Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-06T03:50:11.517Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Kazaks and Kazakstan: The Struggle for Ethnic Identity and Nationhood

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

David M. Crowe
David M. Crowe*
Affiliation:
Elon College, U.S.A.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In a recent article in Ulitsa, Moscow journalist Denis Dragunsky asked whether Russia was an Asian or a European country. Much the same question could be asked about Kazakstan (the land of the Kazaks), particularly given its long historical ties with Russia. And it is not an easy question to answer. While Kazakstan's history is a blend of Mongol, Turkic, Islamic, and Russian heritages, there are Cossacks and Russians both in and outside of Kazakstan who feel that parts of Kazakstan belong historically to Russia. While such claims have been long and vocal, the Kazak response has been forcibly silent during most of this century. However, with the emergence of Kazakstan as not only an independent country, but a potentially powerful regional player, Kazaks have begun to reclaim their history from the Russians. And with questions about how to construct a nation come queries about ethnicity and history. What is a Kazak? Given that the Russians referred to them as the Kirgiz during most of the period that they dominated the Kazaks, and thus robbed the Kazaks of their most basic linguistic identification term, there is much to be explored and reclaimed before this people and nation can truly define itself in the context of its rich history.

Type
Articles
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 26 , Issue 3 , September 1998 , pp. 395 - 419
Copyright
Copyright © 1998 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Notes

1. Dragunsky, Denis, “Is Russia an Asian or European Country? Theatrical Dialogue on a Geopolitical Stage,” Ulitsa, No. 2, 1966, pp. 7–9.Google Scholar

2. Kuzembaiuly, A, Istoriya Kazakhstana s drevneishikh vremen do 20—x godov xxv (Almaty: Sanat, 1996), p. 226. See, for example, Chekov, M. A., ed., Vosstanie Kirgizov i Kazakhov v 1916 godn (Almaty, 1991).Google Scholar

3. Erlanger, Steven, “Demons in Russia's Mind Arise Again—in the Flesh,” New York Times, 18 December 1994, p. E3.Google Scholar

4. Matley, Ian Murray, “The Population and the Land,” in Alworth, Edward, ed., Central Asia: 120 Years of Russian Rule (Durham: Duke University Press, 1989), p. 92.Google Scholar

5. Asfendiarov, S. D., Istoriia Kazakstana s drevneishikh vremen (Alma-ata and Moscow, 1935), pp. 80–81; Radlov, V. V., Opyt'slovaria tiurkskikh’ narechi, Vol. 2 (St Petersburg, 1899), p. 364; Bronevskii, (S. B.) General-Maior, “O Kirgiz—Kaisakh’ Srednei Ordy,” Otechestvennyi Zapiski (1830), p. 400.Google Scholar

6. Bartold, V. V., “Kazak,” Sochineniia, Vol. 5 (Moscow, 1968), p. 535; Allworth, Edward A., The Modern Uzbeks: From the Fourteenth Century to the Present (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1990), p. 25.Google Scholar

7. Elias, N., ed., The Tarikh-I-Rashidi of Mirza Muhammad Haidar, Dughlat: A History of the Moghuls of Central Asia, translated by Ross, E. Denison, reprint edn (London: Academica Asiatica, 1973), pp. 272–273; Sultanov, T. I., “Nekotorye zamechaniia o nachale Kazakhskoi gosudarstvennosti,” Izvestiia AN Kaz SSR, seriia obshchestvennaia, No. 1, 1971, pp. 55–56.Google Scholar

8. Subtelny, Orest, Ukraine: A History, 2nd edn (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994), p. 108; “Cossacks: A Super-Ethnos in Russia's Ribs,” The Economist, 21 December 1996, p. 23; Olcott, Martha Brill, The Kazakhs, 2nd edn (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995), p. 4.Google Scholar

9. Olcott, , The Kazakhs, p. 4.Google Scholar

10. Grousset, René, The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia, translated by Walford, Naomi (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1970), pp. 469–471; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 6–7.Google Scholar

11. Grousset, , Empire of the Steppes, pp. 212, 273, 285–289, 298, 366–367; Legg, Stuart, The Heartland (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1971), pp. 232–233, 280.Google Scholar

12. Bacon, , Central Asians under Russian Rule, p. 22; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, p. 5; Grousset, , Empire of the Steppes, p. 394.Google Scholar

