically strong, but economically disadvantaged, ethnic groups. 183

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Inter-ethnic relations have been jeopardised further by the nature of the development of the political structure since independence. Kazakhs are overrepresented in virtually all the republican foci of power as a result of the activities of official and unofficial affirmative action groups. However, while political advancement is far more accessible for Kazakhs – a reality heavily criticised by other groups – there are niches within society where different ethnic groups are dominant. As a result, all groups feel victimised and all hinder the social and professional advancement of others. Such fragmentation has led to the creation of a tense situation in which social differences become ethnic issues and social mobility strikes against ethnic boundaries. Internal migration has, in the past, led to heightened urban tensions and may do so again in the future. Owing to their poor education and lack of skills, Kazakhs moving from rural areas into urban centres have struggled to find work. Here, however, they must compete with Russians who have well-paid work and comparatively high standards of living. Unskilled-labour jobs or unemployment beckon as many are unable to return easily to the rural communities from whence they came. Such circumstances are becomingly increasingly familiar in Kazakhstan’s northern cities and towns, and provide a breeding ground for nationalist-inspired aggression and urban conflict. The growth of future ethnic competition seems unavoidable, with re-migrations of Kazakh youths from rural areas to urban centres likely to increase. The economic impact The delicate nature of the current ethnic peace is superficial and deceptive, and rests uneasily on the quantitative parity of the two major groupings. Any deterioration of the economic situation, however, could transform tension into conflict. The evidence for Kazakh malevolence towards other ethnic groupings is clear. In early 1992, activists of the Kazakh nationalist organisations, Azat and Kazak Tili, forced Chechen and Ingush inhabitants of the Novyy Mir settlement and Taldy-Kurgan to sell their homes for a pittance and leave the country. In the summer of the same year, Meskhetian Turks living in the Enbekshikazanhkskyy raion received an ultimatum from the local Kazakhs demanding their departure within three months.6 While President Nazarbayev responded by asserting that nobody would be forced to leave the country, he implicitly made it clear that out-migration by non-Kazakhs would in no way be impeded and, in some cases, would even be welcomed. Economic crisis could heighten existing tension. In 1994, the average monthly wage in Kazakhstan stood at $25 at a time when inflation was rampant.7 Since then, the consumer price index has been brought under some control, falling to 39 per cent in 1996 and 17 per cent in 1997, though earnings have failed to keep pace.8 Some sources estimated that, in February 1998, 60 per cent of Kazakhstan’s population were living below the poverty line.9 However, even this delicate economic situation is far from stable due to overdependence on a nascent oil industry beset with developmental and transport 184

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difficulties. The medium-term prospects for high foreign-currency earnings, by which meaningful government development programmes could be funded, are undermined by a variety of factors. Although the price of oil began to strengthen in April 1999, and has been relatively high ever since, the extent of the crisis induced in Kazakhstan during its trough in 1997–8 is indicative of the weakness of the sector’s organisation and its vulnerability to future shocks.10 Although potentially a productive source of substantial revenue, the Kazakh oil industry is currently ailing due to mismanagement and poor resource allocation. In June 1998, work in the Kalamkas field – from which 90 per cent of Kazakh oil was extracted – completely stopped, and at that time some Mangystau oil workers had not received their full salaries since 1996.11 One month later, Prime Minister Nurlan Balgymbayev conceded that ‘the country’s oil and gas sector is in a state of crisis and that efforts should be made to save the industry’, and the power, industry, economics and trade minister, Mukhtar Ablyazov, added that all Kazakh oil refineries were on the verge of ‘grinding to a halt’.12 The impact of reduced revenues on government expenditure was apparent in the austerity measures imposed in the 1999 budget. Finance Minister Sauat Minbaev explained to the Mazhilis (lower house) that as gross domestic product (GDP) growth in 1999 was expected to be flat, the budget deficit was expected to grow to 3 per cent of GDP in 1999.13 He added that sharp cuts in healthcare and cultural programmes would have to be implemented.14 World Bank statistics underline the precarious economic health of Kazakhstan: GDP contracted in 1993, 1994, 1995 and 1998, and in the intervening years, growth rates were insignificant. The fact that strong growth is forecast for the future is more a product of apparently sustainable high oil prices than of any underlying domestic strength. The historic volatility of global energy markets, combined with Kazakhstan’s foreign debt burden – at the end of 1999, it stood at 78 per cent of GDP – suggests that difficult times lie ahead, and that the troughs, when they come, will be deep. The instability of the oil sector is not the only concern. The paths to economic liberalisation, Western-style privatisation and the transition to a diversified market economy are beset with problems.15 Despite considerable international investment and financial aid programmes, progress has been slow and stilted. Not only are there doubts about the sustainability of economic growth in the short to medium term, there are also concerns over the effect of the social benefits of transition from the command economy of the Soviet era – characterised by central planning and theoretical ‘cradle-to-grave’ welfare – to free market capitalism. Some analysts have suggested that such a development is likely to exacerbate the tensions caused by the ethnic division of labour: they fear that a market economy is not likely to suit the descendants of pastoral nomads who have little experience or tradition of commerce and free enterprise.16 The potential for a growing rift between the Kazakh and Russian ethnic groups is clear and has been expressed by the nationalistic Republican Party, which asserted, in 1996, that the privatisation of land and industrial enterprises 185

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would be detrimental to the interests of Kazakhs, ‘whose psychology is not yet ready for market economical principles’.17 Akezhan Kazhegeldin, the former prime minister turned opponent of Nazarbayev, summed up the situation during the campaign for the January 1999 presidential elections: ‘The economic situation is going to get worse. … Living standards are falling. This will cause discontent, and the question will be who, and how, can first harness that discontent, which is already now quite strong.’18 Ethnic politics Inter-ethnic strife can be seen clearly in the political sphere. All political parties formed between 1988 and 1992, with the exception of the Socialist Party (a renamed Communist Party), were organised, or split, along ethnic lines. Only two major bodies since then, the presidential Union of People’s Unity, and the centrist National Congress of Kazakhstan, have declared adherence to the principle of inter-ethnic accommodation. The Kazakh organisations are motivated by the desire to assert and establish a privileged position within the country for ethnic-Kazakh rights. In addition, paramount importance is attached to the maintenance of Kazakhstan’s territorial integrity. At the heart of this aspect of the political debate lies the issue of whether Kazakhstan should evolve into a multi-ethnic nation state or a Kazakh state. The deployment by Kazakhs of ‘indigenous rights’ arguments for priority and special political status has already caused the Russian population to feel threatened and increasingly isolated. The March 1994 elections returned a parliament marked by unequal representation: gerrymandering resulted in 60 per cent of the deputies being Kazakhs while only 28 per cent were Russian.19 Such disproportional representation was reflected in the composition of the government. Nazarbayev’s attempts to rebut criticism of the predominance of Kazakhs in his cabinet were marked by their weakness: ‘Suffice to mention that the vice premier in charge of economic matters is Alexander Pavlov; the general prosecutor is Yuri Khitrin; the science minister is Vladimir Shkolnik; and the minister of labour and social security is Natalya Korzhova.’20 Even Nazarbayev would concede that the responsibilities of these ethnic Russians are not the highest ranking in his government. This ethnic inequality within the cabinet is mirrored throughout the state, and has become an issue of political importance, as the Russian newspaper Kommersant Daily reported in July 1998: ‘In 1985, Kazakhs occupied 50 per cent of the top posts in the republic, but by 1997 this figure had risen to 83 per cent.’21 Russian influence and the language issue The political chasm between the two main ethnic groups, opened by discriminatory Kazakh behaviour, has been further widened by events in Russia. Calls by the likes of Alexandr Solzhenitsyn to annex Russian-populated areas of northern Kazakhstan have induced hostile protest from Kazakhs and deeper suspicion of 186

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the motives and agendas of Russian groups.22 Even more damaging to ethnic relations were the widely disseminated views of Vladimir Zhirinovsky – who grew up in Alma Ata – during his abortive election campaign in Russia. His aggressive, expansionist brand of Russian nationalism evoked fear among Kazakhs and encouraged hostility towards the Russian population. Though Zhirinovsky’s own credibility and popularity have declined in Russia, his neo-imperialist political view maintains a sizeable number of adherents, and if Russia were to suffer from economic collapse, it is not inconceivable that politicians with such extremist views might re-emerge. Such a development would only serve to heighten further the tension between ethnic Kazakhs and Russians. Nazarbayev has expressed concerns that Zhirinovsky’s views continue to hold the attention of a number of Russia’s politicians. In 1993, the Kakakh president went so far as to describe Russia’s policy towards the Russian population in Kazakhstan as being similar to the policy of Nazi Germany towards the ethnic Germans living in the Sudetenland.23 The language issue is, perhaps, one of the most visible sources of contention in Kazakhstan. In August 1989, Nazarbayev forwarded legislation proposing Kazakh as the state language despite vociferous opposition from the Russian population.24 The reasons for the opposition are clear: in 1989 about 63 per cent of the Kazakh population spoke Russian while only 1 per cent of the Russians spoke Kazakh. The Russians, and the other Slavs, have come to regard the policy of ‘Kazakhisation’ as being ‘an infringement of other people’s rights’.25 That the Slavs are prepared to resist the perceived process of acculturation can be seen by the demonstration, staged in December 1992, by an estimated 15,000 Russians in Ust-Kamenogorsk, which demanded that Russian be given the status of a state language. Demands were also made that East Kazakhstan – predominantly populated by Russians – be given extensive rights of self-determination of language, culture and exploitation of natural resources.26 In 1996, it was decided that, while Kazakh was to be the state language, Russian could be used officially and on an equal footing with Kazakh in state organisations and organs of self-government. The significance of the language issue was reinforced, however, in July 1998 when the Russian prime minister, Sergey Kiriyenko, discussed with Nazarbayev the continuing high levels of Russian emigration from Kazakhstan – some 237,000 returned to Russia in 1997: ‘According to Russian government information, the Russians are being forced out primarily for linguistic reasons.’27 In particular, the legislation passed in 1997, which drew up a list of professions for which knowledge of Kazakh was essential, has been criticised: ‘Russians clearly have no chance of doing top-level work in the republic.’28 Furthermore, the state programme for marginalising the Russian language has developed in other areas. The number of Russianlanguage publications has been eroded and the volume of Russian-language broadcasting on television and radio has declined dramatically.29 The political significance of language was reasserted during the run-up to the presidential elections on 10 January 1999, when the Central Electoral Commission established that all candidates not only had to provide a certificate 187

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confirming mental health, but also had to pass a Kazakh language test before they would be allowed to stand.30 The threat of secession or even demands by Russians for greater autonomy in northern Kazakhstan provokes both strong resentment and opposition from the government and Kazakh public opinion alike. Nazarbayev, who noticeably seeks to find the middle path between both Russian and Kazakh nationalistic extremists, has made it clear publicly that any threat to the territorial integrity of Kazakhstan will provoke bloodshed.31 Some analysts see the recent movement of the capital from Alma Ata, deep in the south-east near the border with Kyrgyzstan, to the more northern Akmola (subsequently renamed Astana, meaning ‘capital’), where the bulk of the Russian population is settled, as a mechanism by which Nazarbayev will be able to keep a closer watch on Russian activities and reduce their feeling of alienation from the political process.32 While this might be an overtly simplistic interpretation, the site of the new capital does send a clear signal that the unity of the Kazakh state is inviolable. Nazarbayev has regularly sought to maintain good relations with Russia. His ambition that Kazakhstan should become a regional power, after centuries of subjugation, can only be realised with advice and assistance from Moscow in economic and military affairs. Geopolitical reality – a vast common frontier, and joint concerns over the security of Kazakhstan’s southern boundary – has fostered economic, political and military ties which partially allay Moscow’s suspicion of Kazakhstan’s links with neighbouring states and the West. In December 1992, Nazarbayev declared that Kazakhstan and Russia were ‘tied together by stable links of friendship and fraternity going back centuries’ and ‘are fated to stay together’. He added that due to ‘a common economy, historical and cultural tradition … nobody will ever manage to sow discord between our peoples’.33 No doubt, the intended audience of these comments were Russians within Kazakhstan as well as those in Russia. More explicit views were expressed by Nazarbayev in September 1996, when discussing relations with Russia: We are only proposing that you declare our nations are friendly, and on an equal footing, and that we mutually respect our independence and sovereignty… I am a Kazakh raised on Russian culture. I have many Russian friends. God gave us a border with Russia that’s 7,000 kilometres long.34 The president’s view That Nazarbayev is concerned with ethnic division and the threat that it poses to national stability, and the security of his regime, is beyond doubt. In 1993, he laid out both the nature of the problem, as he saw it, and a blueprint for the future. He stated that, in contemporary Kazakhstan, 188

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there have sprung up altogether new trends in intra-national division, far from innocent and harmless … certain independence in the activities of regions came to be used as levers of exclusive control over the available resources exercised by the local élite. Various forms of tribal protectionism, clannish and territorial loyalties manifest themselves here and there in power structures, in financial and commercial spheres.35 Nazarbayev’s fear that ethnic issues fuel the centrifugal tendencies of the northern regions is clear, as is his concern that the authority and control of central government, dominated by him, is under threat. The implementation of a nation-building process is regarded as being of paramount importance to the state: ‘Overcoming tribal stereotypes should become one of the key guidelines of state ideology – unitary state structure, territorial integrity, unity of centuries-old national culture.’36 Nazarbayev’s intentions on this issue are also clear: he wishes to build a nation state in Kazakhstan that is based on the foundations of ‘nationalism by soil’ rather than ‘nationalism by blood’. With the territorial integrity of the country sacrosanct, he has been forced to walk a tightrope between the fears and demands of the two main ethnic groups. His attempts to relieve tension have been numerous and are illustrated by comments made in 1996 when discussing Moscow’s attitude towards Russians in Kazakhstan: ‘They reply: “We shall defend the interests of the Russian-speaking population of Kazakhstan.” That population sends me letters, asking me to do something so that its defenders will shut up. Because Russians here have it better than in Russia.’37 Nazarbayev has shown limited support for Russian interests: as a Kazakh, he shows his support clearly to that constituency. The establishment of the Kazak Tili organisation, whose purpose is to promote the Kazakh language and culture in the Russiandominated north, has won muted support.38 However, while Nazarbayev’s rhetoric has been sophisticated, and his touch light, he has failed to resolve many of the underlying issues that promote tension between ethnic groups. Fearful of the pernicious nature of ethnocentrism, and concerned by the danger of public debate, Nazarbayev went to the lengths of prohibiting parliament from discussing the status of Russian as a second language in December 1994. Parliament was also prevented from debating the issue of changing the ambiguous and controversial definition, adopted in the constitution in 1993, of Kazakhstan as the republic of a self-determined Kazakh nation.39 Ironically, Nazarbayev’s near authoritarian powers may exacerbate the difficulty of his position. If a point is reached where there is no path available by which he can continue to divide and rule and he is forced into one or other camp, his totalitarian authority could serve to deepen the sense of alienation of the rejected group and increase the probability of violent opposition. His efforts to marginalise both Russian and Kazakh extremists – and use coercion in the process – have, so far, been superficially successful. However, such methods will 189

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not provide a mechanism through which the issue of power sharing between different ethnic groups can be resolved. The absence of consociational structures and the prevalence of Nazarbayev’s totalitarian regime conspire against the emergence of any successful bargaining political culture through which ethnic tension might be reduced. Conclusion Kazakhstan has pulled back from the brink of violent civil discord. In February 1994, on the eve of parliamentary elections, John Ritchotte, field representative for the National Democratic Institute, declared: ‘There’s just no question that ethnic tensions have been increasing. You hear a lot of people talking about the possibility of civil war.’40 Such concerns have eased, but a front-page headline in the local daily Kazakhstanskaya Pravda reading ‘Inter-ethnic Concord Among the Peoples of Kazakhstan Is More Important Than Anything’ still rings as true as it did in February 1994.41 Firm forecasts of future developments are inopportune, but a number of observations can be made. A fundamental paradox has emerged in Kazakhstan: the economic need for cultural homogeneity is in direct conflict with ethnically related social differences, yet a deteriorating economic environment puts greater pressure on the fault-lines dividing the community. Society has become polarised along ethnic lines, and such differentiation has become the source of potentially explosive social disunity. The competition for political participation and economic advancement ensures that ethnicity will remain an unavoidable and integral criterion for political organisation. Ethnic corporatism renders equality of competition between members of different ethnic groups virtually impossible and self-perpetuating tension is generated.

Uzbekistan The problems of building a nation state in Uzbekistan are different. Issues of ethnicity, Islamism, tribalism and weak economic conditions have conspired to undermine attempts to bring stability to the country since independence. The tensions produced by these problems have been further exacerbated by a dangerous demographic situation in which rapid population growth threatens to overwhelm the ability of the state to bring cohesion to society. Ethnic issues While Uzbekistan has a diverse ethnic composition, the direct dangers this poses to the stability of the country are less likely to stem from internally originating conflict than they are to be ignited by events outside the country. Developments in Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan seem to be the likely determinants of any ethnically inspired conflict in Uzbekistan. 190

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The size of the Tajik population in Uzbekistan has become the subject of debate. Official census figures place the figure at around 5 per cent – a figure uncritically used by the majority of Western scholars – but there are reasons to believe that it is considerably higher. Some Tajiks within Uzbekistan estimate they make up 25–30 per cent of the population, and account for 70 per cent of Samarkand and possibly 90 per cent of Bukhara.42 Few analysts would dispute that areas of the Ferghana Valley and Jizzakh province are populated predominantly by Tajiks. Scholars at the Samarkand State University estimate the total Tajik population at about 6 million–7 million – roughly double the Tajik population of Tajikistan.43 That official statistics seek to suppress this can be regarded as both a legacy of the Soviet era and a manifestation of the drive by the Uzbekdominated state to build an Uzbek identity for the nation. It is an inconvenient reality that unlike ethnic Uzbeks, who are of Turkic origin, the Tajik peoples are Persian. Not only have demographic statistics been altered in this pursuit. The Tajik Cultural Society, based in Samarkand, was effectively shut down after it proposed that all Tajiks in Uzbekistan should alter their official identity cards to mark themselves as Tajiks rather than Uzbeks.44 There are other examples of the prevalence of anti-Tajik prejudice. The National Cultural Centre of Tajiks and Tajik-speaking Peoples (NCC), also based in Samarkand, has, for a number of years, complained about official discrimination carried out against Tajiks in Uzbekistan. A number of prominent members of the NCC have been removed from their jobs and all have been prohibited from attending the annual World Congress of Tajiks since 1992.45 However, there is little evidence of growing militant Tajik nationalism within Uzbekistan, and it appears that although official state policy may have provoked opposition of a limited nature – and it is limited mainly to the Tajik intelligentsia – there is little danger of violent conflict erupting. Bordering problems: Tajikistan and Afghanistan Although ethnic differentiation within Uzbekistan seems to be an unlikely source of major conflict, tension is brought to the country along ethnic fault-lines from neighbouring countries. The conflicts in Tajikistan and Afghanistan, to differing extents, have had an impact on Uzbekistan. It is not surprising that President Karimov has staunchly supported the former communists in Tajikistan, General Dostum – himself an ethnic Uzbek – and other secular leaders in Afghanistan. Though there is little evidence that either Taleban forces in Afghanistan, or the United Tajik Opposition (UTO) in Tajikistan, foster expansionist territorial ambitions, Karimov is fearful of the destabilising effect of these conflicts on Uzbekistan: ‘Tashkent does not want Tajikistan to become an Islamic state. An Islamic country bordering on it would be dangerous for the people of Uzbekistan, most of whose population are Muslims.’46 While the danger of ‘overspill’ from the Tajikistan war seems to have receded, there remains the faint possibility of an analogous situation developing in 191

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Uzbekistan. There is clear evidence that the UTO has been involved with opposition forces in Uzbekistan. In May 1998, the Tajik president, Imomali Rakhmonov, demanded of Sayed Abdullo Nuri, the UTO leader, that he locate and hand over forty-five UTO members wanted by the Uzbek government on terrorism charges. Karimov had requested the extradition of the extremists on the grounds that they had been involved in the violence in the Uzbek city of Namangan, near the border with Tajikistan, in December 1997. Reports suggest that a number of the forty-five were senior members of the UTO and close to the leadership. 47 The extent of Uzbekistan’s involvement in the Afghan conflict is difficult to assess. The supply of arms to the anti-Taleban forces is unofficial – and probably boosted by Russian involvement – and there appears to be little publicly admitted state-organised support for the likes of Dostum. Despite this, Dostum is ‘widely considered to be under Tashkent’s patronage’.48 Accusations of Uzbek government involvement in Afghan affairs have been constant. In the summer of 1998, Mulla Mohammad Omar, leader of the Taleban movement in Afghanistan, warned the Uzbek government not to allow anti-Taleban coalition forces to use bases within Uzbek territory.49 The response from Tashkent to such communications has remained virtually unaltered since the Taleban seized control of Kabul in September 1996. Officials have voiced ‘serious concern’ over events in Afghanistan and have made pledges to pursue a ‘peaceful foreign policy aimed at non-interference in the internal affairs of neighbouring countries’.50 Despite proclamations to the contrary by Karimov himself, the chance of any Taleban-led, or Taleban-inspired, invasion of Uzbekistan is extremely limited, and no direct threat is posed either to the territorial integrity of Uzbekistan or the Karimov-led regime.51 However, events in Afghanistan do threaten to bring instability in other forms. Defeat of the anti-Taleban forces in the north of the country could lead to a large number of ethnic-Uzbek refugees flooding over the border accompanied by heavily armed, and fiercely independent paramilitaries. The presence, in Uzbekistan, of the veterans of twenty years’ conflict in Afghanistan can only pose a threat to the stability of civil society. Recent developments in northern Afghanistan have raised the possibility of just such a prospect. The Taleban seizure of Mazar-i-Sharif, long an opposition stronghold and the last of the major Afghan cities to remain outside of their control, in midAugust 1998, raised the chances of victory for the political Islamists. A statement released by the Kremlin on 13 August 1998 reported that President Boris Yeltsin ‘expressed deep concern about the events in northern Afghanistan … which are a real threat to the southern borders of the Commonwealth of Independent States’.52 On the following day the Uzbek defence minister, Khikmatulla Trursunov, was despatched to the southern town of Termez, close to the Uzbek–Afghan border, and unconfirmed reports suggested that ‘Uzbek soldiers [had] already begun to cross to the Afghan shore of the Amu Darya’.53 Tashkent was reported as being ‘less afraid of a direct attack by the Taleban than of the spread of weapons and radical Islamic ideology among their own people, many 192

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of whom are disillusioned with economic hardship’.54 While Tajikistan announced that it was willing to allow refugees to cross over from Afghanistan, despite the risk of Taleban fighters being among them, Uzbek authorities have been reluctant to open their borders. Taslimur Rakhman, head of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees in Uzbekistan, said, in August 1998: ‘We discussed this problem some time ago with the Uzbek government. The government was not against providing humanitarian assistance across the border. What we have noticed however, is that they are against having refugees on their side [of the border].’55 Rakhman added that there were only 8,000 Afghan refugees in Uzbekistan, of which 3,000 were officially registered with the authorities. That Karimov feels a threat is clear, as was shown by his comments in October 1998: What is Uzbekistan supposed to do to maintain stability freedom and independence in the lawlessness that surrounds us? Who were we supposed to turn to for support when the Taleban were seizing one city after another, making no secret of their euphoria, and threatening to move even further north?56 Islam: a changing story The formation of a new national identity in Uzbekistan has been plagued less by ethnic pluralism than by the role of Islam within social and state structures, though the relationship between the two factors is of considerable significance. In the immediate aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union, a number of leaders in Central Asia regarded Islam as being one of the major pillars upon which national identities could be constructed. Karimov was eager to enhance his legitimacy and went to some lengths to portray an overtly Muslim image. At his presidential inauguration he took his oath on the Koran. In the summer of 1992 he made the haj to Mecca, and, describing his experience, said: ‘When we were allowed to enter Kaaba, I prayed to God for my people. I believed that I did not go there for an empty purpose. We have received so much respect and not with an empty promise, it is due to the grace of God.’57 Islam was regarded as a source of national culture and a tool by which political leaders might court popular support. Seeking to exploit this, Karimov publicly described two of the holy days of Islam (Ramadan Xayt and Qurban Xayt) as ‘milestones of the spiritual and religious heritage of the Uzbek people’ and prescribed that the observance ‘of such events will help to awaken the respect and belief of the people in their leaders and to the administration’.58 However, such deeds and words are part of a complex political dynamic. Appreciating the strength of the Islamist movement within Uzbekistan after the Soviet era, and the manner in which Uzbek identity and the Muslim faith have become inextricably linked, Karimov has sought to gain credibility by appealing to Islamic sentiment while attempting to build a secular state. His intention has 193

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been to prevent the growth of any radical Islamist opposition that, if able to gather mass support, could pose a serious threat to his regime, and the stability of Uzbek society. In such a context, the dichotomous nature of his policy towards Islam becomes more clear, and his repressive actions more explicable. Karimov fears that if control of the Islamist agenda falls to the hands of Jaddidist-inspired activists, a new style of opposition – and one more difficult to combat – could emerge. It is also significant that the Ferghana Valley, heavily populated with Tajiks, and hence less locked into the state-dominated process by which the new Uzbek identity is being constructed, is the centre of informal religious activities. Although it is difficult to assess the extent to which Islamist movements threaten Karimov’s regime – and the threat does appear to be minimal – Wahhabism is taken seriously.59 Karimov has stressed that while he supports religious freedom, extremism will not be tolerated, as he made clear to parliament in May 1998 when discussing Islamic fundamentalists: ‘Such people must be shot in the forehead. If necessary, I’ll shoot them myself, if you lack the resoluteness.’60 In a less demagogic fashion, Karimov has explained how he ‘will never give the go-ahead to those who are today trying by any means to introduce political Islam, religious extremism and fanaticism’.61 A number of show trials have been held to demonstrate the vigour of the anti-Islamic campaign.62 In June 1998, the fourth of a series of trials against alleged Wahhabis opened in Tashkent with the state prosecutor demanding the death sentence for Talib Mamajanov, who admitted to being a member of a criminal group responsible for killing twelve people (eight of them policemen) in the Ferghana Valley between 1994 and 1997.63 It was described as being one of ‘a series of open trials of Wahhabis accused of attempting a coup d’état and the establishment of an Islamic state in Uzbekistan’.64 Another high-profile trial of fifteen ‘Islamic extremists’, from the eastern and predominantly Tajik town of Andizhan, opened in mid-October 1998. The Supreme Court was told that the accused belonged to ‘an extremist group that was recruiting young people and had been leading them astray since 1990’ and that ‘with the aim of seizing power and destroying socio-political stability, they have been spreading various kinds of literature of a religious and extremist nature and had in their possession weapons and narcotics’.65 As a response to the rise of Wahhabi activities, particularly among ethnic Tajiks in eastern Uzbekistan, a new law on religious freedom was passed by parliament in May 1998. Sergey Zinin was reported as saying: ‘The law says that the exercise of freedom or conscience, or the right to follow religious or any other beliefs, has to be restricted to an extent necessary for national security and law and order.’66 He added that the legislation was intended to prevent religion being used as a means of ‘spreading anti-state propaganda, and fomenting ethnic enmity’.67 The urgency that has characterised the introduction of such measures to combat the spread of Wahhabism, in regions dominated by ethnic Tajik populations, is indicative of the depth of the regime’s concern. In late October 1998, concerns over the effectiveness of 194

