Kazakhstan Increasingly Polarized on Economic rather than Ethnic Lines, Kudaibergenova Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 6 – The recent unrest in Kazakhstan underscores that society in Kazakhstan is increasingly polarized but along economic lines rather than ethno-national ones, a factor that unfortunately neither the country’s leaders nor most outside analysts give sufficient attention to, Diana Kudaibergenova says.

            A fThe Kazakh sociologist who teaches at Cambridge says that ethnic differences are declining in salience for most people while class differences between rich and poor are becoming ever more important (meduza.io/feature/2022/01/07/pochemu-stabilnost-v-kazahstane-okazalas-illyuzornoy-naskolko-tam-silny-antirossiyskie-nastroeniya).

            Kudaibergenova notes that language is not a divider because almost everyone is bilingual and because people routinely stress in various ways including the acceptance of both languages and both nationality groups that “it isn’t important who you are by nationality. This is our country in common.”

            The regime, she continues, “always has tried to divide the population by language; but however strange it may seem, in society itself, solidarity has been maintained.” It may be easy to play the ethnic card, but in a situation like that of Kazakhstan, such efforts are likely to fail rather than succeed.

            A fundamental problem in Kazakhstan is that “our regime devotes attention [only] to ethnic and linguistic polarization, between Russian speakers and Kazakh speakers. But this doesn’t reflect the situation which has evolved in society.” In fact, people experience not so much ethnic as class distinctions. 

            As far as the attitudes of Kazakhstan residents toward Russians, there is a sense that the two countries are too closely linked for conflict and that any conflict would not be “beneficial for Russia or for us.” “Kazakhstan is not Ukraine either in the nature of protests or the international balance of forces.” Trying to fit the two into a common framework won’t work.

            Kudaibergenova also addresses the fact many have called attention to: the Kazakhstan protests have not led to the appearance of a single leader. There is a reason for this, she says. “Kazakhstan is a very large country: it has 14 regions and three cities of republic level status.” Each has its own concerns, and so leaders are to be found at that level, not at the country one.