13. Rahman, Fazur, Islam (New York: Anchor Books, 1966), pp. 28, 45; Hourani, Albert, A History of the Arab Peoples (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1991), pp. 36–37.Google Scholar

14. Bacon, Elizabeth, Central Asians under Russian Rule: A Study in Culture Change (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987), p. 6.Google Scholar

15. Suleimenov, R. B. and Moiseev, V. A., Izistorii Kazakhstana XVIII veka (o vneshnei i vnutrennei politike Ablaya (Alma-ata: Nauka, 1988), pp. 12–15; Levshin, A. I., Opisanie Kirgiz-Kazach'ikh, ili Kirgiz-Kaisatzikakh, ord i stepei pod obshchiei akademika M. K. Kozybaeva (Almaty: Sanat, 1996), pp. 170, 178–182, 188–190; Curtiss, Mina, A Forgotten Empress: Anna Ivanovna and Her Era, 1730–1740 (New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1974), pp. 111–116. Olcott refers to Abul Hayir as Abul’ Kahyr in The Kazakhs, p. 27.Google Scholar

16. Moiseev, Suleimenov and, Iz istorii Kazakhstana, pp. 23–26, 40–135 passim; Olcott, The Kazakhs, pp. 40–42.Google Scholar

17. Rywkin, Michael, Moscow's Muslin Challenge: Soviet Central Asia, revised edn (Armonk, NJ: M. E. Sharpe, 1990), pp. 4–5; Kochan, Miriam, Life in Russia under Catherine the Great (London: B. T. Hatsford, 1969), pp. 141–142. For references to Kazak and Kirgiz involvement, see Andrushchenko, A. I., Krest'yanskaya voina, 1773–1775 gg. na Yaike, v Priural'e, na urale i v sibiri (Moscow: Izdatel'stvo Nauka, 1969), pp. 43, 114, 152, 154, 299; Kaus, Gina, Catherine: The Portrait of an Empress, translated by June Head (New York: Literary Guild, 1935), pp. 293–294. Soviet scholars view the Pugachev uprising as a great “Peasant War;” Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 38–44.Google Scholar

18. Rwykin, , Moscow's Muslim Challenge, pp. 6–9; Allworth, Edward, “Encounter,” in Allworth, Edward, ed., Central Asia: 120 Years of Russian Rule (Durham: Duke University Press, 1989), pp. 11–15; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 62–69.Google Scholar

19. Rywkin, , Moscow's Muslim Challenge, pp. 14–17. For an excellent demographic analysis of the Russian presence in the Kazak steppes from the late nineteenth century through 1916, see Galuzo, P. G., Kazakhstan v kanun Oktyabrya (Alma-ata: Nauka, 1968).Google Scholar

20. Hélène Carrère d'Encausse, “The Fall of the Czarist Empire,” in Allworth, Central Asia, pp. 207–213; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 118–126; Edward Dennis Sokol, The Revolt of 1916 in Russian Central Asia (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1954), pp. 158–161.Google Scholar

21. Panfilov, A. V., “Bol'sheviki i krest'yanskie organizatsii,” in Dzhagfarov, N. R. et al., Oproshiom olya budushchego. Nekotorye aktual'nye problemy istorii Kompartii Kazakhstana v svete glasnosti (Alma-Ata: Kazakhstan, 1990), pp. 12–61; d'Encausse, “Fall of the Czarist Empire,” p. 214; Hèléne Carrère d'Encausse, “Civil War and New Governments,” in Allworth, Central Asia, pp. 236–239.Google Scholar

22. Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 158–159. According to Viktor Kozlov, the Soviet population dropped from 141 million in 1918 to 133.8 million in 1922; Kozlov, Viktor, The Peoples of the Soviet Union (London and Bloomington: Hutchinson and Indiana University Press, 1988), p. 36.Google Scholar

23. Matley, Ian Murray, “Agricultural Development,” in Allworth, Central Asia, pp. 284–294; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 160–165.Google Scholar

24. Matley, , “Agricultural Development,” pp. 289–294; Kozlov, , Peoples of the Soviet Union, p. 47; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, p. 319.Google Scholar

25. Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 171, 193–196; for more precise data on Kazak literacy by republic, ethnicity, and gender, see Kozlov, Peoples of the Soviet Union, pp. 159–169.Google Scholar

26. Conquest, Robert, The Great Terror: A Reassessment (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990), pp. 261, 303.Google Scholar

27. Levytsky, Boris, The Stalinist Terror in the Thirties (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1974), pp. 334–335.Google Scholar