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the legislation and the speed of its implementation were broadcast on state television.68 Perhaps more revealing is the manner in which the fear of opposition Islamism has contributed to the formation of Uzbekistan’s foreign policy. It has, in conjunction with ethnic considerations, directly influenced Uzbekistan’s response to the conflicts in both Afghanistan and Tajikistan. In addition, concord with Russia over the need to combat Islamic fundamentalism has been one of the main drivers of improved relations between the two countries. Until late 1997, contact with Russia had been strained and marked by weak comments about missed opportunities for economic cooperation. Alone of the five former Soviet Central Asian states, Uzbekistan refused to tolerate the continued presence of Russian troops, even to aid in monitoring its border with Afghanistan. However, in a state visit to Moscow on 5–7 May 1998, Karimov went to some lengths to persuade Yeltsin that ‘the two states have a common enemy in the Wahhabites and called upon him to combat this threat’.69 The announcement of the formation of a troika followed: an alliance between Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan aimed at opposing Islamic fundamentalism was established. Karimov has said, on a number of occasions, that Wahhabites are seeking to establish an Islamic state in Uzbekistan, and that he is determined to counter it: ‘The possible spreading of political radicalism and religious extremism from the south, in the form of Wahhabism, is absolutely unacceptable in Central Asia.’70 Analysts see the Russo-Uzbek–Tajik pact as, in fact, being focused on the threat from Islamist Tajiks both in Tajikistan and in Uzbekistan, and the threat of the spread of Islamism from Afghanistan.71 However, Uzbekistan has already been confronted by the perceived Islamic threat on a regional level.72 Early in 1998, Tashkent accused Pakistan of training ‘Islamic fighters’ and infiltrating saboteurs into Uzbekistan across the territory of Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan: a diplomatic incident was only avoided, following firm denials from Islamabad, by the subsequent Uzbek pronouncement that the extremists were operating outside government control.73 However, Karimov has subsequently repeated the assertion, blaming foreign powers for the outbreak of violence in the Ferghana Valley in the autumn of 1998 that ‘reached the point of armed terrorist attacks against local bodies of power and the police, who were brutally murdered’.74 Measures to counter the perceived Wahhabite threat have involved other countries of the region: in agreement with Kyrgyzstan’s authorities, Uzbek special services have taken Kyrgyz citizens across the border to Andizhan for questioning. The regional nature of the Islamist issue was commented on by Natan Sharansky, the Israeli trade and industry minister, in a visit to Uzbekistan in July 1998, in which he supported the aggressive steps taken by Karimov: Uzbekistan is a very moderate Muslim country, with a very negative attitude to Islamic fundamentalism. After the failure of communism, the biggest threat to the free world is fundamentalism in general and 195

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specifically Muslim fundamentalism that is feeding terrorism. That is why being hard on that kind of fundamentalism is very important. Uzbekistan is a Muslim country on the border of the Christian and Muslim world. It is in the region between Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and China, which today has become an important region for the possible expansion of tension, or, on the contrary, for coping with that tension.75 Whether Karimov’s attempts to prevent the development of any meaningful Islamist opposition within Uzbekistan will prove successful is yet to be seen. The full implications of the six explosions that shook Tashkent on 16 February 1999, killing 15 and wounding about 150, are far from clear. Opinion is divided over who might have been responsible for the bomb blasts, but Karimov wasted no time in affirming that the bombings constituted an attack on his life and that Islamist forces were responsible.76 Within days more than thirty arrests were made and Karimov announced: ‘Virtually all of those arrested have undergone training in sabotage in Chechnya, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. They all belong to various terrorist and extremist religious groups such as Hizbollah and Hezb-e Tahrir or are supporters of the Wahhabi sect.’77 With the bombings in Tashkent, and the response of the regime, the significance of the Islamist issue was elevated to a new level. A complex dynamic appears to be at work in which the virulent measures taken by the state to counter the perceived threat of oppositional Islamism may prove to be the forces which legitimise Islamist movements as the most effective form of opposition to an authoritarian state. The fear of Islamism, and the measures deployed to suppress it, may prove to be the very forces that bring it to life and accelerate its growth. Where there may not have been any meaningful political Islam, Karimov may be creating it. The attempts made by the state since independence to co-opt religious symbolism and language are continuing, but the nature of the attacks on alleged political Islam may prove counter-productive. The veil grows increasingly thin, even as worn by Karimov: ‘We reject outright extremism and fanaticism in religion. We also oppose the use of religion for political goals. Our religion should be rid of fanaticism and extremism. We are fighting fanaticism and the discredit of Islam rather than religion.’78 Regionalism in Uzbekistan While ethnicity and religion are two of the fault-lines which could bring instability to the country, the dangers of both proving a threat to Karimov’s regime are exacerbated by the tribalism and regionalism that is extant within the country. Politics within Uzbekistan have been described as a contest among five regions: Ferghana, Khorzem, Samarkand/Bukhara, Surkhandarya/Kashkadarya and Tashkent.79 Tashkent and Ferghana remain the most important. Some analysts go further and claim that regional divisions are ‘partially kin-reinforced with the political and economic life of the capital controlled by seven influential families’.80 196

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Regionalism continues to be a divisive force within Uzbek society despite the state’s attempts to forge a national identity, and the institutional strength of Karimov’s personalised, authoritarian regime. Events in Margilan serve as an illustration of both the strength of regionalist feelings and the response of the state. Even during the Brezhnev period, Margilan was the centre of the ‘second economy’ and the dominant families from the area were said to control the regulation of trade through Uzbekistan. Since independence, centralised decision taking has been challenged in the region. In 1992, a virulent campaign was launched against the selection of an outsider as head of the Namangan region. The Adolat ( Justice Party), based in Namangan – significantly supported by the clergy – backed the campaign.81 Feeling his authority was under threat, Karimov banned the organisation. It is yet to be seen what success such measures have had in preventing the undermining of state control in the region. Certainly tribal relations continue to be of significance in the rural regions, where traditional modes of lifestyle have greater dominance. In the urban centres the neighbourhood ties of the Mahalla82 are of profound importance to the organisation of society, and represent the mechanism through which government policy can be transmuted from having significance in the public sphere to influencing activities in the private sphere of life. It is not surprising that Karimov has been diligent in extending his system of patronage in such a fashion that the leaders of the Mahalla are well integrated: many of the heads of the Oqsoqol (community leaders, lit. ‘white beards’) have been taken into his employment. This step has given Karimov an element of control at the microsocial level and a highly efficient information network that can be used to prevent the growth and organisation of opposition to his rule. Economic problems The potential threats to Karimov’s regime posed by regionalism, ethnic diversity and Islamism could be magnified by a deteriorating economic situation. In 1999, more than 2 million Uzbeks were estimated to be unemployed, about 10 per cent of the population, in a country where more than half the population is under the age of 30. After independence, GDP declined year-on-year until 1995, and in 1997 still stood below 1993 levels. Short-term solutions to economic problems are precluded by the nature of the Soviet economic legacy: infrastructure is weak and in decay; over-dependency on a cotton monoculture has severely undermined the agricultural sector, which struggles to provide enough food to feed the population, let alone produce a meaningful surplus for export; after almost seventy years of a command economy, dominated by the core in Moscow, the experience required for the implementation of successful developmental programmes, and a workforce with diverse skills, are lacking. Bahadur Ashanov, head of the External Economic Relations Committee for Forecasting and Statistics in the Cabinet of Ministers, described the situation: 197

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Uzbekistan imports 80 per cent of the wheat, all of the tea and sugar, 40 per cent of the meat and meat products, and 35 per cent of the milk and milk products its residents use. We export more than 70 per cent of our cotton, more than 50 per cent of our fruit. Since Uzbekistan imports 80 per cent of its needs … we understand that cotton is the only real opportunity for us to earn hard currency.83 With cotton perceived as the only source of foreign currency, the temptation to pursue cotton monoculture in the agricultural sector is great, but the concomitant dangers are greater: a rapidly expanding population needs to be fed. The frailty of Uzbekistan’s post-Soviet economy, and the uncertainty surrounding its future, are underlined by the country’s harsh demographic realities. The most populous country in Central Asia is experiencing spectacular population growth: growth that is so fast, the basic resources of the state are being strained to breaking point. According to some statistics, the population of Uzbekistan grew by 19.6 per cent between 1990 and 1999, to stand at 24.4 million.84 Many of the indicators of rapid future growth appear to be moving in the right direction: fertility rates (the total number of births per woman) have declined from 4.1 to 2.7 in the period; and infant mortality rates have fallen from 34.6 per 1,000 live births to 22.3. However, the age profile of the population is such that significant rapid growth remains unavoidable: within a young population, there is a disproportionately large rump of young women still either at the beginning of, or even yet to enter, their procreative periods. There are any number of wild forecasts of the heights Uzbekistan’s population will reach: some suggest 30 million by 2005, while others predict even higher levels.85 Population growth of this magnitude poses serious problems. In demographic terms, the issues raised are those of population density, carrying capacity, sustainability and overshoot. Clearly, the larger the population within fixed boundaries, the higher population density becomes. Although the carrying capacity of land can be artificially increased by technological improvements, there is, in any time-frame, an upper limit beyond which sustainability is not possible.86 The dangers of overshoot are not limited to population growth; they can also be applied to pollution and food resources. Rapidly rising population densities in rural regions could stretch the availability of cultivable land. The size of landholdings will decline as the population grows, and more mouths will have to be fed from a static land supply. The situation will be exacerbated by the requirements of the expanding urban centres for the production of an ever-increasing agricultural surplus. The danger of land exhaustion is also real: attempts to increase productivity invariably lead to soil depletion and farmers become increasingly dependent on the use of toxic fertilisers and pesticides.87 Although the environmental and ecological hazards of high population growth are acute, the politico-economic dangers are possibly greater. At the heart of the matter lies the potential for a fiscal crisis. One of the symptoms of a 198

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young age structure within a fast-growing population is a high level of dependency. Within the context of a fragile economy, it is unlikely that the employment market will expand as rapidly as the population: levels of unemployment, and underemployment, will rise in rural and urban areas alike. Neither the unemployed nor the youth contribute to government revenues, but both demand governmental expenditure. The potential for fiscal crisis is further exacerbated by the continued weakness of the state’s attempts to penetrate the private sector in economic terms. The informal, and hidden, business culture that developed under the Soviet regime, in which transactions and contracts are organised through subtle patronage systems, has flourished in the post-independence period, and the levying of taxes by governmental officials has proved to be a difficult task. However, as the population grows, the need for governmental expenditure grows with it. More schools are needed, with greater resources and trained teachers. The medical infrastructure requires expansion to meet ever-increasing demands. The social security network will also be increasingly burdened. The private sector alone is unlikely to be able to meet the demand for new housing: government coffers will be further drained. In addition, economic growth will be constrained by the expanding population. Even if there are relatively high levels of underlying economic growth, per capita GDP is likely to decline, and with it per capita income. The expanding population will induce an increase in the absolute demand for consumer goods. For structural reasons, and probable inelasticity of supply, it is unlikely this will be met by domestic production: levels of imports could rise, which, unless matched by increased exports, would put pressure on the balance of payments. Increased imports are also likely to prove inflationary. All these problems will have to be met at a time when Uzbekistan continues to struggle with post-Soviet strategic structural adjustment. Karimov is confronted with a dilemma. Growing poverty and limited economic opportunity will lead to greater demands being made on limited governmental resources. Failure to meet such demands could exacerbate the strain felt by social divisions and encourage the development of opposition movements that will organise themselves along ethnic or religious fault-lines. ‘If we have a situation where the people are living in poverty and can’t even satisfy their most basic needs, when elements of spiritual degradation appear as a consequence of economic degradation, then naturally the people begin asking the government questions,’ says the president.88 However, there are also marked dangers of too rapid a transformation of the economic structure. Russia stands as an immediate and clear example of the dangers of an accelerated transition to a market economy. The Western-style linkage – upon which so many offers of foreign aid are based – between economic liberalism and political pluralism is not attractive to Karimov and his regime, which stands only to lose rather than gain from such a process. In addition, the process of transition is deemed likely to open the very divisions in society that Karimov fears will bring instability. He has said publicly: ‘I am absolutely sure of the need of transforming the economy, 199

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only it must be step by step’.89 Karimov has also described, when arguing for a slow, state-controlled economic transition, how the ‘thoughtless acceleration of events may lead to conflicts, civil confrontation, inter-ethnic clashes and the further proliferation of problems rather than their solution’.90 Conclusion There are a number of factors contributing to scenarios of instability within Uzbekistan. The demographic reality is bleak: the population will grow rapidly in the medium term, and this will put considerable pressure on the ability of the state to meet the burgeoning demands placed on it. Unless consolidated improvements to the economic situation can be made, tension and civil unrest is a firm possibility. The extent to which Karimov’s regime has mobilised against the perceived threat of opposition Islamism is indicative of the fact that he thinks it poses a real challenge to stability within the country. If the economic situation is not to improve sufficiently, and Islamism is to take root, it would seem likely that the diverse ethnic composition of Uzbekistan could prove to be a divisive factor. As in Kazakhstan, ethnic differentiation could become the source of polarisation and potentially explosive social disunity. With political pluralism unlikely to develop in the foreseeable future, the strength of Karimov’s authoritarianism is likely to be tested to the full. Karimov has made clear that he is well aware of the threats to security in Uzbekistan: The most important thing is that our peoples are becoming increasingly conscious of their national identity. Since we want to build a free, stable and prosperous life, the most vital guarantee is to ensure the security of our country and inviolability of our borders, as well as to maintain and strengthen the unity of the multi-ethnic citizens of Uzbekistan.91

Notes 1 V. Tsepkalo, ‘The Remaking of Eurasia’, Foreign Affairs, March/April 1998, p. 119. 2 Anatoly M. Khazanov, ‘The Ethnic Problems of Contemporary Kazakhstan’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 14 (2), 1995, p. 244. 3 Russian sources suggest that between 1992 and 1998, some 1.34 million Russians left Kazakhstan, with 237,000 emigrating in 1997 alone. 4 Khazanov, op. cit., p. 242. 5 Ibid., p. 249. 6 Ibid., p. 254. 7 Elena Sadovskaya, ‘Prevention of Conflict in Kazakhstan’, OSCE ODHIR Bulletin, Vol. 3 (1), 1995, p. 31. 8 IMF, Annual Country Reports. 9 Interfax – Kazakhstan news agency, Alma Ata, 7.40 a.m., 17 Feb. 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3156 G/1. 10 During the course of a prolonged slump, the price of oil briefly dipped below $10 a barrel. The OPEC basket price of oil sold by member countries averaged $12.37 a barrel in the first half of 1998, down from $19.30 in the same period of 1997. The

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turnaround came after the OPEC meeting of March 1999, since when production quotas by the member countries have contributed to firmer prices, which on occasion have exceeded $30 a barrel. Radio Free Europe, 24 June 1998. Interfax news agency, 12.03 p.m., 22 July 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts SU/3288 G/2. Reuters, 3.37 p.m., 9 December 1998. Reuters, 3.45 p.m., 13 November 1998. In the immediate aftermath of independence, countries such as South Korea were much admired and touted as models for the development of a number of Central Asian states. However, the East Asian economic crisis, which threatened global economic stability in 1998, has left the East Asian ‘tigers’ with less bite, and less to offer as paradigms for the likes of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Khazanov, op. cit., p. 255. Ibid., p. 255. Akezhan Kazegeldin speaking in an interview on Russian television conducted by Nikolay Svanidze. Moscow, 5.45 p.m., 4 December 1998 in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3405 G/3. Sadovskaya, op. cit., p. 33. Moscow News, 16–22 July 1998, p. 5. Kommersant Daily, 7 July 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3278 G/2. Such views were published by Solzhenitsyn in his work Rebuilding Russia: Reflections and Tentative Proposals, translated by Alexis Klimoff (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1991), following his much reported and commented on return from exile travelling east to west through Russia. Radio Liberty, 24 November 1993. John Glenn, ‘Contemporary Central Asia: Ethnic Identity and Problems of State Legitimacy’, European Security, Vol. 6 (3), Autumn 1997, p. 134. Khazanov, op. cit., p. 256. Glenn, op. cit., p. 134. Article in the Russian-language Kommersant Daily, 7 July 1998. Ibid. The broadcasting of Russian Public Television had been cut to 14.5 hours a day from 18 hours and only 10 per cent of radio air-time was in Russian by July 1998. Kommersant Daily, 7 July 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3278 G/3. It was a leading news story on Kazakh television that: ‘After conducting a comprehensive test, members of the Language Commission have come to the unanimous view that Nursultan Nazarbayev speaks the state language fluently.’ Kazakh Television First Channel, 3 p.m., 20 October 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3364 G/1. Khazanov, op. cit., p. 257. In an article in The Times (11 December 1997, p. 16), covering the official opening of Akmola as the new capital, Richard Beeston wrote: The real reason [for moving the capital] is far more logical … the ethnic Kazakhs are particularly fearful about the country’s northern areas bordering Russia which are rich in metals, oil and farmlands. Russians … resent the Kazakh-dominated Government and there have been calls by Russian nationalists on both sides of the border to bring the region under Moscow’s rule.

33 Richard Woff, ‘Kazakh–Russian Relations: An Update’, Jane’s Intelligence Review, December 1995.

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34 Adam Michnik, ‘Changes in Post-Communist Societies’, Transitions, Vol. 4 (1), June 1997, p. 30. 35 Glenn, op. cit., p. 135. 36 Ibid. 37 Michnik, op. cit., p. 30. 38 Glenn, op. cit., p. 137. 39 Sadovskaya, op. cit., p. 33. 40 International Herald Tribune, 16 February 1994. 41 Ibid. 42 Richard Foltz, ‘The Tajiks of Uzbekistan’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 15 (2), 1996, p. 213. 43 Ibid. 44 Ibid., p. 215. 45 Ibid., p. 216. 46 Interfax news agency, Moscow, 3.19 p.m., 4 January 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3117 G/3. 47 Radio Free Europe, 26 May 1998. 48 AFP, 18 September 1996. 49 Radio Liberty, 14 July 1998. 50 Radio Free Europe, 3 October 1996. 51 In late August 1998, as Taleban forces were rapidly extending their authority within Afghanistan, Karimov warned that ‘he feared the Taleban would not stop at seizing power in Afghanistan, but had aspirations regarding Central Asia’. Uzbek Radio, Second Programme, 2.30 p.m., 28 August 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3320 G/3. See also, V. Petrossian, ‘Afghan Crisis Makes Allies of Former Foes’, Middle East Economic Digest, 18 September 1998, pp. 2–3. 52 Reuters, 6.44 p.m., 13 August 1998. 53 Reuters, 12.52 p.m., 14 August 1998. 54 Ibid. 55 Reuters, 1.02 p.m., 10 August 1998. 56 Karimov discussing the pact formed between Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan against Wahhabism in an interview with the Moscow News, 22–8 October 1998, p. 5. 57 Meryem Kirimli, ‘Uzbekistan and the New World Order’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 16 (1), 1997, p. 58. 58 Ibid., p. 57. 59 The term ‘Wahhabism’ is used to describe the austere branch of Islam founded by Mohammed bin Abdul Wahhab (1703–92). A preacher who lived among the Bedouin tribes of what is now Saudi Arabia, Abdul Wahhab promoted a strict return to the origins of Islam, as portrayed by the Hanbali school, based on a close adherence to the Koran and the Hadith. 60 Uzbek Radio II, Tashkent, 3 p.m., 1 May 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3218 G/3. 61 Interfax news agency, 7.10 a.m., 18 April 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3206 G/3. 62 Reuters, 2.05 a.m., 9 August 1998. See also: Pravda Vostoka, Tashkent, 7 May 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3222 G/3; Interfax news agency, Moscow, 12.28 p.m., 12 May 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3227 G/1; and Uzbek Television I, Tashkent, 2.30 p.m., 20 July 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3286 G/2. 63 Reuters, 12.23 p.m., 24 June 1998. 64 Interfax news agency, Moscow, 11.50 a.m., 16 June 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3257 G/2.

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65 Interfax news agency, Moscow, 3.07 p.m., 15 October 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3360 G/3. 66 Interfax news agency, Moscow, 9.14 a.m., 15 May 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3230 G/3. 67 Ibid. 68 ‘A meeting of security officials in the strongly Islamic region of Namangan in eastern Uzbekistan has criticised implementation of a recently adopted law requiring the reregistration of all religious organisations in the republic. … The re-registration process was proceeding very slowly and … there had been cases of breaches of the law in co-ordinating the activity of religious organisations.’ Uzbek Television I, Tashkent, 1 p.m., 19 October 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3364 G/3. 69 Moscow News, 14–20 May 1998, p. 1. 70 Karimov speaking in an interview with Arkady Dubnov in the Moscow News, 22–8 October 1998, p. 5. 71 Moscow News, 14–20 May 1998, p. 1. 72 Kazakhstan has also been the unwilling recipient of Islamic missionaries. In early September 1998, some six Pakistani Wahhabis were expelled as ‘they were engaged in illegal missionary activity without special permission’. A government spokesman added: ‘A large amount of Wahhabi literature and audio-cassettes with calls to combat the infidels and create an Islamic state were found during an investigation.’ Interfax news agency, 11.22 a.m., 7 September 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3327 G/1. In late October 1998 Prosecutor-General Yuri Khitrin announced that a Wahhabi sect had been uncovered which ‘banned secular duties, imposes Islamic code by force and incites people to disobey the authorities’. Khitrin added that the thirty sect members faced criminal proceedings. See Reuters, 12.04 p.m., 27 October 1998. 73 Interfax news agency, Moscow, 3.15 p.m., 16 February 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3154 G/1. 74 Moscow News, 22–8 October 1998, p. 5. Karimov went on to say: It’s no secret that approximately 500 people from Central Asia are being trained in Pakistani camps, with money that comes from Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and other world centres of Islam. Twenty-year-old men from Uzbekistan and Krgyzstan are sent there; first they are taught religious dogmas, then contemporary forms of terrorist activity, and then they are sent back here, to the Ferghana Valley. So what happened there wasn’t just a spontaneous act. 75 Reuters, 9.44 a.m., 1 July 1998. 76 Analysts are divided over who might have been responsible for the 16 February bombings. The conspiracy theorists, including Abdurahim Pulatov, leader of the banned Birlik People’s Movement, suggest Karimov himself may have organised the attack as a justification for another wave of anti-Islamist actions. Others point to the high levels of sophistication and organisation of the plot and suggest that some the high-level officials dismissed from office in 1998, such as ex-Minister of Defence Akhmedov, ex-Minister of Internal Affairs Almatov and ex-Deputy Prime Minister Jurabekov, may have been involved. Others concur with Karimov in that foreignsponsored Islamists were responsible. 77 Uzbek Radio II, Tashkent, 10 a.m. 23 February 1999, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3468 G/1. 78 Interfax news agency, Moscow, 4.25 p.m., 2 March 1999, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3476 G/3. 79 Glenn, op. cit., p. 140. 80 The words of Martha Brill Olcott, taken from Glenn, op. cit., p. 140.

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81 82 83 84

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87

88 89 90 91

Ibid., p. 141. See the following chapter for further discussion of the Mahalla. Kirimli, op. cit., p. 59. The accuracy of demographic statistics pertaining to Central Asia is, invariably, questionable, and the quality of census-based data is erratic, at best. For reasons of consistency, these demographic statistics have been taken from the World Bank website. See Ata-Mirayevich, ‘The Demography of Soviet Central Asia and its Future Development’, in Robert A. Lewis (ed.), Geographical Perspectives on Soviet Central Asia (London: Routledge, 1992), and Nancy Lubin, ‘Implications of Ethnic and Demographic Trends’, in William Fierman (ed), Soviet Central Asia: The Failed Transformation (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1991). Demographers define ‘sustainability’ as the level of resource use, or standard of living, that does not deplete capital or resources for the next generation. See Gayl D. Ness and Meghan Gholay (eds), Population and Strategies for National Sustainable Development (London: Earthscan, 1997). These problems are not unique to Central Asia. The ‘Draft Programme of Action’ for the Cairo Conference on global population in 1994 said: ‘Substantial research also indicates that demographic pressures often exacerbate problems of environmental degradation and resource depletion and thus inhibit sustainable development.’ See Stanley Johnson, World Population – Turning the Tide: Three Decades of Progress (London: Graham & Trotman, 1994), p. 348. Moscow News, 22–28 October 1998, p. 5. Ibid., p. 60. Glenn, op. cit., p. 142. Uzbek Television I, Tashkent, 2.30 p.m., 31 August 1998, in Summary of World Broadcasts, SU/3322 G/2.

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11 THE UZBEK M A H A L L A Between state and society Elise Massicard and Tommaso Trevisani

Uzbekistan since independence There is a temptation to exaggerate the extent of the structural changes that occurred in Uzbekistan after independence in 1991. The dissociation of Uzbekistan from the Soviet Union, often over-emphasised by politicians as ‘an epochal’ event, has in fact induced relatively few changes in the state apparatus. The evident survival of political élites, established and consolidated before independence, has meant that Uzbekistan’s turning point has been characterised by an astonishing degree of continuity with the former Soviet period. In view of this marked continuity, it is hardly surprising that political practices current in Soviet times have survived. Regardless of whether this political élite, which grew up within the Soviet system, wishes now to reconsider this tradition or not, pressing domestic issues are likely to force the agenda. All states born and nurtured by the Soviet system have been forced to reexamine their orientation and their political structure: Uzbekistan is no exception. Founded and shaped by the Soviet regime in 1924, the Uzbek Republic was, until 1991, characterised by the Soviet political structure and Marxist-Leninist doctrine. However, the collapse of the Soviet Union, which catapulted Uzbekistan into independence, ripped away many of the pillars propping up the state. In such a context, the search for new supports was inevitably launched within Uzbek culture and traditions. The ‘Mahalla’ is just such a tradition. But the increasing importance of the Mahalla it is not merely a question of ideological surrogacy; this institution conceals an entire political programme. Despite the apparent conflict between local and national constructs, the youth and immaturity of the political structure in Uzbekistan lends itself to the adoption on a national scale of sub-national forms of identity construction. Since independence, a pre-existing form of local neighbourhood community has become increasingly important in Uzbekistan. The concept of the Mahalla has captured the attention of President Karimov, and it has been expanded to assume national proportions. This newly awakened state interest in the tradition of the Mahalla must be viewed as an indicator of the transformations characterising the post-Soviet 205

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order. Despite its historical, or even in its philological, dimensions, the Mahalla is of primary importance as a socio-political object. It is one that offers an understanding of the post-Soviet redefinition of the relationship between state and society.

