The Development of Civil Society in Central Asia By Janice Giffen and Lucy Earle with Charles Buxton 1 Contents Acknowledgements 3 Introduction 4 Chapter 1 6 An introduction to the debates on civil society Chapter 2 14 The research reports Chapter 3 34 The context for civil society development in Central Asia Chapter 4 53 Pre-Soviet forms of association Chapter 5 70 Soviet forms of association Chapter 6 83 New developments since independence (1) The emergence of NGOs Chapter 7 100 New developments since independence (2) The focus on the community Chapter 8 116 Civil society and state relations Conclusion 133 Bibliography 138 2 Acknowledgements The authors and research teams would like to thank the Social Science Research Unit (SSRU) of the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) whose generous funding supported this project. The fieldwork stage of the research project was managed from Oxford by Dr Simon Heap, formerly of INTRAC. The research teams in each country worked closely with him in the early stages of the project. In Kazakhstan the team included Aigerim Ibrayeva, Aliya Kabdieva, Dina Sharipova and Saule Dissenova, in Kyrgyzstan, Baakyt Baimatov and Bermet Stakeeva, in Uzbekistan Shukhrat Abdullaev, Oksana Abdullaeva and Aziz Tatybayev and in Tajikistan Hofiz Boboroyov. They were provided valuable support by INTRAC’s regional staff, in particular from Lola Abdusalyamova, Charles Buxton and Simon Forrester, and the process as a whole was facilitated by Anne Garbutt, who had overall responsibility for INTRAC’s Central Asia Programme. The authors of this publication are grateful for the insightful and helpful comments provided by INTRAC staff members Brian Pratt and Oliver Bakewell as the final draft was drawn up, and for earlier support from David Marsden, INTRAC associate and former Research Director. We would like to extend particular thanks to our external reader, Babken Babajanian of the London School of Economics and Political Science. His careful reading of the text and the sharing of his knowledge of the region and of civil society issues have been much appreciated. Finally, our thanks to Jackie Smith, INTRAC publications manager, for her dedicated proof-reading and attention to detail. 3 Introduction After centuries as outposts of foreign empires, the countries of Central Asia found themselves sovereign, independent states for the first time in 1991 after the break-up of the USSR. At the time, analysts from across the world predicted a transition to liberal economic and democratic systems for the countries of the Former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The Central Asian states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan attracted particular interest from Western governments and international institutions. The region had been isolated from the rest of the world during the Soviet period and has been of considerable geo-political importance and sensitivity for thousands of years. With the end of the Cold War, there was noticeable international concern to ensure that these fledgling nation states overcame a history of instability to emerge as peaceful democracies. Until relatively recently Central Asian societies were traditionally based on kinship structures and, with varying degrees of importance, on Islam. After colonisation by Tsarist Russia in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, these societies then underwent huge changes as the Soviet structures of government and administration were imposed upon them. Whilst the Soviet system introduced new forms of public association, many of the old traditional structures survived, existing both in parallel and in a type of symbiotic relationship with the new socialist models of social organisation. Then, at the beginning of the 1990s, these countries underwent another upheaval, with independence thrust upon them after the break up of the Soviet Union. Since then, the governments of all five Central Asian states have begun a process of nation-building, drawing on elements of pre-Soviet culture whilst (perhaps with the exception of Turkmenistan) attempting to forge a place for themselves in the modern world. What complicated this project was a general economic collapse that occurred across the region in the early 1990s. The Central Asian states, suddenly deprived of Soviet era subsidies lost 40-50% of their gross domestic product. Levels of poverty increased rapidly as a result. Much current external interest in this part of the world arises from the status of the Central Asian states as ‘transition’ countries. For many this transition is premised upon a shift away from a centrally controlled to a liberal market economy. Others place priority on the transition to a democratic style of governance. But these two goals are generally understood to be mutually dependent and in both cases, the development of a strong, independent civil society is seen as a necessary condition for their achievement. As such, institutions such as the World Bank and European Union, international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and the governments of donor countries in the West have stressed the key role that a ‘strong civil society’ should play in this transition. Clearly, any analysis of the current state of civil society in Central Asia must take account of all of the historical influences mentioned above. However, perceptions of what civil society is, what it can achieve and how it should be encouraged vary considerably amongst policy makers, academics and practitioners both inside and outside of the region. Furthermore, the dominance of certain policy priorities of the main international actors in the region have narrowed working definitions of civil society. As a result of this, particular organisational forms have been privileged, whilst the role of other potentially influential and resourceful bodies and institutions has been overlooked or misinterpreted. Problems of definition have been further 4 compounded by a lack of understanding of the nature of society in these countries and at times a tendency to simplify the complex social interactions and practices that have evolved in the region over centuries, as a result of shifting patterns of power and control. Inevitably the promotion of certain models of civil society by international agencies has impacted upon the way in which people in the region have come to conceptualise civil society in their own countries. Whilst civil societies in Western democratic countries have developed over a lengthy period of time, international actors working in Central Asia are hoping to promote these changes in a matter of decades or less. In this project it sometimes seems that the substance of civil society has been lost in an emphasis on form. This is evident, for example, in a tendency to ‘count’ the number of NGOs that have emerged since independence in the region, and to use this type of statistical data as an indicator of an increasingly ‘dynamic’ and ‘vibrant’ civil society. On the positive side, there has been a steady and exciting, if uneven, growth of civil society organisations and activities in the five countries of the region. Some of the organisations that began work after 1991 were entirely new; others were hybrids of Soviet or pre-Soviet predecessors. They were all working in an unpredictable and often chaotic environment, very many of them dependent on external sources of support. *** It was against this backdrop of change and uncertainty, together with growing international interest in the region that INTRAC first began work in the Central Asian states in 1994. INTRAC’s programmes in Central Asia have centred on support to the NGO and civil society sector. It has worked on a wide range of issues and with many types of organisation but its principal focus has been on partnership with social sector NGOs. The emphasis on social justice set out in INTRAC’s mission statement brings together a concern for participation and democratisation with the determination to assist poverty reduction. Its flexible, pragmatic approach to civil society strengthening as employed in Central Asia since the mid 1990s, is reflected on the research side by an emphasis on empirical analysis of developments in this sphere. This means investigating phenomena as they present themselves rather than adhering to set ideas as to the nature of civil society. The programmes have sought appropriate ways to assist a wide range of groups and actors, so as to strengthen their ability to work together to promote social change and influence policy in favour of poor and marginalized populations. This book is based upon a series of research studies undertaken by local research institutes, academics and NGOs in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan between 1999 and 2003. The studies had a dual aim: firstly, to deepen understanding of the dynamics of civil society development in these countries, and secondly, to strengthen local institutions’ research capacity in data collection and analysis. Drawing on the findings of these studies and placing them within the wider body of programmatic experience and research undertaken by INTRAC and its local partners since 1994, this book will provide insight into the way in which civil society has developed during the period of Central Asian independence to date. Maintaining a critical stance and acknowledging the complexity of Central Asian realities, it examines how civil society has been shaped, hindered and enriched by internal and external forces, both contemporary and historical. Combining findings from empirical case studies with analysis of relevant literature, this book is both an investigation into the specificities of Central Asian civil societies and a broader examination of the emergence of civil society in ‘transition’ countries. 5 Chapter One An Introduction to the debates on civil society There is such an intensity of debate about the term ‘civil society’ and its variety of meanings and interpretations that some scholars, criticising its overuse, have begun to question its validity.1 However, proponents of the concept acknowledge this from the outset – later making an argument for the continued application of the term by pointing out its use as a conceptual tool.