Explosive Growth of Tajik Cities Likely to Become Make Them Centers of Political Radicalization

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 5 – The population of Tajikistan is growth more rapidly than that of any other country in Central Asia; and as a result, urbanization is increasing rapidly as well although at present a smaller percent of Tajiks live in cities (27.5 percent) than do the titular nationalities in the other countries of the region.

            The Asian Development Bank predicts that by 2050, the share of Tajiks living in cities will almost double to 46 percent, with many of them concentrated in regional agglomerations around Dushanbe and Khudzhand (adb.org/sites/default/files/institutional-document/961491/tajikistan-national-urban-assessment.pdf).

            This rapid growth is proving to be beyond the capacity of the Tajikistan government to control the situation. There simply aren’t enough high-rise apartments available and so many people are building their own housing, making it difficult if not impossible for the government to extend electricity, water and sewage lines and roads to all.

            Addressing these problems is beyond the capacity of the Tajikistan government unless it receives outside assistance, according to outside experts and even Tajik officials; and so the problems of rapid demographic growth and urbanization are likely to become increasingly critical (ia-centr.ru/experts/ia-centr-ru/tendentsii-i-problemy-urbanizatsii-v-tadzhikistane/).

            Such problems mean that urban centers are likely to become the centers of radicalization in Tajikistan in the years ahead. And it is there rather than in the declining rural areas that Islamist ideas both homegrown and brought in from Afghanistan and elsewhere is likely to become the most significant.