The office of the Mahalla in the light of the Mahallisation policy Even if there were already partially Mahalla-based committees in Soviet times,1 the Mahalla offices were introduced in a new form only after independence.2 The law of 2 September 1993 defined their new status (clarifying, amongst other things, their organisation, manner of election, and responsibilities, as well as the distribution of authority between the different agencies) in the framework of a reorganisation of the state.3 This law initiated the systematic expansion of Mahalla committees throughout Uzbekistan: by 1994, some 12,300 Mahalla offices had already been established.4 The general spread, together with the fact that there were Mahalla offices for each district in the republic, can be interpreted as a constitutive element of the newly organised Uzbek state, and support for its claim to be present in every district. Since 1993, state support for the Mahalla offices has grown continuously.5 The evidence for this is widespread. First, the consistent increase in the legal authority of the Mahalla offices is obvious, with various laws and decrees granting increased powers in numerous domains to the local administration. For example, since 1994, the offices have been active in the distribution of social aid to the poor and, since 1996, to those under the age of 16.6 Moreover, the Mahalla offices are now involved in military conscription. Additionally, the growing legal authority of the Mahalla offices has been reinforced by frequent emphasis on the importance of the Mahalla in statements by Karimov and his assistants. For example, phrases such as ‘We are all born in a Mahalla’7 or ‘The Mahalla is the mirror of our socio-political life’8 are regularly repeated. Since 1995, the government has supported the publication of a weekly ‘Mahalla newspaper’, distributed within Mahalla offices, which claims to provide information, explanations and practical examples of the importance of the Mahalla offices to the entire population. Furthermore, it is remarkable that state support for the Mahallas requires significant financial commitments. The state has financed the construction and maintenance of many Mahalla offices: in Namangan, for example, the bulk of the offices have been renovated or constructed since 1995, at the expense of the state. The state has also taken on some of the burden of wages: in April 1998 they were increased and now cover, on average, the salaries of two civil servants per Mahalla office.9 It has become a major item in the state budget. Wide-ranging state support for these local administrative units can only be viewed as a major domestic policy initiative, and the ‘Mahallisation policy’ is vigorously controlled by the state. The initiative has not come from the Mahallas 206

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themselves, as is implied perhaps by the state when it claims that the Mahalla offices are ‘self-administration units’ gathered into a ‘Mahalla movement’. Rather, the programme is a state-initiated, long-term, coherent political programme, even if some Mahallas may support it, in certain conditions. The scale and significance of this ‘Mahallisation policy’ can be seen in the multiplicity of functions carried out by each Mahalla office.10 Significantly, the state is assigning a growing number of responsibilities to the Mahalla offices and, in addition, they have acquired an intermediary role between the state and local society. According to instructions issued by the state, the Mahalla office is to deal with all local affairs, and this is put into practice within a framework of thematically orientated committees. There are Mahalla committees for ‘women and girls’, ‘veterans’, ‘weddings and celebrations’, ‘justice’, ‘finance’, ‘school and family’ and ‘road maintenance’, amongst a host of others. The office is active in local and communal affairs – and even in private affairs. Besides, the office plays a part in administrative matters, mainly as a registration office, but also in other ways. It is responsible for the renewal of passports, for example, and functions as the initial point of contact for any citizen who needs to deal with the state on any matter. Thus, it plays an intermediary role between the population and the higher state apparatus. This role is based not only on its administrative functions, but also on its capacity as the most local organ of the state executive power: its officers are responsible for communicating and explaining the decisions of the political centre to the population, and for enforcing them on the local level.11 In the exercise of such authority, the Mahalla office has some flexibility,12 but it remains in close contact with the highest state decision-making authorities, the Hokimiyat.13 In fact, the activities of the Mahalla offices are strongly influenced by the Hokimiyat (for example, in the election of the Oqsoqol, or community leaders), or even controlled by it – as can be seen in the process by which the decisions of the Mahalla office are ratified. A meeting of all Mahalla presidents (or secretaries) in Namangan city takes place weekly in the Hokimiyat, where problems are discussed and the activities of the offices are strictly controlled. The function of the Mahalla office as an intermediary between local society and the state is reinforced by the offices’ active role in decisions pertaining to the distribution of state social services. Obviously, it becomes thus a de facto organ of social control, specifically when the Oqsoqol and his assistants make an exacting inquiry into the economic situation of each household requesting assistance, in order to rule on whether or not to distribute public aid. The law also acknowledges the surveillance of youth as a task of Oqsoqols.14 Such social control is aimed at identifying and solving problems. Moreover, the Mahalla office serves as an information gatherer and provider for the state. The Mahalla office is being developed ‘horizontally’ (it has acquired a growing number of local tasks as a ‘self-administrative unit’) as well as ‘vertically’ (it is linked directly to the state apparatus). However, the many functions it carries out 207

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have not led to an increase in its decision-making powers. To the contrary, the fact that the Mahalla offices are placed under the supervision of the state apparatus via integration into strongly hierarchical administrative system limits their autonomy. Through the Mahalla offices, a two-dimensional broadening of the state has taken place, one which can be interpreted as a symptom of the latter’s propensity to monopolise the norms and rules of every area of social life. This evolution is important as it demonstrates – more than the Mahalla itself – how the state attempts to create, in the form of the Mahalla offices, new fields of control through which it can intervene. The interpretation of this local political structure is significant. One view might be that this comprehensive policy of ‘drawing nearer to the people’ stems from the need of the Uzbek state to get closer to society. If so, this is a significant socio-political development, as it implies a current distance between state and society. This situation may be the product of Uzbekistan’s experience with the Soviet state, when it was directed as a socialist republic, ‘from abroad’.15 The government seems intent on dissolving such conditions, which have grave political implications, by the desired rapprochement between the newly independent state and society within (among other means) the framework of the ‘Mahallisation policy’. The Uzbek state may also hope to find, through such a reforging of relations with society, solutions to political questions raised by issues such as conscription, tax collection or the control of potential sources of instability such as poverty, youthful unrest or political opposition. In light of the historical context in which the ‘Mahallisation policy’ was conceived, this hypothesis seems fairly plausible: with independence, the Uzbek state not only came came under pressure to legitimise itself, it also lost the hold on the population provided by the Communist Party and its local structures. At the beginning of the 1990s, such conditions of insecurity made it necessary to develop systematically a widespread network of state cells in order to consolidate the new state apparatus. The ‘Mahallisation policy’ – an innovative strategy benefiting from the advantage of not being ideologically laden by being part of the Soviet legacy – arose as a stabilising programme in support of the state during this transitional period.

Tradition and innovation The role of ‘tradition’ is important in determining the shape of relations between state and society. If the state is attempting to get closer to society, then it is no accident that the Mahalla, because of its inherent polysemy, is the key element in such a programme. The Mahalla office naturally lends itself to this traditional form of neighbourhood organisation. In fact, not only was the word ‘Mahalla’ taken up again in local administrative language, but its elected president is also officially referred to as the ‘Oqsoqol’ (literally: white beard)16, even when a woman holds the office.17 However, according to his or her tasks and responsibilities, this civil 208

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servant has little, if any, resemblance to the traditional bearer of authority, who makes decisions about weddings and disputes, offers advice and looks after order and morality within the Mahalla. In practice, overlapping is quite frequent: either one of the traditional Oqsoqols is elected to the presidency of the Mahalla office, or, as is often the case in Namangan, the elected president receives advice from an elected council of the Oqsoqols, whose members do not belong among the officials of the Mahalla office, but are nonetheless involved in all important decisions. Because this council retains its moral authority, it has considerable de facto decision-making powers, and this may also have political consequences. Such a legacy from traditional/indigenous forms of authority creates a traditional-moral influence for the Mahalla office, which consequently becomes more than just an administrative engine. In addition, the ‘go’zar’ (community centres) – the social location par excellence of the ideal Mahalla – was reintroduced into the local administration. In the older Mahalla, the Mahalla office was often located directly in the go’zar.18 In young districts, it is remarkable that an element of a newly built Mahalla office will often be in a tearoom whose administrator has risen to become an important figure in the Mahalla office. In some cases, a ‘complex’ appears near the administration, with official buildings, such as the state bank, or service outlets, such as a butcher or shoemaker or a clinic, created or supported by the Mahalla office, which results in the creation of employment opportunities.19 This centre of the community is then officially called the go’zar. Through these different types of revival, the go’zar’s form – as well as its function as a social location, meeting point and business centre – re-emerges, but under the supervision of the state as embodied in the Mahalla office. Through the reintroduction of the go’zar’s terms and functions, the Mahalla office acquires not only a role within the social organisation, but also an obvious centrality. Thus, a ‘qualitative’ dimension supports the Mahallisation policy, as the Mahalla office is inspired by a traditional neighbourhood institution, not only in its terminology, but also in its structure, and to some extent in its functions. It remains to be seen what should be understood by the ‘traditional Mahalla’, and also what value ought to be attached to it. The ‘traditional Mahalla’ is now presented by the rhetoric of the state as a paradigm for ‘authentic Uzbekism’. This, in turn, promotes the Mahallisation policy. The independent Uzbek state has reappropriated concepts with a traditional slant and local ethos. The state has chosen the domestic Mahalla structure as the conduit through which it will improve its access to the social structure. Such recourse to tradition must be seen within the framework of a general policy aimed at restoring national values. However, the policy of ‘a return to tradition’ is selective, and not every element of earlier social practices has been mobilised. Despite its obvious use of tradition, the Mahallisation policy does not aim at merely resuscitating traditional or previously existent institutions, as has been the case elsewhere. Examples of this might include the practices that followed the return of tribal leaders to positions within the Moroccan state apparatus after decolonisation,20 209

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or even the state integration of the traditional dignitary, such as the Malek in Afghanistan in 1978.21 In both cases, previous forms of social organisation are integrated into the state apparatus, and traditional bearers of authority are transformed into civil servants. In present-day Uzbekistan, however, there is a certain discrepancy between what is understood as the traditional Mahalla, and what is recognised as the new, institutionalised Mahalla office. In fact, before the introduction of Mahalla offices, Mahallas did not have a single leader, but in some cases were controlled by a council of elders. With the introduction of a sole official president, a significant alteration to the customary distribution of authority has occurred: it is one that becomes even more evident for the fact that the president must no longer be a traditional bearer of authority. This discrepancy between the state’s interpretation of the Mahalla and its traditional form is, perhaps, most manifest in the generalised spreading of the Mahalla and the Mahalla offices. The Mahalla office is orientated toward the city-district community ‘Mahalla’, and was given a national dimension by legislation passed in 1993: Mahalla offices have since been set up throughout Uzbekistan, even where none had existed before. Thus, Mahalla offices can now be found in modern urban districts as well as in villages.22 However, the implications are significant: the new settings are characterised not only by widely differing topographies, but also primarily by their specific social structures.23 In the high-rise buildings of Namangan, the population is ethnically heterogeneous: Russian, Tartar and other immigrants live there, as well as Uzbeks, who have generally experienced a more individually focused social structure than those in traditional Mahallas. Despite these regional differences and varying social structures, all of the Mahalla offices established throughout the country have the same, uniform legal structure.24 Thus, the Mahalla becomes a suitable vehicle for national unification. The state has homogenised the polysemic expression ‘Mahalla’ so as to generate a flexible form of administration through which its attempts to generate national unity are projected into different social contexts. This enforced uniformity is reminiscent of the language policies once followed by the Soviets:25 the Ferghana dialect, and later the Tashkent dialect, were selected, and then elevated to become the standard Uzbek language, while other dialects were ignored, although they are still used today, coexisting with the ‘literary’ language. The Mahallisation policy also has unifying characteristics, and they too are ideologically laden. In the case of the Mahalla, a state interpretation of ‘Uzbekism’ is opposed to the diversity of the periphery, a diversity that manifests itself only through the flexibility of varying local practices. However, the imitation inherent within the Mahallisation policy of a previous register requires a certain imprecision in official rhetoric. Such ambiguity implies that the state has to make concessions: the practice, which corresponds more to tradition than to an administrative norm, still belongs, however, in the reality of the administrative structure. For, while the Mahalla offices have significant administrative responsibilities, they also provide services usually regarded as 210

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being beyond the realm of the state administration. For example, they organise communal work, lend cauldrons for cooking at weddings, and plan collective cooking for the New Year feast of Nawruz. But these tasks are not clearly defined: precisely because of their local flavour, they are characterised by their flexibility. Because they are part of the traditional tasks of the neighbourhood community, to which administrative responsibilities are added through the Mahalla office, they contribute to the traditional appearance of the office, as well as to its increased acceptance among the population. As a result, the central authority has grown sensitive to the need for self-determination within these local administrative units. Close observation of the activities of Mahalla offices confirms the absence of procedural uniformity. Even central events such as elections are not conducted in the same manner everywhere. This diversity of practice may be the partial result of variations within social structures and sources of authority: in more established areas, traditional holders of authority are usually elected to their offices, while in the modern high-rise buildings, more ethnic minorities and women become Oqsoqol, even if they do not possess the same level of authority as the Oqsoqol elsewhere. The ambiguity of the official discourse allows the persistence of local practices across a broad spectrum of activities. The core has learned to accommodate the variety of the periphery: the state’s centralist claims have been qualified. The tension between claims to a monopoly of authority and the divergent nature of local practices has forced the state to focus on the role of the Rais, the body it controls most completely. These committees, a vehicle for citizen participation, are often just a façade, since they are given very little decision-making authority on decisive issues. Their primary task is to implement plans in various domains that have been proposed by the Hokimiyat, under the supervision of the president, as nothing in the Mahalla office happens without due deference to the latter. In general, there are conflicts between core and periphery on the election of this key person, who is officially elected by the people and confirmed by the Hokimiyat but in reality often strongly recommended by the Hokimiyat, who also holds the power of unconditional dismissal. Following unrest in December 1997, in Namangan, tensions led to the removal from office of one third of the presidents of Mahalla offices by the Hokimiyat, on the grounds that they had failed to execute their duties in a manner consistent with the interests of the state. In a situation where direct participation is neutralised and indirect participation quashed by the arbitrary use of power, ‘self-administration units’ constitute, from the democratic perspective, a façade: instead of a free space for social action, an ‘apparatus’ has been established. As opportunity for public participation has been stifled, alternative means of expression have emerged. Potentially the role of the Mahalla could be reduced, as local problem solving is taken outside its hegemony, and public participation finds new, more personal channels to work through – such as mosques, welfare organisations and extended families – than those institutionalised within the Mahalla offices. Thus, the state is in 211

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danger of losing an opportunity to exercise control on social organisation beyond the level of the façade.

Command state and local society The existence of state forms leading to conditions characterised by a lack of democracy is a theme addressed by many Sovietology and transition studies. However, when Bierschenk, Elwert and Kohnert define the ‘command state’ as one which has a formal framework of laws and tribunals, but where the factual structure of authority is characterised by obedience to the arbitrary orders and official decrees, where there is no separation between the judiciary and executive branches, and where every activity undertaken without an explicit permission or order is considered illegal, they define it in a manner that is not applicable to Uzbekistan, at least not without preliminary reflections concerning the transferability of concepts that are tied to particular contexts, and then adapted to others.26 The neologism ‘command state’ derives from analysis of the development of undemocratic conditions in certain African states in a discussion on the ‘Least Developed Countries’, a context very different from the situation in Uzbekistan. However, independent of any assessment of the democratic culture of the state, the term remains useful and highlights analogies of a legal-theoretical, or even legal-sociological, nature between the two contexts. The state-type referred to here is interesting – from a legal-theoretical perspective even more than from a political one – in that it offers a model for a new articulation of statehood. The differences characterising the command state are concerned by the elementary rules of law: For us, the principles of a legal state, for instance the commitment of administrative action to law-like proceedings and the flow of information over the public sphere, belong to the self-evident, but rarely explicitly expressed, rules of action characterising economical and political space.27 These principles, in particular, are undermined by command-state habits, which explains why, for a legal-theoretical discourse, it can be considered the opposite of the legal state. But even a state vested with legal institutions may be considered a command state when these institutions in their entirety give the impression of a legal state but legal functions are eroded by diffuse practices that undermine this legality. A command state is diametrically opposed to a legal state, even if it maintains its claims to legality. Thus, the existence of legal institutions is not a sufficient 212

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condition for defining a legal state. The relevant criteria in this context are not the institutional framework, but an effective legal framework; not law, but actual legal practices. For our purposes, ‘command state’ is a law-theoretical term incorporating legal-sociological implications that are important for the relationship between state and society. By means of this model, we are able to describe the effective legal framework, which will include: a reality of law, observable in procedures typical of the command state; and a legal sphere implying the claim to participation in social life by social actors, particularly with regard to inclusiveness and exclusiveness of the legal sphere for such actors. This is important because the exclusion of potential actors from public affairs eventually promotes the creation of ‘areas of social retreat’, as a reaction of those exiled into a marginal status. Two factors need to be considered in order to understand the legal reality of a command state. First, the basic principle is that the spoken word uttered by the powerful has priority over the impersonal norm of the written text. This explains how decrees can invalidate law, and laws may invalidate the constitution, with partisan interventions continuing to claim to be above partisan positions. This legal condition leads to a typical political and administrative structure (one that is bureaucratic in form and hierarchical in content) and to typical procedures (inefficiency due to the congestion of decision-making processes) that characterise the command state, as well as every centralised and/or authoritarian state. The extreme hierarchical structure of the command state coincides with the concentration of decision-making authority, since many decisions are made in a single location. If the system lacks procedures for the delegation of responsibility, then a mass of unabsorbable decisions will clog critical points of the system, compromising the efficiency of the entire apparatus. This has been demonstrated clearly by Eckert and Elwert in a study of land law in Uzbekistan, in which the authors show how a centralised system necessarily leads to an uncontrolled ‘decentralisation’ of decision-making processes: If there are between 500 and 1,000 cases of illegal land distribution a year, while the ministry responsible for investigating such breaches can handle only about 25 in that period, then a number of decisions are taken in an authority vacuum. … The real power moves to the middle level, that is, the regional and local administration. This signifies an uncontrolled ‘decentralisation’ of decision-making.28 Another difference between the command state and the legal state appears when the question of participation is considered. Here, the realm of law can be described: in a legal state, the impersonal norm regulates the participation of all actors in social events, whose centre is a public space created by law and which functions, in practice, as a social arena. These two terms are closely inter-related: public space is an abstract term, in that it establishes the location where social actors participate in a total social discourse, however this might be structured. 213

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But if, in practice, this space cannot ensure social actors equal access to social discourse, then it falls behind the claims embodied in the impersonal law norm. Rather, this space is then similar to a (social) arena, making the Mahalla an interesting area of study. Furthermore, the [development] project appears as an arena for different strategies of action. Not a negotiated social consensus, but the interplay of different [group] interests, local knowledge, strategies, norms, conflicts, compromises and truces that together makes up the social structure, decides issues of structural change.29 This suggests that the social arena is a crucial dimension for the conditions of public space as well. This public space has no place within the command state, and little space within a centralised and/or authoritarian state: the freedom of action enjoyed by the powerful, bordering on the arbitrary, crushes such space, and in its place, the above-mentioned central ‘apparatus’ is established. Once the space of participation is eliminated, however, alternative forms are opened up within the framework of the command state in order to discover modes of expression that are possible within the given social order. It is an immanent problem of the command state that its structure cannot be adopted in a pure form. At the lower levels of the hierarchy, or in places where the system cannot afford the price of inefficiency, a certain measure of selfdetermination must be permitted. Instead of a relatively homogeneous social arena produced by the public sphere within a legal framework, it is generally the case in the command state that counter-claims at the peripheries of the system compete with the claims of the central power. Where an authority personifying the central power is absent, the social arena infiltrates the resulting vacuum of an unregulated sphere – even if this is not under the conditions of an impersonal norm making possible a regulated process. An arena of participation – one regarded by the command state as having been already abolished – regains its central location in society, namely where the peripheries of the social system flourish, that is to say, at the margins of command-state power. The manner in which the command state or centralised/authoritarian framework interacts with society can be seen in an inverted manner; it can be interpreted as a reply, as an adaptation strategy by society to the prevailing legal relations. Such is the behaviour of a state that endeavours to maintain as much control as possible over events within its territory, in response to a fear of losing influence over the social dynamic. This is the same fear that can be held responsible for the congestion of decision mechanisms of hierarchical structures. This indicates that the structural inefficiency of such a state system is not merely an epiphenomenonon that might be overcome through administrative corrections. It is instead a consequence of the peculiar characteristics of this state form, and is therefore structurally rooted. 214

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This fact contradicts the command state’s claim for more or less total control over social life. From this it can be deduced that the more absolute the claims to control, the more strongly will the command state’s organisation be developed, as will its systemic limits. That – or structural reasons – is why such an order must inevitably fall behind the level of its own claims. The command state’s claim to constitute the centre is contradicted by the exclusion of considerable segments of society from participation. This statement might easily be refuted by facts drawn from empirical observation, as, for example, when a broad crosssection of the population demonstrates its solidarity with the state, adopting and internalising forms of the state’s rhetoric and, to a greater or lesser extent, following the lines of the state’s ‘Five-Year Plan’. But even in this case, the state’s monopoly is only an apparent one, mirroring the conditions of society’s surface, but not that of its deeper structure. Rather, this monopoly promotes the process of affecting a split between social order and social façade. A command state strives to bring society under its control, a task in which, by virtue of its extremely hierarchical and personalised nature, it can only partially succeed. At best, a state presence embracing all social spheres can deceive itself into believing that it can control and manipulate society. Yet fundamental patterns of sociality remain untouched. They continue to flourish behind a façade, unexpectedly becoming the locus of the synthesis of social change, thus moving to the centre. This occurs at the local level: when the public sphere is absent, another privileged place must be discovered where state and society may encounter and compete with one another. It lies in the nature of every state form to contain a unifying, allocating aspect, one corresponding to its self-definition as a state for a single people, and/or over a single territory, and/or of a single culture, thereby representing the whole through the act of homogenisation. Society, considered as that particularity which is subsumed under a state within the system, has an antithetical function: out of the diversity of interests of all social actors, it confers on the existing order the character of its pluralistic content. In a legal state, a plurality of actors flourishes within a public space that is ensured by the state and by its institutions of conflict management. Something similar happens also where unfavourable conditions make the development of a public space more difficult: the locality becomes the privileged location where society can articulate itself under conditions characterised by the absence of the rule of law. This is so because the locality is a diffuse ‘nonplace’, one opposing the command state and its centralism in a dichotomous fashion. Typically, at the local level, the state can act in this unifying manner only in a diluted fashion. Here the dichotomy between the façade of centralised command state and the local social order manifests itself. In this interface, there is a struggle for a monopoly of authority – one that is also the source of legitimacy and moral order. 215

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Conclusion In Uzbekistan, the state has attempted to introduce new forms of administration that are represented as traditional, and therefore as acceptable. This is consistent with the objective of consolidating the state’s centralised and monopolistic claims to authority, inherited from the Soviet era. In this way, statist rhetoric papers offer differences between the ‘traditional’ Mahalla and the contemporary Mahalla office, which are presented as though they were one and the same thing. Thus, in Mahalla Mehri, whose author is an important proponent of the policy of Mahallisation, we find the assertion that Mahallisation should not be understood simply as an encompassing registration of territory, but instead – and here the author notes a significant contrast with the Soviet Mahalla – as an institutionalisation of the Mahalla’s very essence. In this way, the state tries to give the impression both of dedication to the traditional form of the Mahalla – viewed as the sole indigenous form of self-administration, which persists in harmony with the Uzbek people’s true nature – and of supporting its revival. The state, then, presents a novel, multi-functional administrative unit as though it were a preexisting one – one, moreover, that is evolving quasi-naturally out of a national tradition that had been oppressed during Soviet rule. This strategy, it is hoped, will grant the Mahalla a greater degree of popular legitimacy. The message that the state grows ‘organically’ out of tradition is an attempt to explain the system of hierarchy of power, as it exists in Uzbekistan – man above woman, old over young, ‘better’ individuals over ‘worse’ ones – out of which emerges a chain of social hierarchy – the elder over the Hovli, the Oqsoqol over the Mahalla, the Hokim over town and region, the president over the nation, the state over society. Within this representation of the power hierarchy, the Mahalla represents a nodal point, marking the transition from domestic/traditional hierarchy to state hierarchy. Under these conditions, the policy of Mahallisation might be interpreted as an attempt to transcend conceptually the division between state and society, as it existed in the Soviet period, and to affirm the ‘organic’ state, one in which nation and tradition are reunited, composing the ideological kernel of the post-Soviet state. Everyday language illustrates that the word ‘Mahalla’ is used more often in the informal than in the bureaucratic sense. This would seem to lead to the conclusion that the Mahalla office fails to find the natural place in society claimed for it, and that the state, despite its policy of embracing tradition, has not found an effective conduit whereby it might communicate with the people. Nevertheless, relations of power and authority have often been modified within this area by the multiplicity of authorities and possibilities of allocation in the hands of the Mahalla-Rais. For this reason, the Mahallisation policy cannot be assessed as having no impact on social practices; on the contrary, it is one of the factors conditioning the social process. Thus, the periphery may well become the location for the synthesis of social transformations. Contrary to what post-Soviet rhetoric suggests, the relationship between state and society in contemporary Uzbekistan is not so very different from the relationships characteristic of the Soviet era. 216

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Notes This article was originally published in German in Anthropos, 95, 2000, pp. 206–18. 1 The Mahalla committee as an administrative unit was introduced in the 1920s. See Viktoria Koroteyeva, A. Ginsburg and E. Makarova, ‘Community Structures in a Modern Uzbek City’, Études Orientales, 13/14, 1994, p. 205. The first mention of the Mahalla in an official, normative text appears in the decree of the president of the Supreme Soviet of the SSR Uzbekistan of 4 July 1983 concerning ‘the reinforcement of the status of the Mahalla, city and village committees’. 2 The main differences between Soviet and post-Soviet Mahallas are: first, since 1990, civil servants have received a monthly wage (see Koroteyeva et al., op. cit., p. 209); second, the reinforcement of the relations between the Mahalla committee and the superior administrative authority, the Hokimiyat; and, third, the changes in terminology concerning the Mahalla, from Russian to Uzbek (often directly translated). 3 Law of 2 September 1993 ‘toward organs of legal self-administration of the people of the Republic of Uzbekistan’. One may attribute a symbolic meaning to this date, since it is the day following a national holiday celebrating two years of independence. On 21 September 1993, an accompanying decree was issued (the law’s taking of effect; definition of the territory of each Mahalla and organisation of Mahalla elections for no later than 1 December 1993; annulment of all previous laws and decrees concerning the Mahalla). 4 Data from the national Mahalla fund. Noted in P. Bussière, Les Mahallas en Ouzbékistan, Ambassade de France en Ouzbékistan (Tashkent, 1994). 5 Julia M. Eckert, Das unabhängige Uzbekistan. Auf dem Weg von Marx zu Timur. Politische Strategien der Konfliktregelung in einem Vielvölkerstaat (Münster: LIT, 1996), p. 43. 6 See the Presidential Decree of 10 December 1996, ‘Bolali oilalarni davlat tomonidan kullab-kuvatlashni janada kushajtirish to’grisida’, and its confirmation,‘16 joshgacha bolalari bulgan boilalarga nafakalar tayinlash va tulash to’grisida Nizom – Umumij Koidalar’. 7 Islam Karimov, speech of 25 September 1994 before the National Assembly. 8 Islam Karimov. Quoted in Shavkat Mirolimov, Mahalla Mehri (Tashkent, 1994), p. 3. 9 The Presidential Decree of 24 April 1998 increases the wage of Mahalla servants and allows them to draw also a pension. See Toshkent Oqshomi, No. 47, 24 April 1998, p. 1. 10 For a precise description of the structure, tasks and legal status of Mahalla offices, see Shuhrat Jalilov, Davlat Hokimiyati mahalliy organlari islohoti: Tajriba va muammolar (Tashkent, 1994), pp. 125–57. 11 Law of 2 September 1997, Title VII, article 22. 12 This is also ordered by the law of 2 September 1993. 13 In Uzbekistan, the term ‘Hokimiyat designates an administrative unit inherited from the Russian-Soviet administrative structure. Hokimiyat means in Uzbek ‘power’ or ‘domination’ and, according to this, ‘Hokim’ means governor, prefect of an administrative unit. The main Hokims are directly subordinate to the president: they are nominated and removed from office by the president, and are responsible to him alone. The Uzbek Republic is administratively divided in regions (viloyat), cities (shahar), departments (tuman), towns (shaharchi), villages (qishloq) and districts (Mahalla). There are Hokimiyat and Hokim at the level of regions, cities and departments. 14 Law of 2 September 1993, Title VII, article 22. 15 Gregory Gleason, ‘Fealty and Loyalty: Informal Authority Structures in Soviet Asia’, Soviet Studies, Vol. 43 (4), pp. 613–28. Gleason refers to the Central Asian Soviet Republics as ‘internal colonies’ (p. 614). 16 See the law of 2 September 1993.