28. Rywkin, Michael, Russia in Central Asia (New York: Collier Books, 1963), pp. 103–107; Rywkin, Michael, Moscow's Muslim Challenge: Soviet Central Asia (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1990), pp. 108–113; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 220–221.Google Scholar

29. Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp 187–191.Google Scholar

30. McCauley, Martin, Khruschev and the Development of Soviet Agriculture (London: Macmillan Press, 1976), pp. 52–54, 59–63, 80–85; Ploss, Sidney, Conflict and Decision-Making in Soviet Russia: A Case Study of Agricultural Policy, 1953–1963 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965), pp. 84, 86–87, 91–93; Rumer, Boris Z., Soviet Central Asia: A Tragic Experiment (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1989), pp. 4–5; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 225–228; Crowe, David M., “Nikita Khruschev, 1894–1971,” in Moncure, James A., ed., Research Guide to European Historical Biography, Vol. II (Washington: Beachem Publishing, 1992), pp. 1065–1067; Crowe, David M., “Leonid Ilich Brezhnev, 1906–1982,” in Moncure, , Research Guide to European Historical Biography, Vol. I, pp. 218, 220; Noonan, Norma C., “Virgin Lands,” in Wieczynski, Joseph L., ed., The Modern Encyclopedia of Russian and Soviet History, Vol. 42 (Gulf Breeze, FL: Academic International Press, 1986), pp. 121–124.Google Scholar

31. McCauley, , Khruschev and the Development of Soviet Agriculture, pp. 52–54, 60–63, 85; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 227–230.Google Scholar

32. Noonan, , “Virgin Lands,” p 125; McCauley, , Khruschev and the Development of Soviet Agriculture, p. 152; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 224–225.Google Scholar

33. Natsional'nyi sostav naceleniya SSSR po dannym vsesoyuznoi perepisi Naceleniya 1989 g (Moscow: Finansy i Statistika, 1991), pp. 13–14.Google Scholar

34. Rahr, Alexander G, A Biographic Directory of 100 Leading Soviet Officials (Munich: Central Research, Radio Liberty, RFE/RL, 1984), pp. 116–117; Olcott, The Kazakhs, pp. 231–235, 307–309.Google Scholar

35. Allworth, Edward, “The New Central Asians,” in Allworth, Central Asia, p 552; Rywkin, , Moscow's Muslim Challenge, pp. 124–125; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 243–246, 301; for detailed biographical information on Kunaev, see Rahr, Alexander G., A Biographic Directory on 100 Leading Soviet Officials (Munich: Radio Liberty Research, RFE/RL, 1986), pp. 112–114.Google Scholar

36. Gorbachev, Mikhail, Memoirs (New York: Doubleday, 1996), pp. 330–331.Google Scholar

37. Nahaylo, Bohdan and Swoboda, Victor, Soviet Disunion: A History of the Nationalities Problem in the USSR (New York: Free Press, 1990), pp. 255–260; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 251–253.Google Scholar

38. Olcott, Martha Brill, “Kazakstan: Pushing for Eurasia,” in Bremmer, Ian and Taras, Ray, eds, New States, New Politics: Building the Post-Soviet Nations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), pp. 552–553; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 253–258.Google Scholar

39. Crowe, David M., “Mikhail Gorbachev,” in Moncure, James A., ed., Research Guide to European Historical Biography, Vol. II (Washington: Beacham Press, 1992), pp. 814–816.Google Scholar

40. Olcott, , “Kazakstan: Pushing for Eurasia,” pp. 553–556; Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 262–270, 294; Pannier, Bruce, “A Step Back for Democracy,” Transition, Vol. I, No. 11, 30 June 1995, p. 64.Google Scholar

41. Olcott, , The Kazakhs, pp. 295, 298.Google Scholar

42. Khazanov, Anatoly M., After the USSR: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Politics in the Commonwealth of Independent States (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1996), p. 265; Olcott, Martha Brill, Central Asia's New States: Independence, Foreign Policy, and Regional Security (Washington: United States Institute of Peace Press, 1996), pp. 65, 70–71.Google Scholar

43. Lubin, Nancy, Central Asians Take Stock: Reform, Corruption, and Identity (Washington: United States Institute of Peace, 1995), pp. v, 4–7.Google Scholar