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17 In Namangan in July 1998, of the 72 Mahalla presidents, 5 were women. But the presidents of the Mahalla offices are increasingly called ‘rais’, and the women ‘raisa’. 18 See, for example, the Meshed Mahalla in Namangan. 19 A good example for this is the Dombog Mahalla in Namangan. 20 Rémy Leveau, Le Fellah Marocain Défenseur du Trône (Paris: Presses de la Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, 1985), pp. 31, 37, 52, 60. 21 Olivier Roy, L’Afghanistan: Islam et Modernité Politique (Paris: Seuil, 1985), pp. 56–7. 22 For example, the village of Hazratishoh on the Kirghiz border. It encompasses three Mahallas with some 6,000 inhabitants. 23 On social structures in the countryside, see Vitaly Naumkin, ‘State, Religion and Society’, in Naumkin (ed.), Central Asia: A Post-Soviet Critique (Reading: Ithaca Press, 1993), p. 121; and Sergej Poliakov, ‘Soviet Central Asian Countryside: Traditional Forms of Property in a Quasi-industrial System’, in the same volume, pp. 121–41. 24 Nevertheless, a city Mahalla has the same legal status as all of the Mahallas of one single village, since these latter are often much smaller. 25 Olivier Roy, La nouvelle Asie Centrale ou La fabrication des Nations (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1997), pp. 124–31. 26 T. Bierschenk, G. Elwert and D. Kohnert (eds), Entwicklungshilfe und ihre Folgen (Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 1993), p. 27. 27 Ibid. 28 Julia M. Eckert and Georg Elwert Land Tenure in Uzbekistan (Berlin: GTZ, 1996), p. 54. 29 Bierschenk et al., op. cit., p. 31.

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12 ‘FUNDAMENTALISM’ IN CENTRAL ASIA Reasons, reality and prospects* Petra Steinberger

Is Islamic fundamentalism on the rise in Central Asia? There are rumours that women who refuse to wear the veil are threatened, that alcohol is no longer available in some areas, and that subversive groups are demanding Islamic states and the introduction of shariah (Islamic law). A cry for help is heard from frightened leaders. The Islamist International seems to stretch its tentacles into Central Asia; the Muslim belt of the former Soviet Union is in uproar. Yet some voices warn against exaggeration: In the Russian media, the construction of a mosque in Central Asia is frequently judged as a sign that Islamic fundamentalism is reaching out into Eurasia – as if the renovation of a mosque were a fundamentally different issue than the renovation of Catholic churches in Lithuania or of orthodox ones in Russia.1 This examination of the real or perceived ‘threat’ of radical Islam in Central Asia will focus on Uzbekistan. The republic with the largest Muslim population of the five new states represents the strategic beachhead that must be taken; its thousand-year-long history in Islamic culture and learning separates it from Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, where Islam’s grip on the mainly nomadic societies remains looser. In geo-political terms, Uzbekistan is the most important and influential state in Central Asia. It can be assumed that whatever happens here will considerably affect the other republics.

* This chapter was written in 1999. Since then the lens through which Islamism in general, and Islamism in Central Asia in particular, is viewed has been refocused by the events of 11 September and the subsequent projection of Western force and influence into the region. Although the geo-political reality has been radically altered, the context and analysis provided by this essay remain valid: indeed, they have become more pertinent.

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The problem of sources When examining the role of Islam in Central Asia, it is necessary to be aware of the ideological environment in which research has been conducted. During the Cold War, very little information was available in the West from the ‘Muslim belt’ of the Soviet Union, and the information that did emerge was assessed within the ideological and political framework of the time. The assumption that Islam was a political force in Central Asia, born in an era of marked hostility between East and West, was nurtured for many years by both sides. Russian and Soviet scholars viewed Islam as an anachronism, following the Marxist-Leninist approach that considered religion in any form as superstitious and an obstacle to the evolution of a truly socialist society.2 Islam was to be fought and, if possible, eliminated. Consequently, studies reflected a troubling, if not threatening, reality. Often the analysis gave an ideologically distorted impression, such as the suggestion that Islamic movements engaged in conspiracy.3 Soviet politicians echoed this academic view in over-estimating the threat of Islamic fundamentalism, potential or real, as it existed during the first half of the 1980s. One Russian scholar noted recently that nowhere was ‘Islamophobia more prevalent than in the country’s political leadership’.4 Precisely because of this Russian Islamophobia, Western scholars interpreted Islam as a possible subversive force within the Soviet Union.5 Some even predicted that Muslim Central Asia would be the first to revolt against Soviet domination, and that Islam that would lead to the break-up of the ‘Communist Empire’. For a long time, and with few exceptions, scholars of both superpowers and their allies respectively confirmed their views against each other. As it transpired, both sides were greatly mistaken. Yet the political legacy of the Cold War prevails in many analyses of Islam in Central Asia. ‘The post-Communist political élites in the Central Asian states, primarily those in Uzbekistan, see a deadly threat in the Islamization of the region and are ready to fight it’, write a group of Russian scholars.6 A Western colleague suggests that Soviet antiMuslim politicians understood more about the danger of fundamentalism than their Western counterparts and declares that Islamic Central Asia played a major part in the dissolution of the Soviet Union.7 However, in a referendum held in March 1991, 90 per cent of the population of the Central Asian republics voted to retain the USSR. Conclusively, Eickelman argues that the conventional wisdom from the early years of the Cold War established stereotypes so powerful that evidence of any contrary behaviour was misinterpreted or ignored; there is now a risk of Moscow and Washington seeing Islam – or at least an ill-defined Islamism or Islamic ‘fundamentalism’ – as a monolithic destabilising force.8

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A short history Seventy years of Soviet rule changed the face of Islam dramatically in Central Asia. In total, Central Asia was under Russian and Soviet rule for around 130 years. These years spent under the Tsarist Empire did not differ radically from what occurred in other parts of the Islamic world: the administration remained relatively passive towards Islam, as long as Islam did not threaten or interfere with colonial domination. The Bolshevik revolution changed that. Among the most important turning points for the region were: the national delimitation of 1924, which created five new states in Central Asia; the nationalities policy; and the aggressive anti-Islamic stance of Stalin and his successors.9 Unlike Muslim peoples under French or English rule, the Muslim population of Central Asia has not been exposed to so-called ‘Western’ values, such as capitalism or democracy, although it has experienced Soviet-style modernisation and industrialisation. After the collapse of the anti-Soviet revolts in the early 1930s, the Muslims of Central Asia accepted their new rules, for the most part quietly. This is not to say that they abandoned their faith. In fact, it can be argued that what developed under the Soviets was a form of Islam that was perceived eventually as a cultural legacy rather than a creed. It became a form of ethnic identification that would help to distinguish Central Asians from non-Muslim Slavic intruders. With time, Islam became intrinsically interwoven with growing ethnic awareness. To be an Uzbek was to be a Muslim. The most dramatic consequence of Soviet policy was the near total destruction of ‘high’ Islam: Islamic learning, philosophy and law, traditionally practised and passed on by the ulema. Muslim scholars were deported and many were killed during the purges of the 1920s and 1930s. Around 26,000 mosques were destroyed in Uzbekistan alone.10 A strictly controlled official ulema remained, consisting of a few selected scholars trained in a single madra’sa in Bukhara, the Mir-i-Arab Medra’sa. The ulema of the entire Soviet Union was supervised by four religious directorates established during the Second World War, in the case of Central Asia this being the Spiritual Directorate of the Muslims of Central Asia and Kazakhstan (SADUM) in Tashkent. Its purpose was to mobilise support for Soviet doctrine and to manipulate Muslims’ understanding of Islamic issues.11 Central Asian Muslims were left with what may be termed ‘folk’ Islam: regional traditions and customs that sometimes had little to do with Islamic norms.12 Folk Islam proved resistant to anti-religious Soviet policies. The majority of Central Asians, regardless of their political affiliation, continued to practise such rituals as circumcision, Islamic marriage and funeral rites. The official religious establishment was rarely trusted, and a system of religious communication emerged that Soviet scholars termed ‘shadow’ or ‘parallel’ Islam. This system was based on the traditions of folk Islam and to some extent supported by institutions such as Sufi societies (Tariqas). Opinions differ about the importance and political activity of these Tariqas, namely the Naqshbandis and Qadiris. Soviet authors usually characterised them as 221

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‘fanatical’, ‘militant’ or ‘extremely conservative’. Hence, some Western authors assumed that Sufism would play a major role in destabilising the Soviet system.13 It is now acknowledged that their influence was over-estimated. By and large, Central Asian Sufi orders were orientated towards personal religious experience. With this attitude, they provided a base for psychological resistance and the preservation of religious values rather than an actual politicised platform for revolt.14 It may be assumed tentatively that only a scant tradition of the once rich Islamic heritage prevailed throughout the Soviet period. Although officially defamed by Soviet propaganda, the existence of ‘underground’ Islam appears to have been widely known and accepted, even by the authorities. The phenomenon was ‘a stable, not a radical force in Central Asia during the Soviet era’.15 Even so, Soviet rule led to a secularisation of influential parts of society. These included mainly the Russified, pro-Soviet élite and intelligentsia, as well as sections of the industrial workforce. Where the rural population kept in contact with the more traditional ways of life in the main (which included Islamic rituals and religious affiliations), a much higher percentage of Central Asians has been exposed to secularisation for far longer than populations anywhere in the Middle East. Although an Islamic ‘revival’ of sorts has occurred since the 1970s, the situation on the eve of the disintegration of the Soviet Union can be summarised as follows: while the vast majority of Central Asians considered themselves as Muslims, ‘being Muslim’ consisted mainly of a perceived differentiation from the ‘Other’, the Russians. The border between religious and ethnic identity was fluid. Now, the former Soviet distinction between Islam as a mere normative ‘form of culture’ and ‘Islam as a faith’ has disappeared and Islam, in all its various aspects, has returned to the public sphere. Compared to the rest of the Muslim world, however, there is still a pressing need to catch up. 16

Fundamentalism In many analytical studies of fundamentalism in Central Asia, the actual establishment of political Islam is already taken for granted; the discussion revolves mainly around consequences and prospects concerning this phenomenon. One problem with discussion of a rising politicisation of Islam in Central Asia is the fact that different authors use the term in different ways. Many authors seem to define fundamentalism very widely and consider any rising awareness and consciousness of Islamic heritage as a sign of radicalisation. Confusion has developed over the subtle differences between such terms as ‘cultural revival’, ‘religious traditionalism’, ‘modernism’, ‘neo-fundamentalism’ and ‘Islamism’. It seems necessary to define ‘political Islam’, ‘fundamentalism’ or ‘radical Islam’ as distinct from other forms of Islamic revival. In a sense, the discussion of Islam and Islamism reflects two basic academic positions towards political Islam. One group of scholars attributes the behaviour of Islamic societies to certain 222

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cultural traits and peculiarities of Islam and believes in a strict policy of containment and denial. The other argues that reasons for political Islam are mainly to be found in the legacies of colonialism as well as socio-economic and cultural problems.17 This chapter adopts the definition and typology given by William Shepard, while allowing for other attributes that seem important to Central Asia.18 Shepard distinguishes between secularism, modernism, (neo-)traditionalism and radical Islamism; he defines the latter as an inclusive system of thought that claims Islam ‘for all aspects of social as well as personal life’. Islamists use ijtihad and demand the abandoning of all un-Islamic ‘superstitions’ and innovations (bid’a). Shepard views radical Islamism as distinctly modern and ideological, since it arises primarily as a reaction against Westernising trends. Islamists incline towards social and political activism, which can turn into violent struggle against authorities or opponents perceived as ideologically harmful.19 Almost all Islamist movements reject one particular triumvirate. The first is so-called ‘modernity’ or, more precisely, the cultural contradiction caused by a distorted kind of access to modernity in the Islamic world. Islamists reject modernity as an intellectual concept while accepting modern technology and symbols, and integrating and borrowing from modern ideologies. Ironically, this modern conceptualisation makes Islamism itself prone to secularisation. Secondly, Islamists view the concept of secularism as an ideological approach incompatible with a truly Islamic society. Secularism, as an integral part of modernity, strictly separates private religiosity and official laity. It obviously stands diametrically opposed to any view that takes faith as the only base for all sectors of life. Finally, most Islamists adopt a strong anti-Western position. The West is seen not only as representative of the unacceptable values mentioned above, but also as the source and reason for the decline and abuse of the Islamic world. Especially in the Middle East, the creation of Israel and the subsequent humiliations by military defeat led to a further alienation from the West. This is true especially for the United States, seen as a protector of Israel and suspected of exercising double standards in its treatment of Muslim states and Israel. Internally, the rise and spread of Islamism is seen as the consequence of a crisis of efficiency and legitimacy concerning ideologies and systems in the Muslim world that were established after independence. Intense demographic growth, accompanied by inadequate economic development, has further strengthened the success of Islamist movements.20 Individual Islamist movements are shaped by the particular situation of their domestic social environment. As one academic argues, ‘they draw from it the resources needed for their organisation and growth, but they also change its reference values and are changed by it’.21 Here, one has to take into account the very different historical route that Islam took in Central Asia to determine whether current events can actually be called a politicisation of Islam. Two areas of concern may be identified in the continuing discussion of fundamentalism in Central Asia. Externally, the fear of imported Islamism 223

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(mainly via Iran) has been invoked in recent years. Internally, the term ‘fundamentalism’ has been applied mainly to two tendencies in Central Asia: the so-called Wahhabis, and the Islamic Renaissance Party (IRP). It is questionable whether these concerns are justified due to insufficient data on the structures of Islamist movements and their numerical strength in Central Asia. The ideological character of these tendencies is classified differently depending on who is doing the classification. More basic statistics, such as the number of reopened mosques or religious schools, diverge in different sources. Indeed, ‘nobody, not even those who are living and working within the region, has a clear and full picture of the social and cultural changes that are now in progress. Assessments are inevitably based on partial information and personal prejudice’.22 The majority of Central Asian Muslims are Sunni and belong to the Hanafi school, which is considered liberal.23 Only about 1 per cent, mainly Ismai’li Tajiks, are Shiite. Yet, according to recent American research, very few people in Central Asia actually possess more than a basic awareness that they are Muslim. One poll also challenged the theory that interest in Islam is greatest among postSoviet youth. It is the elderly who hold on to Islamic beliefs – a trend typical in most established religions.24 On a more practical level, few people speak Arabic, and even fewer can read it. The five pillars of Islam and rituals for prayers are known only in fragments, if at all. Even self-proclaimed ‘believing Muslims’ often lack the most fundamental knowledge: one third of this number could not translate the Shahada from Arabic.25 It also seems to be a quite common belief that three pilgrimages to Bukhara or seven to another holy site are equal to the haj.26 The type of Islamic revival or renaissance that occurred after the disintegration of the Soviet Union must be judged, therefore, with such considerations in mind.

The import of Islamism Islamic states, such as Iran and Saudi Arabia, or Islamist movements, such as the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, are often blamed for the infiltration of Islamist ideas; so is the overflow into Central Asia caused by the Afghan civil war. It is claimed that the growing influence of these organisations could have prompted a radicalisation of the Muslim population, and therefore had to be prevented or contained. In the first years after the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the consequent fall of its southern Iron Curtain, a growing import of Islamic literature and media transmissions could be observed. Often listed are the one million Korans sponsored by Saudi Arabia, or the Iranian radio transmissions into the region. Islamic regimes also supported the building or renovation of mosques and the establishment of madra’sas and other religious centres. Considering the widespread ignorance of Islamic knowledge, however, the establishment of relations, exchange of scholars and even religious training do not have to be seen in 224

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the light of an acute radicalisation. Rather, as one scholar has noted, the emerging links with countries like Iran and other Muslim states occurred as part of the natural process of re-establishing neighbourly state-to-state relations.27 Most concern has been expressed regarding official and unofficial relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran. Fear of a transfer of the Islamic system in the first years after independence prompted suggestions of a late twentieth-century ‘Great Game’ between ‘secular’ Turkey favoured by the West and Islamic Iran, competing for influence over this area. One academic even depicted the ‘arms of the Octopus’ of the Iranian regime, and declared that ‘Khomeiniism [is] on the rise’ in the former Soviet republics.28 It is clear today that this fear was greatly exaggerated. In the near future, Iran is unlikely to try to expand its influence over the area. Besides, the Shiite version of Islam does not appeal to the mostly Sunni Central Asians. Moreover, Iran’s form of government, which takes into accord its national Iranian heritage, does not appeal to the mainly Turkic peoples of Central Asia.29 The only possible exception is the Tajiks, who speak a Persian dialect, but have shown no interest in advances from their linguistic relatives to date. On the contrary, the Tajiks now claim to have harboured the cradle of Persian culture, and thus further claim to be the true heirs of the great Persian tradition, language and heroic figures. Shireen Hunter argues that Iran after the Cold War emerged as a ‘conservative power with pragmatic, non-ideological strategies aimed at maintaining the status quo in the regional political order’.30 Consequently, Iran is interested primarily in preventing any threat to its territorial integrity and national security. It wishes to establish economic links with the Central Asian republics, without interfering with the hegemonic interest of Russia, still the main economic power in the region. Relations with Russia have steadily improved since 1993, with both states fearing potential dissent among their Turkic minorities respectively. Until recently, this unlikely cooperation was also used to counterweight the perceived influence of Turkey in the area.31 Contact with the rest of the Islamic world differs from state to state, but has been fairly limited overall. Although a ‘Muslim’ state, Uzbekistan was quick to establish links with Israel and the West in preference to the financially and economically deficient Arab and Muslim states, which, furthermore, lack the technology and knowledge to develop the region.32 This trend continues, especially as the exploitation of the petrochemical resources of the region needs the financial and technical backing of Western oil companies.

The Wahhabis in the Ferghana Valley Repeated warnings are made about fundamentalist movements that allegedly have their stronghold in the Ferghana Valley.33 Ferghana has traditionally been considered a bulwark of tradition and Islamic practice. Here, the last few Basmachi, Muslim irregulars fighting the Bolsheviks, remained until the 1930s. Nowadays 7 million Uzbeks, one third of the total population of Uzbekistan, live 225

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there. The Ferghana Valley is over-populated and suffers from an acute land shortage and an unemployment rate close to 35 per cent.34 One of the movements described as fundamentalist is Wahhabi.35 Information is scarce; even the origins of this movement are obscure. Towards the end of the 1970s, Soviet sources began to report a movement that referred to Islamic values and tried to reintroduce Islamic education and aspects of shariah. They were christened Wahhabis, a name that was soon adopted by Russian and Western scholars alike. That title was applied allegedly by Soviet sources to any non-conformist Islamic group, to discredit them as imported reactionary counter-revolutionary movements.36 Yet no evidence for ties between the Central Asian Islamist activists and Saudi Wahhabi exists before 1990, though the supporters sympathised with some ideas, such as the revival and preservation of strict Islamic principles.37 It was also found that supporters for the most part rejected violence on doctrinal grounds.38 The Islamist movements that emerged in the Ferghana Valley differ in many respects from the puritanical interpretation of Islam by Saudi Arabian Wahhabism. It appears that the movements, though having a strict stance on dress codes and alcohol, do not have any ideological connection with Saudi Arabian Wahhabis. Alexei Malashenko has identified the social foundation of the Wahhabi movement within the peasantry, migrants who had recently moved from the countryside, and residents in small towns.39 However, it has also been argued that these so-called ‘Wahhabis’ are ‘not connected to the traditionalistic fundamentalists, but rather with members of the intelligentsia, or in other words, the local nomenklatura’.40 Contrary to Soviet suggestions, most authors now believe that the Islamist movements termed Wahhabi originated and developed independently in the area itself and were fuelled by the Islamic revival that began during the Soviet period. Therefore no outside influence played a part in their development during the 1970s. Sometimes it is stressed that the war in Afghanistan – in which up to one third of the Soviet soldiers were drafted from Central Asia – strengthened religious awareness.41 It has been argued, however, that the Afghan experience contributed only indirectly to the religious revival already in progress.42 Another academic has made an interesting point in suggesting that the Wahhabi movement in the Ferghana Valley has much older roots, having been introduced from India in the early nineteenth century. He claims that supporters of the Wahhabi movement in India, which had fought the Sikhs and their British allies in the nineteenth century, had brought the tradition to Central Asia. After defeat, they took refuge in the inaccessible region of the Ferghana Valley.43 Even so, the Indian version of Wahhabism differed in important aspects, as it did not regard Sufism as an un-Islamic appearance that had to be fought, but rather incorporated it in form and content.44 Moreover, these assumed Indian origins contradict the author’s own subsequent analysis of the movement as puritanical and devoid of mysticism.45 Not surprisingly, some scholars have suggested that this particular Islamist movement is intermingled with the strong Sufi tradition in the area.46 Others 226

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reject this hypothesis.47 While it is assumed that Sufis in Central Asia have taken on a distinctly political role in the doctrinal fragmentation of Islamic authority, this attitude seems to work against the emergence of radical hegemonic ideologies.48 Traditionally the Central Asian Sufi Tariqas do not have the same strong anti-colonial fighting tradition as, for example, their counterparts in the Caucasus, who historically put up the most vigorous resistance to Russian expansion. It has been maintained that any suggested connection between Sufis and fundamentalists is in fact an anathema: ‘Sufis and fundamentalists live in antagonistic worlds. Sufism, with its open attitude in approaching non-Islamic cultures and towards popular Islam, stands contrary towards the intolerance, dogmatic self-opinion and cultural autism of fundamentalists.’49 Consequently, the Sufi tradition, which, according to one observer, experienced a tremendous revival in Central Asia,50 is providing a major spiritual obstacle to any attempted spread of fundamentalism, which promotes a puritanism alien to the region. In any case, most scholars agree that the base of the so-called ‘Wahhabi’ movements outside the Ferghana valley is not very strong. It is questionable whether the Wahhabi movement or other fundamentalist tendencies have that strong an influence outside some enclaves, or whether they could provide a realistic Islamic alternative in Central Asia, as has frequently been assumed by some Russian and Western scholars.

The Islamic Renaissance Party In 1990, an all-Muslim party was registered in the Soviet Union: the Islamic Renaissance Party (IRP). Initially, it claimed to stand for a supranational idea, fighting for the introduction of shariah, and eventually for an Islamic state. The IRP was therefore considered threatening to the emerging secular regimes in Central Asia. Subsequently it was declared illegal in all the republics except Tajikistan, where it constituted part of the government in 1992. Yet the IRP of Uzbekistan was secretly established near Tashkent in January 1992. Since being banned, the party has conducted its affairs underground. The basic demands of the Uzbek branch at the initial meeting were as follows: to teach the real meaning of the Koran and Hadith and call for life in accordance with it; to fight national and racial discrimination, impudence, crime, alcoholism and other things forbidden by shariah; to educate young people in Islamic principles; to strengthen Islamic brotherhood and develop religious relations with the Muslim world; to cooperate with other democratic parties and state organisations; to create philanthropic funds; to strengthen the family and ensure rights of women and children; to secure the principles of Islamic economy.51 The supposed objectives of the IRP in Tajikistan, the only branch officially recognised for some time, show similarities to the Uzbek IRP. They are concerned with the spiritual revival of Central Asians; they stand for an independent economic and political system and propagate a complete political and legal awakening with the aim of applying the principles of Islam to 227

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everyday life; and they work for the dissemination of Islamic thought among different nationalities of the republic.52 Despite programmatic and structural similarities, the national IRP branches differ in their willingness to compromise and cooperate with national governments. Recently, the IRP branches have moderated their positions and eliminated any implicit or explicit reference to the idea of creating an Islamic republic. The scholar Abdujabar Abduvakhitov, who was asked by the authorities in 1991 to conduct a study on the structure and political programme of the IRP, declared that the party did not stand for an anti-democratic policy. He argued that it was willing theoretically to participate in a democratic political process but that ‘at the present time, with democratic structures undeveloped, revivalists cannot accept democratic methods of political activity’.53 Subsequently, a split appeared within the party itself between advocates of more radical policies and supporters of a legalistic path who would like to strengthen educational and religious aspects. Even so, all factions clearly distance themselves from the use of violence and political terrorism.54 As in the case of the so-called ‘Wahhabis’, until recently there was no indication of strong public support for this party in Uzbekistan, except in the Ferghana Valley and in some of the poorer areas of Tashkent. After their initial attraction, the popularity of most of the IRP branches seems to have declined steadily over recent years. This decline could probably be attributed to lack of financial resources and organisational experience.55 Considering the minimal impact of possible Islamist infiltration, one can conclude that at present Central Asians are not ready for an Islamic revolution. Iran seems content with its pragmatist policy. Should IRP and Wahhabis contain fundamentalist streaks, they would still be unable to recruit enough followers on a grassroots level to become politically significant. The Islamic revival in Central Asia since 1991 has been limited; the majority of the population has not expressed an inclination towards the formation of Islamic states. Popular discontent associated with extreme poverty and oppressive rule appear to be vital preconditions for the propagation of radical Islamic solutions to social and political problems in the Middle East. The main target of such agitation has usually been native national élites, which are perceived as corrupt and impious. But Central Asians are at a very different historical stage: they are not contending for power with decades-old national state structures, élites, and ideologies. On the contrary, they are preoccupied with consolidating their new-found independence.56

Fundamentalism reconsidered: cui bono? A closer look has shown that the three examples mentioned above were overstated. The immediate danger of a takeover by Islamic fundamentalists does not seem to 228

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be as acute as is often suggested. Much of the concern about the perceived Islamist threat seems to result from interpretations of the Cold War. Yet other sources for this prevailing fear and invocation of imminent Islamisation in Central Asia should be mentioned. Two factions which may have an interest, conscious or subconscious, in heightening concern over Islamism may be identified: those who want to constrain fundamentalism, and those who wish to see it grow. The first of the two factions consists of the Russian Federation and the current Central Asian leaders. The Federation has continued to see the ‘near abroad’ as part of its traditional hegemonic sphere. To justify these attitudes towards the West in particular, Russia poses as the vanguard against radical Islam on its soft ‘southern belt’. The potential danger of political Islam can be invoked by Russia and its apologists57 when containing rebellion in the Russian Federation itself, as is the case in Chechnya. The concerns of the rulers of the Central Asian republics are related to Russia’s interests in the region, as ‘some Central Asian leaders are successfully selling themselves as bulwarks against a still-mythical radical Islamic wave’.58 The Uzbek president Islam Karimov has issued polemics against the Islamic threat. A continuation of that critical perception enables him to justify his authoritarian style of government and allows him to crush not only the occasional Islamist assembly, but also more numerous groups of opposition (which might otherwise develop into a stable, pro-secular and loyal opposition).59 In addition, through fuelling this fear, Karimov and other Central Asian leaders can endeavour to claim further financial aid and economic support from the West to stabilise the situation in their republics. That the present ruling élite has been educated and trained under the Soviet secular system must also be taken into account. Anti-Islamic by political instinct, they are prone to over-estimate the danger implied by their peoples’ rising Islamic awareness. Under the second faction of supporters for a growing Islamisation come Islamists in other parts of the Muslim world who would see a strong Islamist movement as a success and a continuation of their policies. Ironically, in an odd coalition with these Islamists, a particular segment of Russian and Ukrainian society, namely some anti-democratic radical nationalists and orthodox communists, have also embraced the Islamic cause. The advantages for the Russian nationalists lie in the fact that an Islamic state to the south of Russia would help them to justify their goals, namely the re-establishing of a strong Russian hegemony in the south. In addition, they consider Islam as an obstacle to American supremacy. The Ukrainian nationalists, on the other hand, seem to hope that a strong Islamic south would support them in containing Russian hegemony and political influence.60

Analysis The possibility of the politicisation of Islam in Central Asia is fairly remote at present. This does not mean that such a possibility is ruled out in the long term. 229

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Certain indices already show a chance of rising Islamisation in Central Asia over the next few decades. The following analytical approach will be based mainly on circumstances experienced in the Middle East. There, new national regimes, as well as the process and establishment of Islamist movements, have a history decades long. Furthermore, development and causes of Islamisation in the Middle East have been well researched and can provide a framework for analysis: to some degree, one can look at the predisposition for the rise of Islamisation in one region in order to understand the situation in another. It must not be forgotten, however, that the particular Soviet legacy has shaped the face of Islam in Central Asia. Close comparison will show that certain conditions that shape Islamist movements in the Middle East are not, or not yet, existent in Central Asia. The chosen approaches and perspectives in analysing the long-term prospects of radical Islam necessarily overlap and are interdependent. Yet it seems useful to identify certain aspects and trace chains to exemplify the given possibilities in the region. Intellectual and ideological sources for Islamism The guiding intellectual forces behind Islamist movements in the Middle East are the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hasan al-Banna, his disciple Sayyid Qutb, and the Pakistani Sayyid Abu ‘Ala Mawdudi. These thinkers were introduced to Central Asia through Middle Eastern contacts even before the war in Afghanistan.61 Currently, both extremist and moderate Islamist movements trace their roots back to these early Islamists. This is due to the fact that their writings, lacking dogmatic coherence, invite elastic interpretation. Aside from the doctrinal differences in their concepts, Al-Banna and others provided the intellectual base for converting Islam the faith into Islamism the ideology. In the Middle East, most of the ideologists at the forefront of Islamist movements are laymen (with the possible exception of Iran, where the Shiite structures favoured the clergy as the focus of revolt). As such, they are not often well versed in the depth and resources of Islamic thought accumulated over centuries. This lack of Islamic training has resulted in an eclectic blend of modern ideologies and their integration into an Islamic context. The majority of these laymen came from traditional backgrounds where popular Islam was the predominant cultural base; their exposure to modernity and the despised West was usually limited to the superficial, and their perception negatively distorted. This differentiates them from the Islamic modernists, who were often educated or had studied in the West. Hence, they were familiar not only with the distorted and negative images and results of modernity in the Middle East (such as alienation and unemployment, for example), but also with the positive aspects, such as political thought and expression, democratic values and human rights. In Central Asia, the case is somewhat different. Great parts of the population have remained closed to Islamic tradition and have practised Islamic rituals 230

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within the network of parallel Islam,62 thereby circumventing the officially approved and controlled institutions. Yet they were exposed to an active policy of secularisation and Marxist-Leninist indoctrination for more than seventy years. It has been argued that parts of the society, especially the urban intelligentsia, became ‘secularised from conviction, education and habit’.63 Opinions differ on the effects of secularisation. Some scholars believe that religious activists in Central Asia, like anywhere else in the Muslim world, are more likely to be the products of mass higher education than of traditional educational institutions.64 It has been noted, however, that the group best prepared to articulate and propagate Islamist views, the Central Asian intellectuals, has been fed atheistic propaganda through the Soviet media and educational system: they are sceptical of, or in outright opposition to, Islamist ideas.65 The legacy of secularism has led to a situation where the awareness of Islam as an intellectual resource is only weakly embodied in the opinion-forming strata of society. Applying the Middle Eastern experience, this absence of deeper Islamic knowledge could persuade many Central Asians towards fundamentalism. Yet a minimal knowledge of the Koran is required even of lay Islamists, and it is at least debatable whether even this scarce knowledge exists in Central Asia.66 Conversely, the long-term exposure to the Soviet version of modernity provides the preconditions that one finds in the history of Islamic modernists. According to Shepard’s definition, modernism, like radicalism, insists that Islam provide an adequate ideological base for public life and that it has a very strong tendency to emphasise the flexibility of Islam (that is, the use of ijtihad) in the public sphere. It is, moreover, willing to use this flexibility in terms congruently, or at least in very positive dialogue, with Western ideologies.67 In this respect, the option towards the development of Islamic modernism in Central Asia exists. The catalogue of demands of at least some factions within the IRP could develop into something more similar to the demands of Islamic modernists than to the fundamentalist line of thought. This evolution would also make sense in an historical perspective: Islamic modernism, while never reaching the broad public, was the first conceptual response to modernity in the Middle East. If one interprets the present revival of Islam in Central Asia as a first step (necessarily belated) to reclaiming the past, some modernist intellectual response could well be next. This is if socioeconomic conditions allow it, and provided there is the opportunity to work within a democratic context rather than against the system. But since ‘Western’ intellectual concepts such as democracy (as opposed to scientific modernity) are not inherent to the secular legacy in Central Asia, it may well be that antiWestern modern ideologies provide the base for a new Islamic interpretation. For the same historical reason, other features of Islamism, such as antiWestern and anti-US outbursts common in the Middle East, are not evident in Central Asia (with the possible exception of Tajikistan). At present, Western exploitation is less feared than Western indifference to the economic and technological needs of the new states.68 The function of the Israel-syndrome and 231

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anti-Zionism, which in the Middle East is an integral part of almost every Islamist ideology, is not yet evident in Central Asia.69 Rather, an anti-Russian sentiment could develop if the competition for employment, for example, starts to be seen as an inter-ethnic problem. In such circumstances, a future evolution of Islamic thought will not necessarily follow the path of Middle Eastern Islamism. It could develop into a unique combination of Marxist-Leninist, modern and Islamic concepts and inspirations with a yet unknown destination. Nazih Ayubi has taken such a possibility into consideration when he writes that ‘on an intellectual level, liberal-nationalist Islamism, cultural-historicist Islamism, and the broader circle of discourse revolving around the issue of authenticity … may eventually translate themselves into a movement for cultural nationalism that is nativist, “specifist”, if not particularly secularist’.70 Socio-economic preconditions Another indispensable prerequisite for Islamism in the Middle East is a decline in socio-economic conditions. These alone do not necessarily result in the politicisation of Islam. Yet economic hardship is perceived often as a direct or indirect result of either the legacy of colonial rule, unfair trade relations especially with the West, and/or the mismanagement of an authoritarian regime. One essential precondition for the growth of Islamism is the arrival of modernisation (as distinct from modernity). Again, it is not so much the technological and economic modernisation to which Islamist movements in the Middle East are opposed. Rather, the social implications of modernisation are rejected. These imply a shift from a society in which status is determined by characteristics such as gender, religion and family, to one in which social and legal status is largely determined by what people achieve by their own effort. Importantly, this shift leads to a diminution of the influence of religion in the public sphere.71 In Central Asia, however, religious expression has been restrained throughout Soviet rule and has just recently re-emerged in public life. Thus, this factor, though a minor consideration, will probably not provide a precondition for Islamism. Social modernisation is potentially disruptive. Islamist movements in the Middle East have usually appeared in environments of rising expectations, poor achievements and frustrated hopes. Rapid economic growth and industrialisation, urbanisation and secular mass education all provided the base for discontent and eventual Islamisation in the Middle East.72 Faced with this challenge, some people experience a sense of helplessness, which results in anxiety and a consequential turn towards a possible ‘lobby’ or party appearing to fight for the interest of the voiceless majority. The strata of society especially affected and equipped with higher expectations of a promised better future tend to turn towards Islamism.73 Central Asians, although initially forced into modernisation and industrialisation, have had time to become accustomed to its effects, even 232

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though the collapse of the Soviet Union has dramatically shown the inefficiency and superficiality of these achievements. Another factor to be considered is the almost complete absence of a free market economy. It would not be the disappointed expectations of modernisation itself that would provide the base for Islamist movements in Central Asia, but the more limited, unfulfilled promises of capitalism. The influence of literacy and mass education on the process of Islamisation in the Middle East has been profound: it has been argued that ‘mass education opens the way to “democratized” access to sacred text and overcomes restrictions as to who is “authorized” to interpret it’.74 Whether this will be the case in Central Asia is uncertain. The level of literacy, at almost 100 per cent, is far higher than anywhere else in the Muslim world; with it come comparatively high standards of education. This state of mass literacy and education was reached decades ago in Central Asia, while in the Middle East it is still a relatively recent phenomenon or, in some areas, extremely limited. One could assume that the acute impact of the literacy experience has already faded in Central Asia. But these currently high standards of education are already declining, due to a lack of financial resources. The consequences for Central Asia could be similar to Middle Eastern experiences. There, the groups who felt the socio-economic descent the most were usually the urbanised lower middle classes and educated groups. In a time of economic decline, they face unemployment instead of a secure position in the state apparatus. In Central Asia, the potential supporters of Islamists can be assumed to be: university students, mainly those in humanities; young people in general, especially young men who have just moved to the cities; members of the intelligentsia with a traditionalist inclination; and middleand lower-level religious officials who want to distance themselves from the staterecognised religious establishment.75 Hence, in both cases, Islamic radicalism could establish itself as an urban response and an ideological articulation of contemporary dimensions, highlighting and condensing the social divisions and problems of Islamic cities and towns. … Its ideology is closely related to the anxieties and ambitions of certain strata of society: small merchants, middle traders, artisans, students, teachers and state employees.76 Until recently, socio-economic conditions in Central Asia did not appear to provide a platform for Islamist groups. The future, however, looks bleak. Since independence, Central Asia has been forced to face problems typical of developing countries. While the birth rates of most Central Asian ethnic groups have decreased since the mid-1980s, they remain very high. The region is experiencing an explosion in population, especially in rural areas. According to business sources in Tashkent, Uzbekistan is facing growing discontent among its agricultural workforce, particularly in the Ferghana Valley.77 Their main complaint is that the regime’s continued use of the old Soviet state-order system 233

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pushes many farmers to the brink of financial ruin. This system forces them to sell cotton and grain well below market prices.78 It is argued that this could lead to an enhanced attraction for Islamist movements, which, as illustrated in the Middle East, often function as the focus for socio-economic opposition. While traditionally the rural population is characterised by low mobility even within the republics, the threat of under- and unemployment in the country could lead to rising migration to the cities. This urban drift may be sporadic but it is growing. Unlike the Middle East, there are still no shantytowns on the peripheries.79 However, considering the growing problems in the rural sector, Central Asian republics could face a second wave of urbanisation in the future where no external authorities would defuse any potential points of conflict. Central Asia would then have to come to terms with the consequences: alienation, frustration and radicalisation. Conclusively, new migrants who are disadvantaged professionally, educationally and linguistically constitute a new and growing underclass in Central Asian cities. As one author predicts, ‘dissatisfied, alienated, angry, and sometimes desperate, they are often particularly hostile towards the Russians and other ethnic minorities and prove to be particularly prone to extremism, violence, and other criminal activities’.80 Post-Soviet identity and nation building The rise of political Islam is often connected with the difficulties faced by Muslim regimes when attempting to legitimise their rule. As in many modern states, rulers of Muslim nations try to manifest and justify their regimes, and even their very existence, with readily available means. Cultural and religious symbols are transformed into national ones. Islam and its manifestations have been favourite targets for such leaders. Yet this method tends to create its own enemy, usually consisting of competing élites and oppositional forces within an Islamic framework. Once again, the Islamic dimensions of Central Asian life are becoming increasingly evident, not least because they constitute an integral part of national identity. This inclusiveness is enforced by some factors associated with the particular development in recent years: the continuing emergence of Islamic symbols and signs indicate that the process of nation building is still under way in Central Asia. Hence, the integration of Islamic symbols and practices, the naming of streets and buildings after famous Muslim theologians and poets, does not either inevitably signify a religious revival or serve as evidence of fundamentalist trends. Instead, it expresses the search for symbols that support a nation-building process that is far from secure and in need of every possible resource, to the extent of inventing phrases of the Prophet, such as that seen on many posters in Uzbekistan: ‘The love for the Fatherland derives from the faith.’81 The difficulties in the process of nation building can, to some extent, be compared to similar developments in the Middle East during the 1950s and 234

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1960s. At that time, most Muslim states had gained independence and struggled with the concept of establishing and legitimising nation states. In Algeria, for example, the Islamic heritage was employed during the struggle for independence as a banner to rally Muslims against the French administration. With independence, however, many newly emerging states had to redefine Islam in national terms in order to justify the concept of a nation-state which was contrary to the concept of the all-inclusive Muslim ‘umma. In the case of Central Asia, a further perspective may be added. Islam becomes ‘a public statement about their ethno-political identity’ for non-Arab Muslims and Muslims living within the periphery of the Islamic world.82 Thus, Islam and its cultural manifestations evolve into an ethnic marker against perceived or real cultural domination by non-Muslims. Even so, this does not necessarily strengthen the bondage with brother Muslim nations. Here, the importance of the ethnic component of Islam in Central Asia can be traced back to two initial causes. The first is the psychological need for distinction between the original indigenous population and foreign newcomers such as Russians, Ukrainians and other settlers during Tsarist and Soviet rule. The second is the political need to consolidate the process of nation building. Islam has become a fundamental facet of all Central Asian nationalisms – which can mean that there is nothing to preclude a practising atheist from identifying himself as a Muslim.83 The symbiosis of national consciousness and Islam became evident in the wake of perestroika during the 1980s. Like other peoples in the Soviet Union, Central Asians began to drift away from Moscow’s orbit and to reclaim their national heritage and cultures. The growing realisation of nationalism led to an inevitable revival of Islamic motifs and symbols that had been an integral part of Central Asian history. During these years, Central Asian intellectuals demanded a more positive evaluation of Islam and highlighted progressive aspects of their Islamic heritage. Islamic motifs were used in literature and arts. Another manifestation was the demand to translate the Koran into the respective national languages.84 Unlike other states in the Middle East and Asia, Central Asia never went through the unifying experience of an anti-colonial struggle. Apart from individual voices, Central Asians never actively yearned for independence – it was thrust upon them. Hence, the new national citizens lack much of the self-sacrificing enthusiasm that carried nations elsewhere through a difficult transitional period. Most importantly, Central Asians were denied the opportunity to formulate alternative national ideologies, which made the need for Islamic and other national symbols even more urgent.85 Assuming the supranational appeal of Islam, shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union speculations were made about a pan-Islamic identity emerging in Central Asia. Again, these theories were based on pre-Soviet concepts86 as well as on the Cold War estimation of Islam as an anti-Soviet but unifying force for the whole of Central Asia.87 It soon became clear that Islam would not have such an impact. On the contrary, each state incorporated Islam into its national 235

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concept. This included the division of the former Central Asian Spiritual Directorate into five national institutions. Not surprisingly, the former all-Soviet Islamic Renaissance Party followed suit by establishing (mostly illegal) national departments. Another obvious sign of the weakness of pan-Islamic consciousness is the fact that problems and disputes in Central Asia have arisen between Muslims themselves rather than with the non-Muslim population, with the exception of Kazakhstan. On a more basic level, one author reports that Muslim neighbours of different nationalities are often treated as ‘bad Muslims’, not equal to ‘genuine Muslims’, that is, those sharing one’s own nationality.88 Élites and opposition Another aspect of nation building has been the use of Islamic symbols by competing élites in their struggle for power and influence. Islam has become a feature of all of the Central Asian elites.89 This new regard for religion reflects the process of growing religiosity that started during the early 1980s. The élites, determined to stay in power, had to respond to this phenomenon. As in the Middle East, political demands are expressed in Islamic symbols. ‘[P]ressing “Islam” into the service of patrimonialism as patrimonial structures seek to manage the government of modern states could be said to be one of the main themes of late twentieth-century politics in the Middle East’,90 but it is equally valid in Central Asia. For example, all the new ex-communist presidents of the Central Asian republics swore their oath on the (explicitly secular) constitutions with a copy of the Koran in their hands. This manipulation of religious symbolism could lead to a vicious circle: by drawing Islam into the political sphere, politics could be drawn more and more into a religious discussion. In the struggle for influence in the process of nation building, several competing élites can be identified in Central Asia. First, there is the former communist élite turned nationalist and religious: Karimov and other Central Asian rulers need to legitimise their grip on power. In Islam, they recognised a valuable instrument. As Islam is not a monolithic faith, it is, to some extent, malleable to the dictates of political necessity. Second, the Russified intellectual élite, the most secular segment in Central Asian society, will eventually have to reconsider its stance towards Islam; otherwise it could become alienated from major parts of the population as the trend towards native identity continues and the knowledge of Russian declines. Such circumstances could give rise to a similar development to that in Algeria, where the Francophile intellectuals lost contact with their compatriots. In both cases, the issue of language is obstacle enough. Third, there are the different layers of religious leadership. It has been argued that a distinction should be made between élites that incorporate Islam as a part of their claim to station, and élites that exist within Islam. Very different roles will be played in the future of Central Asia by élites who are now adopting an Islamic 236

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dimension as a part of a general claim on power, and by élites of the religious hierarchies themselves, official and unofficial.91 After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the official Islamic hierarchy faced a crisis. The Mufti of Central Asia was accused of corruption and voted out of office.92 Yet the Islamic establishment in Central Asia has arguably remained the handmaiden of the existing leadership. ‘For public consumption, the official religious establishment bestows its benediction on the political leadership on one hand and eschews any efforts to introduce religion into politics on the other.’93 This conforms to a feature typical of the Middle East: the attempted ‘nationalisation’ of mosques; the funding of Islamic institutions of learning; censorship and control of Islamic publications; hence the licensing of Islamic politics by the state authorities.94 This obedience towards the government tends to enhance the distrust of the population. They see the official clergy as state-dominated, and turn towards the unofficial religious circles that challenge the establishment. In the case of Central Asia, however, official and unofficial religious élites are not strictly independent. In fact, during recent years it has been observed that religious officials sometimes work together with the discredited unofficial religious élite. Another point of conflict pertaining to Islamic symbolism is the sub-national power struggle between competing ‘clans’ or ‘solidarity groups’.95 A number of ‘solidarity groups’, similar in composition to traditional ‘clans’ based on blood relations and common regional origins, have formed around Soviet and exSoviet functionaries and regional politicians. They are built on a patrimonial and hierarchical structure.96 Considering that the Ferghana Valley, together with Samarkand and Tashkent, is a ‘traditional powerbase’ in Uzbekistan,97 the detention of so-called ‘Islamist’ forces by the central government in Tashkent appears in a new light. Politicisation of Islam will thus rely on the strength of the traditional ties and the client–patron system, and how they will develop their relationships with Islam. The political manipulation of Islam and its use by competing élites has in many cases triggered the success of Islamist movements in the Middle East. It has been argued that in the Middle East, ‘Islamic radicalism … is primarily seen as a direct reaction to the growth of the nation-state and the peculiar problems of the twentieth century’.98 The preconditions for the rise of Islamist movements are the policies of the governments themselves. By co-opting and manipulating Islamic symbols to legitimise their power, they offer such movements the same structures and concepts for oppositional action.99 Simultaneously, the rise of the Islamist phenomenon is facilitated by the effort of Muslim governments to suppress secular political parties.100 Religious symbols become the only alternative for opposition movements to articulate dissatisfaction with the government. As one scholar puts it, in a strictly political sense, the main reason for the spread and success of the Islamist movements in the Arab world is that, to date, they represent 237

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the only means of expressing popular opposition to regimes generally regarded as corrupt and inefficient.101 As has happened in many cases, the outcome of the process of co-option is exactly what the rulers initially tried to prevent by using religion for their own purposes: they end up by having to ‘swallow the same poison that they have forced upon others’.102 In Central Asia, the situation is somewhat reversed, but still follows a similar pattern. Central Asian leaders are co-opting Islamic symbolism and language in the perceived assumption of a forceful return to Islam and out of fear of fundamentalism.

Outlook Radical Islam in Central Asia could be one key element in the political future of the region, as comparison with the Middle Eastern experience has shown. However, its ultimate role in Central Asia cannot be predicted, as such analogies are dependent on ‘ideal’ conditions which, in reality, are always altered by other factors. In time, Islamic values and religious institutions will probably assume a legitimate role in the political life of Central Asia. After seventy years of clandestine practices, people may be slow to rediscover their cultural roots, which in many ways are embodied by Islam. This process within the greater parts of society can be classified as an Islamic revival. Such a revival incorporates features untypical for other Muslim regions: since the structures and knowledge of ‘high’ Islam have been almost totally destroyed, events such as the studying of the Koran take on an unusually strong importance. Mainly for these reasons, this revival is often perceived as radical, and is confused with a growing trend towards fundamentalism. But with the exception of Tajikistan, the Islamic revival in Central Asia has, to date, shown a decidedly moderate character. At the time of writing, the pockets of Islamist movements had failed to acquire a substantial following among Central Asians. In the Ferghana Valley, the only place where radical Islamisation is more prevalent, this is due to a particular history and situation. The existing movements that may be termed moderate Islamists, or even modernists, have ruled out violence as a method of political struggle. Furthermore, Islamisation in Central Asia has been shown not to be a monolithic phenomenon with inter-republic appeal. Rather, it has been co-opted by the individual republics. It also differs in strength and manifestation within the republics themselves. It is worth noting that, to date, an Islamic revival has never occurred in a Muslim society that is so strongly infused by secular ideas and that has such high standards of literacy and education. In Central Asia, it is the Soviet legacy that has ensured this level of secularism and literacy. If this is preserved, then it is possible that, in time, truly modernist ideas will gain the upper hand in the majority of the society – something never achieved in the first wave of Islamic modernism in the Middle East at the beginning of the twentieth century. 238

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Under present conditions, however, this is highly unlikely. The rise of Islamist movements in the Middle East is supported by a combination of the following factors. Countries are especially prone to political Islam when: the population growth is high and the needs of large urbanised communities are not met; low standards of living exist and are intensified by corruption; governments have destroyed most meaningful opposition and use force in crushing Islamist movements, thus radicalising and polarising them; and the population sees in Islamist movements the sole legitimate opposition to state power.103 The authoritarian regimes in Central Asia are en route to create a similar scenario. Fear of a perceived threat of radical Islam fuels the pressure of the authoritarian state apparatus against their populations. Economic hardship, manipulation of Islamic symbols in élite competition, and lack of democratic means of expression could justify Islamist resistance. The result would be a selffulfilling prophecy. If the trend set by the authoritarian rule of Uzbekistan’s leader proceeds, if socio-economic conditions deteriorate, and if the West continues to support Uzbekistan in suppressing any opposition out of fear of the perceived threat of fundamentalism, then Olcott’s prognosis will become a long term possibility: The official response to Islam in Central Asia seems almost designed to transform the general return to Muslim observance, which characterizes society’s attempt to reclaim its lost identity into the sort of political Islam that the present leaders fear the fundamentalist revival will become. … If the other leaders of Central Asia choose to follow the lead of Uzbekistan’s Karimov … in seeing Islam as an inherently destabilizing force which can be extirpated by force, then it seems as if the further politicization of Islam in central Asia is inevitable.104 As in the Middle East, the best possible solution to such a dilemma is seen in the ‘integration of the integrists’. Via the politics of inclusion, Islamist movements will have to deal with realpolitik rather than with ideal constructs of a world to come.105 Yet warnings seem as yet unheard in Central Asia. Karimov, in particular, continues to clamp down on any perceived Islamic opposition.106 Moreover, if the West continues to support these regimes, it is assumed that this stance may well have a negative impact on public opinion in Central Asia. This would lead to the anti-Western position so typical for most of the Islamist movements in other parts of the Muslim world. As one author predicts, such support could be used as a ‘rationale for launching an uprising against an oppressive regime within the only truly indigenous framework available: Islam’.107 Another option must be mentioned. Islam need not necessarily be perceived as threatening.108 In Central Asia, the reflection of the ethical values of Islam occurs in a torn world. Social polarisation, conflict and economic crisis have turned society upside down. Consequently, Islam, when not co-opted by governments or radical groups, could provide a last anchor for difficult times ahead. 239

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Notes 1 Uwe Halbach, ‘Der Islam in der GUS: Eine Wiedergeburt?’, Berichte des Bundesinstituts für ostwissenschaftliche und internationale Studien, No. 25 (1996), p. 13. 2 In that respect, Marxist-Leninist theory resembled Western modernisation theories of the 1960s and 1970s. See Dale F. Eickelman and James Piscatori, Muslim Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), pp. 22ff. 3 Ibid., p. 7. 4 P. Goble, ‘Islamic “Explosion” Possible in Central Asia’ in Radio Liberty Report on the USSR 2, No. 7, 16 February 1990, pp. 22–3, quoted in Anatoly M. Khazanov, After the USSR: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Politics in the Commonwealth of Independent States (Madison and London: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995), pp. 131f. 5 For example, Alexandre Bennigsen and Marie Broxup, The Islamic Threat to the Soviet Union (London: Croom Helm, 1983), pp. 148f. 6 Yurij Kulchik, Andrey Fadin and Victor Sergeev, Central Asia after the Empire (London: Pluto Press, 1996), p. 55. 7 Bassam Tibi, Die fundamentalistische Herausforderung (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1992), pp. 172ff. Tibi never questions the reason behind the Russian and Soviet defamation of the Muslim south but accepts that their perception of a threat was justified. 8 Dale F. Eickelman (ed.), Russia’s Muslim Frontiers: New Directions in Cross-Cultural Analysis (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993), p. 2. For a short discussion on this issue see also Halbach, op. cit., p. 3. Another problem is that most of the existing data unearthed by Soviet and Russian scholars are in the original Russian. Many Western specialists on Islam do not read Russian and have to rely on second-hand information. 9 The anti-Muslim policy differed from period to period. After the purges, and under the impression of national unity during the Second World War, repression became less evident. Anti-Muslim policy was enforced again under Khrushchev and finally restricted during perestroika. 10 Halbach, op. cit., p. 12. 11 A. Abduvakhitov, ‘Islamic Revivalism in Uzbekistan’, in Eickelman (ed.), op. cit., p. 80. 12 For example, the worshipping of bushes, rocks and other objects of nature and other forms of religious syncretism. See Halbach, op. cit., p. 14; Diloram Ibrahim, The Islamization of Central Asia (Leicester: Islamic Foundation, 1993), p. 21. 13 For example, Bennigsen and Broxup, op. cit. 14 Halbach, op. cit., pp. 20f. 15 Lowell Bezanis, ‘Exploiting the Fear of Militant Islam’ in Transition Vol. 1 (24), 1995), p. 9. 16 Halbach, op. cit., p. 15f. 17 Shireen T. Hunter, ‘The Rise of Islamist Movements and the Western Response: Clash of Civilizations or Clash of Interests?’, in Laura Guazzone (ed.), The Islamist Dilemma (Reading: Garnet, 1995), pp. 320 ff. 18 Space prevents a more detailed presentation of thesis on political Islam. A good overview of the different approaches is given by Hanna Lücke, Islamischer Fundamentalismus (Berlin: Klaus Schwartz Verlag, 1993). 19 William E. Shepard, ‘Islam and Ideology: Towards a Typology’, International Journal for Middle East Studies, Vol. 19, 1987, pp. 314–17. 20 Laura Guazzone, ‘Islamism and Islamists in the Contemporary Arab World’ in Guazzone (ed.), op. cit., p. 4. 21 Ibid., p. 3. 22 Shirin Akiner, ‘Islam, the State and Ethnicity in Central Asia in Historical Perspective’, Religion, State & Society, Vol. 24, Nos 2/3, 1996, pp. 47f.