44. Dave, Bhavna, “Kazakhstan: Heading Toward Dictatorship,” in Schmidt, Josephine, ed., The OMRI Annual Survey of Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, 1995: Building Democracy (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1996), p. 268. Kazakstan's GDP in 1994 was 60% of its 1991 GDP rate; Olcott, Central Asia's New States, p. 66.Google Scholar

45. Wright, Gordon, France in Modern Times, 4th edn (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1987), p. 423.Google Scholar

46. Maurois, André, A History of France, translated by Binsse, Henry L. and Hopkins, Gerard (New York: Minerva Press, 1968), pp. 415–417.Google Scholar

47. Amnesty International Report, 1996 (New York: Amnesty International, 1996), p. 195.Google Scholar

48. Dave, Bhavna, Fuller, Elizabeth, Ionescu, Dan and Schmidt, Fabian, “Kazakhstan: Crackdown on the Cossacks,” Transition, Vol. I, No. 23, 15 December 1995, pp. 3–4; Dave, “Heading toward Dictatorship,” p. 271; Olcott, Central Asia's New States, p. 69.Google Scholar

49. Dave, Bhavna, “New Parliament Consolidates Presidential Authority,” Transition, Vol. 2, No. 6, 22 March 1996, pp. 33–37.Google Scholar

50. Dave, Bhavna, “Cracks Emerge in Kazakhstan's Government Monopoly,” Transition, Vol. I, No. 18, 6 October 1995, p. 73.Google Scholar

51. Dave, , “Cracks Emerge in Kazakhstan's Government Monopoly,” pp. 74–75; Nivat, Anne, “Taking on the Police in Kazakstan,” Transition, Vol. 2, No. 23, 15 November 1996, p. 62.Google Scholar

52. Dave, , “Heading toward Dictatorship,” p. 275.Google Scholar

53. “China Executes 16 in Mostly Muslim Region,” Washington Post, 13 January 1998, p. A11.Google Scholar

54. Tyler, Patrick E., “Ethnic Strain in China's Far West Flares with Bombs and Rioting,” New York Times, 28 February 1997, pp. A1, A7; Tyler, Patrick E., “Control of Army Is Crucial Issue for China Rulers,” New York Times, 23 February 1997, pp. A1, A8; Mufson, Steven, “Ethnic Turmoil Roils Western China,” Washington Post, 23 February 1997, p. A25; “10 Die as Muslims Battle Chinese in Border Zone,” New York Times, 11 February 1997, p. A4; “China's Rebellious West,” The Economist, 15 February 1997, pp. 33–34; “The Uighurs: China's Muslim Rebels,” The Economist, 13 July 1996, p. 33; “China Cracks Down on Muslim ‘Rebels’ in Far West,” Toronto Star, 9 June 1996, p. A14.Google Scholar

55. Olcott, , Central Asia's New States, pp. 75–78.Google Scholar

56. Salpukas, Agis, “Chevron's Bet on Kazak Oil, A Long Shot, Is Paying Off,” New York Times, 12 February 1997, pp. C1, C8; “Pipe Dreams in Central Asia,” The Economist, 4 May 1996, pp. 37–38; Nodia, Ghia, “Ethnic Conflicts and Oil Politics in the Caucasus,” Analysis of Current Events, Vol. 9, No. 2, February 1997, p. 9; Olcott, , Central Asia's New States, pp. 79–80.Google Scholar

57. LeVine, Steve, “On Luxury's Edge, Kazakstan Endures Deprivation,” New York Times, 9 February 1997, p 4.Google Scholar

58. “Kazakstan's Pipeline to Prosperity,” The Economist, 11 October 1997, p. 47. According to a recent New York Times article, Kazakstan's potential oil reserves are 95–101 billion barrels and 141–171 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Collectively Central Asia's oil and gas reserves place it third in the world behind the Persian Gulf region and Siberia; LeVine, Steve, “Instability by the Barrelful? Central Asia's Coming Oil Bonanza and Its Consequences,” New York Times, 17 February 1998, pp. C1, C6.Google Scholar

59. Dave, Bhavna, “Inventing Islam—and an Islamic Threat—in Kazakhstan,” Transition, Vol. 1, No. 24, 29 December 1995, pp. 22–25; Olcott, Central Asia's New States, pp. 82–83.Google Scholar

60. Lubin, , Central Asians Take Stock, p. 21.Google Scholar

61. “Likely Lads,” in “Survey of Central Asia,” The Economist, 7 February 1998, p. 17.Google Scholar