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23 This characteristic is stressed by some authors to distinguish Central Asian Islam from more radical or puritan varieties such as Saudi Arabian Wahabism. See Mehrdad Haghayeghi, Islam and Politics in Central Asia (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1995), pp. 80ff. 24 Roger D. Kangas, ‘The Three Faces of Islam in Uzbekistan’, Transition, Vol. 1 (24), 1995, p. 19. See also Nancy Lubin, ‘Islam and Ethnic Identity in Central Asia: A View from Below’, in Yaacov Ro’i (ed.), Muslim Eurasia: Conflicting Legacies (London: Frank Cass, 1995), pp. 53 ff. This study, one of the few first database researches by hand on Islam in Central Asia, provides a good overview on existing Muslim selfawareness and practice. 25 Lubin, op. cit., p. 57. 26 Ibrahim, op. cit., p. 21. 27 Henry Hale, ‘Islam, State-Building and Uzbekistan’s Foreign Policy’, in Ali Banuazizi and Myron Weiner (eds), The New Geopolitics of Central Asia and Its Borderlands (London and New York: Routledge, 1994), p. 168. 28 Mohammed Mohaddessin, Islamic Fundamentalism (Washington, DC: Seven Locks Press, 1993), pp. 67–81. 29 For the Iranian–Turkmen relations see also Patrick Karam, ‘Realpolitik contre messianisme islamique’, Les Cahiers de l’Orient, Vol. 1 (24), 1995, pp. 71ff. 30 Shireen T. Hunter, ‘Closer Ties for Russia and Iran’, Transition, Vol. 1 (24), 1995, p. 42. 31 Ibid., p. 45. 32 Hale, op. cit., pp. 159ff. 33 The Ferghana Valley is a region divided between Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan and has one of the richest traditions of Islamic learning in Central Asia. It is geographically isolated from the rest of the country and can become inaccessible in the winter. 34 Ahmed Rashid, The Resurgence of Central Asia (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1994), p. 100. 35 There were a couple of other small movements that had occasional tendencies towards political Islamism, namely the Party of Islam and Democracy and the People’s Front of Uzbekistan. Little is known about the structure and programme of such movements as they have been either driven underground or absorbed by other organisations in recent years. See, for example, Haghayeghi, op. cit., pp. 85ff. 36 Halbach, op. cit., pp. 31f. Ironically, this reflects the undifferentiated defamation policy of the French in Algeria and the British in India towards Islamic movements. See Eickelman and Piscatori, op. cit., p. 74. 37 Abduvakhitov, op. cit., pp. 84f. 38 Ibid., p. 89. 39 Alexei Malashenko, ‘Islam versus Communism: The Experience of Coexistence’, in Eickelman (ed.), op. cit., p. 69. 40 Olivier Roy, ‘Geopolitique de l’Asie Centrale’, in Cahiers du Monde Russe et Soviétique, Vol. 32 (1), 1991, p. 150, quoted in Malashenko, op. cit., p. 69. 41 For example, Marie Broxup, ‘Political Trends in Soviet Islam after the Afghan War’, in Andreas Kappeler, Gerhard Simon and George Brunner (eds), Muslim Communities Re-emerge: Historical Perspectives on Nationality, Politics, and Opposition in the Former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994), pp. 314f. 42 Martha Brill Olcott, ‘Islam and Fundamentalism in Central Asia’, in Ro’i (ed.), op. cit., pp. 33f. 43 Haghayeghi, op. cit., pp. 92 f. 44 After his hajj, the Indian pilgrim Sayyed Ahmad Bareilly introduced certain Wahabi ideas to Northern India. Under his lead some Pathan tribes began a jihad against the Sikhs until his defeat and subsequent death in 1831. Ironically, while this Indian movement called themselves mujahid, the term ‘Wahhabi’ was mostly a creation by the

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45

46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66

67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78

British, who either could not distinguish between the different doctrines of Indian mujahedin and Saudi Arabian Wahhabis or meant to discredit such movements. See Peter Hardy, The Muslims of British India (London: Cambridge University Press, 1972), pp. 50ff. For a detailed study see Qeyamuddin Ahmad, The Wahabi Movement in India (New Delhi: Manohar Publishers, 1994). Haghayeghi does not seem to differentiate between the Saudi Arabian and Indian version of Wahhabism. Thus, the contradiction pointed out above does not feature in his description. However, some Central Asian Wahabis seem not to make that distinction either. See Haghayeghi, op. cit., pp. 93f. For example, Olcott, op. cit., p. 36. For example, Halbach, op. cit., p. 20. Eickelman and Piscatori, op. cit., p. 72. Halbach, op. cit., pp. 20f. Rashid, op. cit., p. 246. Abduvakhitov, op. cit., pp. 96f. S. Tadjbakhsh, ‘The Tajik Spring of 1992’, Central Asian Monitor No. 2, 1993, p. 25, quoted by Haghayeghi, op. cit., p. 88. Abduvakhitov, op. cit., p. 89. Halbach, op. cit., p. 29. Haghayeghi, op. cit., pp. 86ff. Bezanis, op. cit., p. 9. A prime example is the combined effort of Kulchik et alia. Bezanis, op. cit., p. 6. Ibid., p. 6. See Patrick Karam, ‘La Russie et l’Islam: Entre alliance et rejet’, Les Cahiers de l’Orient, No. 41, 1996, pp. 33ff. These paradoxical coalitions appear somewhat similar to the common bond of interest between orthodox Jews in Israel and radical Palestinians. Olcott, op. cit., p. 34. See section ‘A Short History’ and Halbach, op. cit., pp. 14ff. Yaacov Ro’i, ‘The Secularization of Islam and the USSR’s Muslim Areas’, in Ro’i (ed.), op. cit., p. 15. Eickelman and Piscatori, op. cit., p. 43. Bezanis, op. cit., p. 9. See, for example, Halbach, op. cit., p. 34. It could even be argued that a rapid rediscovery of the Koran could prevent Central Asians from being manipulated by extremists, for example, by Bruce Pannier, ‘A Need for Common Ground in Tajikistan’, Transition, Vol. 1 (24), 1995, p. 12. Shepard, op. cit., p. 311. Bezanis, op. cit., p. 9. See Halbach, op. cit., p. 34. Nazih Ayubi, Political Islam (London and New York: Routledge, 1991), p. 237. Henry Munson, Islam and Revolution in the Middle East (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), pp. 108f. Ibid., pp. 111f. Ayubi, op. cit., pp. 176f. Eickelman and Piscatori, op. cit., p. 111. Malashenko, op. cit., p. 70. Youssef M. Choueiri, Islamic Fundamentalism (London: Pinter Publishers, 1990), p. 12. See also Ayubi, op. cit., p. 158ff. See Country Report Uzbekistan, The Economist Intelligence Unit, 3rd quarter 1996 (London: 1996), p. 44. Ibid., p. 44.

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79 Shirin Akiner, ‘Post-Soviet Central Asia: Past Its Prologue’, in Peter Ferdinand (ed.), The New Central Asia and Its Neighbours (London: Pinter Publishers, 1994), p. 28. 80 Khazanov, op. cit., pp. 119f. 81 Halbach, op. cit., p. 22. This phrase was first used by the Jadids, the Central Asian brand of Islamic modernists. 82 M. Hakan Yavuz, ‘The Patterns of Political Islamic Identity: Dynamics of National and Transnational Loyalties and Identities’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 14 (3), 1995, p. 352. 83 Yaacov Ro’i, ‘The Islamic Influence on Nationalism in Soviet Central Asia’, Problems of Communism, Vol. 39 (4), 1990, p. 59. 84 Ibid., p. 55 f. 85 N. N. Shahrani, ‘Islam and the Political Culture of “Scientific Atheism” in PostSoviet Central Asia’, in Michael Bordeaux (ed.), The Politics of Religion in Russia and the New States of Eurasia (New York: M. E.Sharpe, 1995), p. 280. 86 For example, Ro’i. ‘The Islamic Influence on Nationalism’, op. cit., pp. 63f. 87 For example, Bennigsen and Broxup, op. cit., pp. 135ff. 88 Ibrahim, op. cit., p. 21. 89 Olcott, op. cit., p. 22. 90 Charles Tripp, ‘Islam and the Secular Logic of the State in the Middle East’, in Abdel S. Sidahmed and Anoushiravan Ehteshami (eds), Islamic Fundamentalism (Boulder, CO and Oxford: Westview Press, 1996), p. 59. 91 Olcott, op. cit., p. 25. 92 Ironically, one of the accusations claimed that the Mufti had sold off free Korans from Saudi Arabia for profit. See Rashid, op. cit., p. 99. 93 Bezanis, op. cit., p. 8. 94 Tripp, op. cit., p. 58. 95 Olivier Roy, La Nouvelle Asie Centrale ou La Fabrication des Nations (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1997), p. 161. 96 Ibid., pp. 159ff. For a case study on Sharaf Rashidov see Demian Vaisman, ‘Regionalism and Clan Loyalty in the Political Life of Uzbekistan’, in Ro’i (ed.), op. cit., pp. 105ff. 97 Akiner, ‘Post-Soviet Central Asia’, p. 33. Olcott writes that Margilan, the centre of Islamic revival in Ferghana, ‘functioned as a state within a state, and served as a centre for Uzbekistan’s “second” or “black-market” economy. Margilan’s clans are key to the regulation of trade throughout Central Asia.’ Olcott, op. cit., pp. 35f. 98 Choueiri, op. cit., p. 10. 99 Tripp, op. cit., p. 56. 100 Hunter, ‘The Rise of Islamist Movements’, op. cit., p. 328. 101 Guazzone op. cit., p. 17. 102 Ayubi, op. cit., p. 61. 103 Graham E. Fuller and Ian O. Lesser, A Sense of Siege (Boulder, Co: Westview Press, 1995), pp. 171f. 104 Olcott, op. cit., p. 37. 105 Such a strategy is proposed, for example, by Fuller and Lesser, op. cit., pp. 119ff. 106 The most advanced state in democratic issues, Kyrgyzstan, seems also to have the least problems with an Islamic opposition. 107 Bezanis, op. cit., p. 6. 108 Halbach, op. cit., p. 37.

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13 WATER The difficult path to a sustainable future for Central Asia Kai Wegerich

It was Moscow, the centre, the Soviet Union … it was the barbaric use of water resources that led to the Aral tragedy. (President Karimov, Uzbekistan)1

The UNESCO ‘Vision 2025’ presented in The Hague in 2000 is an optimistic proposal for water management in Central Asia. The ambitious plan is to save 20 cubic kilometres (km) of water a year, so that the fast-shrinking Aral Sea can be stabilised at its current size. The Aral Sea is a landlocked lake in Central Asia. In the beginning of the 1960s, it was still the fourth largest lake in the world. However, by the beginning of the 1990s, the surface area had decreased by half: from 66,085 square kilometres (km) to approximately 33,500 km. The lake is today divided into two separate bodies of water. The decline of the Aral Sea has had a considerable impact on the ecological, social and economic structures and systems that were traditionally established in the deltas of the lake. For example, the diminished size and increased salinity of the lake has caused a decline in the biodiversity of flora and fauna. One of the immediate consequences has been the disappearance of the tourism and fishing industries. High unemployment and social migration followed the decline, and the urbanisation of the autonomous republic of Karakalpakstan has accelerated accordingly, outstripping areas such as the Tashkent oblast.2 Furthermore, the dwindling lake has caused polluting dust and salt storms, affecting not only the health of the inhabitants of the Aral Sea deltas, but also communities located throughout the region of the basin. The UNESCO report for Central Asia aims at having 20 km of water annually allocated to the environment, that is, to the Aral Sea. It is hoped that the use of more efficient technology in agricultural production will bring a saving of water, and that the implementation of technical changes will lead to a decline of water use (see Table 13.1).

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Table 13.1 Possible goals for 2025

Present

Future

Average water use per hectare in m for wheat (net) Average water use per hectare in m for rice (net) Average water use per hectare in m for cotton (net) Water application efficiency in the field (%) Efficiency of water distribution to the fields (%) Proportion of irrigated area salinised – medium to high salinity (%)

5,000 30,000 12,000 40 50 45

3,200 14,000 8,000
75
70 10

Source: UNESCO report, Water-Related Vision for the Aral Sea Basin 2000, p. 60.

Theoretical analysis of a future path Central Asia has enough water to meet the demands of the industrial, domestic and agricultural sectors; the shortages are a product of the limited adaptive capacity of the institutions dealing with the Aral Sea problem. Vision 2025 can be explained by use of the model of the environmental Kutznets curve advocated by Allan and Karshenas.3 While the negativists argue that the future is already determined and that a Malthusian catastrophe lies ahead, Allan and Karshenas have a more positive view of the future. The negativist approach assumes population growth leads to resource depletion: a sustainable position becomes unsustainable, at which point an environmental catastrophe beckons. A core aspect of this analysis is that the amount of resources is continuously shrinking and the standards of living declining. The Aral Sea Basin adhered to the negative pattern and has, until recently, followed the path towards environmental unsustainability. The positivists assume that the future is not negatively determined and that there is potential for change through development. According to Allan and Karshenas, three ‘positive’ future scenarios are possible: a ‘conventional’ one, a ‘precautionary’ one, and one reconstructing the natural resource. Where, in the first scenario, any improvement in living standards is based on the depletion of natural resources, in the ‘precautionary’ scenario, development first reduces the natural resource, but then stabilises at a certain level of natural resource depletion. In the third scenario, not only is the use of resources stabilised, but the base is also reconstructed. The development of the different scenarios is dependent on the will of the political leadership. In the case of water, to implement the ‘conventional’ strategy, decision makers have to save only small amounts of water and to allocate the water savings away from the agricultural sector towards more profitable sectors such as industry, services or households. In countries dominated by agriculture, water use in agriculture can constitute up to 90 per cent of all water consumption. To save water for other sectors would require the raising of water-use efficiency in agriculture either in the distribution system or at the level of the end-user. Reallocation is a matter of politics. In this case, reallocation of water towards other sectors might not be difficult, especially if one considers the high returns from these sectors and the assumption that these sectors utilise water without wasting it. The utilised

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water, when recycled, feeds back into the network (at least in theory). Therefore, the amount of the available water is not meaningfully reduced. However, the ‘conventional’ strategy does not allocate water to the environment. The ‘precautionary approach requires that economic development should not reduce the stock or the value of environmental capital for future generations’.4 In the case of the Aral Sea, the enforcement of this strategy has to reallocate water not only to industry, services and households, but also to the environment. The allocation to the environment in the precautionary scenario requires only the amount of water needed to sustain the lake at its current level. The problem is that ‘environmental’ water has no immediate, direct, financial benefits: according to some paradigms, the fact that it has not been used suggests that it has been wasted. As with water destined for the other sectors, water allocated towards the environment has to come from the main user of water, the agricultural sector. Vision 2025 assumes that the water needed to stabilise the lake can be saved only through an increase in the technical efficiency of water management in agriculture. Similar to the conventional scenario, savings could be achieved either through more efficient distribution systems or by the end users. The distribution issue is purely technical, but alterations in the behaviour of end users require a fundamental change in attitude: water can no longer be viewed simply as a resource; it is scarce and therefore valuable. If this adjustment in thinking can be made, it is probable that the end user will use water more efficiently. In the scenario of natural resource reconstruction, the water needed for the environment cannot be saved through technical improvements alone. To replenish the Aral Sea and return it to previous levels, not only will the agricultural sector have to cut down on its water consumption through an increase in efficiency, but the very size of the sector will have to be reduced. The social impact of this will be considerable. Ohlsson’s approach,5 which regards the ‘adaptive capacity’ of society as a resource, is useful for explaining the model of Allan and Karshenas. If the adaptive capacity of a society is high, then that society is able to change in a transforming environment. However, in the case of a low adaptive capacity, the society fails to change and fixed consumption patterns can lead to resource depletion. Ohlsson calls the failure of the society to adapt a ‘second-order scarcity’. In the case of the three different development scenarios, the adaptive capacity of society has to be higher for the ‘precautionary’ than for the ‘conventional’ development path, and must be higher still for the path of natural resource reconstruction. While the ‘precautionary’ path could be achieved through an increase in efficiency in the agricultural sector, the third path suggests a fundamental reallocation of water between different sectors and a shift in the social structure: society itself can be defined as an institution.6 The approach of the movement termed the New Institutional Economics (NIE) distinguishes two different drivers of institutional, or social, change: demand and supply. The first is induced through changes in relative prices, 246

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leading to marginal adjustments of institutions,7 the second focuses on advances in knowledge, such as technical advances, which induce change.8 The anthropological approach of Douglas divides society, with its institutions, into centre and periphery. She argues that the ‘centre is too constricted in its casing of institutional habits’ and claims that ‘no change ever comes from the centre, all innovation comes from without’.9 Changes promoted by the centre focus not on real alternatives but on suggestions already ‘best known and closest to existing programs’.10 This contradicts North, who does not question the value of change as such. While ‘marginal’ changes reconfirm the institutional structure, ‘real’ changes alter the institutions. The impact of supplied ‘knowledge’ on institutional structures can be varied. The evidence suggests that supplied knowledge will be accepted by an institution and its stakeholders if the overall benefits to an institution are high, and if ‘outside’ knowledge does not threaten the interests of the stakeholders. Hence, the borrowing of institutional innovations is not always possible. Location and community determine the shape and attitude of institutions, and existing institutional arrangements affect the acceptance of institutional change. As a result, changes of, and within, institutional systems are path-dependent and not as flexible as indicated in North’s approach. The NIE and Douglas do not take fully into consideration the role of élites and their influence on institutional change. Élites are power position holders in institutions, and their positions enable them to resist or to manipulate changes. Institutions have to be interpreted as multi-layer constructs, of which the layers are defined by different actors, each with specific interests. Changes can be interpreted as risk situations for certain levels of the institution. Supply-induced changes can face resistance when they have a negative impact on specific layers, particular interest groups and stakeholders of the institution. The theoretical reasoning implies that marginal changes are induced from within the system. In the case of Uzbekistan, it implies that change according to the ‘conventional’ development strategy is possible. Marginal changes do not disturb the balance within the institution. A second weakness of the NIE and the anthropological approach is that a change of awareness is not considered as change. However, according to Hajer, new awareness is an institutional change.11 The change of awareness to achieve the ‘precautionary’ strategy is not a marginal change of the institution, but a real change. The shift in the social awareness of the value of water is induced from the outside and might threaten existing institutional settings. The more powerful these settings are, the more likely is their resistance to change and outside influence.

Precautionary path or resource reconstruction? Before independence, an environmental discourse in Central Asia pointed to the malfunction of the cotton sector. National leaders and international organisations focused on simple negotiation sets, however, such as water (and, later, water 247

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and energy), and avoided more complicated negotiation sets such as water, energy and agriculture, which would have addressed the issue of environmental protection.12 Spoor indicates that it was never the intention of the international donors or the national governments to restore the lake to its 1960s level.13 A World Bank mission concluded that ‘the Sea could not be saved’.14 The verdict was reached because of the understanding that reducing the wasteful use of water was not enough ‘to change the desiccated sea’.15 Weinthal argues that the Central Asian water specialists preferred ‘simple’ technical solutions to ‘complicated’ political solutions.16 She reasons that, due to the ‘importance of cotton as a mechanism for social and political control’,17 radical restructuring would have been socially destabilising. Even the World Bank admits that reducing the irrigated rice and cotton area was not viable because ‘millions of people were living in the irrigated areas’.18 Technical solutions focused on improving the efficiency of water distribution. In 1996, Israel sponsored pumps for sprinklers for the irrigation systems. However, a field visit to a site in Syr Darya oblast showed that the pumps have not been used. The high maintenance and energy costs for operating the pumps, and the low costs for water and the abundant water supply, make the use of sprinklers inefficient. Weinthal argues that ‘the old water nomenclature sought to restructure the system of water management just enough to ensure that they retained their positions of power and to procure much coveted foreign assistance’.19 Spoor points also to the vested interests at national and local levels within the cotton sector.20 Cotton guaranteed not only political and social stability, but also foreign revenue earnings, which were used to ‘reinforce regionally-based patronage systems’.21 Hence, the leadership was unwilling to pay the transaction costs demanded by agricultural reforms. The UNESCO vision is to interpret the situation drawing on old approaches, which do not disturb the institutional setting of the élites in place. Whether the current status of the institutions is ready for the ‘precautionary’ development path remains to be seen.

Historical perspective Russia’s policy of cotton production Prior to the Russian conquest of Central Asia, agricultural production of cotton was already established in the region and crops were exported to Russia, though Russia received most of its cotton from the USA. During the US Civil War (1861–5), cotton imports ceased, and Russia had to find new sources of the raw material for its rapidly developing industrial base. Lipovsky argues that this was one of the reasons for conquering Central Asia from 1864 to 1885.22 After the conquest, the Russian government actively promoted the production of cotton in Central Asia: cotton seed of better quality, giving higher yields, was introduced, as was a new tax system, which favoured regional cotton production.23 Clem 248

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adds that Russia also imported cotton-processing machinery from the USA and, in the early twentieth century, the Russian state extended cheap credit to cotton farmers to advance further cotton production.24 The Russian focus on cotton led to a decline in the proportion of agricultural land planted with food crops. As a result, Central Asia ceased to be self-sufficient in food. The minister of agriculture, Krivoschein, stated in 1912: The present development of cotton plantation can and should be intensified still further by means of further reduction in the quantity of grain crops planted on irrigation land. … Every extra pood of Turkestan wheat means extra competition for Siberian and Kuban wheat; every pood of Turkestan cotton means competition for American cotton. Therefore, it is better to give the territory imported wheat – even at extra cost – but to make irrigated land available for cotton growing.25 The region did import wheat, which was subsidised, and it became dependent upon this imported food.26 By the beginning of the First World War, more than 50 per cent of the agricultural land used for crop production was used exclusively for cotton. According to these sources, the Russian expansion of cotton production was based not on an increase of irrigated area, but solely on a shift from food crops to cash crops. The Soviet Union’s policy of cotton production The Revolution had no immediate, direct impact on the agricultural sector. But a decade later, under Stalin, the peasants, and the land they worked, were collectivised in state farms. These large-scale farms were vertically structured into the state’s planning system. Even though the regime changed, Moscow’s policies did not, and the specialisation of Central Asia in cotton production increased further. Micklin argues that, during the mid-1920s, ‘so-called “modern” irrigation techniques were mandated in Central Asia by the Communist regime’.27 However, it is questionable whether this mandate could have been implemented immediately. It was not until the 1930s that Soviet agricultural policy focused on bringing virgin land under agricultural production.28 The policy reached its height in 1953 with the launch of Krushchev’s ‘virgin land’ project. The project was supposed to raise agricultural productivity, and by 1956, an additional 88.6 million hectares of land was under cultivation in the Soviet Union, mainly in Kazakhstan and Western Siberia. In conjunction with the ‘virgin land’ project, Krushchev promoted the idea of expanding the irrigated areas of Central Asia.29 Kotlyakov states that the irrigated area increased in the early 1960s in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan by 1.5 times, in Kazakhstan by 1.7 times and in Turkmenistan by 2.4 times.30 While in 1965 an area of 4.5 million hectares was irrigated in Central Asia, by independence the total irrigated area had increased by an additional 2.5 million hectares.31 A symbol of the cotton expansion policy 249

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is the Karakumskiy Canal (1,400 km long) in Turkmenistan. Before the construction of the canal in 1954, the irrigated area in Turkmenistan was only 0.35 million hectares. The irrigated area increased from 0.5 million hectares in 1965 to a total of 1.25 million hectares in 1988. 32

A brief introduction to agricultural policies since independence in Kyrgyzstan (upstream) and Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan (downstream) Kyrgyzstan After independence, the Kyrgyz government privatised agricultural land and reformed the law governing private property.33 Former collective and state farms were abolished. The land was divided into shares, whose size was determined by the density of the rural population and the amount of land available. As indicated in the Social and Economic Research Associates (SERA) report and the study by Bauman, the land reform and distribution of land and farm assets created inequity amongst the rural population. Inequity of wealth is a direct consequence of the time at which the individual employees left the state and collective farms and applied for their fair share of the collective farm. Owing to the rising debt of the state and collective farms, and the equal distribution of assets and of debts, the early leavers were better off than those who left later.34 In addition, the studies show that the former state farm managers are still in powerful situations, controlling land and farm assets.35 Kyrgyzstan has an irrigated area of approximately 1 million hectares. The irrigated area increased only marginally after independence. However, without the guidance of the government, the agricultural production changed rapidly. Between 1992 and 2000, the area allocated to cotton increased from 21,500 to 36,000 hectares; that for wheat rose from 284,400 to 495,000 hectares; and that for rice and vegetables increased from 1,900 to 6,000 hectares, and 24,400 to 56,000 hectares, respectively. Livestock declined during the same period. The data suggest a change in agriculture, which leads to a higher water demand, based on a shift from fodder to food and cotton crops. The high poverty of the rural population is responsible for the shift towards food crops.36 Only the comparatively rich farmers are willing to plant the riskier crop, cotton. Overall the agricultural sector became more important: since independence it has come to dominate the Kyrgyz economy and accounts for about 45 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP).37 Turkmenistan Since December 1991, the policy of the sovereign government has been to strengthen its independence. The drive for self-sufficiency in food has been one aspect of the government’s attempt to assert this sense of independence.38 It is 250

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no coincidence that such a policy is in direct contradiction to the former Soviet agricultural policies for Turkmenistan. Since independence, the area allocated to household plots increased from 52,000 to 102,000 hectares. Citizens could apply for 50 hectares of virgin land from 1993 onwards. Consequently, the irrigated area increased from 1.5 million hectares in 1992 to 1.8 million hectares in 1996. In 1994, state and collective farms started to be transformed into new privatised peasant farms. However, Brooks and Lerman’s analysis indicates that the transformation has been more of a shift in terms, rather than a fundamental change in real ownership and production.39 Furthermore, the state has kept a tight control of cotton and wheat production, in terms both of the total area of these crops under cultivation and of their expected yields. The area allocated to cotton production has remained stable at a level of 570,000 hectares, and despite fluctuations during the intervening years, cotton production in 1999 was the same as it had been in 1992, namely approximately 1.3 million tonnes. The area allocated to wheat increased from 197,000 hectares in 1992, to 550,000 hectares in 2000, and the amount of wheat harvested increased from 377,000 tonnes to 1.7 million tonnes during the same period. Brooks and Lerman point out that during the Soviet period 2 per cent of the area was exempt from state production and marketing orders; today it is only about 10 per cent.40 The UNESCO report points out that even though 40 per cent of the population is employed in the agricultural sector, it accounts for only 10 per cent of GDP. 41 Uzbekistan In 1991, collective and state-owned farms covered 4.2 million hectares of irrigated land. In 1992 and 1993, the first privatisation of land took place. Some 500,000 hectares – around 12 per cent of cultivated land – was distributed among former state or collective farm employees as household plots. A further 100,000 hectares of land was allocated in 1994 to establish livestock farms: allocations were made on the basis of between 0.3 and 2.0 hectares per head of cattle.42 In the mid-1990s, the land was still distributed unevenly among the different users: household plots, 530,000 hectares; peasant farms, 350,000 hectares; and collective and cooperatives, 3,500,000 hectares. At the beginning of 2000, another wave of land distribution took place. Unprofitable collective and cooperative farms gained independence, and their land was distributed among their former employees. Land allocation was dependent on the location and the pressure on land, the number of family members and the amount of livestock on the farm. The early land reforms had no discernible negative impact on the production of cotton and wheat. Cotton and wheat production remain centrally controlled and ordered by the Uzbek government. Hence, from 1992 to 2000, the total area planted with cotton declined only marginally, from 1,666,700 hectares to 1,425,000 hectares. This change is largely the product of the government aim of 251

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achieving self-sufficiency in food production.43 However, farmers do not receive a market price for their cotton and wheat. According to UNESCO data, the agricultural sector generates only 20 per cent of GDP; however, cotton accounts for 40 per cent of total Uzbek exports. 44

Causes of the Aral Sea crisis The reasons for environmental destruction in the Aral Sea Basin are manifold. McKinney points out that there are two distinct groups of scholars, identifying two different fundamental causes for the environmental destruction of the Aral region. Former Soviet water planning specialists believe that the root cause has been an incorrect economic development strategy.45 On the other hand, Micklin argues that the introduction of modern large-scale irrigation techniques, and the shift from individual farming towards collective farm enterprises, are the causes of the environmental crises. Perhaps both camps are right and the reality is closest to a combination of the two explanations. Kotlyakov argues that ‘the region’s economy has reached a catastrophe, not because of the desiccation of the Aral; conversely, the Aral catastrophe is the inevitable result of a deep crisis in the regional economy’.46 The Soviet economic strategy for Central Asia focused on a high specialisation in agriculture, namely in cotton production. Cotton is a high water-consuming plant. However, the specialisation in cotton production was not the main reason for the depletion of the Aral Sea. The collected data show that since the 1960s the total area of irrigated land has increased rapidly: the use of water was driven up exponentially as much of the newly cultivated land is comparatively unproductive and requires intensive use of water.47 Glazovsky agrees with Kotlyakov, adding that the development of cotton production focused on the expansion of irrigation systems and not on increasing the productivity of already irrigated land.48 However, the increase in expenditure on fertilisers and pesticides – which was on a genuinely higher level in the Central Asian republics compared with other Soviet republics – could lead to the conclusion that an increase in productivity on already irrigated land was propagated. Either way, the focus of agricultural policy was increased production, rather than more efficient water use. Kotlyakov supports such a view, demonstrating that individual irrigation systems tended to be of low-quality design, construction and operation.49 Glazovsky substantiates Kotlyakov’s reasoning with estimates showing that 30–45 per cent of water was lost due to canals and drainage collectors being constructed without linings. Glazovsky stresses that irrigation techniques were ‘primitive’: the use of furrows was commonplace, and often watering was done by hand rather than by sprinklers.50 Although Micklin agrees that large-scale expansion of irrigation is responsible for the drying up of the Aral Sea, he argues that the problem is more complex and that concentrating on the current irrigation system is a superficial way of addressing the real issue. He focuses on a study of irrigation systems at the time 252

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of the October Revolution in 1917, reasoning that past systems have been environmentally friendly and sustainable. Micklin argues that in the past, small-scale farms have managed irrigation systems with an average size of 2–3 hectares and with irrigated fields of 0.3–0.8 hectares. The introduction of collective and state farms increased the flooded area to 3.5 hectares. The expansion of irrigated area during the 1950s led to an additional increase in the area flooded.51 For Micklin, the introduction of large-scale enterprises and the collectivisation of private land are the fundamental causes for the destruction of the Aral Sea.

The current situation The claim that currently 10 km of water reaches the Aral Sea annually along the Amu Darya and Syr Darya is very optimistic.52 A flow of 23 km is enough to sustain the sea at the current level. To refill the lake to the level of the 1960s – the time before the expansion of large-scale irrigation was implemented – at an annual flow of 60 km would take about twenty years; to refill the lake 1,000 km is needed. The level of the Aral Sea is not the only changed factor. Since the 1960s, a variety of other variables have been altered, constraining the future development of the region (see Table 13.2). During that decade, the development strategy of the Soviet Union led directly to a condition of environmental unsustainability. The current situation of the Aral Sea, however, could be defined as beyond sustainability, or even as an ecological catastrophe. While past events will determine the future development of the region, it is not possible to turn back the clock and to focus on the past as a possible future. The governments of the downstream countries (Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan) have indicated that they are not inclined to return to the situation of the 1960s. Evidently, it is not politically or socially feasible for them to reduce irrigation to save water for the environment, or to cut the production of cash crops, such as cotton, in a time of economic crisis and foreign currency dependency.

Environmental and population constraints for future development Reliable estimates of the population growth rate within Central Asia are not available. UNESCO suggests the rate of annual increase is currently around 1.61 per Table 13.2 Changes

1960

1990

Irrigated area (million hectares) Population (million) 3 Water requirement (km ) Salinity of the lake

4.5 14 60 10

7.0 50 120 40

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cent; the World Bank estimate is 2.5 per cent. Using the conservative UNESCO rate, by 2025 the population in the region will have increased to 70 million. As the analysis of the historical data shows, under Russia and Soviet influences, Central Asia was forced to focus on an agricultural development based on cash crop monoculture at any price, irrespective of economic, social and environmental costs. The two countries with the highest environmental burden caused by the production of cash crops through irrigation are Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. The World Bank reports that Uzbekistan has an irrigated area of 4,280,600 hectares, of which 2,140,550 hectares are highly saline. Turkmenistan’s irrigated area is 1,744,100 hectares of which 652,290 hectares is of high salinity. In addition to the high level of salinity, in Central Asia the use of fertilisers was very high compared to other Soviet Union republics. In 1965, Uzbekistan used 147 kilograms of fertiliser for each irrigated hectare (kg/ha). This level increased to 238 kg/ha in 1975 and 306 kg/ha in 1987, compared to an average of 122 kg/ha in the Soviet Union in 1987. The amount of pesticides used for agriculture was approximately 30–5 kg/ha, almost thirty times higher than the average amount in the USSR. The extensive use caused degradation of the arable land as well as the pollution of groundwater. Both have long-term implications for the future development and cause health threats to the rural and urban population. The sudden independence of the Central Asian states left the economic infrastructure in turmoil. Central Asia depended completely on imports in kind and money transfers from the Soviet Union. With independence, the Central Asian states had to search for new trading partners for their natural resources and had to compensate for the income lost from Moscow. Although Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan are poor in terms of domestic water resources, they are rich in other natural resources – oil and natural gas. While both aim to export these products, the fact that they are landlocked and surrounded by other countries with similar resources to market could lead to transportation and trading difficulties. The expected revenue streams could be some way off.

The potential for conflict Nowhere in the world is the potential for conflict over the use of natural resources as strong as in Central Asia. (David R. Smith)53

The sphere of conflict can be divided between potential international conflicts and local conflicts among different water users. The study on ‘environmental degradation as a cause of war’ in the Aral Sea Basin by the Environment and Conflict Project (ENCOP) offers detailed analysis of the potential for conflicts. 254

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A river basin is, as well as being a single irrigation system, a common pool resource, and this has two implications: ‘(1) the difficulty of excluding individuals from benefiting from a good, and (2) the subtractability of the benefits consumed by one individual from those available to others’.54 The problem faced is one of agreement over how water is shared and utilised, and also one of externalities, such as water pollution and water scarcity downstream. After independence, the Central Asian republics agreed to manage the basin water on the basis of the International Water Law. This implied equitable, reasonable and mutually advantageous water resource use for the countries within the Aral Sea Basin.55 The principal objective of the code is that water use is coordinated according to sustainability towards long-term conservation planning. Water resources have to be preserved, developed and maintained for present and future generations. Even though the Central Asian states signed up to obey the international law, the governments agreed to employ water resources according to their utilisation prior to independence. Furthermore, Weinthal argues that prior patterns of use, local customs and oral agreements continue to underlie ongoing negotiations over water sharing.56 She states that water management in Central Asia does not have a ‘tradition of rule of law’ and that ‘engineers do the drafting without any legal expertise’.57 Consequently, the International Water Law is not applied. Furthermore, future developments and possible claims are not taken into account. The Amu Darya receives 8 per cent of its water from Afghanistan. This is not reflected in the current agreement as it implies that in the future Afghanistan could claim a fair share of water for its own development. As Table 13.3 indicates, water distribution in the Aral Sea Basin is unequal: the countries that contribute most to the shared rivers utilise the least amount. Equitable water resource management according to the International Water Law simply does not exist. Small changes in policies can disturb the current agreement. An increase in the irrigated area or the employment of more water-intensive agriculture by one of the upstream countries (as occurred in Kyrgyzstan) would disturb the current equilibrium and would lead to tension. Smith, in his analysis of water availability in Central Asia, argues that water in the region is abundant. Maps from the International Water Management 3

Table 13.3 Water flow in the Aral Sea Basin watershed (km ) Country

Amu Darya

Syr Darya

Total

Agriculture

Industry

Afghanistan Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan Turkmenistan Uzbekistan Total

6.18 – 1.90 62.90 2.78 4.70 78.46

– 4.50 27.4 1.10 – 4.14 37.14

6.18 4.50 29.30 64.00 2.78 8.84 115.60

– 27.41 9.50 10.96 23.29 54.37 125.53

– 6.26 0.59 0.91 0.49 3.68 11.93

World Bank paper, Fundamental Provision of Water Management Strategy in the Aral Sea Basin, 1996, p. 13.

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Institute (IWMI) showing water scarcity on a global scale confirm this. The IWMI does not either identify Central Asia as a water-scarce region today or predict that it will become so over the next twenty years. Using Myers’s framework, which states that a situation can be classified as water-scarce when 2,000 people share 1 million cubic metres (m) of water, Smith argues that water availability in Central Asia ranges from a high of ‘52 people per every 1 million m’ in Turkmenistan, to a low of ‘192 people per every 1 million m in Uzbekistan’.58 Hence, in Central Asia there is no natural resource scarcity. Allan confirms this view and argues that the problem lies not with the resource but with the institutions managing it.59 However, Smith argues that it is possible to interpret the situation in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan as water-scarce, due to their dependence on water from outside their territory.60 Gleick, who identified four criteria for a country’s water vulnerability, agrees. He points out that vulnerability is dependent ‘on the extent to which water is shared’ and ‘the degree of dependence of a country on shared supply’.61 As Table 13.3 indicates, downstream countries such as Uzbekistan are vulnerable to water scarcity, according to Gleick’s reasoning. However, Gleick does not take into consideration the adaptive capacity of a country, which could add to the argument of water scarcity in Central Asia. Turton and Ohlsson point out that even if a country can have water abundance, it can be unstable in terms of water resources, because of a low social capacity to manage water.62 This implies that water is wasted. Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan use their water inefficiently; hence, they experience water scarcity in a time of water abundance. Areas of conflict Klötzli indicates that conflicts might be sparked not only by disputes over the volumes of water used by upstream and downstream states, but also by the quality of water available to the downstream states and by issues of sovereignty over water reservoirs. After independence, the control and use of hydro-technical assets became politicised. Kyrgyzstan controls dams and reservoirs along the Syr Darya. In 1993, Kyrgyzstan used these resources for the production of hydropower during the winter months, which caused shortages for downstream irrigation later in the year.63 Confrontation over sovereignty rights has also been reported between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan (Karakumskiy reservoir, Tajikistan), Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan (Tuyamuyun reservoir, Uzbekistan), and Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan (Lake Chardara, Kazakhstan). Ethnic minorities living in the contested regions fuel such disputes over water. Not only are reservoirs under dispute, but so too are canals that cross international boundaries, the most contentious of which is the Karakumskiy Canal between Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan.64 While it was agreed in Soviet times that the canal should divert only 6 km, its annual transfer is 12 km. Weinthal asserts that while water is currently allocated equally between Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, plans to open fresh areas of irrigated land in Turkmenistan could 256

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endanger the agreements.65 However, according to Klötzli, Turkmenistan wants to utilise water saved through technical improvements. The World Bank states that the water supply of the region is insufficient to satisfy future demands. According to its report, Kyrgyzstan wants to ‘increase irrigated acreage more than two-fold’, Turkmenistan is ‘expanding irrigated acreage’, and Uzbekistan ‘plans to increase the area of irrigation to 4.92 million hectares’.66 However, the problems of water allocation and water use within the basin are not only quantitative but also qualitative. The salinity of downstream water is high. According to Spoor, ‘a total of 84 million tons of salt is discharged annually into the river’.67 Furthermore, discharges from upstream industries and mines are polluting the rivers upstream and causing contamination of irrigation and drinking water in the middle and lower basin. Pollution can be identified as a further contributing factor to potential conflict. Conflict resolution on the international level Weinthal points out that cooperation over water resources after the breakdown of the Soviet Union in 1991 occurred immediately. On 12 October 1991, the water ministers of the newly independent states jointly declared that the Soviet principles of water allocation would remain in force.68 It is astonishing that an agreement over water resources was reached in this early stage of nation building. Nationalistic policies and strategies to secure sovereignty over territorial resources are very common among new nation states, as can be seen in the drive for food self-sufficiency in all the new Central Asian countries. However, the Central Asian leaders recognised the importance of water allocations and use for the stability of the region, and agreed on the old water allocations. Weinthal states that ‘co-operation was constructed to serve the political goal of ensuring stability and preventing conflict’.69 Small-scale local conflicts Another area of potential conflict over water resources has been created by the emergence of new small-scale farms. In 1996, in Kyrgyzstan, 40,000 farm enterprises existed, compared to 450 state and collective farms in 1990. Out of these, 38,000 have an average arable land area of less than 9 hectares. A study conducted by SERA reports on the regularity of small-scale conflicts over local water resources. The study states that individual farmers at the tail of irrigation systems complained ‘about the poor availability of the water as well as its poor quality’.70 Furthermore, the study highlights the potential for conflict ‘between whole settlements or villages at the head and tail end of the canals’.71 Ethnic diversity may fuel conflicts between villages over water. The water user associations (WUAs) recently introduced in Uzbekistan will encourage further destabilising behaviour, as small-scale agricultural water users will not be responsible for the costs of operation and maintenance of the irriga257

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tion and drainage system. Furthermore, it is questionable whether the WUAs will be able to control the water consumption of small-scale users. Hence, the situation at the local level is prone to conflict between the different water users, especially in years with low average flow. In Uzbekistan, oblasts differ in terms of water availability. The quality and quantity of water in upstream oblasts is higher than in those downstream, which may lead to tensions on a regional level, especially in the case of Karakalpakstan. In Turkmenistan, marginal virgin land is being opened for agricultural use. The new farmers have neither the knowledge nor the capital to develop irrigation systems that are efficient in terms of water use. However, they have to ‘open virgin lands by their own efforts and with their own resources’.72 The new areas will compete with the already established farms for access to the available water resources. The experience of other Central Asian countries suggests that the former state farm managers will stay in power and determine membership within the newly formed associations. Their positions, which are reminiscent of the past vertical hierarchy, could cause further social instability and insecurity, and may lead to conflicts over water at the collective farm level. Overall, independence for the Central Asian states has increased the number of water users. Former on-farm irrigation canals have become transformed into inter-farm irrigation canals, without any facilities for measuring water use at the outlets to the individual farms. Privatisation has aggravated the water-use situation. Furthermore, the evidence from different countries suggests that, for financial reasons, private farms will be incapable of efficiently operating and maintaining existing irrigation and drainage systems.73 Institutional change throughout the region has also exacerbated the tension, and could give rise to conflict as long as the old structures hang on to their old powers and attempt to manipulate the changes. As soon as the transitional phase has passed, the potential for conflict will cease. The new institutions have to be fully established rapidly to prevent an instability-fuelling vacuum from developing. It is reasonable to hope that the transitional phase on the local level can be guided with the assistance of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and other international organisations. The Technical Assistance to the Commonwealth of Independent States (TACIS) pilot project for the implementation of WUAs in Uzbekistan was a success, in terms of local participation and the management of water at the local level. Further international assistance is needed to educate farmers in the responsible operation and maintenance of the irrigation and drainage system. Furthermore, it has to be assured that the old structures of institutions do not manipulate the induced changes, so that significant rather than simply marginal changes can occur.

Routes to the precautionary development path Any number of theoretical solutions to the current water crisis in Central Asia have been proposed. Most are based on the reasoning that ‘any real solution to 258

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the crisis must be found … by using less water, or by using the available water more efficiently’.74 Weinthal claims that the cause of the water problem is that ‘all the Central Asian states want to be independent in food production as well as to continue cotton production for export’.75 Even though she argues that ‘the Soviet legacy of economic interdependence could have served as an asset for expanding environmental co-operation’,76 she does not expand this into the trade in food. She identifies a plan to replace cotton with less water-intensive crops,77 possibly just food crops, as the best long-term strategy. Hence, she does not take into consideration the geographical position of Central Asia, and its comparative advantage in the production of cotton. On the other hand, Spoor, who analyses the crisis in a socio-economic context, argues that any solution can only be realistically formulated if it includes the continued widespread presence of cotton.78 He claims that the policies of food-crop production have ‘very high economic and environmental costs’.79 Spoor argues that water has to be managed with greater efficiency. He predicts that the WUAs will not be successful because of the reluctance of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan to restructure farms.80 However, recent developments undermine his case. It seems that Spoor is in favour of complete farm restructuring, as took place in Kyrgyzstan, although in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan WUAs have been introduced, with the aim that they take over the full cost of operation and maintenance of the irrigation and drainage systems. However, their willingness and ability to pay the full costs is limited. Spoor sees water pricing as the key to more efficient and sustainable patterns of water use.81 Perry, who argues that water pricing is useful for cost recovery but does not lead to water savings in agriculture,82 contests this view: Only in the domestic sector is price seen as a viable approach to constraining demand. Why, then, are so many still advocating the use of pricing to limit agricultural demands in countries that do not yet have water rights, do not have well-regulated distribution, do not have a welleducated rule-following group of agricultural users?83 Spoor points out ‘the great disadvantage is that working with planned norms of water use is leading to the “use it or lose it” principle’.84 This is in direct contradiction with the experience of Pakistan, however, where farmers have to manage water in a paradigm of highly induced resource scarcity. Hence, with planned and induced scarcity it is possible to influence the decisions of farmers, and encourage them to use scarce water more efficiently.

Conclusion It is clear that the newly achieved independence of the Central Asian states did not reduce the environmental burden caused by agriculture, but rather has 259

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served to heighten it. The evidence suggests that the problems created by attempts to manage water according to national boundaries rather than by water basin management, as in the Soviet Union, can be resolved through the intervention of external actors, such as the World Bank, or USAID. These international organisations have already proved themselves capable of bringing about meaningful change. However, it seems that the reforms introduced in the newly independent states have not encouraged water savings, but could, in fact, lead to increased water use in agriculture. This is due to the fact that WUAs are not fully functional, for which there are a number of reasons: organisational flaws in their structure; the remaining external constraints such as fixed production ratios and prices, which continue to operate in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan; the small size of the farms which are members of the WUAs; and, lastly, the diversified strategy of farmers in Kyrgyzstan. Shah identifies these last two elements and suggests they could render the WUAs unsustainable.85 The established WUAs will not be able to enforce equal water sharing and will fail to deal adequately with the operation and maintenance of the irrigation and drainage systems. Hence, the irrigation system will further deteriorate and water distribution on the local level will become increasingly prone to conflict. Furthermore, the economic situation in these countries, combined with the fact that water is not treated as a scarce good, dictates that water users will have neither the financial resources nor much willingness to invest in new technology – or even the reconstruction of the existing irrigation and drainage canals – which would contribute to more efficient water use. Old institutions, utilising North’s definition, are still present in Central Asia, and they are preventing the foundation of new institutions. This not only increases the possibility of conflict on the local and national level, but it makes attempts to develop a more efficient paradigm of water management prone to failure.

Notes 1 See D. R. Smith, ‘Environmental Security and Shared Water Resources in Post-Soviet Central Asia’, Post-Soviet Geography, Vol. 36 (6), 1995, p. 365. 2 R. R. Hanks, ‘A Separate Space? Karakak Nationalism and Devolution in Post-Soviet Uzbekistan’, Europe Asia Studies, Vol. 52 (5), 2000, p. 947. 3 J. A. Allan and M. Karshenas, ‘Managing Environmental Capital: The Case of Water in Israel, Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza, 1947 to 1995’, in J. A. Allan (ed.), Water, Peace and the Middle East: Negotiating Resources in the Jordan Basin (London: I. B. Tauris, 1996). 4 Ibid., pp. 125–6. 5 L. Ohlsson, Environment, Scarcity and Conflict: A Study of Malthusian Concerns (Department of Peace and Development Research, Gothenburg University, 1999). 6 North gives a broader definition of institutions, associated with the movement termed the New Institutional Economics (NIE): Institutions provide the framework within which human beings interact. They establish the co-operative and competitive relationships, which constitute a

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society and more specifically an economic order. … Institutions are a set of rules, compliance procedures, and moral and ethical behavioural norms designed to constrain the behaviour of individuals. (cited in D. Feeny, ‘The Demand for and Supply of Institutional Arrangements’, in V. Ostrom, D. Feeny and H. Picht, Rethinking Institutional Analysis and Development [San Francisco: International Centre for Economic Growth, 1988], p. 171)

7 8 9 10 11 12 13

14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29

The definition will be applied in the remainder of the chapter. Economic theory and anthropology are both dealing with institutional change; their framework is utilised to explain the adaptive capacity of an institution. D. C. North, Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990) and ‘Institutions and Economic Growth: An Historical Introduction’, in World Development, Vol. 17 (9), 1989. H. P. Binswanger and V. W. Ruttan, Induced Innovation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978). M. Douglas and A. Wildavsky, Risk and Culture (London and Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982), p. 189. Ibid., p. 93. See M. A. Hajer, The Politics of Environmental Discourse (Oxford: Claredon Press, 1995), p. 55. Compare with E. Weinthal, ‘Sins of Omission: Constructing Negotiating Sets in the Aral Sea Basin’, The Journal of Environment and Development, Vol. 10 (1), 2001. M. Spoor, ‘The Aral Sea Basin Crisis: Transition and Environment in Former Soviet Central Asia’, Development and Change, Vol. 29, 1998, p. 412; confirmed through informal interview with Dr Sokolov, Deputy Director Scientific Information Centre (SIC), Interstate Coordination Water Commission (ICWC) of Central Asian States, Tashkent, 2000. World Bank, ‘Fostering Riparian Co-operation in International River Basins’ (Technical Paper No. 335, 1996), p. 13. Ibid., p. 13. Weinthal, op. cit. E. Weinthal, Making or Breaking the State (Ph.D. thesis, Columbia University, 1998), p. 159. World Bank, ‘Fostering Riparian Co-operation’, p. 13. Weinthal, ‘Sins of Omission’, op. cit. Spoor, op. cit., p. 411. Weinthal, ‘Sins of Omission’, op. cit. I. Lipovsky, ‘The Central Asian Cotton Epic’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 14, 1995, p. 529. Ibid., pp. 529–30. See also R. S. Clem, ‘The New Central Asia: Prospects for Development’, in M. J. Bradshaw (ed.), Geography and Transition in the Post-Soviet Republics (New York: Wiley, 1997), pp. 175–6. Lipovsky, op. cit., p. 532, and Clem, op. cit., p. 176. Lipovsky, op. cit., p. 530. Clem, op. cit., p. 176. P. P. Micklin, ‘The Aral Crisis: Introduction to the Special Issue’, Post-Soviet Geography, Vol. 33 (5), 1992, p. 270. J. Pallot, ‘Agriculture and Rural Development’, in D. J. B. Shaw (ed.), The Post-Soviet Republics: A Systematic Geography (Harlow: Longman Scientific and Technical, 1995), p. 104. B. Z. Rumer, Soviet Central Asia: A Tragic Experiment (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1967), pp. 88–9.

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30 V. M. Kotlyakov, ‘Concept for Preserving and Restoring the Aral Sea and Normalizing the Ecological, Public Health and Socioeconomic Situation in the Aral Region’, Post-Soviet Geography, Vol. 33 (5), 1992, p. 285, and see also N. F. Glazovsky, ‘The Aral Sea Basin’, in Jeanne X. Kasperson, Roger E. Kasperson and B. L. Turner II (eds), Regions at Risk: Comparisons of Threatened Environments (Tokyo and New York: United Nations University Press, 1995), p. 105. 31 V. M. Kotlyakov, ‘The Aral Sea Basin: A Critical Environmental Zone’, Environment, Vol. 33 (1), 1991, p. 5. 32 Z. Lerman and K. Brooks, ‘Land Reform in Turkmenistan’, in S. K. Wegren (ed.), Land Reform in the Former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (London: Routledge, 1998), p. 165. 33 For more detail see: P. C. Bloch and K. Rasmussen, ‘Land Reform in Kyrgyzstan’, in S. K. Wegren (ed.), Land Reform in the Former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (London: Routledge, 1998). 34 P. Baumann, Kyrgyz Republic, Agriculture, Area Development Project, Social Diagnosis, July 1999, p. 17. 35 Ibid., p. 13. 36 Ibid., p. 26. 37 UNESCO report, Water-Related Vision for the Aral Sea Basin 2000, p. 60. 38 K. Brooks and Z. Lerman, Turkmenistan: An Assessment of Leasehold-Based Farm Restructuring, World Bank Technical Paper 500 (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2001), p. 17. 39 Ibid., p. 35. 40 Ibid. 41 UNESCO Aral Sea Basin report, p. 64. 42 Spoor, op. cit., p. 51. 43 The area of wheat harvested increased from 626,990 hectares in 1992 to 1,452,000 hectares in 1996 but decreased again to 1,108,000 hectares by 2000. 44 UNESCO Aral Sea Basin report, p. 64. 45 D. C. McKinney, Sustainable Water Management in the Aral Sea Basin (http://www.ce. utexas.edu/prof/McKinney/papers/aral/AralSus.html, 1997), p. 4. 46 Kotlyakov, ‘Concept for Preserving and Restoring the Aral Sea’, op. cit., p. 287. 47 Ibid., p. 286. 48 Glazovsky, op. cit., p. 106. 49 Kotlyakov, ‘Concept for Preserving and Restoring the Aral Sea’, op. cit., p. 286. 50 Glazovsky, op. cit., p. 107. 51 Micklin, op. cit., p. 270. 52 UNESCO Aral Sea Basin report. 53 Smith, op. cit., p. 351. 54 E. Ostrom, R. Gardener and J. Walker, Rules, Games, and Common-Pool Resources (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1994), p. 6. 55 World Bank paper, Fundamental Provision of Water Management Strategy in the Aral Sea Basin, 1996, p. 13. 56 E. Weinthal, ‘Making Waves: Third Parties and International Mediation in the Aral Sea Basin’, in M. B. Greenberg, J. H. Barton and M. E. McGuinness (eds), Words over War (Lanham, MD.: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2000), p. 288. 57 Ibid., pp. 287–8. 58 Smith, op. cit., p. 358. 59 Personal conversation with J. A. Allan of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London. 60 Smith, op. cit., p. 358. 61 Ibid., p. 359.

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Volin, L., ‘The Russian Peasant’, in Cyril Black (ed.), The Transformation of Russian Society, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960 Volkan, Vamik, and Norman Itzkowitz, The Immortal Atatürk: A Psychobiography, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984 Volodarsky, Mikhail, The Soviet Union and Its Southern Neighbours Iran and Afghanistan, 1917–1933, London: Frank Cass, 1994 von Rummel, Friedrich, Die Türkei auf dem Weg nach Europa, Munich: Verlag Hermann, Rinn, 1952 Webb, Sidney, and Beatrice Webb, Soviet Communism: A New Civilization, London: Longman, 1947 Webster, Donald, The Turkey of Atatürk, Philadelphia: AMS Press, 1973 Weinerman, Eli, ‘The Polemics between Moscow and Central Asians on the Decline of Central Asia and Tsarist Russia’s Role in the History of the Region’, The Slavonic and East European Review, Vol. 71, July 1993 Weinthal, Erika, ‘Sins of Omission: Constructing Negotiating Sets in the Aral Sea basin’, The Journal of Environment and Development, Vol. 10 (1), 2001 —— ‘Making Waves: Third Parties and International Mediation in the Aral Sea Basin’, in Melanie C. Greenberg, John H. Barton and Margaret E. McGuinness (eds), Words Over War, Lanham, MD: Rowman & and Littlefield Publishers, 2000 —— Making or Breaking the State, Ph.D. thesis, Columbia University, 1998 Werner, C. A., ‘A Preliminary Assessment of Attitudes Toward the Privatisation of Agriculture in Contemporary Kazakhstan’, Central Asia Survey, Vol. 13 (2), 1994 Wheeler, Geoffrey, The Modern History of Soviet Central Asia, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964 —— and David Footman, ‘Medical Services in Central Asia and Kazakhstan’, Central Asian Review, Vol. 11 (1), 1963 Williamson, John (ed.), Economic Consequences of Soviet Disintegration, Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics, 1993 Wittel, Giles, Extreme Continental, London: Victor Gollancz, 1992 Woff, Richard, ‘Kazakh–Russian Relations: An Update’, Jane’s Intelligence Review, December 1995 Wolfe, Bertram, An Ideology in Power, London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd, 1969 Wolfson, Zeev. ‘The Massive Degradation of Ecosystems in the USSR’, in John Massey Stewart (ed.), The Soviet Environment: Problems, Policies and Politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992 Yakovlev, Alexander I. and Sergei A. Panarin, ‘The Contradiction of Reforms in Arabia and Turkestan’, in Vitaly V. Naumkin (ed.), State, Religion and Society in Central Asia, Reading, MA: Ithaca Press, 1993 Yavuz, M. Hakan, ‘The Patterns of Political Islamic Identity: Dynamics of National and Trans-national Loyalties and Identities’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 14 (3), 1995 Zeki, Velidi Togan, Begunku Turkili ve yakin tarihi, Istanbul, 1943 Zenkovsky, Serge, ‘Ideological Deviation in Soviet Central Asia’, The Slavonic and East European Review, Vol. 32, 1953–4 Ziegler, Charles E., ‘Political Participation, Nationalisms and Environmental Politics in the USSR’, in John Massey Stewart (ed.), The Soviet Environment: Problems, Policies and Politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992 Zürcher, Erik Jan, Turkey: A Modern History, London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 1995

281

INDEX

Abdrakhmanov, Yusup 54 Abduvakhitov, Abdujabar 228 Abdykalykov, Mukhomedzhan 136 Abramzon, S. M. 107 Achylova, Rakhat 121, 125 Adil, Mir 34, 42 Afghanistan: relationship with Uzbekistan 191–3; Soviet Union’s military campaign in 24–5, 29n; water 255 agriculture: amlak 61–3; Bolshevik land and water policy 68–73; irrigation, cotton 67, 150, 151–2; Kyrgyzstan 250; land and water reform in 1920s 57–75; legislation (1920s) 70–3; mulk 60–1, 62–3; pre-Tsarist land tenure 58–63; Russian immigration 64–6; sharecropping 74; transformation under Soviet Union 2–3; Tsarist land reform 63–8; Turkmenistan 250–1; waqf 63; water 64, 255, see also cotton; land tenure; water Ahmed Midhat 88 Aitmatov, Chingis 114 Akaev, Askar 113, 114, 120; impact of ethnic minorities 123, 124–5; Islam 122; language 118; Manas 117; nation building 126, 127; tribal network 125 Akmola, made capital of Kazakhstan 188, 201n Al-Afghani, Jamal ud Din 32 Al-Banna, Hasan 230 Algeria 235 Ali Suvai 88 All-Russia TsIK law (1918) 71 Allan, J. A. 245, 246, 259 Alma Ata 147 Aminova, R. 57–8, 64; land reform 70, 71, 74 amlak 61–3

Amu Darya, water 255 Andijan uprising (1898) 5 Andijan uyezd 45 Aral Sea 169–70, 172, 173–4, 178n, 244, 246, 248; causes of crisis 252–3; current situation 253–4; water flow 255, see also agriculture; cotton Asaba Party of National Revival 120 Asfandiyar, Kazakh Sanjar 36 Ashanov, Bahadur 197–8 Atatürk, Mustapha Kemal 88, see also Mustafa Kemal authoritarian rule, and Islam 239 autonomy, republican autonomy 159–60 Ayubi, Nazih 232 Bacon, E. 71 Bailey, F. M. 26n Bakenov, Suniat 68 Basmachi revolt 2, 5–23, 25n, 41, 70, 72, 92, 98, 225 Bauman, P. 250 Baumann, Robert F. 24 Beeston, Richard 201n Begjan, Muqim ud Din 33 Behbudi, Mahmud Hoja 32, 34, 35, 40 Behbudiy, Mahmud Khoja 6–7 Bekmakhanov, E. B. 141, 143 Bennigsen, Alexandre 90 Bergne, Paul 30–43 Berkes, Niyazi 89 Bierschenk, T. 212 Bolsheviks: and Basmachi revolt 6–20; and Kokand autonomy 30–42; land and water policy 68–73 boundaries 1, 2, 3, 48–9; border delimitation between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan 49–56; and native élites

283

INDEX

158; Soviet government’s attitude to in Ferghana Valley 48–9 Brest-Litovsk treaty 38–9 Brooks, K. 251 Budenny, S. M. 20 Bukhara, fall of 12–13, 27n Büyük Türk Devrimi 84 Carlisle, Donald S. 159 Caroe, Olaf 66 Carpenter, F. 72 Cave, W. M. 72 Chagatay 94–5 Chaikin, Vadim 40 Chernobyl accident 168 Chingis Khan 107 Chokaev, Mustafa 8, 26n, 31, 32, 34, 38, 39, 40, 42; Russian settlers 70 Civil War, Basmacki revolt 5–20 class 68–9; land and water reforms 72, 75 Clem, R. S. 249–50 Cold War: and Islamophobia 220, 229; Soviet historiography 140–3 collectivisation 20, 75; land reform in Uzbekistan 74, see also land tenure colonialism, historiography of Kensary Revolt 132–43 consumption 155–6 corn, Bolshevik’s offer of 16 cosmopolitanism 142–3 cotton 248, 259; impact on the environment 150–1, 168; Kyrgyzstan 250; monoculture 66–8, 149–52; replacement by wheat and corn 16, 70; Russia’s policy 248–9; scandal, Uzbek affair 60, 146, 147–8, 159; Soviet Union’s policy 249–50; Turkmenistan 251; Uzbekistan 251–2, see also Aral Sea Counter-Insurgency, Soviet Union’s attitude to 24 Cyrillic script, Soviet language planning 95–6, 104–5n Danish, Ahmad 32 dashnaks 7, 8 Davidov, Yusef 39 dependence, and specialisation 148–50, 160–1 Douglas, M. 247 Dutov, Ataman 6, 30, 31, 37, 40, 41 Dybenko, P. E., General 21 Dzhunaid Khan 8, 13, 16, 23

Eckert, Julia M. 213 economy: consumption 155–6; and ethnic tensions in Kazakhstan 184–6; income 154–5; living standards 152–8, 162; Uzbekistan 197–200, see also agriculture edinonachaliia 25 education 156–7; and Islamisation 233; literacy 96, 156, 233 Eickelman, Dale F. 220 Eliava 10 Eliot, Sir Charles 85 élites: institutional economics 247; nation building 236–8; native élites 158, 159–60 Elwert, Georg 212, 213 Emir of Bukhara 8, 14, 21, 31, 35, 40, 42 Encausse, Hélène Carrère d’ 61, 62; land redistribution 71 Enver Pasha 14–16, 28n environment 162, 167–77; Aral Sea 169–70, 172, 173–4; cotton production 150–1, 168; non-governmental organisations (NGOs) 172–3; poaching 171–2; radiation in Semipalatinsk area 171; soil erosion 171; water 173–6, 253–4, see also cotton; water Ergash, K. 39 Etherton, Thomas 37 ethnicity: ethnic diversity 3–4; Ferghana Valley 46–56; Kazakhstan 181, 182–90; Kyrgyzstan 112–13, 123–5; and nationalism 2; Russification 110–12, 126; Uzbekistan 181–2, 190–200, see also identity; language ethnosymbols, Kyrgyzstan 114–17 Everett-Heath, Tom 1–4; instability and identity 181–200 famine (1910–13) 5 famine (1919) 7 Ferghana Valley 45–56, 109; Islamic fundamentalism 194, 195; Wahhabis 225–7, see also Kokand Fitrat, Abdulrauf 35 Fraser, Glenda 16 Fraud Koprülü 88 Fruchet, Henri 132–43 Frunze, Mikhail Vasil’evich 5, 6, 9–14, 23–5, 115 Frunze (town), renaming 115 fundamentalism, see under Islam Fuzail Maksum 17, 19, 21, 22

284

INDEX

Garm 21–2; fall of 19 Gaspirali, Ismail 32 Gasprinskii, Ismail Bey 6, 91 GDP: Kazakhstan 185; Uzbekistan 197, 199 gender, khudzhum campaign 20 Germany, changing attitude of Soviets to 134 Gha’i, D. 74 Gissar (Hissar) Expedition (1921) 13 glasnost 112, 146, 147, 168 Glazovsky, N. F. 252 Gleick, P. H. 256 Gökalp, Ziya 88 Gorbachev, M. S. 112, 118, 168 governmental non-governmental organisations (GONGOs) 173 go’zar 209 Grekov, Boris D. 133, 134, 137 Günes-Dil Teorisi 87–8 Hajer, M. A. 247 Hashimov, Oktir 152 Hayit, Baymirza 37, 159 health: cotton production 150–1; healthcare 157–8; life expectancy 157 Herzfeld, Salomon 42 historiography: Khan Kenesary Kasimov 132–43; Kyrgyzstan 107, 121–2; Turkey 89–90; Uzbekistan 96–8 History of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, The (Pankratova) 135–6, 137, 143 Hodjent oblast 45 Hoja, Faizullah 40 Hoja, Nasir Khan 34, 39 Hoja, Ubaidullah Hoja Asadullah 32–3, 34, 39–40, 42–3 Hoja, Usman 32 Hokimiyat 207, 211 Hunter, Shireen 225 Huskey, E. 126 Iakolev, Aleksei I. 136 Ibrahim Bek, Uzbek-Lokay: and the Basmachi 8, 13, 15, 16–20, 21, 22–3; land reform 75 identity: and fundamentalism 234–6; Islam, Central Asian identity 110; Jaddidists, and Uzbek national identity 91–2; Kazakhstan 181, 182–90; Kyrgyzstan, national identity 3, 106–28; Muslim identity 92; national identity 1, 3; symbols, Islam 234, 236,

237; Turkey, national identity 80–90; Uzbekistan 81, 90–8, 181–2, 190–200, see also ethnicity immigrants (Russian) 64–6, 94; Kyrgyzstan 123–4, see also ethnicity income 152–3, 154–5 industrialisation: Kahakhstan 183, see also modernisation infant mortality 157 Inoyatov, Kh. Sh. 41 institutional economics, New Institutional Economics 246–7, 260–1n International Water Law 255 International Water Management Institute (IWMI) 255–6 Iran 224–5 Irgash, Z. 9, 12 irrigation: Aral Sea crisis 252–3; cotton 67, 150, 151–2, 249–50; Karakumskiy Canal 250; Siberal canal project 170, see also water Ishan Suleiman 17 Ishan Sultan 17 Islam: alleged infiltration of Islamist ideas 224–5; Central Asian identity 110; and Central Asian Turkic language 94; fundamentalism 4, 191–6, 203n, 219, 222–9, 234–6; history of 221–2; identity 234–6; identity in Uzbekistan 191–6; Islamophobia 220; Jaddidists 6, 32, 34, 37, 42, 81, 91–2; Kyrgyzstan 111, 122–3; politicisation, socioeconomic preconditions 232–4; Wahhabis 194, 195, 203n, 225–7 Islamic Renaissance Party (IRP) 227–8, 231, 236 Ittifaki 73 Ivanov, Y. M. 64, 69; land redistribution 71, 74 Jaddidists 6, 32, 34, 37, 42, 81; and Uzbek national identity 91–2 Jalling, Lars 167–77 Jdanko, T. A. 47 Joftgaran, Tajikistan 73 Kaganovich, L. 54 Kambagalan 73 Kara-Kalpak, Ferghana Valley 54 Karakalpakstan 244 Karakumskiy Canal 250, 256 Karimov, I. A. 191–7, 199–200, 229, 236, 239; Mahalla 206; water 244

285

INDEX

Karshenas, M. 245, 246 Kazakh Tili 189 Kazakhstan 1; ethnic diversity 3–4; ethnic tensions 181, 182–90; Kensary Revolt, Soviet historiography 132–43; Russian emigration 187; Soviet Union’s nuclear experiments 2; transition under Soviet Union 2; Wahhabis 203n; water 255 Kazakhstan from the 1820s through the 1840s (Behmakhanov) 141 Kazhegeldin, Akezhan 186 Kemalism 84–5; definition of nation 84, 100–1n Kenesary Kasimov, Khan, Soviet historiography 132–43 Kerensky, A. F. 33, 36 KGB 25 Khan, A. 74 Khan, Nadir 22 khanlik 60 kharaj 60–1 Khasanov 40 Khitrin, Yuri 186 Khiva 13 Khodzaev, Usman 14 Khrushchev, N. S. 110 khudzhum campaign (1927) 20 Khurram Bek 20 Kipchaks, Ferghana Valley 47 Kirghiz Republic: renaming 115, see also Kyrgyzstan Kiriyenko, Sergey 187 Kitchener, Lord 11 Klötzli, S. 256, 257 Kochan, L. 66 Kohnert, D. 212 Koichiev, Arslan 2, 45–56 Kojan, Sultan 36 Kokand: autonomy (1917–18) 2, 6, 30–43; government 7, 8; pogrom (1918) 6, see also Ferghana Valley Kokand khanate 107 Kolesov, F. 13, 26n, 30, 31, 35, 36, 40 korenizatsiia 111 Kork, A. I. 18 Korovnichenko, General 30, 33, 36, 41 Korzhova, Natalya 186 Koshchi Union, land and water reforms 71, 72–3 Kostenko, L. P.: land tenure 59, 60, 62, 63; Russian settlement 65 Kotlyakov, V. M. 249, 252 Krivoschein, Minister of Agriculture 249

Krushchev, N. S. 249 Kudriatsev 138 Kuibyshev, V. 9, 12 kulaks, and land redistribution 71 Kunayev, Dinmukhamed 160 Kurama, Ferghana Valley 48 Kurbashis 21, 22 Kuropatkin, Governor-General A. N. 6 Kurshirmat 13 Kuznetzev 66 Kvergi, Hermann F. 87 Kyrgyz oblast, boundary delimitation 50 Kyrgyz Tili 118 Kyrgyzstan/Kyrgyz Republic/Kirghiz Republic: agriculture 250; border delimitation 49–56; ethnic minorities 123–5; Ferghana Valley 46; frontier 1; historiography 121–2; independence 113–14; Islam 111, 122–3; language 109–10, 112–13, 117–19, 120; legal framework 119–21; national identity 3, 106–28; perestroika 112–13; pre-Soviet history 107–8; Republic, creation 113; Russification 126; semiotics and ethnosymbols 114–17; small-scale farms 257; Soviets’ policy towards 108–13; tribalism 125; water 174, 250, 255, 256, 257, 259 land tenure: amlak 61–3; and Aral Sea crisis 252, 253; collectivisation 20, 74, 75; Kyrgyzstan 250; mulk 60–1; smallscale farms 257, 258; Turkestan, land redistribution 71, 73; Turkmenistan 250–1; Uzbekistan 251–2; waqf 63, see also agriculture language: and ethnic tensions in Kazakhstan 186–8; Kyrgyz 109–10, 112–13, 117–19, 120; Pre-Soviet Central Asian Turkic languages 94–5; Turkey, national identity 85–8; Uzbekistan 94–6, 210, see also ethnicity Lapin, Sher Ali 31, 34, 35–6, 43 Law on Water Monopoly (1924) 72 legal institutions, and the state 212–13 legislation (1920s) 70–3 Lenin, V. I. 36, 68, 70, 71; language 96, 105n; national question 48 Lerman, Z. 251 Lewis, Bernard 80, 83, 89, 101n life expectancy 157, see also health Lipovsky, Igor 152

286

INDEX

literacy 156, 233; Uzbekistan 96, see also education living standards 152–8, 162 Lokai Valley 17, 18, 19 Lowe, Robert 106–28 McAuley, Alastair 154, 156, 157 MacGahan, J. A. 62 McKinney, D. C. 252 Maclean, Fitzroy 161 McMichael, Scott R. 24 Madamin-Bek 9, 12, 16 Mahalla 197, 205–16 Mahmud, Abijan 32, 34, 43 Malashenko, Alexei 226 Malleson, General 41 Mamajanov, Talib 194 Manas 116–17, 126, 128 Mao Zedong 27n Maqsudi, Sadri 33 Margilan 197 Marshall, Alexander 5–25 Masaliev, Absamat 112, 113, 125 Massicard, Elise 205–16 Matcha 18 Mawdudi, Sayyid Abu ‘Ala 230 Mazour, Anatole 142–3 Medlin, W. K. 72 Mel’kumov 11, 14, 15, 18 Micklin, P. P. 249, 252–3 milk 60 Milli Markazi Shurasi (Central Muslim Council) 33 Minbaev, Sauat 185 modernisation: and Islam 232, see also industrialisation modernism 223, 231 Molotov, V. M., on history 133 Monstrov 12 Morozov, M. 138 mulk 60–1, 62–3 Muslim identity 92 Muslim Provisional Government of Autonomous Turkestan 6 Mustafa Kemal 80, 84, 86–7, 95 Mustafaev, M. 98 Myers 256 Nalivkin, V. P. 33, 36 Namangan uyezd 45 national delimination, see also boundaries national delimitation, and native élites 158 national identity 1, 3; Turkey 80–90;

Uzbekistan 81, 90–8, 181–2, 190–200, see also identity nationalism: and ethnicity 2, see also identity Nazarbayev, Nursaltan 169, 183; ethnic tensions 184, 186, 187, 188–90 Nazi-Soviet Pact 134 Nechkina, M. V. 141 Nevada-Semipalatinsk movement 169 New Economic Policy (NEP) 12, 72 New Institutional Economics (NIE) 246–7, 260–1n Nikora 34 Niyaz, Pahlavan 32 nomenklatura 159 non-governmental organisations (NGOs), environmental politics 172–3, 177 North, D. C. 247, 260, 260–1n Nove, Alec 147, 152, 154, 156, 163 nuclear test area, Semipalatinsk 171 Obedinennoye Gosudarstvennoye Politicheskoye Upranlenie (OGPU) 21, 22 objectivism 143 Ohlsson, L. 246, 256 oil, Kazakhstan 185 Olcott, Martha B. 239 Omar, Mulla Mohammad 192 O’Neill, Gerard 57–75 Operation Barbarossa 134 opposition, political opposition and Islam 236–8, 239 Oqsoqol 197, 207, 208–9, 211 Orazay, Abdulrahman 43 Osh uyezd 45 Osipov rising (1919) 6 Ottoman language 86, 94, 101n Otunbayeva, R. 125 Pahlen, K., Count 46, 47, 62, 66 Pankratova, Anna 135–6, 137–8, 139 Park, A. 68; Russian settlers 70; sharecropping 74; water reform 72 Pasha, Salim 18 Pavlov, Alexander 186 Pavlov, Pavel Andreevich 18, 19, 25 perestroika, Kyrgyz Republic 112–13 periodisation (Marxist-Leninist) 145n Perry, C. 259 Petrovskiy, G. 52, 53 Piakovskii, A. V. 136 Piatkov 70

287

INDEX

Pierce, R. 61, 62, 63, 64 poaching 171–2 Pokrovsky, M. N. 133 Poliakov, S. 62 Poltoratskiy, P. G. 38 population growth: Central Asia 253–4; Uzbekistan 198–9 Pulatov, Abdurahim 203n Pundeff, Marin 133–4 Qari, Munavvar 32, 34, 35, 39 Quelquejay, Chantal 90 Qutb, Sayyid 230 Rabzemles, land and water reforms 72–3 Rakhman, Taslimur 193 Rakowska-Harmstone, Teresa 73 Rashid, Ahmed 162 Rashidov, Sharaf 159 Red Army 5 redistribution (land): Turkestan 71, 73, see also land tenure regionalism, Uzbekistan 196–7 religion see Islam republican autonomy 159–60 Resettlement Act (1889) 65 Resulzadeh, Mehmet Emin 32 Revkoms 17 Ritchotte, John 190 Ross, E. D. 61, 63 Rumer, Boris 153, 154, 157 Russia: Civil War 5; pre-Tsarist land tenure 58–63; Russian nationalism 140; Tsarist administration 6; Tsarist land reform 63–8; Tsarists, rise of Uzbek identity 91–2, see also Bolsheviks; Soviet Union Russians, Kyrgyzstan 123–4 Russification 110–12, 126, see also ethnicity; identity Ryskulov, Turar 7, 10 Rywkin, Michael 64 Sabirov 54 Salihati, Ahmad 32 Salikh, Mohammed 152 Samarkand, revolt 26n Sami, Cemseddin 86 Sami, Haji 16–19 Sardar, Oraz 41 Sarts 91; Ferghana Valley 46 Sazonov 38

sblizhenie 109 Scherbina 66 Schuyler, E. 60, 61, 62, 63 secularism 223 Segars, Andrew 80–99 self-determination, Soviet government’s declaration of right to 48 semiotics, Kyrgyzstan 114–17 Semipalatinsk: Nevada-Semipalatinsk movement 169; nuclear test area 171 Semirechiye, land redistribution 71 serf system, and Bolshevik policy 68–9 Shah, T. 260 Shahislam, Shahahmad 34, 43 Shamagdiev, Sh. A. 7 Sharansky, Natan 195–6 sharecropping 74 shariah 227 Shchepkin, Nikolai 33 Shepard, William 31, 223 Shestakov 133 Shiite Muslims 224, 225 Shkolnik, Vladimir 186 Shura ye Islam 34–5 Siberal canal project 170 Skalov 13 Skrine, F. H. 61, 63 slianie 158 Smith, David R. 254, 255, 256 Soviet Middle East: A Model for Development, The (Nove) 147 Soviet Union: declaration of right to selfdetermination 48; development in Central Asia 146–63; Kyrgyzstan 108–13; language planning in Uzbekistan 95–6; nationalisation plan 2; nationalities policy 93, 103n, 109; nuclear experiments 2; perestroika 112–13, see also Lenin; Stalin Sovnarkom 6, 7, 9, 11–12, 30 specialisation, and dependence 148–9, 160–1 Spiritual Directorate of the Muslims of Central Asia and Kazakhstan (SADUM) 221 Spoor, M. 248, 257, 259 Stalin, J. 40, 93, 96; creation of national socialist republics 109; historiography 137; on history 133; purges 110 Starr, S. F. 121 state: Mahalla 205–16; relationship of Islam to 237 Steinberger, Petra 219–39

288

INDEX

Stolypin, P. A. 66 Stringer, Alex 146–63 Sufism 221–2, 226–7 Suleimenov, Olzhas 169 Sultan, Muksum 23 Sun-Language Theory 87–8 Sunni Muslims 224, 225 symbols: ethnosymbols, Kyrgyzstan 114–17; Islam and identity 234, 236, 237 Syr Darya, water 255 Tachau, Frank 84 Tajikistan 93; Basmachi revolt 21–2; Joftgaran 73; poverty 155; relationship with Uzbekistan 191–2; water 174, 255 Tajiks 91 Taleban, attitude of Karimov to 191, 192–3, 202n Tanzimat era 85, 88 Tarih 90 Tariqas 221–2, 227 Tashkent dialect 95 Tashkent Soviet 57; Basmachi revolt 6–10; Central Committee on 7 Technical Assistance to the Commonwealth of Independent States (TACIS) 258 Teneshbay 33, 39 Tevkelev, Kutlug Muhammad 40 Tillett, Lowell 134, 137, 138, 139–40, 141 Tinishbay, Muhammadjan 31, 32, 43 Toblin, I. O. 38 Tobolin 7 Togan, Zeki Veledi 8, 14, 26n, 34, 62; class 69; irrigation 67; land and water reforms 70, 71, 72 Tora, Nasir Kham 43 tradition: Mahalla 205–16, see also regionalism; tribalism transition, under Soviet Union 2 Treaty of Kyzyl Teppe (1918) 40 Trevisani, Tommaso 205–16 tribalism: Kyrgyzstan 125; Uzbekistan 197, see also regionalism; tradition Trursunov, Khikmatulla 192 Tsarist administration 6, see also Russia Tsepkalo, V. 181 Tukhachevskii, M. N. 9, 24–5 tunduk 116 Türk Dil Kurumu 87 Türk Tarih Kurumu 89 Turkestan: Basmachi revolt 6–14; cotton

66–7; Ferghana Valley 45–56; land redistribution 71, 73; land and water reforms 71–2; Lenin on national delimitation 48; water 255, see also Kokand; Tashkent Turkey: historiography 89–90; kemalism 84–5; language 85–8; nation building 80–90 Turkistan Milli Markazi Shurasi 34 Turkkommissia 6, 10 Turkmenistan 1, 93; agriculture 250–1; small-scale farms 258; water 174, 250–1, 254, 256–7, 258 Turks, Ferghana Valley 47 Turton, A. R. 256 Tuzmuhamedov, R. 98 ulema 221 Ulema Jamiati 30–1, 35 UNESCO 244, 248 Unified Military Doctrine 5, 24–5 Union of Poor Workers 71, 73 United Tajik Opposition (UTO) 191, 192 ushri 60 Uspenskyi, H. 35 USSR see Soviet Union Usubaliev, Turdakun 112 Uzbek Cavalry Brigade 12 Uzbekistan 146, 147; border delimitation 1, 49–56; cotton monoculture 149–52; cotton scandal (Uzbek affair) 60, 146, 147–8, 159; economy 197–200; ethnic tensions 181–2, 190–200; Ferghana Valley 46–7; historiography 96–8; income 155; Islam 191–6, 203n; Islamic Renaissance Party 227–8; land redistribution 73–4; language 94–6, 210; Mahalla 197, 205–16; music festival 1; nation building 81, 90–8; preRussian identity 90–2; regionalism 196–7; relationship with Afghanistan and Tajikistan 191–3, 195; and the Soviets 92–3; Tsarists 91–2; water 174, 251–2, 254, 255, 256, 259; water user associations 257–8 Vambéry, Arminius 60, 61, 63, 82 Vinnikov 48 virgin land project 249 Vision 2025 (UNESCO) 244, 245, 246 Volin, L. 66, 68 Von Kaufman, General 64

289

INDEX

wages see income Wahhabis/Wahabis 194, 195, 203n, 225–7 waqf 63 water: Aral Sea 169–70, 172, 173–4, 178n, 244, 246, 252–3; conflict 254–8; disputes and cooperation 173–6; irrigation, cotton 67, 150, 151–2; Kyrgyzstan 174, 250; Law on Water Monopoly (1924) 72; Siberal canal project 170; sustainable future 244–60; Turkmenistan 250–1; Uzbekistan 251–2, see also Aral sea; cotton; environment water user associations (WUAs) 257, 258, 260 Webster, Donald 84 Wegerich, Kai, water 244–60 Weinerman, Eli 136 Weinthal, E. 248, 255, 256, 257, 259 West, Islamists’ view of 223

Wolfe, Bertram 133, 140 Wolfson, Zeev 178n World Bank, water 175, 248, 257 World War II, Soviet historiography 134–5, 137–8, 142 Wrangel, F. P., Baron von 23 yarimdji 60 Yeltsin, Boris 192 Young Bukharans 13 Young khivans 13 Yurgul Aga, Hedayat 34–5, 39, 43 Zaitsev, Colonel 31, 37, 40, 41 Zhirinovsky, Vladimir 187 Zhogorku kenesh 115 Zinin, Sergey 194 Ziya Gökalp 83–4 Ziya Pasha 85–6 Zürcher, Erik 87

290